Sahara cruises to the top!

Adventure drama Sahara torched the opposition over the weekend. It wasn't really a sweet victory, considering the film's $100 million cost and its uneventful $18 million gross.

But adventure movies have a bigger market abroad and given the film's attractive cast --Penelope Cruz -- it could be a bigger success abroad and end up with a profit.

Fever Pitch, the romantic drama with baseball background, opened to a disappointing $12.4 million at the third place but unlike Sahara, it cost about $30 million and could also be profitable. But the comedy, starring Drew Barrymore and Jimmy Fallon, proved once again that the director duo Bobby Farrelly and brother Peter have long lost the magic touch that made their There's Something About Mary (1998) and Dumb And Dumber (1994) huge hits worldwide.

As expected, the dark comic-book drama Sin City parachuted by about 51 percent at the second place. The $40 million movie that has already grossed $50 million will make a tidy profit especially when the DVD and VHS versions hit the market. The fourth and fifth positions were occupied by comedies Guess Who and Beauty Shop.

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There was good news for the Van Diesel comedy The Pacifier, which brought in $3 million and saw its six week gross reach $100 million.

The Paramount movie Sahara features an Indiana Jones-type character -- played by Matthew McConaughey -- in search of a lost Civil War battleship. It also stars Penelope Cruz, Steve Zahn and William H Macy.

Explorer Dirk Pitt (McConaughey) embarks on a treasure hunt through some of the most dangerous regions of North Africa. He is searching for what locals call 'The Ship of Death,' filled with precious coins. Pitt and his wisecracking sidekick (Zahn) are confronted by a sensuous Eva Rojas (Cruz) who believes the ship may be linked to mysterious deaths.

Reviews for the film were generally harsh.

'Would have been hot stuff about 30 years ago,' wrote Kirk Honeycutt in Hollywood Reporter 'but looks tired and worn today despite a perky, attractive cast that refuses to wilt in the desert sun.'

In New York Post, Kyle Smith complained: 'The one-liners, mostly bland, are used so liberally that they water down the action.' And in The New York Times, Stephen Holden wrote the film had '...more story than it can comfortably accommodate.'

In USA Today, Claudia Puig slammed the film, noting that it 'plays out as dryly predictable as the desert's endless dunes.'

But there were some defenders. In Seattle-Post Intelligencer, William Arnold found the film to be 'agreeably light in tone and never seems to be trying very hard...'

It was an unfortunate week for Hindi films like Salman Khan's Lucky: No Time For Love which made just about $148,000 on 44 screens in North America. The film, which was at the 25th place on the chart, has little chance of reaching the half a million figure. Two notches below, it was followed by the rapidly declining Bride & Prejudice, which grossed $130,000 and saw its cume reach $6.2 million in nine weeks.

Mughal-e-Azam, which started on weak legs last week on 32 screens experienced a 43 percent plunge and its gross reach a puny $110,000 in two weeks. The movie also lost four screens. Its distributors had announced a plan to show it on more than 70 screens but given the weak results so far, it is doubtful the movie, which dropped from 44th place to 53rd, will go really wide.

On the other hand, the Oscar-winning documentary Born Into Brothels -- revolving around children of Kolkata prostitutes -- enjoyed another successful week, grossing $100,000 in its 18th week.

By next weekend, the film could reach $3 million mark, with plenty of money to come when it goes into the video stores after three months.

Box-office estimates for North America