SCOOBY-DOO TOP B.O. DRAW

Scooby-Doo, where are you? On top of the box office charts of course.

The big-screen update of the Hanna-Barbera cartoon, starring Matthew Lillard, Freddie Prinze Jr., Sarah Michelle Gellar, Linda Cardellini and a computer-animated Great Dane, took in $56.4 million to debut as the No. 1 film.

Matt Damon's The Bourne Identity, a spy thriller about a deadly amnesiac agent, opened in second place with $27.5 million.

Windtalkers, starring Nicolas Cage in a drama about Navajo Indian codetalkers in World War II, premiered a weak third with $14.5 million.

The Sum of All Fears slipped to fourth place after two weekends as the top film, taking in $13.5 million and pushing its 17-day total to $84.5 million.

The industry continued its upward trend, with the top 12 movies grossing $160 million, nearly 25% higher than the same weekend a year ago. Revenues for 2002 are running about 22% ahead of the record $8.4 billion last year. One could only wish the music industry would follow this trend.

Scooby-Doo is one of Hollywood's few successes in adapting a TV cartoon to the big screen. The Flintstones in Viva Rock Vegas, Josie and the Pussycats and The Adventures of Rocky and Bullwinkle were all commercial disappointments.

Playing in 3,447 theaters, Scooby-Doo averaged an impressive $16,368 a cinema. The Bourne Identity averaged a healthy $10,425 in 2,638 theaters, and Windtalkers did a so-so $5,003 in 2,898 locations.