'Last Dance' On Top
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A desert island gave way to a crowded dance floor as the hip-hop flick "Save the Last Dance'' bumped "Cast Away'' from the top spot at the movie box office.
"Save the Last Dance,'' starring Julia Stiles as an aspiring ballerina and Sean Patrick Thomas as her hip-hop dancing boyfriend, took in $24 million in its opening weekend, according to studio estimates Sunday.
That was a record debut for the Martin Luther King Jr. Day weekend, beating the previous mark of $15.2 million for "Varsity Blues'' in 1999.
"It hit the nerve of that young female audience. MTV was a huge factor because it has a tremendous reach to that audience,'' said Wayne Lewellen, Paramount's head of distribution.
