One of the advantages of making a movie with an extremely complicated, labyrinthine plot is that people will need to see it more than once in order to figure out what it's about.  They may also want to talk about it afterward, thus piquing the curiosity of eavesdroppers who generally don't go to the movies.  That's evidently what happened with Christopher Nolan's Inception, which finished well ahead of the significantly less complicated, more audience-friendly Salt (which also had the advantage of being nearly an hour shorter). 

Not unlike a spinning top that wobbles slightly but doesn't fall over, Inception's box-office intake fell only 31% from last week ($43.5M compared to $62M).  In an age where most blockbusters drop off 70%, that's fairly remarkable -- especially for a 2D movie not aimed at children.  

: 9:09 AM