You just know someone at 20th Century Fox is going to get fired come Monday, even though they have what looks to be the top film of the weekend.

Despite all the hype online and in regular press, Hollywood's famous 'tracking figures' indicated last month that the "Borat" movie wouldn't perform anywhere near as well as various other flicks this season including the two other major releases this weekend.

As a result Fox cut the amount of screens for the film from around 2,000 down to a mere 800 - thinking that not many people were going to go out and see the film.

That manuever is now looking like one of the worst studio decisions in recent times with "Borat" taking in over $9 million on Friday - beating out expected favourite "The Santa Clause 3" which took just $5 million from playing on FOUR TIMES as many screens.

Of course comedies like this usually perform strongest on Fridays, but still it doesn't change the fact the film is an unmitigated success with Fox expanding the run dramatically next week to around 2,200 screens.

The other good news is that the film has pulled in an incredible 96% positive and 8.4/10 average rating on Rotten Tomatoes, easily one of the highest of the year.

An interesting essay on the 800 screens vs. wide release approach worth a look is up at The Hot Blog.