The Candy Man can--and how!

Charlie and the Chocolate Factory cranked out a very sweet $56.2 million to lead the weekend movie list.

With Wedding Crashers also bashing in big--$33.9 million in second place, per studio tallies--the overall box office was up for a second weekend in a row compared to this time last year after a record 19 straight down weekends.

The second big-screen take on Roald Dahl's dandy candy tale, directed by Tim Burton and starring Johnny Depp as eccentric confection tycoon Willy Wonka and Freddie Highmore as golden ticket winner Charlie Bucket, was unwrapped at 3,770 sites. The PG-13 Warner Bros. release attracted the family audience, averaging a filling $14,901 per theater.

The result was at the high end of Industry expectations and didn't seem to have been seriously dented by the competition for the 'tween crowd in the book stores, where Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince sold a whopping 6.9 million copies and accounted for about $140 million in revenue. (For Warners, which owns the movie rights to the Harry franchise, the news is doubly delicious.)

The Oompa-Loompa-powered debut marked a personal best for Depp, topping the $46.6 million debut for 2003's Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl.

Pleasing the older crowd was Wedding Crashers, starring Owen Wilson and Vince Vaughn. The R-rated New Line comedy romp, broken in at 2,925 sites, averaged $11,590 per theater, also above projections.

Dropping 59 percent from its superlative number one opening last week was Fantastic Four, a result Fox admitted was not unexpected considering Charlie drew the family audience and Wedding Crashes the adults. Still, the comic book caper managed to rake in $22.8 million in third place and has now grossed $100.2 million.

In limited release, director Don Roos' ensemble indie drama Happy Endings, starring Lisa Kudrow, Tom Arnold, Jason Ritter, Maggie Gyllenhaal and Laura Dern, opened at 52 sites, where it averaged $4,617 for $240,075.

In very limited release, The Warrior, a period action drama about revenge and redemption on the Himalayan frontier starring Irfan Khan and directed by Asif Kapadia, opened at just four sites, where it averaged $3,533 for $14,130.

Overall the top 12 movies grossed $155.7 million, 12 percent higher than last weekend and 11 percent over this time last year, when I, Robot debuted with $52.1 million.

Continuing their strong runs were Paramount's War of the Worlds (in fourth with $15.2 million), Warners' Batman Begins (in fifth with $6 million) and Fox's Mr. & Mrs. Smith (in sixth with $5.2 million), each of which has grossed well over the $150 million mark. So too has DreamWorks' Madagascar, which occupied the 10 slot with $2.3 million to bring its current gross to $183.1 million.

In 11th place was Fox's Star Wars: Episode III - Revenge of the Sith, which grossed $1.7 million for a nine-week tally of $373.9 million. That's one of the reasons that Fox has now grossed $1 billion this year in domestic box office, the second fastest distributor to achieve that goal, which Sony reached four days sooner in Spider-Man-led 2002.

In 12th place, March of the Penguins continued to ice all comers in the limited release market. Now at 132 sites it its fourth week, the Warner Independent Picture documentary grew 40 percent, averaging $11,478 per screen for $1.5 million, and has now hatched $4 million.

Here's a rundown of the top 10 films, based on final studio tallies compiled by Exhibitor Relations:

1. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, $56.2 million
2. Wedding Crashers, $33.9 million
3. Fantastic Four, $22.8 million
4. War of the Worlds, $15.2 million
5. Batman Begins, $6 million
6. Mr. & Mrs. Smith, $5.2 million
7. Dark Water, $4.6 million
8. Herbie: Fully Loaded, $3.6 million
9. Bewitched, $2.6 million
10. Madagascar, $2.3 million