Fox’s Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs outpaced Paramount’s Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen on Wednesday to take first place at the daily box office for the day. However, the race between the two films yesterday was a bit closer than expected, as Ice Age 3 topped Transformers 2 by $2.85 million for the day. That should transfer into to a very close race between the two for first place over the three-day weekend.

Ice Age 3 grossed $13.79 million yesterday. That was well below the $21.79 million opening day performance of 2006’s Ice Age: The Meltdown, though it is hard to make comparisons between the two at this point given that Ice Age 2 opened on a Friday in March. Further complicating matters this weekend is the fact that July 4th falls on a Saturday, an occurrence that hasn’t happened since 1998. As a result we could see unfamiliar fluctuations in the performances of all films over the next few days.

Transformers 2 grossed $10.94 million for the day. The blockbuster sequel from Paramount and DreamWorks was down 19 percent from Tuesday, which represented a solid hold given the new competition it faced from both Ice Age 3 and Public Enemies. However, Transformers 2 was down 82 percent from last weekend’s opening day performance, which marked a harsher decline than the 65 percent The Dark Knight fell one week after its opening day performance last July. Nevertheless, Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen has grossed a massive $239.38 million in eight days of release and should clear the $300 million mark on either Sunday or Monday.

Universal's Public Enemies debuted in a respectable third place on Wednesday with $8.17 million. The opening day performance for the Michael Mann directed gangster film was within pre-release expectations. At this point Public Enemies, which stars Johnny Depp and Christian Bale, appears set to see a five-day start somewhere in the $42 million to $50 million range.

Disney’s The Proposal fell two spots to fourth on Wednesday. The romantic comedy was down 14 percent from Tuesday and down 29 percent from last Wednesday. That represented one of the day’s better holds among wide releases, as holdovers saw significant declines across the board yesterday thanks to the new presence of both Ice Age 3 and Public Enemies in the marketplace.

The Hangover was down two spots to round out the day’s top five. Warner’s comedy blockbuster also experienced one of the day’s better holds, as it was down 13 percent from Tuesday and just 22 percent from last Wednesday. The Hangover has grossed $190.78 million in 27 days of release.