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Theater Necking To Take On New Meaning
20 November 2009 3:24 PM, PST
Defying conventional wisdom that teenage boys control the box office, box office analysts are predicting record crowds -- mostly of teenage girls -- for this weekend's opening of Summit Entertainment's The Twilight Saga: New Moon. Today's (Friday) Los Angeles Times said that the film will likely sell about $90 million worth of tickets and could possibly cross the $100-million mark, putting it just behind the year's biggest ticket seller, Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen. Deadline Hollywood's Nikki Finke quoted sources as saying that the movie's midnight take may have exceeded that of The Dark Knight. Both Transformers and Knight were aimed squarely at young men, while the Twilight movie is aimed at young women. Although today's ticket sales are likely to be enormous, Saturday's are likely to fall off dramatically, if the original Twilight is any indication. That movie saw a decline of 41 percent on its second day, then drop 62 percent on its second weekend, despite the fact that it, like its sequel, went into its second week with the benefit of the Thanksgiving holiday. The vampire/werewolf love-triangle will be doing battle with the second week of the end-of-the-world saga 2012, which is expected to lose more than half its opening-weekend audience, but still perform quite nicely. Two new films (besides New Moon) opening wide, Planet 51 and The Blind Side, are iffy propositions.
Update: The Twilight Saga: New Moon amassed a sensational $26.27 million for its midnight screenings, smashing the previous record, according to estimates released today (Friday) by its producer, Summit Entertainment. The result far outdistanced that for Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, which recorded a midnight opening of $22.20 million in July, to set a record for a five-day weekend, and The Dark Knight, which garnered $18.5 million in July of 2008, to set the record for a three-day weekend. »
Movie Reviews: “Planet 51”
20 November 2009 3:21 PM, PST
Planet 51, an animated film about an alternate Earth still living in the 1950s (while the inhabitants are green and sport antennas on their heads, they speak English) that is invaded by modern man, is likely to attract an alternate audience -- families. It's receiving so-so reviews. "Although not bowling me over, Planet 51 is a jolly and good-looking animated feature in glorious 2D," writes the Chicago Sun-Times's Roger Ebert, who is no fan of most animated 3D features. Stephen Holden in the New York Times calls it "agreeable but flagrantly unoriginal." Annie Biancolli in the San Francisco Chronicle regards Planet 51 as "an innocuous computerized bauble." And Nancy Churnin in the Dallas Morning News says it's "definitely a planet worth a visit." But Steven Rea of the Philadelphia Inquirer regards it as an "uninspired computer-animated feature that may satisfy undiscriminating pipsqueaks and nearly no one else." Jane Horwitz in the Washington Post agrees, noting, "Most of the jokes are geared to adults and are a little tasteless, yet the story itself seems aimed at kids." Similarly, Ty Burr writes in the Boston Globe that the movie is "obnoxiously written, with too many cutesy-dirty double-entendres that are meant to appeal to the grown-ups but that only make the movie seem cringingly infantile." »
Movie Reviews: “The Blind Side”
20 November 2009 3:13 PM, PST
Lou Lumenick in the New York Post describes The Blind Side as "part football movie and part Precious with a happy ending." It's the true story of a wealthy Southern couple, played by Sandra Bullock and Tim McGraw, who take in Michael Oher, a homeless black teenager played by Quinton Aaron, and encourage him to play football. He ends up being signed by the Baltimore Ravens. It's the kind of movie you'd expect it to be, A.O. Scott suggests in the New York Times -- "shedding nuance and complication in favor of maximum uplift." Indeed, says Elizabeth Weitzman in the New York Daily News, the movie turns "Oher's remarkable life into a Hollywood fable that trades difficult truths for easy clichés." And Linda Barnard in the Toronto Star concludes that the movie winds up being "as Southern as pecan pie and twice as gooey." On the other hand, several critics bestow high praise on the performance of Sandra Bullock. "Bullock gives her best performance in years," writes Roger Moore in the Orlando Sentinel. And Claudia Puig in USA Today says, "This is Bullock's movie, and it is perhaps her best role." »
Vampires And Werewolves Arrive At Midnight
19 November 2009 3:14 PM, PST
This will be the night when a pain in the neck trumps the destruction of the world. It's the night -- midnight, to be precise -- when The Twilight Saga: New Moon debuts in theaters, all of which are likely to be sold out. Online ticket sellers have said that the Twilight sequel has set a record for presales. Box-office prognosticators have been predicting that the film should earn at least $85 million this weekend, with a few boldly prophesying that it will cross $100 million. Warner Bros. distribution chief Dan Fellman would only forecast "a really healthy opening." The original Twilight debuted with $69.6 million on its way to a final gross of $191.5 million domestically. »
Movie Reviews: “The Twilight Saga: New Moon”
19 November 2009 3:09 PM, PST
Critics all seem to agree that The Twilight Saga: New Moon delivers what it is supposed to deliver -- in the words of Elizabeth Weitzman in the New York Daily News, "swooning romance, PG-13 thrills, and enough sharp cheekbones and shirtless boys to carry any adolescent over to the next installment." Few of them even attempt to appraise the movie for its artistic quality, the apparent thinking being, "Why bother?" Hence, Kyle Smith's hilarious review in the New York Post, which begins: "Twilight, which was about a girl and a vampire who don't hook up, is totally different from The Twilight Saga: New Moon, which is about a girl, a vampire and a werewolf who don't hook up. And it's not at all like the next sequel, in which a girl, a vampire, a werewolf and a mummy fail to find romance, nor the one after that, in which the girl gets unfriended by all of the above plus the Invisible Man and King Kong -- yet finds her heart aflutter when she befriends the Bride of Frankenstein." And Mick Lasalle solves the critic's dilemma in assessing the movie by observing that it's really not a movie at all. "This is a pop culture phenomenon," he writes, "some weird early 21st century aberration, our equivalent of the hula hoop or dancing the Charleston on a biplane's wing. In the future, people will watch this second installment of "The Twilight Saga" and think, 'What was that?'" Clearly, there's not a teenage heart beating among any of the critics. Roger Ebert comments in the Chicago Sun-Times that the charisma of stars Robert Pattinson and Kristen Stewart "is by Madame Tussaud." (He has apparently not witnessed any of the teenage hysteria that accompanies their every move.) On the other hand, Roger Moore in the Orlando Sentinel concludes that the sequel is "more polished" than the original, "and we get the sense that even though a guy directed it [unlike Twilight], he wants the mostly-female fanbase to revel in the overheated romance, the blood-enforced chastity and the sacrifices this toothy Romeo-and-Juliet tale serves up." And Peter Howell in the Toronto Star dishes out quite a bit of praise to the filmmakers: "They well serve an evolving and involving love saga that gives us a lot more to chew on than the typical teen romance," he writes. »
Will Ferrell Named Most Overpaid Star
19 November 2009 3:04 PM, PST
Comic actor Will Ferrell has the dubious distinction of heading a new Forbes magazine list of Hollywood's most overpaid stars. A top-ten list also includes (in order): Ewan McGregor, Billy Bob Thornton, Eddie Murphy, Ice Cube, Tom Cruise, Drew Barrymore, Leonardo DiCaprio, Samuel Jackson, and Jim Carrey. All of them, said the magazine on its website Wednesday, "cost more to hire than they appear to be worth at box offices." Ferrell ended up at the top of the list, it said, largely because of the flop Land of the Lost, a movie that cost about $100 million to produce, but which earned less than $65 million worldwide. Based on his estimated salary for each film, Forbes concluded that for every dollar Ferrell was paid, his films earned an average of just $3.29. »
Sexiest Man Looks Anything But In TMZ Clip
19 November 2009 2:57 PM, PST
The tabloid website TMZ, fast becoming the bane of Hollywood publicists, wasted no time Wednesday undercutting the news that People magazine had named Johnny Depp its "Sexiest Man Alive" for the second time. (He also won in 2003.) Just hours after People senior editor Kate Coyne announced the magazine's selection, saying that he had achieved an almost "iconic status in terms of sexiness," TMZ videotaped him emerging from a New York bar, looking dazed and unkempt and being supported by members of his entourage -- poles apart from his image as a sexy icon. "It seems the guy was really into celebrating his Sexiest Man Alive victory," TMZ wisecracked in a brief video caption. »
Another Study Says Popcorn Is Bad For You
19 November 2009 2:49 PM, PST
Theater owners have made it plain that they intend to ignore a new study showing that the popcorn they sell at their concession stands is loaded with calories and saturated fat. The study, conducted for the Center for Science in the Public Interest and reported in USA Today, disclosed that a large popcorn at the AMC theater chain contains 1,030 calories and 57 grams of saturated fat. However, the study found that a large popcorn at Cinemark theaters, which uses canola oil, contains only 4 grams of saturated fat -- despite the fact that it contains one more cup of popcorn than AMC's. Responding to the study, the National Association of Theatre Owners said in a statement that after results of a similar study were released in 1994, "many cinema operators responded by offering patrons additional choices, such as air-popped popcorn. After very little time, movie patrons in droves made their voices heard - they wanted the traditional popcorn back. Many of our patrons enjoy the traditional taste and aroma of theater popcorn." »
Disney Pulls Plug On “Captain Nemo”
18 November 2009 2:39 PM, PST
Captain Nemo: 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, a $150-million epic, directed by McG, aimed at bringing to the screen a favorite Disneyland adventure ride, has sunk. The Los Angeles Times and Daily Variety reported that Rich Ross, who has been shaking things up as Disney studios' new movie chief, made the call to shut down the project after it was approved by his predecessor, Dick Cook. The company had reportedly already spent about $10 million on preproduction. But the Times said that Ross had "creative concerns" about the current script and now plans to redevelop the entire project. »
Deaf People Riled By Caption-less “Up” DVD’s
18 November 2009 2:30 PM, PST
Deaf and hard-of-hearing people are angered by Disney's decision to remove closed-captioning from DVDs of the animated Up that are being distributed to online, brick-and-mortar, and kiosk rental outlets. The website consumerist.com quoted a reader as saying that a Disney customer service representative told him that all "extras," including closed captioning, had been removed from the Up version "for marketing reasons." The website commented that doing so may make sense "from a marketing perspective, but isn't fair to those customers who use and need captions." On the website Fwd (Feminists with Disabilities), one writer commented, "It seems clear to me that Disney must not employ anyone with a disability in their marketing department, because if they did they would realize that this is likely to cause people to not buy the DVD, rather than increase sales." »
Comedies Producing Big Profits For Studios
18 November 2009 2:26 PM, PST
They rarely get mentioned when Oscar nominations are announced, but comedies continue to generate a lot of ticket sales worldwide, according to USA Today, which noted that of the top ten grossers over the past year, six have been comedies -- several of which were "savagely reviewed." Comedies are generally big earners during periods of economic hardship, the newspaper observed, quoting Universal's distribution chief Nikki Rocco as saying, "People need something to take their mind off things, and comedies do that." Robin Williams, who stars in the comedy Old Dogs, which opens Nov. 25, told the newspaper that "as things get stranger in the world, people want to laugh as a release. It reaffirms our humanity." Williams also complained that comedy receives little respect from critics -- or from the industry as a whole. "Comedy built this industry," he said. "But it's treated like it's damaged. All we have, really, is the Golden Globes [which has separate categories for comedies and musicals]. Usually we have to sit at the children's table." »
Who’s Winning War Between Redbox And Studios?
18 November 2009 1:18 PM, PST
Twentieth Century Fox has boasted that it was able to prevent Redbox from offering cheap rentals of Ice Age:Dawn of the Dinosaurs after it was released on DVD last month. Redbox had vowed to purchase from retail outlets DVDs that Fox, Universal and Warner said would only be provided to the kiosk operator 30 days after they became available elsewhere. But, according to the Los Angeles Times, Fox researchers checked 1,105 Redbox kiosks in 35 states and found that Ice Age was missing from most of them when first released. But Redbox President Mitch Lowe told the Times that new films are generally available at the kiosks only about 30 percent of the time (presumably because of heavy demand). He insisted that Redbox has been able to fully stock DVDs from the non-cooperating studios within a few days of their release dates. Meanwhile, financial services firm Merriman Curhan Ford said Tuesday that by Nov. 14, Ice Age was stocked in 94 percent of Redbox machines. Home Media magazine quoted Merriman analyst Eric Wold was saying, "We are encouraged by the incremental gains in stocking the title with the company's workaround program." »
Report: Icahn May Be Aiming To Control MGM
18 November 2009 1:05 PM, PST
Corporate raider Carl Icahn is suddenly buying up MGM bonds "like a bat out of hell," Deadline Hollywood's Nikki Finke reported Tuesday, citing unnamed film financing sources. "He's in Carl mode: buy first, ask later, and then throw lawyers at it," one of the sources told her. Finke said that the source is guessing that Icahn may be buying 100s of millions of dollars or more. (Its current owners, a consortium that includes Sony, Comcast, Providence Equity Partners and the Quadrangle Group, have reportedly been trying to sell it for around $3.5 billion; they took the company private in 2004 for $5 billion.) Finke said that Icahn is determined to hand control of the studio to his 29-year-old son Brett, who currently works in the family business. »
Explosive Opening For “2012”
17 November 2009 2:43 PM, PST
Defying numerous predictions of doom for the $225-million movie, 2012 raked in more than it cost in its opening weekend -- $230.4 million worldwide, of which $65.2 million was earned in the U.S. and Canada, according to final studio figures released Monday. But perhaps even more startling was the performance of the indie film Precious, which came in at No. 3 with $5.9 million, despite playing at only 174 theaters. That amounted to $33,762 per theater, compared with $19,165 per theater for 2012. Another pleasant augury of Christmas-yet-to-come: Disney's A Christmas Carol failed to give up the ghost in its second weekend as some analysts had predicted, dropping just 25.8 percent to $22.3 million. However, Pirate Radio, the only other film besides 2012 to open wide over the weekend, was forced to walk the plank, as it took in just $2.9 million, to finish out of the top ten, in 11th place. Two films crossed the $100 million mark, Couples Retreat, which has now grossed $102.05 million, and Paranormal Activity, which has taken in $103.69 million. »
“Christmas Carol” Has Small Drop In Second Week
17 November 2009 2:32 PM, PST
Disney's A Christmas Carol, which had a somewhat disappointing opening -- given its reported $200-million budget -- at the box office two weekends ago, may still turn a profit if the current trend continues, the Los Angeles Times observed today (Tuesday). The newspaper observed that the movie fell just 25.8 percent in its second weekend, well below the 32.8 percent drop that director Robert Zemeckis's The Polar Express experienced in its second weekend in 2004. The film, it noted, has now grossed $63.3 million -- $11.8 million more than The Polar Express took in at the end of its second weekend. The Times pointed out that the film still has several more pre-holiday weekends in theaters, including next week's four-day Thanksgiving break, before James Cameron's Avatar grabs away its 3D screens, which have been producing the lion's share of its ticket sales, on December 11. And even then, it's likely to return to theaters for holiday runs for years to come. »
Black Actors Deleted From “Couples Retreat” Ads In U.K.
17 November 2009 2:07 PM, PST
Two African-American actors who portrayed one of the four couples featured in the Universal movie Couples Retreat were removed from posters and print ads for the movie in the U.K., prompting critics to condemn the editing as racist. A spokesperson for Universal told London's The Mail on Sunday that Universal was merely attempting to "simplify" the ad for the U.K. and international markets. But the newspaper, which published a photo of the U.S. version of the ad next to the U.K. version, pointed out that there appears to be little that is different about the two -- except for the deletion of the two black actors, Faizon Love and Kali Hawk. Universal said that it "regretted causing offense" and that it had abandoned plans to use the ad in other countries. In an interview with the Mail, Vivienne Pattison, director of Mediawatch-uk, said: "I think this was an ill-conceived move. We celebrate diversity in Britain and we could have coped with seeing the same poster used in America." »
Linklater Film Caught In Miramax Crunch
17 November 2009 2:01 PM, PST
Disney's decision to slash Miramax's releases to three films a year, shut down operations in New York, and reduce its overall budget by 70 percent has resulted in the cancellation of the planned Richard Linklater romantic comedy Liars (A to E), MovieLine.com reported on Monday. Linklater, whose films include 2003's The School of Rock, 2005's Bad News Bears, and the 2006 documentary Fast Food Nation, told the website that the cancellation of the film left him without "anything coming up." He said that after receiving the green light from Miramax, he had cast Rebecca Hall and Kat Dennings in leading roles, but that the light had now turned red. "It's no longer happening, unfortunately," Linklater confirmed. »
The World Ends With A Bang
16 November 2009 2:56 PM, PST
2012 certainly shook things up at the box office over the weekend. The Sony film took in an estimated $65 million domestically and another $120 million overseas leaving just about every other film grasping for life and box-office prognosticators and movie critics gasping at the magnitude of its triumph. "Even the Maya would have struggled to forecast an opening weekend this big," commented the Los Angeles Times, referring to the central premise of the movie -- that the ancient Mayan calendar ends on December 21, 2012. "Doom spelled dollars," said the Associated Press. Nevertheless, the weekend gross, which unlike many other recent hits, did not have the benefit of premium 3D ticket pricing going for it, ranked far behind director Roland Emmerich's previous disaster epic, The Day After Tomorrow, which opened with $85.8 million over the Memorial Day holiday in 2004 and trailed farther still in attendance. The only other film to open (relatively) wide this weekend, Pirate Radio, foundered with just $2.9 million at 882 theaters. Last week's winner, Disney's A Christmas Carol, managed to bring in about $22.3 million this time around, a modest 26-percent drop, but that may have been small comfort for the Walt Disney Co., which spent nearly as much on the movie as Sony spent on 2012. Still, it's got an entire holiday season ahead of it to try to catch up. Continuing to impress was Lionsgate's Precious, which took in around $6.1 million in just 174 theaters -- or $35,000 per theater. The movie, which was screened in just nine cities expands to around 100 next weekend. Another newcomer, 20th Century Fox's Fantastic Mr. Fox, debuted in just four theaters in New York and Los Angeles with an impressive $260,000. It is due to open wide next Wednesday. Other films drew small audiences -- and in fact, despite the huge ticket sales for 2012, the total box office gross for all films ended up 6 percent behind the comparable week a year ago, when the James Bond movie Quantum of Solace debuted with $67.5 million. »
Movie Reviews: “Fantastic Mr. Fox”
16 November 2009 2:50 PM, PST
The stop-motion animated Fantastic Mr. Fox, with a voice cast that includes George Clooney, Meryl Streep, Bill Murray, Willem Dafoe and Jason Schwartzman, received enthusiastic reviews from national critics and those in Los Angeles and New York, where the film opened over the weekend. Directed by Wes Anderson from the Roald Dahl children's book, the film looks rather primitive compared with today's state-of-the-art 3D computer-animated features, the critics agree, while also observing that may be part of its charm. Indeed, Lou Lumenick in the New York Post described it as "a retro marvel." None of the critics appeared to be put off at all by the unrefined imagery. "Once you adjust to its stop-and-start rhythms and its scruffy looks, you can appreciate its wit, its beauty and the sly gravity of its emotional undercurrents," wrote A.O. Scott in the New York Times. Elizabeth Weitzman in the New York Daily News escalated the praise, calling the movie, "a visual treasure that successfully blends deadpan quirkiness with a wry realism rarely seen in any film, let alone one for children." In USA Today Claudia Puig somewhat reticently concluded that Anderson renders Dahl's story as "a sometimes witty, if odd, cartoon for all ages." Actually, several critics suggested it may not be a movie for children at all. Kenneth Turan in the Los Angeles Times called it "ultrasophisticated," adding that it "does more than occupy its own particular space between the worlds of childhood and adults. It provides a pleasantly cerebral experience, exhilarating and fizzy, that goes to your head like too much Champagne." »
“2012” Likely To Fall To “Twilight”
16 November 2009 2:35 PM, PST
Suggesting that 2012's supremacy at the box office is likely to be shortlived, the online ticket seller Fandango said Sunday that The Twilight Saga: New Moon has sold more tickets in advance of its opening than any film in history. The film, which opens at midnight Thursday/Friday, has also altered the plans of theater owners, for as each midnight screening sells out, they have reportedly been adding new ones, presumably by "bicycling" prints between screens. Last year's original Twilight, which opened on the same weekend, took in $69 million, and some analysts are predicting that the new one could earn close to $100 million, and a few are predicting it could challenge Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen, which has the year's best opening weekend with $108 million. »
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