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SUNDAY AM: When Disney does cute the right way, it’s a can’t miss with North American moviegoers — even when the stars are yappy rat dogs on a crowded weekend when 7 motion pictures embracing almost every genre opened at the multiplexes. As expected, No. 1 Beverly Hills Chihuahua opened for a $29 million weekend gross for the best October debut in the studio’s history. The pic took in $7.8 million Friday, then up to $12.4M Saturday thanks to a huge kiddie matinee bounce, plus a projected $8.6M from 3,215 theaters. This was a true 4-quadrant hit, with over 70% of the audience made up of families, and 12% couples, without children.
DreamWorks/Paramount’s holdover Eagle Eye starring Shia LeBoeuf as Hollywood’s newest action star had a minimal 2nd weekend drop and came in No. 2 with $17 million (-39% from last Friday) from 3,516 venues after earning $5.4M Friday and $7.8M Saturday for a new cume of $54.6M. Taking 3rd was Sony’s tween/teen new comedy Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist with $4.5 million Friday and $4.5M Saturday from 2,421 dates for a $12M weekend, which is less than anticipated but a great return on a $13 million negative cost. ”Young females followed by young males better hurry to get there,” one rival studio bigwig told me. Indeed, the audience was 62% female and 55% under age 21.
No. 4 was Warner Bros’ mature romance Nights In Rodanthe at $7.3 million (-45% from last weekend) from 2,702 runs for a new cume of $25M. And New Line/Warner Bros Appaloosa had a surprise 5th place finish from just 1,045 plays for a $5 million FSS and new cume of $5.5M at the start of its 3rd week in limited release. The next pics were both holdovers: in 6th place, Sony’s Lakeview Terrace grossed $4.5 million over the weekend for a new cume of $32.1M. And No. 7 was Focus Pictures’ Burn After Reading with a $4 million FSS and a new $51.6M cume. Hollywood continues to register surprise at the box office for the faith-based firefighter saga Fireproof from Provident/Samuel Goldwyn: the low-budget pic held for #8 with a minimal 2nd week drop of 40% for a $4M weekend in only 852 theaters and new cume of $12.4M. After 10 days in release, Fireproof has surpassed the cume of Facing The Giants, the last faith-based film directed by Alex Kendrick.
As for other newcomers, David Zucker’s right-wing spoof An American Carol from Vivendi Entertainment opened decently for this genre of pic at No. 9 with $3.8 million from 1,639 locales. By contrast, Bill Maher’s left-wing satire Religulous directed by Borat‘s Larry Charles for Lionsgate opened on Wednesday and is doing far better proportionately at the box office, making $3.5 million this weekend despite playing in 1/3 as many venues as American Carol (just 502). Even more telling, Maher/Charles’ per screen average was a robust $6,972 compared to Zucker’s $2,325 — good enough for No. 10.
Julianne Moore couldn’t help the R-rated Miramax thriller Blindness which tanked at the box office, debuting #11 with just $2.3M from 1,690 dates. Spyglass Entertainment/Universal-distributed Flash of Genius, starring Greg Kinnear as an inventor who takes on the American auto industry, was always going to be a hard sell despite the studio’s best efforts (remember Tucker?): it opened only 12th with just $2M from a limited release of 1,098 plays. Exit polls showed it appeared predominantly to an over-40 audience (78%) of females (57%) and Caucasians (89%). But faring far worse was the Autonomous Films/MGM-distributed How To Lose Friends And Alienate People which opened to only $1.4M from 1,750 runs. Well, Toby Young’s book was small, too. Finally, Sony Classics’ Oscar-touted Rachel Getting Married directed by Jonathan Demme and starring Anne Hathaway platformed in 9 theaters (3 in NYC, 5 in LA, 1 in Toronto) for 302K this weekend and a staggering per screen average of $33,659!
Total weekend box office was way, way up from last year thanks to top dog and plenty of choice — $115M this year, soaring 37% over 2007′s $89M. Year-to-date revenues are running neck and neck at $7.2B. For more stats, see Media By Numbers.
Editor-in-Chief Nikki Finke - tip her here.
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How depressing…I used to revere the ZAZ comedy spirit.
After a series of flops (My Boss’s Daughter, BASketball), David Zucker is suddenly a born-again right-winger.
What a career move. At least he gets “A” name talent like Leslie Neilsen, Jon Voight, and Kelsey Grammer in his films now.
Luckily, the American public (and this includes the 60 million Republican-leaning voters Zucker was aiming for) see through the charade of AN AMERICAN CAROL and are staying home. Or seeing RELIGULOUS.
Nick And Norah’s Infinite Playlist looks like Raising Victor Vargas II. It was made by the same filmmakers after all, although Victor Vargas was much stronger.
Surprising turnout for Religulous! I wouldn’t have expected such a strong early showing. I’m seeing it tomorrow!
If American Carol beats Religulous at the BO, you know right wingers are going to spin this as a convincing defeat of liberal secular humanism and a harbinger of McCain’s November victory.
Yes, that $5 million or so weekend tally for American Carol shows just how much America hates Michael Moore. Hmmmmm, how much did Fahrenheit 9/11 get at the BO.
But expect more and more bile from the right. Their philosophy of government stewardship has brought this country on the verge of its biggest economic calamity since 1929. And what are they doing? They’re blaming blacks and Hispanics for the housing market implosion, even though level-headed economists have proven them otherwise. Fannie and Freddie? Barney Frank’s fault, even though Fannie and Freddie were victims of housing prices crashing after the subprime goldrush flaming out as well as undercapitalization.
I really hope Drudge links to this subject because the comments section will be barraged by dead-enders and insane dunces, after all, the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results, and right-wingers want more of the same.
I had been genuinely interested in seeing “Flash of Genius” but was eventually dissuaded by the TV ad campaign that consistently refused to say what the picture was about. You know how some commercials just reek of being disingenuous?
I’ve lived 40 years in this world and been in this busines for 6 years to learn today on my favorite blog that there’s a movie called Beverly Hills Chihuahua.
Now I can die… What’s next? OC Pinschers? San Fernando Poodle? We could mix the superhero trend with that… Er, no… I forgot Underdog.
I expect American Carol to do well at the Box office and beat Bill Mahar’s Relegions documentry. When do R ratings apply to so call relegious documentries? Movie going public isn’t stupid. It was time for the left wing to be satirized.
BLINDNESS was a rare misstep for Miramax; they’ll more than make up for it come December when DOUBT hits theatres.
The Zuckers are blood suckers. They have that stink about them, like they’re so rich and so out of touch, dying to get back ‘in there’. Please stay ‘out there’, Pacific Palisades, wherever. But stay.
Where is Dennis Miller in this musty, flop sweaty (Nikkispeak) pandering to the fascist side of Americana?
For shame…a shonda…
I’m not surprised “How to Lose Friends…” did so poorly, I didn’t see ANY marketing at all for it, no commercials, no print, not even online. You’d figure MGM would at least market the hell out of the shots featuring Megan Fox in underwear.
Given the fact Simon Pegg starred, perhaps MGM chickened out after the other Brit-starrer “Ghost Town” didn’t do so well?
Why is it that a right leaning picture like AN AMERICAN CAROL is deemed a “charade” yet RELIGULOUS is not? Why do all films have to have a left wing bent to them. Its just a joke when people will attempt to knock down a film on one side of the aisle but will praise many farces from the other side (a number of films from Michael Moore fit the bill). Whatever Jeff. Your ideology shows through in your post.
The American public wasn’t seeing Religulous either. It wouldn’t have done much better with a higher screen count due to its very far-left subject matter.
Maybe if Universal had actually advertised ‘Flash of Genius,’ it could have been saved. I was interested in this movie but didn’t even know it was out this week…
Slow time for theatres and these films aren’t helping much. Nothing that makes me compelled to rush out to the theatre, though I am a bit interested in Religulous…
I think it’s going to be slow for attendance and revenues until Xmas…
As a regular viewer of the O’Reilly Factor, I was very much looking forward to American Carol. I saw it, and let me tell you this is one of the worst “spoofs” I have ever seen, if not one of the least funny movies ever made.
So while Hollywood is definitely way too liberal, evidenced by the fact that I continue to wait for one studio to realize the blockbuster potential of a movie that celebrates the American soldiers in Iraq and heroizes their sacrifices, there is one point that needs stressing. When American Carol make NO money at the box office, everyone should NOT come to the conclusion “well obviously a conservative comedy would tank” and instead, they should instead realize that THIS boring and unfunny disaster that was worse torture sitting through than being water-boarded, is not representative of what a GOOD movie with a conservative point of view could be.
And in other news, agree with him or not, Bill Maher knows how to entertain, so I’m still looking forward to seeing Religulous!
Now Blindness I would go see. Why? I read up on it last night to get a better idea what the movie is all about and its based on a 1940s Portuguese novel. But the director reinvented it for the 21st Century. The tv spots is what got me hooked on it. Listen the society of blindess condoned this film for its portrayal of blind people. I would have to judge that for myself. I came across the film condone in a Google search by accident. So has Miramax taken misstep? Perhaps but every film has its risks and rewards.
We just saw Eagle Eye. What a smartly developed story and an awesome edge of your seat thriller! That film’s going to stay near the top of the box office as mainstream America avoids Infinite Playlist, Religulous, American Carol, and the rest of those obviously bizarre films. The titles alone are enough to frighten most people into the Eagle Eye movie ticket line.
Flash of Genius has gotten plenty of trailer rotation on TV. The problem with the trailer (and the poster) is that it reveals jack shit about what the movie is about. I assume it’s about a guy who works at Ford. That’s about it. When the studio is too scared to bother to even reveal what the movie is about, people aren’t exactly going to be in a hurry to hand over their cash to see it. Plus, neither Greg Kinnear nor the ever annoying Lauren Graham are box office names.
In regard to Blindness being a “rare Miramax misstep” whoever said that needs to pull their head out of their ass. Most of Miramax’s films have been outright flops.
A major point I think a lot of people are missing about AN AMERICAN CAROL is this: it *needs* to be lumped in with the very movies pseudo-Conservatives rail against, because at the end of the day, it’s the same thing – a film trying to hammer you over the head with a message. Guess what? People don’t want to go to the movies to have any agenda forcibly crammed down their throats, whether it’s “boo-urns to the Iraq War” or “liberals are traitors, go USA!” Escapism is and always has been the name of the game … trying to politicize movies into overt agendas is a great way to lose money, as Vivendi and co. have discovered.
As much as I like Don McKellar, Blindness has received abysmal reviews and looks like pretentious drivel. I appreciate a good intelligent story, but not all stories, or novels, need to be re-told. I don’t think this is one of them.
I’m probably voting McCain, as I like money, and saw An American Carol with a more hardcore right friend (who was paying.) The movie isn’t a complete mess, there’s maybe 20 minutes worth of material that’s pretty good, but the rest of it is all filler, and just drags. This didn’t need to be a feature, it really should have been cut down to a couple of online shorts…
The two main problems are 1.) Team America already covered this, like four years ago, and to much greater effect, and 2.) Michael Moore is already played out, it’s like beating a dead horse…stuff like Zeitgeist, or 9-11 truthers (which the movie does briefly touch on) seem like much more fertile ground for generating lulz.
Nikki, I don’t think you need to read in (crow) too much over the per screen averages of the Left v. Right satires, it’s probably safe to assume one plays in the big metropolitan cities and one doesn’t. (Religulous, despite the limited release, is playing in more NY theaters than American Carol for example)
I expect we will see “Religulous” expand over the next few weeks and continue to see a steady, but, um, faithful audience over time.
“An American Carol”, on the other hand, will be down to 2 showings a day next week in all those theaters it is currently playing in and will be whisked away quickly to the 2nd run theaters.
Political satire or not, why would you release a movie that spins off the theme of “A Christmas Carol” in early October? Probably because they knew it would stand no chance of picking up an audience in the more crowded late fall field.
It’s also worth noting that Bill Maher’s flick outdid the opening weekend of Ben Stein’s “Expelled” documentary earlier this year, that launched on twice as many screens…
The reason people stayed away from FLASH OF GENIUS has less to do with its lack of marketing, and more to do with the fact that…who the hell wants to pay and see a movie about the guy who invented the intermittent winshield-wiper?
I like Kinnear a lot but he’s hardly a draw. I know it’s a David vs. Goliath story but really, how and why did this film get made? It should’ve been an HBO film at most.
On the other hand, I thought APALOOSA was terrific. A must-see for Western fans certainly, it’s first-rate.
As for NICK & NORA…cute. Nothing more.
Religulous probably already made all the money it ever will at the box office. The movie does NOT take on Muslims, or Weird Hollywood stuff (Scientology, Kaballah) or Voodoo/Santeria etc.
So it’s hardly brave. Smug, yes.
American Carol will probably make a small profit on DVD, given that their audience is older and avoids theaters.
The movie does NOT take on Muslims, or Weird Hollywood stuff (Scientology, Kaballah) or Voodoo/Santeria etc.
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Uhhh…yeah it does.