Will Smith’s ‘MIB 3′ Beats … 
Over-Achievers Of This Year’s Upfront 
Could ‘Rebounding’ Become Companion For … 
Interview: Philip Kaufman At Cannes With ‘Hemingway … 
R.I.P. Lee Rich 
Cannes Biz Climate Shines Despite The Wind And Rain 
Full 2011-2012 TV Season Series Rankings 
2011-12 Season Network Rankings: Fox Still On Top But Down, … 
HLN Set To Air Daytime Emmy Awards 
Grant Bowler Cast As Richard Burton Opposite Lindsay Lohan … 
UPDATE: Dish Network And Broadcasters Ask Courts To Decide … 
Cannes Surprise Screening: Change Of Plans On Juan Antonio … 
Kevin Hart In Talks To Join Kevin James In ‘Valet … 
Anthony Hopkins Up For ‘Red 2′ Villain; Can … 
Cannes Conflicted Over ‘The Paperboy’ As … 
RATINGS RAT RACE: ‘American Idol’ Posts … 
Ghost Of 2004 Hovers Over L.A. Screenings As Int’l … 
On The Road To Awards Season? Kerouac Book Finally Makes It … 
Michael Bay’s Name Pushed Paramount To Settle Injured … 
Several More New Series In Recasting Mode; Returning Ones … 
‘G.I. Joe: Retaliation’ Moving To March 2013 To … 
SATURDAY PM/SUNDAY AM: This was a tough weekend at the box office for one new major studio tentpole opening on a long Martin Luther King weekend but not for another which met the lower end of expectations. The 4-day holiday overall is looking -25% down from last year’s:
1. The Green Hornet 3D (Sony Pictures) NEW [3,584 Theaters]
Friday $11.1M, Saturday $12.7M
Estimated 3-Day Weekend $34M, Estimated 4-Day Holiday $40.5M
Saturday’s take was up +15% from Friday’s, which relieved Sony fears tonight. 
It seemed a miracle that this much bad-buzzed big movie that’s a modern adaptation of the old radio series about the legendary action duo – Britt Reid (with the unorthodox casting of Seth Rogen) and his resourceful Kato (with Taiwanese pop singer Jay Chou) not to mention their coolly equipped The Black Beauty – was tracking very well for weeks now. But then rival studios emailed me Friday that The Green Hornet was surprisingly underperforming. Sony execs disagreed. They said things could have been worse at the box office Friday but the West Coast was “pushing it way up” with late shows. And just as they predicted, Saturday’s number jumped. Friday’s post midnight screenings were light — $550K on 700 plays — because Sony didn’t push them. Meanwhile, The Green Hornet earned a “B+” CinemaScore overall but an ”A-” among audience members under age 25. The audience skewed male (61%) vs female (39%) and age was evenly split over and under 25 (50%).
The debut is the 2nd highest opening ever for a film ever released during the 4-day holiday weekend in January and the 3rd highest debut ever for a 3-day January bow. But given the higher 3D ticket prices and PG-13 rating and superhero genre, these grosses are still on the lower side of Hollywood’s $40M-$50M expectations. Then there’s the $120M-$150M production cost: blame reshoots and the release delay from December 22nd to January 14th so Sony could give the flick a 3D makeover. As for the marketing plan, “we really worked hard to create a summer film launch in January,” a Sony exec told me. Personally, I hated those cheezy Carls Jr promos but they helped create awareness. Pic had a strong presence with ads during key NFL and College Bowl games, plus the NBA. And a high impact outdoor campaign with a glow-in-the-dark logo effect plus “real” headlights on the image of The Black Beauty which toured in 20 markets and starred on Myth Busters and in U.S. auto shows. Rogen (who lost a lot of weight to play the role) and Chou each did an enormous amount of PR/appearances to support the film.
2. The Dilemma (Universal Pictures) NEW [2,941 Theaters] B
Friday $6.1M, Saturday $6.8M,
Estimated 3-day Weekend $17.4M, Estimated 4-day Holiday $20.6M
This is a shockingly soft opening for a Ron Howard-directed movie starring proven box office strongmen Vince Vaughn and Kevin James whose last four comedies were mega-openers (Four Christmases – $31M, Couples Retreat – $34M, Paul Blart: Mall Cop – $31M, and Grown-Ups – $40M). “Somehow putting them together gets you half that,” one rival studio exec snarked to me Friday night. I readily admit to being relieved to see Vince cool off at the box office because he’s such a pain-in-the-ass to almost everybody in the filmmaking process. On the other hand, The Dilemma was Universal Pictures chief Adam Fogelson’s first release of his new greenlit movie slate. But, seriously, what Big Studio mogul would not have okayed that talent combination in a PG-13 comedy? (Although I think Ron Howard should have deleted that gratuitous gay slur scene which was cut out of the trailer after protests that it was offensive.) The pic’s CinemaScore was a “B”. Given that this film’s production budget was $70 million, Dilemma has a long way to go but Universal believes it’s “performing at or slightly above tracking” which was forecasting only high teens because of poor tracking in recent weeks. That’s soft for the pic’s respective cost and a disaster for the reputations of Howard, Vaughn, and James. The disconnect, insiders tell me, was the storyline. “The subject of infidelity is a really challenging one,” one exec explained to me even though the studio’s own pre-release publicity points out that Vince has consistently proven to be a popular draw in comedies that take a look at the issues of relationships. ”At a tie when people are looking for wish fulfillment, this may be too painful.” Other insiders are complaining to me that “this pic was meant to be a comedy with some drama, and it turned out to be a drama with some comedy”. Universal is also distributing the film internationally and it opens day and date in Australia, New Zealand, and Romania. In April, Universal begins rolling it out to the rest of the world.
3. True Grit (Paramount) Week 4 [3,459 Theaters]
Friday $3.2M, Saturday $4.5M
Estimated 3-Day Weekend $10.5M, Estimated 4-Day Holiday $12.5M, Estimated Cume $127.7M
Wow, the Coen Brothers’ Western just keeps going and going as it rides to awards wins.
4. The King’s Speech (The Weinstein Co) Week 8 [1,543 Theaters]
Friday $2.4M, Saturday $3.8M
Estimated 3-Day Weekend $9M, Estimated 4-Day Holiday $10.7M, Estimated Cume $46.3M
This Oscar-touted film doubled its screen count this weekend.
5. Black Swan (Fox Searchlight) Week 7 [2,328 Theaters]
Friday $2.4M, Saturday $3.2M
Estimated 3-Day Weekend $8.1M, Estimated 4-day Holiday $9.9M, Estimated Cume $74.7M
This is a big expansion for this awards-praised pic, adding 750 locations.
6. Little Fockers (Universal) Week 4 [3,394 Theaters]
Friday $2M, Saturday $3M
Estimated 3-Day Weekend $7.1M, Estimated 4-Day Holiday $8.3M, Estimated Cume $135.4M
8. Tron: Legacy 3D (Disney) Week 5 [2,439 Theaters]
Friday $1.3M, Saturday $2.4M
Estimated 3-Day Weekend $5.7M, Estimated 4-Day Holiday $7.4M, Estimated Cume $158.6M
9. Yogi Bear 3D (Warner Bros) Week 5 [2,702 Theaters]
Friday $1M, Saturday $2.4M
Estimated 3-Day Weekend $5.2M, Estimated 4-Day Holiday $7.3M, Estimated Cume $84.1M
7. The Fighter (Relativity/Paramount) Week 6 [2,414 Theaters]
Friday $1.4M, Saturday $2.1M
Estimated 3-Day Weekend $5M, Estimated 4-Day Holiday $6.1M, Estimated Cume $66.7M
10. Tangled 3D (Disney) Week 8 [2,408 Theaters]
Friday $840K, Saturday $1.7M
Estimated 3-Day Weekend $3.9M, Estimated 4-Day Holiday $5.7M, Estimated Cume $182.7M
Editor-in-Chief Nikki Finke - tip her here.
Loading ...
1. The opening of Hornet is not that bad. After all, in the analysis of Dilemma, you call 31 million a “meg-opener.”
2. The Dilemma numbers are not great. Will someone PLEASE tell the exec community that Allan Loeb can’t write?
3. can we can the gay discussion. It’s a bore.
People need to remember context matters with these numbers. 30 million is very good for an adult comedy. Thirty million for an expensive, 3D superhero movie is only so-so.
Y’know what MDE? Civil rights and the casual bigotry that impede them ARE a bore. How incisive of you. Perhaps we could load the topic with plosions (both im and ex), girls with large fake breasts and extremely muscular men in spandex. Maybe a giant monkey-spider that eats babies, too. Would the topic bore you then? ‘Cause you know what, MDE? We’d HATE to bore YOU.
ron howard should be embarrassed making a film like The Dilemma. They were walking out of the Mann’s Chinese.
So…homosexuals have already changed the meaning of “gay” once (it used to mean “happy and carefree”; now it means “homosexual”…not what I’d call an apt description, given all the whining and pouting gay groups exhibit nowadays), and now they want to change it again. Just like they want to change the definition of marriage and not let anyone else have a say in the matter (via the ballot box).
If this keeps up, the word “fascist” will come to mean “gay” too…
Next the NAACP will protest unflattering uses of the word “black,” outlawing such phrases as “it was black day on Wall Street,” “black Friday,” “black comedy,” “black eye,” etc., and then the Far Right will say that the word “right” can only refer to them, and not civil rights, or right-turn signals, or “yeah right.” Gimme a break. For at least 30 years, the non-happy, non-sexual use of “gay” has simply meant “corny,” with no relation to sexuality, as in “Mike Huckabee’s band is gay,” or “gays monopolizing the word ‘gay’ is gay.” Look, I understand their concerns about kids getting bullied, but overly policing freedom of speech adds resent, not relief.
I bet you’re the first person to cry ANTI SEMITE in a crowded room. But everything else = “What’sthebigdealit’sjustjokesguy?”
Reveler,
You really don’t seem to get it. The word “gay” hasn’t been changed more than once. It’s the context that it is used that is the problem.
Side note: voting via the ballot box IS allowing people to have a say, that’s why its a democracy.
Really? Then when the people go to the ballot box and vote on an issue, such as, oh, gay marriage, then, in a democracy, the votes ought to stand for something – not be summarily thrown out by a sympathetic gay judge.
Oh, and just to make it clear, the context of “gay” in that sentence refers to the judge’s sexuality, not his happy, carefree attitude.
One more question – do you know the difference between a pure democracy and a republic? Because this nation is the latter.
“Although I think Ron Howard should have deleted that gratuitous gay slur scene which was cut out of the trailer after protests that it was offensive.”
It was the ONLY line that got a laugh in the trailer!
“He can do bomb after bomb (I’m still recovering from Observe and Report) and Hollywood inexplicably rewards him with bigger projects.”
Thank you. I’ve been saying the for awhile. He’s just “in” and it doesn’t matter if the audience doesn’t like him as a leading man, the studios do so they’re throwing money away on him again an again and it makes no sense!! Then again they do that all the time, throw big paydays and develop big projects for people they like that no one else does and then reason failure away as something else like bad marketings. Green Hornet had a lot of marketing, it was just a bad idea from day one and no one would admit it. Well, maybe noe they will. Oh yeah right they won’t, he’ll just be handed some new $50M+ flick with an $8M paycheck within the next 6 months and it’ll bomb too. Sheesh.
To be clear I actually kinda enjoy him sometimes, in the right roles when it works. But lately he’s just not working in the roles given and also his shtick is old. Like Zack G, he’s overrated and does the same performance everytime which is funny since no one says anything but when a woman plays a similar part more than once people scream typecasting and say she can’t play anything else. Irony, party of one!
But isn’t the Green Hornet a hit? $34m in 3 days? What am I missing? What is it?
What your missing is that the film cost over 100 mil to produce – another 100 mil to distribute and advertise – it’s front loaded and will plummet next week – and it will end up losing 10′s of millions of dollars – so no it is not a hit. That’s what you’re missing.
Also the fact that Hollywood has been using increased ticket prices to mask declining ticket sales and attendance and now that they seem to have hit a wall (November down 50%, December like 33% and this week is expected to be down 25%.) it is even more noticeble that films fans don’t want to see these films.
“Also the fact that Hollywood has been using increased ticket prices to mask declining ticket sales ”
Lmao. Learn some basic economics. The main factor for attendance being down is that prices are high, not the other way around. Throughout Hollywood’s history whenever prices are high (in real terms) like early 70s and now, attendance is way down. When they are low (pre-60s and late 90s) attendance is high. Simple fact.
I thought it was obvious that bill #1 meant that when a movie is a hit, it becomes a MASSIVE hit when offered in 3D – masking the fact that fewer than expected people may actually be going to see that particular movie. Is that not what you understood?
…saw Green Hornet and enjoyed it immensely. maybe had too much of my geek on but even alot of geeks didnt want to like it. it is/was a fun flick. may see it again.
enjoy
me too — especially in 3D… the 3D of the movie was watershed eye-opening to me… really dug it…
Seth Rogamd is sooo hansome.
It’s odd to hear people refer to ‘superheroes’ as actual heroes. It doesn’t suggest flattering things about the state of our country.
I watched ROSEMARY’S BABY with a 16 year old last night. He loved it and said that he was never bored. His interest in Hollywood films is declining as well. I consider this a small-but-nonetheless-good sign for the future of storytelling in this town.
People actually DO want new ideas in their storytelling.
I wish Hollywood would go back an make Quality movies like Rosemary’s baby again and use real actors. Not hopeful beauty queens
Keep showing the 16 year old the classics, Jay. It’s the only way out of this mess we’re in.
no they don’t.
they re both disasters. seth rogen loser.
The large Green Hornet poster at the local cinema in Korea only features Chou, Diaz and Waltz. There is not even a mention of Seth Rogen.
NOTE TO HOLLYWOOD STUDIOS: Make less 3D movies and more people will go to the cinema.
The Dilemma. First, stupid premise. Second, I have to agree with the poster above about Allan Loeb. How does he keep getting work? He just can’t write a funny script. Third, I used to really like Vince Vaughn but after wasting my time with Four Christmas’s (couldn’t even get through the whole thing) and then wasting my time with Couples Retreat (got through it but it just wasn’t funny) and now The Dilemma, I’ve pretty much given up on the guy. I too thought Ron Howard being associated with this would add credence.
Why oh why has it become so difficult for Hollywood to make good comedies. We just want to laugh after a tough week.
Might have been interested in Green Hornet if it weren’t for Rogen. Just can’t bare to look at him or listen to him. It’s painful.
The two male leads in The Dilemma look too much alike–I have a hard time telling them apart. You need at least one guy who’s attractive to women to pull the women in. Two dark-haired women too (though I like both of those actresses)… Should have removed the gay slur too.
Wow. Someone just compared Vince Vaughn to Kevin James. Hopefully that’s a wake-up call for Vince to get in shape and stop goddamn boozing night after night. Jeez.
Well according to the story Ron Howard told on The View, the premise came from him and Brian Grazer. It seems Grazer saw a woman with a guy who he at first thought was Howard’s wife. He told Howard and they laughed about it and they began discussing it at parties which led to them thinking there was a movie in there somewhere.
And they were wrong.
Seriously? First of all, how is that funny? Second, Howard thought there was a movie in there somewhere?
Someone’s ready to retire I see…
Honestly, I never saw one trailer for The Dilemma… not one. It may be a bad movie (I haven’t seen it yet) but the marketing was non-existent.
As for the 16 year old that watched and enjoyed Rosemary’s Baby… rejoice. They are planning a remake of that film as well. Thankfully Platinum Dunes (Michael Bay) is no longer producing it.
“Electric cars are gay. I mean, not ‘homosexual’ gay but ‘my parents are chaperoning the dance’ gay.”
That’s the exact quote from The Dilemma. How’s is this worse than “Paging Dr. Faggot. Dr. Faggot” from The Hangover? People talk like this. That’s just the way it is. What’s next? Trying to edit out every single the “N-word” from “Huck Finn?”!
It’s not worse. The line in The Dilemma is totally harmless contextually in comparison to how loathesome that line from The Hangover was to me…it wasn’t funny in the least, and the studio should KNOW better than to let that slip through when there were no doubt plenty of other choices for that line that would have actually worked better within that scene and been equally vulgar and childish without sounding hateful.
Some guy IS publishing an edition of “Huck Finn” sans ‘N’ word
I think it was a joke, American.
When I was growing up the word “gay” meant you were happy and merry, does that still apply? I sure hope so.
So the word gay is now classified under slur? Are we going to have to start calling it the G-word?
All of the G-word people I know have terrific senses of humor and perspective, and they weren’t outraged in the slightest by a dumb character in a bad movie using certain terminology that emphasized, within that context, both his personality type and the sales strategy he was trying to apply.
It would be really condescending if this was another case of the paternalistic, watchdog media turning a blind eye to the era of widespread tolerance we live in and patting a minority group on the head, as if to suggest that they’re too weak or unsophisticated to think for themselves.
God bless Ron Howard for not groveling at the feet of the base opportunists, who acted accordingly by demanding an apology tour and swift, unconditional censoring of his work. I think it was Mark Twain who said that “Censorship is like telling a grown man that he can’t eat a steak because a baby can’t chew it.”
Nikki is one of my journalistic heroes, and it saddens me to hear her join in on this clarion call. I get an Orwellian shiver any time that language police break out their batons.
As one of those G-word people, I would say that “gay” is not a slur any more than your name “Jon” is. However, using “gay” to describe stupid thing you hate, that’s upsetting. Just like you’d probably not like it if everyone said “that’s so Jon” to describe things they hate.
I would suggest Jon, that unless you are gay, you not comment on the situation. You can’t generalize all gay people by something one friend of yours said.
As a Green Hornet fan from day 1 (or 1966, actually), a GH movie CAN work with a great story, some style and panache. Rogan is the complete opposite of that and this project has been “nails on a chalkboard” ever since it was first announced.
I’ve waited 40 years for THIS abortion??
And every piece of promotion was worse and worse.
Why don’t they just give the Batman franchise back over to Adam West??
Seriously, the only way to go with GH was a period movie with someone like Jon Hamm in the lead. The fact that anyone could possibly think any other approach would work, well…small wonder Hollywood movies generally suck.
Stop ramming ur PC-ness down our throats, the term gay can have two meanings, it didn’t always refer to being homosexual, describing a car as gay in today’s context means lame not homosexual, everyone under 40 knows this, when you say black mold is bad for you are you condeming African Americans, language is ever changing, fight real bigotry
Both true grits’ were equally good.
Now, Please give us a donation to buy groceries to prepare meals with on Sunday mornings to give to the Homeless!
The opening day of “The Green Hornet” is $11.1 million dollars. In what universe is that a soft opening? Keep in mind that this movie is geared toward teens who will show-up throughout the weekend. Although the reviews are leaning negative, the word-of-mouth is positive, so this thing should have legs. As for “The Dilemma”, they’ve got to be counting their blissings. It is so bad Ron Howard is seemingly keeping his name out of the ad campaign. But I wouldn’t count this one out yet. Vaughn has been in many terrible comedies over the past few years that have been resoundingly leggy. Even “Fred Claus” with a similar opening found its way past 70 mil.
LIGHTEN UP PEOPLE. If Vince Vaughn had said “only homos drive electric cars” then I could easily understand why there would be a campaign to have that line deleted from the movie: an openly anti-homosexual comment with no purpose or meaning. However, saying a car is ‘gay’ (in my opinion) doesn’t really warrant an attack on freedom of speech… people need to calm down or find something better to do with their time.
The Velvet Mafia/P.C. Squad would disagree. See how they pinklisted Isaiah Washington for using the word “faggot” off camera.
i’m looking forward to the 3D version of “mr. ed”.
Hi Sony,
I was going to see the Green Hornet, but the only showings near me were in 3D. Therefore, you did not get my money.
Besos,
TL
What I’m most annoyed about in Green Hornet isn’t that they chose an obscure superhero and expected the masses to react to it, nor that they totally mis-cast Seth Rogan in the lead, though both of those things are laughable. What I’m really sick of is hearing about that stupid “Black Beauty” car. If I saw someone drive up in that, I would say, “What a crappy clunker.” Oh wait, that is what I said when I actually saw that thing in real life. Maybe a car enthusiast would like it, or some Melrose hipster might think its neat in a retro way, but … geez, couldn’t they have found something better?
Whether good or bad in quality how can anyone say that a 4 day t,otal of in or around 40 million is bad especially in January, Seth rogen shows he is a draw and this makes close or just over 100 million domestic and the same overseas pretty good for something that’s been in development hell
Seth Rogan is not a draw! It’s called lack of other options. Since all the screeners are being passed around like mono on spring break, many are NOT going to pay to see on the screen. A chubby, slovenly, pot smoking “superhero” is NOT attractive to look at, nor is he very funny.
Agreed. The problem, plain and simple with this movie is that somehow marketing came onboard without adequately digesting the research. Since when does research come back saying audiences would enjoy seeing Seth Rogan in a superhero blockbuster?