Friday, 27 February 1998

WEEKEND PREVIEW
Is it a coincidence that when you enter Dark City, you find a place with no water around? No water usually means no boats, but not this weekend. Titanic may actually dip below $20 million for the first time this week, but The Crow director Alex Proyas' Dark City is unlikely to beat the boat. My estimate is that it will scare up $14 to $16 million. For any of you that were feeling the need for a new movie from the cast of "Friends," David Schwimmer turns up in Kissing A Fool, which should have a hard time taking third place from The Wedding Singer, but could open in the $7 million range, beating out Good Will Hunting in its 13th week. Impressive. The wildcard this weekend is Krippendorf's Tribe. As I reported earlier this week, sneak preview attendance was light in L.A., even in multi-plexes that normally sell out 80 percent of their screens on Saturday nights. But that may just be L.A. I like Jenna Elfman and Richard Dreyfuss a lot, but I'll say Disney has a $5 million opening weekend stiff on its hands.

THE GOOD: Titanic's numbers are awesome across the globe. After six straight weeks of grossing at least $55 million outside of the U.S., Cameron's revenge is number three of all-time in international gross with more than $460 million. Add in domestic totals and Titanic will pass the $900 million mark sometime this weekend.

THE BAD: It's hard to imagine that everyone who wants to see The Full Monty has already seen it, but it can't seem to break the $1 million weekend mark since its Oscar driven re-release. It's experienced the smallest award boost of the five nominees.

THE UGLY: Dark City is the most beautiful movie of an ugly place you might ever see.

TWO BAD MOVIES EQUAL: Senseless + Deep Rising = Deeply Senseless. Anthony Hopkins is Sigmund Freud. Jim Carrey is Kirkegaard. Hilarity ensues when this duo fights over the meaning of life. With Sharon Stone as Golda Meir and Carrot Top as himself.

JUST WONDERING: Did this column degenerate into a playground fight for a couple of days there or was it just me? (If your answer is yes, my apologies.)

BAD AD WATCH: Originally, Dangerous Beauty was maliciously destined for this slot, with glowing pull quotes from such major reviewers as the SSG Syndicate, GQ, Playboy and Dr. Joy Brown of WOR radio. But Siskel and Ebert came along and gave it "Two Thumbs Up." I've already crowned this film my "Worst of 1998 To Date" and I know Gene Siskel will give a positive review to most films that get him aroused, but Roger, Roger, Roger. What were you thinking?

READER OF THE DAY: From Steve of Taipei: "You won't believe this, but Burn Hollywood Burn already opened in Taiwan last week. Many people who bought tickets complained to the cinema manager and all of them got their money returned. Why? Because they thought it was a movie with Sly, Whoopie, and Jackie, but it turned out to be a silly movie. My opinion is that only entertainment news reporters can really know what the movie talks about."

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E ME: What do you think? Can Burn Hollywood Burn play outside of L.A. and New York? Will it even play on the coasts? Or will it be the next Hollywood home video guilty pleasure following "Pam & Tommy" and Showgirls?