Friday, 10 July 1998

WEEKEND PREVIEW

Armageddon week two is here... the moment of truth. You know, I do this every week, but rarely do I discuss one of the guiding principals of box office: The Second Weekend Rules. It's this simple. As much as we like to think the first weekend tells us the future, as much as we like to think the weekdays leading up to the second weekend are great indicators, as much as we use calculators, we don't know jack until the second weekend. If Armageddon drops only 30 percent this weekend, it may do the $160 million-plus that Joe Roth (Disney Movie King) is predicting. But if it's a 50 percent dropper, as the rest of us seem to suspect, then look for it to stay in the mosh pit of moderate hits with Deep Impact and Godzilla. (Second place, 48 percent drop to $17.3 million). So, who is the new champ? Same as the old champ. Lethal Weapon 4 should manage to pull in around $23 million for the same old, same old first-place finish. (They always &#^@ you in the drive-thru!) And look for a bigger opening than many are predicting for Small Soldiers. Let's say $16 million.

Dr. Dolittle should hold up well enough for a $12.8 million third week, pushing past the $85 million mark and taking the fourth spot on the Top 10. In the five spot, it looks to be a rugged battle between Mulan (which should fall by about 35 percent to $7.5 million) and the new kids' film, Madeline, which has been unceremoniously dumped into the marketplace by Sony. I'll bet on Mulan to win this one, and I will live with my fear that I may be overestimating Madeline by a few million. Filling out the Top 10, Out of Sight fights for its life, The X-Files fights the future and Harrison Ford (Six Days, Seven Nights) fights Jim Carrey (The Truman Show) to stay in the Top 10. Don't look for any of these pictures to stay over the $4 million mark. And if numbers continue as they have in the last few weeks, don't be too surprised if The X-Files is drops from sight here. The X-Files total, which looks to be about $80 to $85 million, is a surprise, but it shouldn't be. The longer I spend this kind of time examining the numbers, the more I realize history is almost always right. And the singular phenomenon that is Titanic is more and more impressive every week.

THE GOOD: After waiting an hour later than expected for the Small Soldiers premiere screening to end, we finally got Stan Winston, Henry Rollins, Dick Miller and Dionne Warwick to chat with us at the post-party. Check out the transcript here.

THE BAD: Christina Ricci, who looked great in a slinky, royal blue jumpsuit, dissed us. Just wouldn't come on-line. I guess she's been getting media advice form Vincent "The Brain" Gallo, who directed her in the grossly overrated and ego-driven Buffalo 66. Oh, well.

THE UGLY: Not Cheri Oteri. You know, the crazed cheerleader from "Saturday Night Live." She stopped by for a quick chat, worrying the whole time that she wasn't going to be funny enough. She was. But the surprise was that she looked so much like a movie starlet. It's one of the great oddities of this job that you get to take a close look at the people you cover. You get to know who has great skin and who has fake boobs. But the one thing that always shocks is eye color. So many actors and actresses have really beautiful eyes that never come across on TV or are well lit enough in features to see their real color. So, Cheri has great eyes. That's all I'm trying to say. She does a cameo in Small Soldiers and plays "The Mayor" in Inspector Gadget, which she's shooting now with Matthew Broderick and Rupert Everett. And she let us know that The Cheerleader is going on hiatus for a while. "Leave them wanting more, not less," she told me.

TWO MOVIES EQUAL: Small Soldiers + Armageddon = Small Armageddon. Plastic soldiers come to life and fight back when a small child tries to use Comet to get them clean. Led by the voice of Bruce Willis, who loses all his hair to the scrub brush. Demi Moore as the G.I. Jane, who takes half of Bruce's body as part of the doll divorce settlement. (She takes the torso, which leaves the Bruce character with his head and his brain closer than ever.) Special appearance by Steve Buscemi as the voice of Malibu Psychotic Ken.

JUST WONDERING: Will you all go see a movie for its soundtrack if it's not a movie that's based around the music? Small Soldiers has such hot names as Bone Thugs N Harmony, Wyclef and Queen Latifah. Armageddon has Aerosmith. There's Something About Mary has a great retro soundtrack. City of Angels is a smash with new songs by Alanis Morrisette and Goo Goo Dolls. Do these call for a trip to the movies or just the record store?

BAD AD WATCH: It's killing me to see Sony using pull quotes from the amazing Ron Brewington in TV ads for The Mask of Zorro. I really enjoyed the film, which is as corny as Kansas in July but twice as sweet, and I'm pretty sure they could have gotten someone who isn't such a quote whore to say something nice about the film. Perhaps a lesson of this summer is that reviews from the meaningless are pretty much meaningless. Opening a movie is about creating a "must-see" audience and those kind of committed moviegoers see right through pull quotes from guys like Brewington.

ARMAGEDDON SPIN WATCH: Disney was able to take the day off from spinning as the Armageddon soundtrack, driven by the Aerosmith single, "I Don't Want to Miss a Thing," hit the top of the album charts. Congratulations! Of course, Aerosmith frontman Steven Tyler was the first person to spin his involvement in the film, when, after being jeered at the Cape Canaveral premiere for donning an Armageddon cap, told the crowd, "Hey! My kid's in the movie. I gotta do this!"

READER OF THE DAY: From Scott T: "I saw Lethal Weapon 4 last night and I must say that Mel, Danny, Joe and company are definitely too old for this crap. Jet Li makes an impressive American debut, and Chris Rock is good for a few laughs, but everyone else seems tired. The main problem seems to be the script that sometimes lapses into sitcom-like situations. The direction is somewhat lacking, as well. There is no flow. The plot is almost negligible. There are some good, if not unbelievable, action scenes. The most irritating aspect of the movie is the character Leo [Joe Pesci]. I can't remember if this character was appealing in the second film, but he certainly has outstayed his welcome. His character seems to be a variation of the one he played in Gone Fishin'. If I were he I wouldn't want to remind anyone of that mess. The sad thing is you can tell they had a great time making the movie. It's too bad they didn't bother to find a story the rest of us could enjoy as well. This movie, like the recent U.S. Marshals, is fun to watch but is totally uninvolving and quickly fades from memory as soon as you leave the theater."

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E ME: News By The Numbers returns tomorrow. Send me your takes on the new films. And let me know what the people around you in the theater think of Lethal and Small (sounds like a Two Movies Equal). I know that you are unusually interested moviegoers, but what's the buzz?