Monday, 22 February 1999

WEEKEND REVIEW

Before I get to the box office, a few words about Gene Siskel. The work of judgement sometimes causes a certain loss of humanity. We can all too easily forget that those who live in the limelight live in the same fragile skin in which we all live. Gene Siskel lived on both sides of that reality. Let us all first remember the loss of a human. A 53-year-old man with a wife and three kids. He was more than a thumb. And less. He was a reflection of us. And that reflection, in tandem with Roger Ebert, became among the most important spokesmen for the commercial cinema, for better and for worse, that we have ever seen. With all the good work that Ebert will do for the decades to come, no one man (or woman) will fill the particular shoes that Siskel and Ebert filled. We have both lost a man before his time and have witnessed the end of an era. (For Roger Ebert's comments on Gene Siskel, click here.)

AND NOW, THE BOX OFFICE

The battle between holdovers Message in a Bottle and Payback is literally too close to call. As of Saturday night, the difference was $15,000 in Message's favor, with Message winning Friday and Payback taking Saturday. Both films are estimating a $10.3 million weekend. That will be broken, but not by much. Last Sunday, as it turned out, Message beat Payback by $425,000. But this Friday, the difference between the two films was one-10th as great as it was last Friday, so if that remains consistent, the final tally seems likely to have the two flicks separated by less than $100,000. Both of these films were way ahead of the pack, landing more than $3.5 million ahead of the No. 3 finisher, My Favorite Martian. I did get one positive letter about MFF last week. Just one. It is the only evidence I've seen of anyone (other than Ron "Outta This World" Brewington) liking the film. Yet, it dropped only about 20 percent in weekend two of its run ($6.7 million). That is outta this world. Blast From the Past's claim of a 13 percent drop (to $6.1 million and fourth place) strains credulity for much the same reason.

The only newcomer to break the $5 million mark was October Sky (an estimated $6 million), a film which I like more and more upon reflection. It is sappy. It is old-fashioned. It really works. The film opened on significantly less screens than any other top five (1,495 screens) and did only $34 less per-screen over the weekend than the top per-screen film, Message in a Bottle. Universal, which has been pushing this film among the critical community harder than any film in a long while, seems to believe that a long run for the film is likely. And I would agree with some reserve. Building a picture into an eight-figure box office hit without an awards ploy ahead is not easy. And this is, as I've written before, one of the strongest winter/spring movie seasons I've seen in years. A week against 200 Cigarettes, 20 Dates and 8MM may help the cause. But Analyze This, Cruel Intentions and The Deep End of the Ocean are on the way, chasing much of October Sky's audience. Anything less than a 500 screen bump next weekend is playing it a bit too safe.

The second five starts with Shakespeare in Love, which actually cooled for the first time, down approximately 20 percent with an estimated $5.8 million weekend. She's All That continued to stay pretty strong, with a 30 percent fall to $5.4 million and seventh place. It seems likely that "her" strength was reflective of the weak start for Jawbreaker, which managed only $1.6 million on just 801 screens. I guess that romance for the young ladies and some bitchy hot bods for the horny boys works better than bitchy hot bods all around. (Speaking of which, take a look at my chat transcript with Rose McGowan and Rebecca Gayheart, here.) There's no bitchiness in Office Space. Jennifer Aniston is on display, but she's exposing more flair (as in buttons worn at her Fridays-like place of employment) than underwear. The $4.3 million eighth place surely disappointed the Fox team which seemed to like the film more than they expected to once delivered. But that is the rub. The staff of grown-ups connected with a comedy that is really for working adults. Don't get me wrong. This ain't Casablanca. But maybe the adult audience will connect strongly with this one on video and cable.

Rushmore dropped just 7 percent to $2.7 million after adding 25 percent more screens. Unfortunately, this film still hasn't hit the $10 million mark. I'm sick of writing about how Disney blew this one and I'm sure that you are sick of reading it, but it burns me to see a film this good lost to the whims of a big machine. It just ain't right. Closing the Top 10, one wrong was made right as Saving Private Ryan added an estimated $2.4 million (down approximately 35 percent) to its total, hitting $203 million and taking its well-deserved spot as the highest grossing film of 1998, passing Armageddon. Speaking of quality, Best Picture nominees Life is Beautiful, The Thin Red Line and Elizabeth all finished out of the money, in that order. Ebb and flow. Ebb and flow.

THE GOOD: The Thin Red Line, which is closing in on $35 million domestic, continues to look like it will find a bigger audience outside North America. It snapped up the Golden Bear at the Berlin Film Festival this weekend. The film also took the award for Outstanding Achievement in Cinematography from the American Society of Cinematographers. (Now you know what that "A.S.C." means in the credits of films.) This could be an indication of the one award TTRL might take at the Academy Awards in a year when a four-Oscar® sweep could be the best any one film does. Meanwhile, back in Germany, Stephen Frears was named Best Director for The Hi-Lo Country, a film that has fallen off the face of the Earth after not winning many (I think it got something) critics awards or major award nominations. The film deserves better.

THE BAD: The Berlin Film Festival was home to more concerns about how the Asian financial crisis continues to make conditions for international film financing tougher and tougher. The European Film Market (EFM), which runs concurrently with the festival, noted a decided lack of new product from the once unstoppable Hong Kong industry. Like the American Film Market (The AFM), much of the business done is TV and not theatrical sales these days. There's not enough money in those sales to put bread on the table.

THE UGLY: There are already protests over the production of American Psycho up in Canada. The film, which started shooting yesterday, is upsetting me, too. I believe in freedom of speech as an absolute. This film should be made. But director Mary Harron continues to add sexy young women to the cast (Reese Witherspoon, Samantha Mathis, Chloë Sevigny and Guinevere Turner) who would seem to be inevitably involved in graphic depictions of sex and death with star Christian Bale. Sexy sadism might reach into a dark place in my psyche that I generally stay away from. But then Harron tells the Toronto Globe & Mail, "I'm not really interested in violence, so none of the ghastly things that are in the book make it into the movie." So maybe I don't have to worry about feeling too weird. But is that good or bad? I still feel that the book was a weak piece of writing, but the concept was as horrifyingly brilliant as A Clockwork Orange or much of David Cronenberg's work. If the transition to film doesn't fulfill that promise, it will be as disappointing and gimmicky as the book was.

THE CHAT: This Wednesday, Martha Plimpton, one of the stars of Paramount's 200 Cigarettes joins me for Movie Chat. 6:00 p.m. ET/3:00 p.m. PT. Only from roughcut.com. Only on Yahoo! Chat.

JUST WONDERING: Do you all get as much goofy e-mail as I do? I know it's not a movie thing, but I ran into a story on the Net hoaxes at C/Net Central and I enjoyed reading it so much, I bet you might be amused too. Click here to read it for yourself.

QUOTE WHORING USA: For My Favorite Martian: "Christopher Lloyd's best crazy character since, well, what was his last movie?" "Just when you thought Ray Walston was dead..." "Just when you thought Daryl Hannah left show business!" "Outta this world!"

HAPPY TRAILERS TO YOU: I was a bit shocked by the trailer for Drew Barrymore's Never Been Kissed. I think the film has made one huge mistake. Drew's beauty is a simple beauty. And yet, in this tale of a less-than-attractive young adult going back to high school for a story and becoming a high school princess, they decided that Drew's goofball style would be even simpler than the Drew men drool for. When she emerges from the cocoon, she doesn't look much different. To cover up her inner light, she needs to be a woman who makes the wrong fashion choices (see The Drew Carey Show's Mimi) and not no fashion choices. She needs to emerge by stripping down to the essential Drew, not dressing up to be the vixen. Of course, producer Drew may have felt that the stereotypical glasses and bad hair were too cliché. And she'd be right, but this choice just doesn't seem to work.

BAD AD WATCH: This is a fun one. To me, at least. James Wilson of Fox-TV, St Louis calls 8MM "This year's most powerful thriller." Well, he might even believe that, but it's still a Bad Ad Watch winner. Why? The only other film that can legitimately be called a thriller and that was released this year was Payback. Now, I haven't seen 8MM, so I can't make the comparison. For all of my deconstruction of Payback, I didn't really dislike it with abandon, but there is something off about winning a bold-headline, all-caps battle with just one other film.

JUST WONDERING 2: Does anyone actually get the sense that they are really releasing Just the Ticket this Friday? (This question is also the answer to another question -- Why are the Bond films the only movies that MGM/UA can make any money with?)

READER OF THE DAY: From Helen: "Two notes. I am so saddened by the death of Gene Siskel. I have watched the Siskel and Ebert show for many, many years. Through them I began to question critics and to really watch films. I learned much. I will miss their differences and their take on films. I know Ebert will still be around but it will not be the same. I, for one, will miss Mr. Siskel. Second, thank you for blasting the possibility of (Joel) Schumacher directing another Batman movie. I have been so disgusted with WB for letting Schumacher run his mouth that I have almost stopped seeing their releases if I possibly could. (Which hasn't been that hard of late!) I cannot imagine what they have for brains if this is true! Rocks, sawdust? It is beyond me how this big mouth has been allowed to run amok for so long! Thanks for listening. Hope you were able to get rested from Sundance. You still sound a little tired. Take care of yourself."

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E ME: I am still pretty exhausted and I'm afraid that it's not going to get any slower anytime soon. How about a word for Gene Siskel? And who would you like to see Christian Bale chop up

 

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