October 14, 2002

Howdy…

After six hours on the road and a breathtaking Dolphins-Broncos game that reminded me why I watch football on 20 weekends a year, I am exhausted.  So, the full Mill Valley report will come tomorrow.  And I have to go back and look at what I wrote about Punch Drunk Love, because I don’t think I called it worthless crap… just a piffle.  But I am finding myself accused of changing my tune.  Hmmm.   In the meantime…

Oscar column – A lot of the mail seemed concerned about who was or was not on the list.  The list, beyond Best Picture, was for locks alone.  So, while I believe in Sam Jackson or Al Molina or Bebe Neuwirth in Tadpole, etc, etc, etc, they are not locks.  The one Best Picture possible that I forgot was The Quiet American.  Oops.  I’ll make up for it in a couple of weeks. 

As for Nicole Kidman in The Hours, please keep in mind that the studio’s campaign determines category 99 percent of the time… and at this time, Paramount’s Oscar maven has Nicole listed as a Best Actress candidate.  And, as if she needed any more push than her excellent work, Kidman did a post-screening Q&A for BAFTA members last week… they liked her… they really, really liked her.

Speaking of Sam – I didn’t get to see Sam or Ashley or any of the gang on the set of Blackout, the new thriller from Phil Kaufman.  Sadly, there was no time to invade that part of NoCal.  But word has it that things are going swimmingly and that there is a real fondness between the director and Ashley, Sam, Andy Garcia and the entire crew.  It sounds like a very happy show. 

White Oleander winners – I love winners.  I hope you do too.  The list can be found here. Congratulations to all of you… especially you overseas winners for whom the postage costs may outweigh the value - retail, not emotional – of your prizes.

And now, back to business…

TOO MANY MOVIES:  I am loathe to repeat what Len Klady laid out so effectively in yesterday’s column. Yes, Len’s box office analysis goes up on Sunday afternoon… if you are a home reader, make sure to check it out.  And if you are an office reader, get a home computer already… what are you, Amish?)

But still, the weekend at the box office was kind of like a remake of Armageddon where Bruce Willis is hired to make the asteroid hit earth… just quietly. 

The six wide releases grossed, by estimates, just over $39 million.  Last weekend, Red Dragon grossed  $36.5 million by itself.  You do the math. 

Seems to me that The Transporter is the wide-release most likely to get a little traction.  The action film’s per-screen was 30 percent better than the next best in the group (Knockaround Guys) and the word-of-mouth should be very positive in some very specific circles.  White Oleander has a shot at catching on with some of the women who have gotten out to see My Big Fat Greek Wedding.  And, though they keep telling us how hip it is, the future of The Rules of Attraction is mostly as a DVD freeze-frame wank fest… though the truth is, it doesn’t work all that well on that level either. 

Things quiet down a little next weekend, with only three wide openers and the expansion of Punch Drunk Love, which had the best per-screen of any film this weekend, with an estimated $76,000 per.  Also starting strong was UA’s brilliant Bowling for Columbine, which was second in per-screen despite being a documentary. 

Swept Away lived up to its name.

Among holdovers, Sweet Home Alabama will probably break $100 million by the end of next weekend, while Red Dragon seems sure to break the tape… but not until its fifth or sixth weekend.  Universal, Brett Ratner, Ted Tally and everyone else kind of got caught in a Catch-22 there… Red Dragon is not a story centered around Hannibal Lecter, unlike Hannibal or even Silence of the Lambs.  Red Dragon is about Will Graham.  But it couldn’t be that movie because Lecter is an icon now.  The huge opening came courtesy of Tony Hopkins’ face and vocal tones.  But they might have had a more successful movie if they had given up the ghost, much as Ridley Scott did in his confused but significantly higher grossing sequel.  They went Bond when they should have went Alien.  C’est la vie.

ADDED RULES:  Interesting story on Lion’s Gate’s internet effort on behalf of Rules of Attraction.  Like so many things, it is unfair to put all the weight on any new effort and it will be unfair to lay all the blame for the film’s failure to gross $10 million domestic.  Anyway, the story is here.

DATE SWITCH:  News broke late last week that Miramax would break the logjam and move Gangs of New York.  Then, news broke that Phonebooth was considering a date change due to the current rash of sniper shootings in the Washington/Virginia area.

Here’s my suggestion… move Gangs of New York to November 15, where it really belongs, and move Phonebooth – which is a good little thriller – to February, where it belongs.  It’s not like Phonebooth is an Oscar movie and it would do well to be free of all the commercial competition.  Gangs, on the other hand, would be even better on November 1, where it would face I Spy and Santa Clause 2… very different demos.  But on the 15^th, where there are suddenly 1500 or so screens coming available, it’s Harry Potter, period… and Gangs would give parents something else to go to the movies and see. The next weekend, The Emperor’s Club,  Friday After Next and Bond… again, not head-on competition.  Solaris hits on the 27^th.  But that’s two full weekends of servicing the adult audience before reaping the Thanksgiving benefit.  

C’mon, Harvey… it’s a genius move… admit it… you have one of the few movies that doesn’t need the extra month of promotion.  Journalists are wetting themselves, just waiting to play with the Gangs… and it would be impossible if Phonebooth weren’t moving… but fate and fortune smile on you, oh Jewish Movie Buddha.  Go for it.

P.S. TO SEARCHLIGHT:  In America… damn it!  Get it some late December dates…start screening the film in town… this is the year where you can really make something like In America happen.

AND ABOUT NICOLE AND ABOUT SEARCHLIGHT AGAIN:  Jonathan Glazer’s follow-up to Sexy Beast, called Birth, has Nicole Kidman set to star, but Fox Searchlight will not be home to the film after New Regency, with which Fox Sr. has a first-look deal, dropped out.  Coming to Glazer’s rescue is Fine Line.  It used to be that a guy like Glazer would be held onto like a vestal virgin by his “discovering” studio.  Things change. (The Variety story is here.)

EDDIE’S NEW HOME:  Eddie Murphy has a studio deal for the first time since the grand old Paramount days.  And this time, the studio is DreamWorks.  It’s a first-look and you never know what that really ends up meaning these days, but file it away after reading the Variety story.

MAXIM-UM:  On Thursday, the New York Times’ David Carr back-end announced the deal between New Line and Maxim Magazine to work together towards making movies.  Unlike magazines like The New Yorker, there is no actual content to mine in the laddie magazine.  But, like Artisan’s recent use of the National Lampoon brand on the completely unconnected Van Wilder, it is easy to imagine Maxim’s Tomcats 2: The Next Humiliation.  (Of course, it’s the wring studio, but you get the idea.)

Sounds like a contest to me!!!  No prizes are currently available, but come up with some great new ideas for this enterprise.  How about “Freddy Versus Jason’s Horny Little Sister” or “Lord of the Cock Rings” or “Lost In Space With Heather Graham Without Her Spacesuit”?  Come on… you can top those!

(Read the story here).

P.S.:  The deal might have more serious consequences and I reserve the right to discuss the issue more seriously… some other time… after seeing “Maxim Presents Austin Powers in The Woman With Really Tight Clothes, But No Evidence Of Natural Female Parts.”  Can you airbrush an entire movie?

READER OF THE DAY:  A great, interesting letter from AB POSITIVE:  “An interesting post-script to your musings last week on the future of Disney in general and Eisner in particular. I just got the new 'Beauty and the Beast' 2-disc DVD set and was struck by the slant taken in the supplemental features. In the many featurettes on the second disc, Eisner pops up on several occasions to speak about how proud he is of this movie, but it's odd how the supplementals give the impression that the movie's success and the revival of traditional Disney animation in the early '90's was mainly down to him and ROY DISNEY. Not once during the feature commentary, and only once very fleetingly on the documentaries, are the words 'Jeffrey' and 'Katzenberg' EVEN MENTIONED! And one can't help but wonder if some sort of point was being made there..... clearly resentment still rules the Eisner regime eight years later, even to the point of not giving clear credit where it's due!”

E ME:  What’s it all about, Alfie?