November 25, 2002

Okay, so I was a little high on Bond…

Well, not a little.  $10 million or so.  So much for being bold.  Nonetheless, this is the first really huge jump for Bond box office since MGM moved back to pre-Thanksgiving, after the ill-fated move of the franchise into mid-December with Tomorrow Never Dies, which ended up going head-to-head with Titanic and Scream 2’s second weekend.  I think it’s reasonable to guess that had MGM put T.N.D. in the traditional mid-November slot. the opening would have been about $30 million, consistent in the history of the franchise.  Instead, it dipped by about a million, even though the final domestic gross rose by 18 percent.  Conversely, in T.W.I.N.E.’s return to November, the opening was $10.4 million higher, but the ultimate domestic total was only $1.6 million ahead of T.N.D. 

So what am I trying to say?

Die Another Day’s opening, an $11.3 million surge, can turn out two ways.  Either the leap is simply a reflection of the change in distribution over the three years since the last film and Bond could be headed for a domestic total of about $135 million, much like Minority Report, or the film could get really strong word of mouth, pushing the $100 million mark by the end of the upcoming holiday weekend, looking for all the world like the first  $150 million-plus Bond film, which would also make it the first $130 million Bond film.  I believe in the latter scenario. 

And don’t cry for poor Harry Potter.  The film’s estimated 52 percent drop is pretty average for a huge opener.  But with a current domestic cume just under $150 million, Potter 2 still has the five-day Thanksgiving weekend to fatten up on, while the first film’s second weekend was Thanksgiving weekend.  Look for The Chamber of Secrets to be filled with just under  $200 million domestic by the end of next weekend.  And there is still a Christmas bump to come.  All in all, it looks like this Potter will come up right behind the first installment, if it doesn’t manage to pass the original.  With the third installment expected to hit in June 2004, Warner Bros. will be licking their chops, as they can get away with reducing the marketing costs and to surf on the wave of the first two films.

8 Mile will pass the $100 million mark this week.  And Universal will tell you, truthfully, that this is an achievement of which they are very proud.  That said… in light of a massive opening weekend sampling of $51.2 million… 8 Mile looks like one of the biggest box office “disappointments” of 2002. 

Remember The Hot Button Rule, which doesn’t change whether I like or don’t like a film:  Opening weekend is never a good gauge of how audiences feel about a movie.  Look to the legs.

There are seven films that have opened better than 8 Mile this year.  The worst long-run performer in that group was Scooby Doo, which topped out at $153 million.  8 Mile is unlikely to get to $125 million.  Let’s lower the altitude a little… there are three $40 - $50 million openers this year so far.  We don’t know where the Bond movie is going, but we know that Ice Age was a leggy hit, totaling $176 million domestic.  But even the much shat upon XXX managed to make it to $141 million after its $44.5 million start. 

Both Eminem and Vin Diesel opened.  And they deserve credit for that.  But the next great box office stars?   They are going to have to deliver the totals next time around.  Or as some old fogies once sang, “We won’t get fooled again.”

REMAKE THAT!:  Someone was remarking to me about Steven Soderbergh’s history of remaking films… Criss Cross (The Underneath), Traffik (Traffic), Ocean’s Eleven and now, Solaris.  I took the sneary subtext of this as the lightweight Soderbergh bashing it was intended to be and shrugged it off. 

But I have to say, when I looked at the news of the weekend and found that Jonathan Demme was talking about directing the remake of The Manchurian Candidate after hitting a trouble zone with his remake of The Truth About Charlie… I thought again.  And then I saw that Antone Fuqua is talking about doing yet another variation on Strangers On A Train.  The Coen Bros. are remaking The Ladykillers.  Fincher is doing a Mission: Impossible movie.  Frank Oz is directing the remake of The Stepford Wives. 

I don’t know that there is anything really wrong with this picture, but…

NY TIME OUT:  I’ve been pretty supportive of the work of NY Times film industry writers Laura Holson and to a lesser degree, Rick Lyman.  But their Sunday Times piece, “Holidays Turn Into Hollywood's Hot Season” is a rather bizarre hodgepodge of facts and ideas that lead to… well, they don’t really lead anywhere, except to a completed story that got published. 

The story starts with the wildly inaccurate premise that the holiday movie season is the new summer, not only a key period, but so key that it supplants the summer.  No. 

When Rob Friedman says that “the heart of the holiday season represents the best 12 to 14 days of the year,” he’s right.   With two national holidays that mean that not only are the kids on vacation, but mom and dad are too, there is a lot of cash on the table.  Friedman also calls the season “the highest traffic period of the year.”  Again, absolutely right.  Because of awards, there are more movies opening in a shorter time frame than at any other time of the year.

But the premise stops making sense when stretched further.  When they talk about the rush of franchise films into this eight-week period, they overstate reality.  A dozen of the Top 50 grossers last year opened in the holiday season.  Twenty-four launched in the fifteen weeks of summer.  Last year, the two highest grosser came from the holiday season.  This year, the top two will probably be from the summer.  If Spider-Man were released November 1, it would still probably be #1.  When Potter 2 opens mid-summer, we’ll see just how big it is. 

Then there are the intellectual stragglers… allowing the argument that The Santa Clause 2 opened on Nov 1 to give it “extra playing days before Christmas.”  Bull.  The film couldn’t open Thanksgiving because of Harry Potter.  And they completely miss the irony that Disney built out that weekend-before Thanksgiving date as a franchise slot with Toy Story, 101 Dalmatians, Flubber, A Bug’s Life and Toy Story 2.  In fact, Disney’s specialty was the one-two November punch.  It started with early November re-releases of animated classics, then they started creating original films for the early slot.  Pairings like Ransom/101 Dalmatians and The Waterboy/A Bug’s Life worked well.  And then, WB took the early slot with Pokemon in 1999, while Disney rode Toy Story 2 in the later slot, The Grinch overshadowed 102 Dalmatians in 2000 and last year, Harry Potter made Monsters, Inc. into a very successful also-ran.

 

Then there are some disconnected ideas… trailer battles and an elaborate look at Maid In Manhattan.  How complicated is finding a date for Maid In Manhattan?  Bullock and Warners are reclaiming her Miss Congeniality date by placing Two Weeks Notice on December 20.  WB’s Analyze That comes out December 6.   Do you want to shove J-Lo to January again like you did with The Wedding Planner or do you want to use all the celebrity and a movie you believe in and go after Christmas?  Unless you want to chase Thanksgiving instead of Christmas, December 13 is your only date.

 

Yes, the holiday business is good and will remain good.  But Spider-Man made the case for summer loud and clear.  As soon as Harry Potter came along and took the opening crown with a $90 million start, Spider-Man smashed that number by almost $25 million. 

 

The upside of the holiday season is also a minor downside… it’s too crowded.  There is a reason why the first weekend of May, Memorial Day, July 4^th and the first Friday of august are the best dates in the summer season.  They are spaced far enough away from one another for a new film to get screens and marketing traction for a huge opening.  There are only holidays associated with two of the dates.  Of the Top Ten openings ever, only one, The Lost World, is actually on a holiday weekend. 

 

READER OF THE DAY: NOT JEW writes:  “David, you couldn't be more wrong. Any true Bond fan knows that 1969's "On Her Majesty's Secret Service" is widely considered one of the best in the series, despite George Lazenby, because it's the truest adaptation of the novels. And Timothy Dalton's first turn as Bond in "The Living Daylights" is as true

to Fleming's spy world as any of the series.

Did you see the same film as me? "Die Another Day" has the worst Bond theme song in its history, combined with Halle Berry's noticeable lack of talent (a Jinx spin-off? Yeah, sure), and absolutely wretched CG amid a climax that goes on forever without any interesting action choreography -- I mean, these are the same car chases from the films of the 60's. Brosnan is good and sincere, but come on. Listen to that damn theme song!”

And this from NOT MICHAEL JORDAN:  “Finally saw STAR WARS: EPISODE II: The IMAX Experience...

I have to ask...is it just me...or is EPISODE II IMAX a better movie than Episode II.

Don’t get me wrong, I am a huge Star Wars fan.  I enjoy Lucas’s work (which is why I’m writing you, not Jeff Wells) and even enjoyed Episode I and II, though I know they are both flawed works.  I will be seeing Episode III day one come May of 2005.

Now, I have been hearing a lot of stuff in recent years about how much Lucas has lost it.  But then again, he never claimed to be a great writer.  He once described writing the script as “torture” and “painful”.  He never thought of himself as a great Director, my belief is that it’s something he has to go through to get to the editing room.  Now, as an Editor, we may be talking one of the best in Film History.  He just has a way of cutting a scene, breathing life to it that is something to behold.  (The fact that Spielberg left help out with the Post-Production of Jurassic Park while he was in Poland shooting Schlinder’s List shows...particularly in the first T-Rex Attack, which has Uncle George’s fingerprints all over it.)

But his reputation as Editor is taking a bit of a beating in recent years, at least in my mind.  Watching the deleted scenes on the Episode I DVD, I had to wonder in two instances, just what was he thinking in excising them.  Watching the deleted scenes in the Episode II DVD, I thought the same thing.  The romantic subplot was better served by some of the stuff he trimmed, than by some of the stuff he left in.  Listening to the commentary material, it seemed as though Lucas was doing an awful lot of writing in the editing room, as he went along, as opposed to his typewriter.

Then, I watch IMAX...and it hits me.  It’s not Lucas the Editor that’s making these films suffer.  It’s Lucas-the-lack-of-someone-to-say-no-him that is making these films suffer.

Episode II IMAX had its shortcomings here and there, but it was a fast moving, wonderfully entertaining ride.  With twenty plus minutes to cut, there was simply no room for B.S.  All the Politics were cut.  The romance was cut in such a way that even though it was getting silly, the scenes didn’t linger long enough to be physically painful.  And they moved smartly.

In one case, one of the Edits matured the film a little.  The scene where Anakin is meditating on the balcony after the nightmare about his mother is interesting because Lucas edited out the shot of him alone in his own bed, writhing in agony.  When Amidala comes out to to talk to him, and says “I know you had another nightmare”...well, one could...if one wanted to...interpret the scene as meaning that they had spent the night together.  It’s nothing overt, but the mind could go there, and it lent a kick to the scene that wasn’t there in the longer version.

It was just leaner, meaner, tighter film.  I think I missed maybe two scenes total, which I can’t remember now.  Lucas needs to find someone who will stand up to him, and fire Rick McCallum who is too much of a yes man.

The experience was good.  All the stuff in the foreground and in close up looked as though I was watching in on a digital projection system.  But all the backgrounds looked either very still, very painted, or very pixilated.  I noticed more of a separation between the Actors and their backgrounds.  A faint white or black halo around their bodies at time.  Something that seemed seamless in the regular theater was way more noticeable.  Particularly the Kamino Ocean Planet Sequences and Gladiator Pit/Clone Battle Sequence.

Then again, why should I complain?  That kind of separation made these new-fangled Effects look more like the original Trilogy Effects at times.  I’m just a sucker for nostalgia at times.”

Finally, this from & THE COCONUT:  “Few comments on the new Bond. I'm fascinated at how so many loyal fans view the films so differently, what they look for in them. There's the troop who enjoyed the detached overkill of "Tomorrow Never Dies" and now "Die Another Day," rather than what I consider more intimate storytelling in "The World Is Not Enough" and the Dalton duo (though "intimate" in a Bond film is certainly a new definition of the word, perhaps "finesse" is a better word). Anyway, viewing the film tonight, I couldn't get over the massive CGI overkill, the same easy way out which I think marred last summer's Star Wars entry.  What I'd like to know is why some are calling this the best in decades? The performances are OK (the old Korean general was the only surprise) but nothing resonates and all the clever moments are confined to the first half. After that it's all pretty much numbing stuff... soulless sound and fury. Entertainment by way of distraction.

I still think TWINE is the underrated gem in Brosnan's bunch (Am I actually agreeing with Roger Ebert!?!). Not so much shit blowing up for the sake of shit blowing up, where Robert Carlyle and Sophie Marceau gave us a pair steeped in pain and anger... evil characters who didn't really like what they became.

And is it me or did "Die" play more like a far out sci-fi film than anything remotely applicable to our world? the tornado lasers? virtual reality training? DNA body reconstruction? invisible fucking cars!?! One of them would have been fine but there's only so much disbelief a person can take -- yes, even from 007! (Like "Moonraker," this is a Bond film that owes more to George Lucas than Ian Fleming.)

Still it's a James Bond year, and this has never been a bad thing. Here's hoping someone will wise up and hire Colin Firth for the next four....  rent "Valmont" and tell me I'm wrong.”

E ME:  Colin Firth? Didn’t he just play Dean Martin in a TV movie?  Oh, it was Jeremy Northam?  Doesn’t Colin Firth play Jeremy Northam?