SPEARE'S TIPS - THE FILMS OF 12/4

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Shrykespeare
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SPEARE'S TIPS - THE FILMS OF 12/4

Post by Shrykespeare »

A lot to go over. First of all, for those of you who want to enter the December Regulars leagues, please let me know. This month’s themes and price list can be found here:

viewtopic.php?f=35&t=147

Also, if you haven’t heard, there is a brand new league set up by our Italian friends over at MMG. For details on how to join, go to this thread:

viewtopic.php?f=8&t=150

In a month’s time, we will be starting the Super Leagues all over again, so pay attention to the Boards and/or your Inbox, as I will be beginning the registration process very very soon. In the meantime, on to business as usual.

The first weekend following the Thanksgiving holiday is typically one of the worst box office weekends of the year, particularly for new films. Last year at this time, Punisher: War Zone was the only wide-release being shoved into theaters, and it was (rightly) spurned by audiences, bowing at only #8 with $4.2M. The year before that, the lame thriller Awake was barely able to crack the Top 5, bringing in only $5.9M. Can this year’s group fare any better? Well, based on star power alone, one would certainly hope so.

Given that all four of December 4th’s new releases will be showcased on just under or just over 2,000 screens, it will take a big effort to even come close to the November holdovers, even with a post-Thanksgiving swoon. The Blind Side actually IMPROVED on its opening weekend’s totals, and I fully expect it to take #1 this weekend after New Moon suffers another big drop. Even so, I expect those two films to pull in $22 million and $16 million, respectively, which is not bad for the first weekend of December.

The first film up this week, probably the one with the (ahem) best chance of success is Brothers, the latest offering from Lionsgate Pictures, and a remake of a Danish film of the same name. Directed by Jim Sheridan, who has had a very respectable resume so far with films like My Left Foot, In the Name of the Father, The Boxer and In America (we won’t even discuss Get Rich or Die Tryin’), Brothers tells the story of two, well, brothers (duh), Sam and Tommy Cahill. When Sam (Tobey Maguire) goes missing – and is declared dead - in Afghanistan, his wife Grace (Natalie Portman) and children find themselves leaning on Sam’s charismatic but unreliable ex-con brother Tommy (Jake Gyllenhaal) for support.

Of course, things take a truly dramatic turn when two things happen: first of all, Grace and Tommy start to fall for each other (uh-oh); and second, Sam returns home, very much alive, hoping to pick up where he left off (double uh-oh). Things escalate from there when it turns out that Sam isn’t exactly… all there, if you know what I mean. Mare Winningham, Sam Shepard and Carey Mulligan (An Education) co-star.

What few reviews for Brothers can currently be found on RT are decidedly mixed. Most agree that Brothers is well-acted and well-directed, but lacks the emotional connection that the original version did. Of course, most people who will want to see Brothers probably do not frequent Danish cinema, so I doubt that will have much of an impact. What WILL have an impact, however, is the genre: films that connect in some way to the wars in the Middle East have almost universally failed to find an audience. However, Brothers has been advertised fairly well, and I think it could debut as high as #3 (depending on whether the allure of 2012 has worn off yet). It will run you only $7 in the December Ultimate leagues ($6 in Box Office), for what I ultimately (heh) believe will bring you three Top 5 points, no PTA, $28 million and a decent PTA. Not bad, but I think you can do better.

Second up this week is Armored, the latest from Sony Screen Gems. Delving into the tough, hard-bitten world of – wait for it – armored car drivers, this film boasts a fairly decent cast that includes Laurence Fishburne, Matt Dillon, Jean Reno, Columbus Short, Skeet Ulrich, Amaury Nolasco, Fred Ward and Milo Ventimiglia. Armored is directed by Nimrod Antal, who struck out in 2007 with the clichéd thriller Vacancy (but whose 2003 film, Kontroll, was vastly underrated). The main character in the film is Ty Hackett (Short), a newbie guard who is put through his paces by the more veteran members of his team. However, when a big shipment of money, upwards of $42 million, is assigned to them, he is told by his pal Cochrane (Dillon) that they will likely get robbed – and they will be the ones doing the robbing. Boy, this economy…

Turns out just about everyone is in on it, and they have a foolproof plan to get the money without drawing suspicion. Of course, when a cop (Ventimiglia) shows up unannounced, everything goes pear-shaped, and Ty decides that he can’t embrace the Dark Side anymore. From there, it’s a game of survival as Ty tries to get himself and the cop away from his extremely pissed-off former colleagues. (This is not a spoiler, this much was in the trailers.)

Armored has gotten a tremendous amount of advertising in the last few months, but will it be enough to make a splash? Given the weekend and the low screen count, I kind of doubt it. It costs $7 and $6 in the December leagues (exactly the same as Brothers), but I doubt that its OW will crack $10 million, which means it ultimately is not worth its price tag.

Even cheaper is Everybody’s Fine, another remake of a foreign film (in this case, Italian) brought to us by Miramax. This holiday-themed family feel-good movie stars Hollywood veteran Robert DeNiro as Frank, a widower who would traditionally spent Christmas with his three grown kids. But since the death of his wife, he finds that the distance between he and them has grown larger and larger. Finally, when all three of his kids (Drew Barrymore, Kate Beckinsale and Sam Rockwell) cancel on him at the last moment, he decided instead to go and visit each of them. And it turns out that their actual lives are quite different from the lives they tell him they live.

Early reviews of director Kirk Jones’ (Nanny McPhee) latest project have been promising. Almost all believe it to be a rather generic story (and a bit overdramatic at times), but all agree that it is enjoyable and well-acted, especially by DeNiro, who turns in his “best performance in years”. Nobody’s re-inventing the wheel here, but at this time of year, this is just the kind of feel-good movie that a lot of people like to watch.

So why have I seen little or no buzz for this film? At this point, I don’t believe an OW of more than $6 million is in the cards for Everybody’s Fine. It’s only $6 in Ultimate, but for no PTA or Top 5 points, would you really want it on your slate? Yes, its current IMDb rating of 8.7 (with only 200 votes) is impressive, but a film has to have more to offer than that for me to take it. You’re better off taking something just as cheap with better prospects, like The White Ribbon or The Young Victoria.

Finally, we have Transylmania, which is bargain-basement priced at only $2 in each league. The long-awaited (yeah, right) sequel to the 2006 comedy National Lampoon’s Dorm Daze 2, Transylmania follows a group of less-than-intelligent American collegians who decide to spend a semester abroad, and end up at the only “university” that will take them: Razvan University, deep in the heart of vampire country, in eastern Europe.

Shot entirely on location in Romania (the home of Transylvania), this film that will probably consist of eighty-eight minutes of dumb schtick and two minutes of actual comedy (most of which were in the trailer). Why it didn’t go straight-to-DVD like the last American Pie is beyond me. About the only thing I can think to recommend this film is that it is still tentatively listed as being a “wide” release on Box Office Mojo, which probably puts Transylmania ahead of the rest of its $2 competition in Box Office leagues. But only just.


My predictions for the weekend of December 4-6, 2009:

1. The Blind Side - $22 million
2. Twilight: New Moon - $16 million
3. Brothers - $11 million
4. 2012 - $10 million
5. Armored - $9 million

Well, that will do it for me for another week. Next week, the respectability factor of December improves radically with the release of Invictus, the latest outing by Hollywood icon Clint Eastwood, starring Morgan Freeman as former South African president Nelson Mandela. Also up to bat is Did You Hear About the Morgans?, a comedy about an estranged couple (Hugh Grant and Sarah Jessica Parker) who must rebuilt their relationship in backwoods Wyoming courtesy of the Witness Protection Program. After two weeks of limited release, I'll finally talk about The Princess and the Frog, Disney's latest animated neo-classic. And finally, I’ll say a few words about The Lovely Bones, the long-anticipated return to the big screen of LOTR director Peter Jackson, who is adapting the best-selling book by Alice Sebold.

Later!
Happy 60th birthday Jet Li! (4/26/23)

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Re: SPEARE'S TIPS - THE FILMS OF 12/4

Post by Buscemi »

I don't see Brothers making more than $6 million on opening weekend. The trailers make it look like Stop-Loss 2 and compared to titles like The Hurt Locker, this film already looks like a relic of the type of Iraq movie that Hollywood thought would work but didn't.

Meanwhile, Everybody's Fine may outopen it simply because it's not a cliched-looking relic of the Hollywood Iraq.
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W
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Re: SPEARE'S TIPS - THE FILMS OF 12/4

Post by W »

I don't know, Brothers kind of looks Oscarish to me...
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Re: SPEARE'S TIPS - THE FILMS OF 12/4

Post by BanksIsDaFuture »

I think Brothers look terrific and I've been waiting for it since I saw the trailer back in July.

I thought Armored would do well, but it has no buzz at all. It'll probably fizzle out completely.

Also, The Blind Side probably won't drop that much. Still could get above $30M this weekend.
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Re: SPEARE'S TIPS - THE FILMS OF 12/4

Post by Buscemi »

I just watched the trailer to Transylmania. How does stuff like this go nationwide while Trick 'r Treat and [REC] go straight to video and Let The Right One In and Teeth die in limited release? It boggles the mind.

Anyways, the film will be lucky to hit $1 million opening weekend or a $1,000 PTA. Best guess: $400,000 opening weekend and gone by the next week from all theatres.
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Re: SPEARE'S TIPS - THE FILMS OF 12/4

Post by J.I. »

BanksIsDaFuture wrote:Also, The Blind Side probably won't drop that much. Still could get above $30M this weekend.
Impossible. I'm just hoping it cracks $20 million.

thswrestler160
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Re: SPEARE'S TIPS - THE FILMS OF 12/4

Post by thswrestler160 »

yeah at my theater blind side didnt do even close to half of the business it did last week. also armored only did like 30 ppl

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Re: SPEARE'S TIPS - THE FILMS OF 12/4

Post by BanksIsDaFuture »

Well, everyone thought it was possible for it to improve by 17% in it's second weekend, so a small drop in its third is not very far-fetched.
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Re: SPEARE'S TIPS - THE FILMS OF 12/4

Post by undeadmonkey »

I think Blind Side will pass $20M this weekend, which would make it the fifth movie this year to have a 3rd weekend with a $20M+ amount, joining T2, Star Trek, Hangover, and Up. Anyone think that Blind Side will surpass $250M like the other four did?

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Re: SPEARE'S TIPS - THE FILMS OF 12/4

Post by Geezer »

LOL was that a serious question?
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Re: SPEARE'S TIPS - THE FILMS OF 12/4

Post by undeadmonkey »

Yes it was serious, I dont think it'll get to 250, but I do think it will get to $200M. It has Christmas season coming up and potential Oscar nominations will help as well.

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Re: SPEARE'S TIPS - THE FILMS OF 12/4

Post by Geezer »

I'd be utterly shocked if it crosses 175, if it even gets there which would mean a seriously long crawl. Great movie, but too much competition coming up.
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Re: SPEARE'S TIPS - THE FILMS OF 12/4

Post by BanksIsDaFuture »

Well, The Blind Side is already at $130M and is still pulling in $20+ each weekend. $200M looks to be in sight. Especially because it has no competition until maybe Christmas Day.
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Re: SPEARE'S TIPS - THE FILMS OF 12/4

Post by Geezer »

It dropped 49% this weekend to that 20 million number. At that rate its got about 20 million total left from its weekends, and about 12 or so from the weekdays, which would be a little over 160, 15 mil shy of my ceiling. Those may be conservative estimates, but even still, it would have to be 40 million better than them to hit 200. I just think that with Princess, Invictus, Morgans, and the little film called AVATAR coming out, its going to keep getting hit pretty hard. Its been a monster out of nowhere so far, but the competition will eat it alive starting this week. Invictus is direct competition, and Princess will take away families. Not to mention Sherlock and Alvin will finish it off entirely. I'm sticking with my 175 absolute ceiling.
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Re: SPEARE'S TIPS - THE FILMS OF 12/4

Post by Buscemi »

Invictus will be a box office disappointment. The last three Eastwood historical projects have been box office disappointments.
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