‘The Winter Soldier’ ices the competition

The Avengers effect was on full display this weekend as Captain America: The Winter Soldier blew its predecessor out of the water, not to mention the other films currently playing in theatres, with a $96.2 million debut. That tallies out to a 48 percent improvement over the first Captain America’s opening weekend haul, and falls just shy of the wildly successful Iron Man’s $98.6 million bow in 2008. Since The Avengers premiered in summer of 2012, subsequent films featuring Avengers characters have enjoyed great success, prompting pundits to coin the term “The Avengers effect.” To wit: Iron Man 3’s debut was up 63 percent over pre-Avengers Iron Man 2, while Thor: The Dark World enjoyed a 30 percent bump over its predecessor. If Captain America: The Winter Soldier roughly follows the same theatrical trajectory as The Dark World, it should end up banking around $230 million in total. With audiences (64 percent male) awarding the movie an A CinemaScore grade, The Winter Soldier’s hold should prove strong in the weeks ahead.

Coming in way, way, practically subterranean (subaquatic?) below Captain America, Noah landed the weekend’s No. 2 spot with a $17 million gross. Down a whopping 61 percent from last weekend, Noah has so far earned $72.3 million.

For its part, the weekend’s No. 3 earner, Divergent, has raked in $114 million to date. It earned $13 million of that total this weekend.

God’s Not Dead continues to testify to the power of the faithful: The film added an additional $7.7 million to its cume that now stands at $32.5 million.  Clocking in at No. 5, The Grand Budapest Hotel continues to testify to the appeal of Wes Anderson: The film raked in $6.3 million. Its cume thus far tallies out to $33.4 million.

Halle Berry’s maltreated Frankie & Alice, which has been ready and waiting for theatrical release since 2010, finally debuted this weekend. Unfortunately, interest in the flick, for which Berry earned a Golden Globe nomination in ’10, was wanting. The movie earned just $350,000 from 171 locations.

On the positive end of the specialty spectrum, Jonathan Glazer’s Under the Skin starring Scarlett Johansson raked in $140,000 from four theatres (two in LA and two in New York City), which tallies out to a nice per-theatre average of $35,000.

Can the Captain break an April record?

Captain America: The Winter Soldier flies into 3,938 theatres today, by all indications readying itself for quite the stunt landing. This latest installment in the increasingly crowded Marvel cinematic universe has already broken the record for most advance tickets sold, according to Fandango. Overseas, the film has grossed more than $100 million.

Can Captain America break $100 million at the domestic box office this weekend? Between advance sales and positive reviews (87 percent fresh on Rotten Tomatoes) it’s certainly possible, although most pundits are predicting slightly lower returns, in the still-magnificent $80-$90 million range. The Winter Soldier has a few things going for it: The return of Avengers crossover characters Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson) and Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson) as well as an association with the familiar S.H.I.E.L.D. organization (itself the subject of a TV series – media hybridity at its best), and the introduction of a new hero, Falcon (Anthony Mackie). The WWII period setting that dominated much of the first film has been swapped in favor of a contemporary Washington, D.C., backdrop. An ultra-modern conflict involving wiretapping, national security, and that thin line between necessary protection and unlawful invasion of privacy also lends the movie a topical boost. Critics certainly like it. All in all, Captain America: The Winter Soldier is poised to set a new April record. (Fast Five currently holds the title of Strongest April Debut, having opened to $86.2 million in 2011.)

The much delayed Halle Berry vehicle, Frankie and Alice, also opens this weekend in limited release. The movie has been ready and yet collecting dust on the shelves since 2010, even though Berry won an award for her portrayal of a woman suffering from multiple-personality disorder that year. From distributor Freestyle Releasing, Frankie and Alice changed hands to current distributor Code Black, which is a division of Lionsgate.  Even given the draw of Berry’s name, it’s unlikely Frankie and Alice will earn more than $500,000.

Holdovers Noah and Divergent should round out the weekend’s top three just behind Captain America: The Winter Soldier.

Trailer for 'We Bought a Zoo' surprisingly sappy

By Sarah Sluis

Director Cameron Crowe hasn't made a feature film in six years. 2005's Elizabethtown fell flat on its face, a huge disappointment for those looking for another one of his memorable movies with heart, like Jerry Maguire, Almost Famous, or Say Anything... The trailer for his next movie, We Bought a Zoo, just released, but the movie footage portends a filmi that's more tears-and-hugs than anything else he's done before. Think Marley & Me, but with zoo animals instead of a pet dog. For that reason, I actually think this movie may be a commercial success on par with Jerry Maguire, though for different reasons. 20th Century Fox certainly seems to think so, too, giving the movie a prime Dec. 23 release date, the more perfect to capture intergenerational audiences in search of warm-fuzzies around the holidays.

Matt Damon plays a widower with two children. He buys a house that comes with a backyard menagerie addition. Scarlett Johansson appears to be his love interest, who may have come on initially to help out with the zoo animals. Elle Fanning is a sympathetic next-door neighbor and Thomas Haden Church Damon's father.

The trailer serves us classic Crowe-esque elements. Damon quits his job in a public way, a la Jerry Maguire. His father, giving Damon advice--"Attempt to start over. Sunlight. Joy"--reflects the spare, affected dialogue that Crowe has always done so well. Where the movie gives me pause is during this voice-over from Damon: "You don't even need a lot of special knowledge to run a zoo. What you need is a lot of heart." Okay, Crowe is a sensitive filmmaker who specializes in poignancy, but that crosses the line into cheesy. In general, I wasn't totally happy with the pacing of the trailer, especially when it came to the beats between jokes. As a big fan of Crowe's films, I hope that the trailer was overplaying the sensitive and the actual movie will be hiding more nuanced emotional content.