'Wolverine' has modest victory with $55 million opening

With so many big-budget tentpoles face-planting at the box office, all eyes were on the domestic performance of The Wolverine. But as it turned out, the Hugh Jackman-led superhero movie opened to $55 million. Sure, that's $30 million less than the 2009 opening of X-Men Origins: Wolverine, but great overeas performance, where the film has already earned $86 million, is helping to make up for this gap.

Fruitvale Station entered the top ten in its third week. After expanding into over 1,000 theatres, the fact-based story of a black man who was fatally shot in tragic circumstances totaled $4.6 million. That was enough for it to beat another expanding indie, The Way, Way Back. The lighter, coming-of-age dramedy totaled $3.3 million, another good number, especially since its release was about 20% smaller.

The rest of the top ten was returning releases. Most had drops in the 30-50% range, but one exception was the buddy cop comedy The Heat. The female-driven picture dipped just 26%, its smallest decrease to date. Positive word-of-mouth is often cited as critical for movies that appeal to women, and that appears to be the case here. Its fifth-weekend total of $6.8 million brings its cumulative to $141 million.

The To Do List had great reviews, but a lackluster opening of $1.5 million. The weak interest in the movie is disappointing, but perhaps it will do better in aftermarkets like VOD. Even if it earns several times its opening weekend, it may not break $10 million.

Woody Allen's Blue Jasmine had a much stronger opening, earning an out-of-the-park $102,000 per screen for a total of $613,000. That's a few thousand over the per-screen average of Midnight in Paris, Allen's biggest recent hit. However, right now Allen is playing to his core audience in New York and L.A., so it's a bit early to know if this film will approach the $56 million earned by his vintage Paris-channeling 2011 success.

On Wednesday, The Smurfs 2 will enter a field already crowded with animated features. On Friday, Mark Wahlberg and Denzel Washington will team up for action flick 2 Guns.

'Wolverine' sole new wide release in indie-dominated weekend

Audiences may be suffering from box-office fatigue, with too many tentpoles hitting theatres this summer, but The Wolverine (3,924 theatres) has one thing in its favor: it's the only new wide release this weekend. Sure, two other superhero movies have released this summer, Iron Man 3 and Man of Steel, but the sixth appearance of Hugh Jackman as Wolverine, although the smallest of the bunch, should top $60
million. The previous Wolverine installment, X-Men Origins:Wolverine in 2009, didn't get the strongest of reviews. Although this follow-up has earned positive endorsements from critics, including our Daniel Eagan, it will be an uphill battle to win over audiences. Eagan calls out the feature's "involving script, focused direction
and a powerhouse performance by Hugh Jackman," going on to note that the James Mangold-directed feature "isn't a
run-of-the-mill, effects-heavy comic-book adaptation—it's a solid
drama that's only incidentally about superheroes."

This summer has also yielded a number of strong specialty features. The To-Do List (591 theatres) is a bit in-between an indie and mainstream release. The 1993-set teen sex comedy stars Aubrey Plaza as a high school graduate anxious to get some sexual experience. The "sublimely entertaining female version of

American Pie," according to our critic David Noh, "goes just as far as most male-oriented
teen sex comedies, except its raunch and gross-out humor are
actually funny and, yes, fully empowering." CBS Films is keeping the release small, which will hopefully lead to packed theatres and positive word-of-mouth. It's only expected to open to $2 million, but it could be in for a long run as word spreads, just like last year's Pitch Perfect, which earned ten times its opening weekend.

In its third weekend, Fruitvale Station will expand into 1,064 theatres. That's an aggressive expansion, given the socially conscious drama was in just 34 theatres last week. The move into wider release may also be related to the Weinstein Co.'s upcoming release The Butler, which will open in just four weeks. Both focus on social justice and America's racial issues, albeit in different ways,
which could prove a challenge for the distributor.

The Way, Way Back will nearly triple the locations in its release for a total of 886 theatres. The comedy is so perfect for summer, you can almost feel the sand between your toes, and the casting of Steve Carell has helped bring more eyes to this coming-of-age tale. In three weeks, it's earned over $5 million, and this week should add a significant chunk to that total.

Also opening this weekend is Blue Jasmine (6 theatres). Woody Allen's features always open to sky-high per-screen averages, so his latest should open to at least $70,000 per screen. Allen's auteur status always draws his loyal crowds, but the question is whether his films will catch on with a wider audience, like Midnight in Paris did, or quietly fade out. Blue Jasmine has earned generally positive reviews (82% "Fresh" on Rotten Tomatoes), and its light take on timely subject matter, via its focus on Cate Blanchett, the spurned wife of a Bernie Madoff-like character, should propel it forward through the rest of the summer.

On Monday, we'll see if The Wolverine breaks the box-office curse that has plagued many of this summer's would-be tentpoles, and which of the smaller releases shows the most promise.

Sundance 2013: Acquisition deals soar despite the emptying Park City

The 2013 Sundance Film Festival, which is now on its 7th day, might be quieting down as the industry crowd starts heading back to the real world that exists outside the streets of Park City, yet from a sales standpoint, the noise remains steady as this year’s festival plays host to some of the most high-profile distribution deals in its recent history. As I was making my way to The Marc on Monday morning to attend the 8:30am screening of Richard Linklater’s Before Midnight (which is officially one of this year’s hottest titles, and surprisingly STILL without a distribution home) I was catching up with the latest tweets from prominent press, most of which were talking about Ryan Coogler’s Fruitvale, a tearjerker of a US Dramatic Competition title that has had three screenings in the previous two days and sold to The Weinstein Company for over $2M. My latest opportunity to catch this unforeseen hit (which instantly became the only film that mattered to press on Twitter) was later that afternoon at a Press & Industry screening, which unfortunately clashed with my plans to see Shane Carruth’s Upstream Color (his first feature since Primer in 2004), which I was enthusiastically told to definitely not miss by a friend from the Film Society of Lincoln Center. Having scored that hot ticket, I didn’t reshuffle my schedule to fit in Fruitvale, but also learned quite quickly that in Sundance, the wind might change direction at any given moment and one should be prepared for last minute change of plans.

Fruitvale was one of the first major deals that continued breaking in the news later on. I am including the distribution deals I am so far aware of at the bottom of this post, but noteworthy ones are The Way, Way Back from writer/directors Nat Faxon and Jim Rash which was sold to Fox Searchlight for almost $10M –a rather large sum for Sundance- according to a Deadline report; Jerusha Hess’ Austenland and John Krokidas’ Kill Your Darlings, both of which Sony Pictures Classics has bought; Jordan Vogt-Roberts’ Toy’s House that CBS Films closed the deal on; James Ponsoldt’s The Spectacular Now (one of my favorites of this year among the 21 movies I saw through Tuesday) which went to A24 and Joseph Gordon-Levitt’s directorial debut Don Jon’s Addiction that Relativity Media grabbed.
As important as it is to keep one’s finger on the pulse and to take every Harvey Weinstein spotting seriously (side note: I saw him leaving the Holiday Village Cinemas around 7pm on Monday), one should also trust his/her own instincts around which films to give priority to. I have already talked about the majority of what I saw during the initial days of the festival (check out both the day 1 recap and the weekend recap), so here is an account of everything I was able to catch on Monday and Tuesday, before my inevitable return trip hit earlier today.

Linklater’s Before Midnight somehow and miraculously not only lived up to my unrealistically high expectations, but also exceeded them. Eight years after the trilogy’s second installment Before Sunset, the creative collaboration of Linklater, Delpy and Hawke once again results in an extraordinary, dialogue-driven film which zooms into a couple’s intimate, frank conversations while reminding the viewers about the big world which they embrace and need to exist in. The magic of this trilogy –with its latest installment being the best of the three- is in its ability to make the viewer a fly on the wall. This kind of honesty in film, conveyed through long takes, tightly written dialogues with just enough breathing room and all-around grounded performances, is a rarity and a direct product of a visibly evolved partnership and strong trust between Linklater, Delpy and Hawke (which Linklater talked about in length during the post-screening Q&A), and I for one would like to see at least a Best Original Screenplay nomination awarded to Before Midnight in the next year’s awards season. After this festival highlight, I continued to conquer my screening schedule with Carruth’s Upstream Color, a deeply experimental and abstract work of art –or rather, artifact- on human paranoia of control, captivity and animalism (well, this is one of the million ways one can look at it) that certainly got a lot of respect from me without inspiring much desire to wrestle with its many layers. Lynn Shelton’s Touchy-Feely and Jill Soloway’s Afternoon Delight, both of which are Dramatic competition titles I saw in the second half of Monday, marked one of the highs and lows in this year’s festival for me, respectively. With Rosemarie DeWitt’s character as a massage therapist at its center, Touchy-Feely, an honest account of a family whose members dwell on the verge of potentially life-changing transitions, is a deceptively small film that finds its balance through its increasingly empowered characters, bringing Shelton’s subtle genius to life. On the other hand, Soloway’s Afternoon Delight failed to shine (at least for me) with its confusing tonal clashes, forced humor and dark twists, as well as its overtly self-important attitude toward its minor ambitions.

On my final day at Sundance, I started with two of the crowd-pleasing titles of the Dramatic Competition. Adapted from a novel by Tim Tharp, James Ponsoldt’s The Spectacular Now is a refreshing, beautifully-written film about a pair of high-school seniors, that is completely free of the disingenuous millennial snark and quirkiness that I started growing tired of in movies depicting this particular demographic. Both Miles Teller and Shailene Woodley are likely to go far in these roles (their characters are so honest that they instantly get under your skin), and the same can be said about the film’s director Ponsoldt as well as its writers Scott Neustadter and Michael H. Weber. Jordan Vogt-Roberts’ Toy’s House on the other hand, a hilarious comedy about a group of teens whose lives are turned into practical nightmares by the adults who surround them, provides a very different angle on a similar demographic. I personally would have preferred the comedic silliness to be tempered slightly, yet I still enjoyed this unique entry with all of its oddball characters.

The second half of the day, I fit in Sean Ellis’ World Cinema Dramatic Competition title Metro Manila, a poignant, slightly heavy-handed yet competently shot film about a family struggling to rise above the poverty line in a Philippine metropolis. And I concluded Tuesday's screenings with Greg Barker’s documentary (in US Competition) Manhunt: The Search For Osama Bin Laden (to premiere on HBO in May 2013), which made for a great way to bring Sundance to a personal end and transition back to the current film conversation which is still pre-occupied with the torture controversy around Kathryn Bigelow’s Zero Dark Thirty. Through archival footage and interviews conducted with long-time CIA analysts, director Greg Barker pulls off a responsible documentary that not only shines a light on the process of a two-decade-long manhunt (which started long before 9/11), but also challenges the approach to “war on terror”, which in his and his subjects’ opinions is currently trapped in a vicious cycle with no end in sight due to the inability and unwillingness of the public to understand the underlying reasons behind terror. In attendance during the post-screening Q&A –in addition to director Barker- were three of the film’s subjects: ex-CIA Operatives Cynthia Storer, Nada Bakos and Marty Martin, who received an enthusiastic standing ovation from the crowd. In response to my question about what each of them think regarding the controversy around the other Bin Laden movie currently in theaters, the CIA trio emphasized the complexity of the process in which a lot of techniques have helped with putting the pieces of the puzzle together. Then Marty Martin jumped in with an additional comment: “I can tell you that the film’s portrayal of Jennifer Matthews was completely inaccurate. She was a very serious woman in real life”, referring to the character played by Jennifer Ehle in Bigelow’s movie.

Following a very fun karaoke party hosted by Cavu Pictures (another Sundance lesson learned: karaoke is a popular form of late-night entertainment) where several of the filmmakers, Slamdance staff and a few prominent film critics were in attendance, it was time to call it a night, and call it a Sundance for now...at least until the news of the next distribution deal broke.

2013 SUNDANCE ACQUISITIONS TO-DATE

Relativity Media

Don Jon’s Addiction (Joseph Gordon-Levitt)

Fox Searchlight

The Way, Way Back (Nat Faxon, Jim Rash)

Sony Pictures
Classics

Austenland (Jerusha Hess)

Kill Your Darlings (John Krokidas)

CBS Films

Toy’s House (Jordan Vogt-Roberts)

Weinstein Company

Fruitvale (Ryan Coogler)

Radius-TWC

Concussion (Stacie Passon)

Twenty Feet From Stardom (Morgan Neville)

Lovelace (Rob Epstein, Jeffrey Friedman)

Inequality For All (Jacob Kornbluth)

A24

The Spectacular Now (James Ponsoldt)

IFC Films

The Look Of Love (Michael Winterbottom)

The Summit (Nick Ryan)

Sundance Selects

Dirty Wars (Richard Rowley)

HBO Films

Pussy Riot – A Punk Prayer (Mike Lerner, Maxim Pozdorovkin)

Magnolia Pictures

Blackfish (Gabriela Cowperthwaite)

Prince Avalanche (David Gordon Green)

Showtime Networks

History of the Eagles (Alison Ellwood)

eOne Distribution

We Are What We Are (Jim Mickle)