Golden Globe nominations: A whole lot of 'Whaaat?'

By Sarah Sluis

So maybe this hasn't been the strongest year for movies. But does that really justify the Hollywood Foreign Press nominating the flop The Tourist in three categories? When I outlined the film's dismal box-office prospects the Friday it opened, I wondered if Angelina Jolie and Johnny Depp would be enough to save the film. Well, it earned just $17 million opening weekend, but the star wattage of Jolie and Depp was enough to blind the Foreign Press Association to its negative reception stateside. I imagine the dialogue going something like this--"We need Depp and Jolie on the red carpet--we can't disappoint the people running E!'s Red Carpet show!" How big of a joke were The Tourist's nominations? They "drew audible laughter from the crowd of press and publicists assembled at the Beverly Hilton for the pre-dawn announcement," according to THR.

The other big "What" came from the HFPA's total shut-out of The Coen Brothers' True Grit. I don't see the movie until tomorrow, but it's currently tracking at 93% positive on Rotten Tomatoes. The Tourist? 20%.

Another big shut-out, but one that will receive less attention, was Sofia Coppola's Somewhere, which received zero nominations. Perhaps they didn't like the movie's jabs at press conferences and foreign awards shows? Stephen Dorff and Elle Fanning both turned in solid performances, but at the very least a writing or directing nomination was deserved. Never Let Me Go didn't receive any nominations (though it was better than many nominated films), but that's less of a surprise as its early, October release shows that Fox Searchlight wasn't putting too much faith in it for awards season.

The Hollywood Foreign Press did make a couple of good decisions. It nominated Ryan Gosling and Michelle Williams for Blue Valentine, one of the best movies I've seen all year. Jennifer Lawrence also got a nod for Winter's Bone, an Ozarks drama that's quietly powerful. But really, a lot of these nominations are a joke. The silver lining? The star power will make for an entertaining broadcast, and smart people betting on winners in awards pools may just get lucky.

'Saw 3D' a cut above 'Paranormal Activity 2'

By Sarah Sluis

Despite projections that competing horror flicks Saw 3D and Paranormal Activity 2 would be neck and neck, the newer content won out this weekend. Saw 3D opened to $22.5 million, with 92% of the figure coming from 3D screens. Billed as the "final chapter" of Saw, it remains unseen whether the seventh film will be the last, especially since the movie outperformed Saw VI's opening weekend by $8 million.

Paranormal Activity 2 dived 59% to $16.5 million in its second weekend, though the sequel's high opening weekend and weekday activity has already pushed the film to a healthy cumulative total of $65 million. It's just a matter of time before Paramount announces the next sequel.

Jackass 3D, with its similarly young, opening weekend-driven crowd, fell another 60% in its third weekend to $8.4 million, despite the fact that its gags could be called "frightening" by many of those squeamish around physical injury, along with gross-out moments that put reality show "eating challenges" to shame.

Adult fare held better. Geriatric action comedy Red descended 28% for a $10.8 million weekend. Secretariat slid 27% to $5 million, making both films look better than their opening weekends predicted.

The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest, the final installment of the Swedish thriller trilogy, opened slightly higher than its predecessor, earning $915,000 on a 153-screen release. That puts the movie on track to earn at least as much as The Girl Who Played with Fire, which is still playing in 33 theatres and has accrued $7.5 million in four months.

Conviction rose into the top ten in its third week, running up $1.8 million as it expanded from 55 to 565 screens. The per-screen average dipped from $5,500 to $3,200, a strong hold that helps make up for its lackluster first two weeks.

Documentary Waste Land eked out the highest per-screen average of the week with $11,600 on one screen. Just below, the French film Inspector Bellamy averaged $11,200 per screen on two screens. The indie film Monsters, despite its topical content, had a more mellow $7,000 per-screen average on three screens, though the sci-fi film's microbudget should help make up for a middling debut.

This Friday, the Zach Galifianakis-Robert Downey Jr. road trip comedy Due Date will go against Tyler Perry's artsy play adaptation For Colored Girls and DreamWorks Animation's tentpole release of animated 3D feature Megamind. Platform releases of 127 Hours and Fair Game will round out the crowded weekend. The end-of-the-year movie season has begun!

Friendly competition between 'The Social Network,' 'Let Me In'

By Sarah Sluis

Led by a press barrage and endless speculation on the film's awards prospects and accuracy, The Social Network will hit 2,771 theatres and, some say, earn in the high $20 million range. The semi-biographical movie follows the founder of Facebook, Mark Zuckerberg (Jesse Eisenberg), from his Harvard days to his

company's growth in Silicon Valley. Critic Dana Stevens at Slate exclaimed, "What a joy to sit in a theater and be engaged, surprised, challenged, amused." Under the direction of David Fincher and with the verbal stylings of Aaron Sorkin, the movie is a "social satire, a miniaturist comedy of manners, and a Greek tragedy; it bites off a lot, at times more than it can chew. But even the unmasticated morsels are pretty tasty."

A remake of the Swedish vampire film Let the Right One In, Let Me In will bow in 2,020 theatres. While many Hollywood remakes of foreign films aren't treated very kindly by critics,

this vampire horror film has gotten props from reviewers who applauded its consistency, if not its originality. "Not only does it refrain from softening or dumbing down the story of a persecuted youngster who finds his soul mate in a vampire," critic Maitland McDonagh praises, "it incorporates additional material taken from John Ajvide Lindqvist's deeply disturbing source novel." It seems director Matt Reeves (Cloverfield) borrowed something good and, harder, kept it good.

The much-delayed Case 39 (2,211 theatres) starring Renee Zellweger will go head-to-head with Let Me In. Both films have been tracking in the $10 million range, and with slightly different

audiences--Case 39 has been attracting Hispanic audiences while arthouse lovers want to catch the foreign vampire film remake. Interestingly, the two films center on innocent/violent girls. In Let Me In, a boy befriends a vampire girl, while in Case 39 Zellweger adopts a girl who turns out to be evil.

After being available on iTunes for almost a month, Freakonomics will hit 20 theatres. If the documentary performs well, it will quell fears that opening multiple windows diminishes, not intensifies, box-office returns. Critic Ethan Alter found the film uneven, with some segments stronger than others.

Two of next week's films, romantic comedy Life as We Know It and feel-good horse racing film Secretariat, will offer sneak peeks on Saturday in roughly 800 theatres, hoping to get a leg up on positive word-of-mouth. Studios don't always release the earnings from these sneaks, but they could tip the scales during their openings next Friday.

On Monday, I'll circle back to see The Social Network's impact on returning films such as Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps and The Town, and see which horror-thriller, Case 39 or Let Me In, lured more audiences.