'Hunger Games' may have a bigger weekend than 'Twilight: Breaking Dawn'

It's hard to imagine a female-driven, book-based franchise bigger than Twilight. Yet The Hunger Games should open far above the first Twilight's opening. In fact, it's on track to beat The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn, the fourth film in the vampire romance series. What accounts for The Hunger Games' astounding tracking numbers?

One, a wider variety of people are embracing the movie. Breaking Dawn had 36% interest among younger women, Hunger Games has 45%. Among women over 25, 29% expressed interested versus 27% for Twilight. The trend is even more pronounced among males. 28% of males under 25 are interested in Hunger Games, versus just 10% for Breaking Dawn. Only 8% of older males wanted to see Breaking Dawn, but 20% are interested in Hunger Games. The additional interest from males and younger women could push the movie to a $100 million opening. Within a week, Lionsgate could have its highest-grossing film ever.

There's also a more varied plotline. Unlike Twilight, The Hunger Games has action and romance. Its love triangle (a la Twilight) is sandwiched within between an original, futuristic action plotline. These aren't young kids having car chases. They're young kids who have been compelled to fight to the death. For people who are sensitive to realistic motivations, a demographic that may include more females and males, The Hunger Games delivers.

Finally, people are expecting to be wowed. Like the Harry Potter series, the Hunger Games series is filled with action sequences and fantasy elements that just beg to be created on-screen. A big reason fans wanted to see the Harry Potter series was in order to see how the movie interpreted and re-created its magical creatures and buildings. Hunger Games is inspiring the same anticipation.

The Hunger Games comes out on Friday, March 23. American viewers can relish the fact that the PG-13 film didn't require any digital removal of blood, like the U.K. rating board demanded for it to receive a "12A."

 

Two,

'Twilight' lingers, with a third week in the top spot

By Sarah Sluis

The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn Part I kept its spot in first place for the third week in a row. The vampire romance earned another $16.9 million for a total of $247 million. That puts the blockbuster slightly behind the previous two installments, but a second sequel tracking just 5-10% less is actually cause for celebration.

The Muppets grabbed second place by sinking 61% to $11.2 million. The modestly budgeted movie has already earned $56 million in total, more than the reported production costs. However, this weekend consisted solely of holdovers from Thanksgiving, so the family film should have held much better.

Hugo had a quiet start in just 1,277 theatres. This week it added 563 locations while dipping just 32% to $7.6 million. With a 94% positive rating, good word-of-mouth should be forthcoming. This weekend, I ran into someone who went to see Hugo last weekend, only to decide against buying a ticket because it was only showing in 3D, and she'd never seen a 3D film. Another friend quickly jumped in to explain that the 3D is a big reason why the movie is so great--word-of-mouth. Still, this shows that a certain segment of adults who like quality films by auteurs like Martin Scorsese haven't warmed to the idea of 3D.

Besides The Muppets and Hugo, four other family-targeted movies crowded the box office. Arthur Christmas fell 39% to $7.3 million. Happy Feet Two earned $6 million with a 55% drop. Jack and Jill defied its 4% positive Rotten Tomatoes rating and stayed in sixth place with a 45% dive to $5.5 million. Finally, Puss in Boots is hanging on in ninth place with $3 million and a 60% decline.

Awards season films are in full swing. The NC-17 drama Shame debuted with $36,000 per screen in ten locations. The strong debut indicates that maybe the NC-17 rating isn't the death knell it used to be. Sleeping Beauty, which also focuses on the seedy aspects of sex, earned $5,000 per location in two places, a much softer opening.

The Weinstein Company is working its magic on The Artist, which earned .2% more than last week as it moved from four to six locations. Its $34,000 per-screen average indicates that its silent, black & white throwback isn't as hard of a sell as everyone thought. The distributor's other release, My Week with Marilyn, topped $1.1 million by pulling in a $4,800 per-screen average in 244 locations.

The most successful of the specialty releases right now is The Descendants. The George Clooney-starring dramedy earned $5.2 million and the seventh-place spot, while still playing in just 574 theatres.

This week will add just two more wide releases, New Year's Eve and The Sitter. The specialty field will be more crowded, with Young Adult, W.E., We Need to Talk About Kevin, and Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy joining the fray.

Why is Bill Condon directing 'Breaking Dawn'?

By Sarah Sluis

Over at Summit, the decision-makers have made an interesting left turn in the Twilight series: hiring a "prestige" director. While Catherine Hardwicke, Chris Weitz, and David Slade, who have helmed the first three installments, all have well-regarded indie movies under their belt, the final choice for Breaking Dawn is none other than Bill Condon. Weitz was an Oscar nominee, but Condon has actually been nominated twice and won once.

Condon is a writer/director who helmed Dreamgirls, Kinsey, and Gods & Monsters. He also wrote the screenplay for Chicago, the Oscar winner for Best Picture. Condon wasn't the only director with a history of high-profile, artsy films to be recruited for the final two installments (most likely Breaking Dawn will be split into two films--why not double the revenue?). Summit apparently approached Stephen Daldry (The Reader), Gus Van Sant (Milk), Sofia Coppola (Lost in Translation) and Fernando Meirelles (City of God) before settling on Condon as the frontrunner.

Perhaps Summit feels that since its audience will be a few years older by the final films, they'll expect more from the movies. The plot for the final movie appears more complicated, too [SPOILERS AHEAD]. The Wikipedia synopsis reveals that Bella gives birth to Edward's child in the final book. In order to prevent the child from dying, they must turn her into a vampire, making the baby a uniquely sentient being that the author herself thought would be difficult to bring to screen. Maybe she just hadn't seen The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, though, to be honest, I found the old-baby in that movie really creepy-looking.

In the meantime, Twihards will have Eclipse to look forward to this summer (less than a year after New Moon) and production stills from Breaking Dawn when it starts filming this fall.