New Pixar trailer offers campus tour of 'Monsters University'

Drumroll, please. Pixar has released the first full-length trailer for Monsters University in the U.K., but thanks to YouTube, people in the U.S. can get a peek at Mike and Sully back when they were in college. This trailer gives the full rundown on the prequel. Back in the day, Mike and Sully were roommates. Who didn't like each other. But then, by working together, did. Disney had already released a teaser trailer in the U.S., and it's likely the full trailer will show up in front of an animated release soon since the film comes out June 21.

Because this is a follow-up feature, it's not so surprising that so much of the story is given away in the trailer. I still admire Pixar's famously nebulous campaign for Up, which Brave and non-Pixar release Wreck-It Ralph have also used, leaving major twists under wraps to surprise audiences. The trailer makes the movie seem
like a cut-and-dry story of rivals turned friends, but I wouldn't be
surprised if Pixar has a few tricks up their sleeve. One clip shows the young monsters on what appears to be a break-in mission, and there's also a genuinely scary monster we briefly glimpse. Perhaps those scenes will feature unexpected reversals and unusual characters?

Like Wreck-It Ralph, Monsters University will offer a strong nostalgia component to the parents accompanying their children to the theatre, which should also continue the animation house's trend of drawing in
non-family and date night audiences. Since Disney's acquisition of Pixar, it appears that both brands have changed. Disney movies have become more Pixar-like, especially Wreck-It Ralph, which seemed like an idea hatched in a Pixar think tank. Pixar went into Disney Princess territory with Brave, which had a similar feel to Disney's princess installment from just a couple of years ago, Tangled. Then there's been Cars 2, the financially successful Pixar franchise that fell flat among critics. Monsters University promises to have more heart than Cars 2, and many will welcome the chance to spend another 90 minutes in the charming world where monsters are just friendly creatures in search of scared humans.

 

'Identity Thief' rings up a $36 million weekend

Even with an East Coast blizzard that took an estimated 10% from the overall box office, Identity Thief spectacularly overperformed, coming up with $36.5 million over the weekend. That's a full $10 million over what must have been conservative estimates. Pent-up demand for an attention-
getting R-rated comedy helped drive up the weekend total. Though there have been plenty of R-rated actioners, the last R-rated comedy to open over $20 million was Ted, which came out over the summer. The Melissa McCarthy-Jason Bateman led comedy was a popular date-night choice and also brought in female fans of McCarthy. The fact that couples enjoyed the movie should be a positive sign this Thursday, when many dates opt for a movie to celebrate Valentine's Day.

Director Steven Soderbergh appears to have a hard time winning over both critics and audiences. Last year's spy-action genre offering, Haywire, was a critical success (80% positive on Rotten Tomatoes) that opened to just $8.4 million. Side Effects, an efficient noir, also pleased critics (85% positive) but again failed to bring in audiences. Its $10 million opening still falls
within the low range of expectations, but it's disappointing such a good film didn't have a huge audience to go with it.

Silver Linings Playbook continued another week of miniscule drops, dipping just 11% for $6.9 million. At $90 million cumulative total thirteen weeks in, it's just a matter of time before this romantic comedy tops $100 million.

Argo, which released 18 weeks ago, climbed 23% from last week to break into the top ten again with $2.5 million. This is the second weekend in a row it added theatres and upped its weekend haul. Many consider the Ben Affleck-led movie to have unseated Lincoln as the Academy favorite for Best Picture, so this will position the release well should it score at the Oscars in two weeks.

Top Gun 3D averaged $6,300 per screen at 300 locations for a total of $1.9 million. That's a nice chunk of funds. Paramount is releasing a 3D-equipped Blu-ray of Top Gun next week, so the theatrical release gave it an extra publicity boost.

Charlie Sheen-led A Glimpse Inside the Mind of Charles Swan III earned less in a weekend than Sheen can probably spend on one crazy night out. Two locations posted a $6,000 per-screen average, though perhaps the comedy will have better luck once it hits the Netflix crowds.

On Thursday, Valentine's Day, a trio of offerings will hit theatres: Safe Haven, a romance of Nicholas Sparks vintage, A Good Day to Die Hard for action fans, and teen supernatural romance Beautiful Creatures. The animated Escape from Planet Earth will follow on Friday.

'Identity Thief' set to steal the weekend

Melissa McCarthy's first headlining movie role, Identity Thief (3,141 theatres) should grab first place this weekend without resorting to any deception. The stars may be the best thing about this February comedy about a man whose identity is stolen by a woman. "A volcanic Melissa McCarthy
and dust-dry Jason Bateman elevate this weak-scripted but energetic comedy," our Chris Barsanti declares, but it's a qualified endorsement. The comedy "is about two-thirds
worthy of your money and one-third a waste of everybody’s time; in
other words, better than average for a major studio comedy these
days." The movie could earn in the mid-$20 millions, but the big x factor is the Northeast blizzard dubbed "Nemo" that could keep many moviegoers indoors. New York City alone counts for 8% of the U.S. box office, and a blizzard warning there that discourages travel may have a big impact.

"A crisp but low-voltage neo-noir," as described by Barsanti, Side Effects (2,605 theatres) is a great quality option for those who have already seen more of the Oscar nominees. Rooney Mara
stars as an anxious woman who turns to prescription drugs to help her when her ex-con husband (Channing Tatum) returns home from jail. It's supposedly director Steven Soderbergh's last film, at least for a while, and it serves as a "classy farewell," as well a reminder of "just how
few smart and unassuming genre films are being made these days." Side Effects should make it over $10 million, but not too far above that benchmark.

Top Gun will fire up its engines once again and release in 300 locations in 3D. The vintage Tom Cruise picture certainly has a following, but the question is if they will want to show up in theatres for a repeat viewing. Back in 1986, Film Journal International interviewed the film's producers,
which you can check out in our archives here.

Charlie Sheen plays a version of himself in A Glimpse Inside the Mind of Charles Swan III (2 theatres), which has a surprisingly appealing cast that includes Aubrey Plaza, Bill Murray, and Jason Schwartzman. According to THR's review by Deborah Young "the TV fan base who loved him in 'Two and a Half Men' and 'Anger Management' are really the only imaginable audience for this off-the-wall comedy," so don't get your hopes up too high.

On Monday, we'll see how if Nemo the blizzard wreaked havoc on the East Coast box office, or if enthusiasm from other markets helped make up the difference.

More 'Star Wars' films to go beyond new trilogy--but which characters will make the cut?

I want an Ewok film. After announcing that is was purchasing Lucasfilm and launching a new Star Wars trilogy, Disney has parceled out yet another piece of information. It plans to make standalone films set in the Star Wars universe. They wouldn't have any bearing on the direction of the trilogy, but would take certain characters or worlds from Star Wars and build feature films around them. This actually
isn't a new idea. Though many people's exposure to Star Wars has only been the feature films,  there have been animated series based on Star Wars as well as lower-profile features. The Ewoks have actually already appeared in the 1980s made-for-TV movies The Ewok Adventure and Ewoks: Battle for Endor, and the animated series "Star Wars: Ewoks."

Disney spent $4 billion on Lucasfilm, and a single trilogy is unlikely to recoup that sum--even with merchandise included. Disney is also planning more films as a way to hedge its bets with the trilogy. The concern now is not the trilogy's success, but timing. It may be easier to get a spinoff off the ground than a pivotal launch to a trilogy. If Star Wars: Episode VII ends up not releasing in 2015, it's likely another related movie will instead.

Screenwriter Lawrence Kasdan, who wrote The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi, is working with J.J. Abrams, the director of Star Wars: Episode VII, and Simon Kinberg (X-Men: The Last Stand, This Means War) on ideas that won't end up stepping on the trilogy's toes. Just as long as they don't make a spinoff featuring the most-hated Star Wars character, Jar Jar Binks, I think everyone will celebrate a Star Wars spinoff that gets the big-budget, tentpole treatment.

Assembling the cast for 'The Book Thief'

Like many kids, I was fascinated with the Holocaust and World War II growing up. Newbery Award-winning novel Number the Stars, which features a girl whose Jewish friend is threatened by Nazis, was required reading. Orphans have always been literary favorites, because these novels give their child protagonists independence that's uncharacteristic for kids. Combine that with living in a
secret hiding place, and the blend is absolutely thrilling--which is not to say that kids don't understand the gravity of the historical fiction or non-fiction they're reading. In recent years, enthusiasm for the genre hasn't died down. Now The Book Thief, which tops the "Amazon Best Sellers for Children's Holocaust Fiction" (yes, you read that category right, and it only covers the top 100) is being turned into a movie.

Sophie Nelisee (Anna Karenina, War Horse) will star as the title character, The Book Thief. The Munich-based foster child finds comfort and salvation in books during a time of war. Her foster parents, who will be played by Geoffrey Rush and Emily Watson, also take a Jewish man (Ben Schnetzer) into hiding. Tonally, the movie has the potential to be more Inglourious Basterds than The Reader. The book by Marcus Zusak is narrated by Death, and is filled with dark comedy that has drawn in adults and young readers alike. That may be enough to set this story apart from the large pack of novels covering the same topic.

Brian Percival of "Downton Abbey" is directing. Now that the leading cast is assembled, the Fox 2000 project will begin shooting next month in Berlin.

'Warm Bodies' heats up a cool weekend

At least teens had a good movie to go to this weekend. Viewers under the age of 18 gave an "A" CinemaScore rating to Warm Bodies, which debuted in line with expectations, to the tune of $19.5 million. People over the age of 18 lowered the overall score to a "B+." Much of the success of this zombie love story is owed to Summit, which has had plenty of experiencing marketing
supernatural romances to teens thanks to the runaway success of the Twilight series. They even did late-night Thursday screenings, which inched the movie's cumulative total to $20.03 million.

For a while, aging action stars were officially a thing (see: Taken, Red, The Expendables), but it could be that the market for these pictures has cooled off, especially when the stars are playing it straight. That could explain the poor debut of Sylvester Stallone in  Bullet to the Head, which came up with just $4.5 million. Sure, there were fewer audiences on Sunday because of the Super Bowl, but this also comes just weeks after Arnold Schwarzenegger's The Last Stand also had an opening in the single
millions, $6.3 million.

Still, Bullet to the Head did just fine compared to the opening of Stand Up Guys, which had a below-top-ten debt of $1.5 million. The limited release did have a higher per-screen average ($2,200) than Bullet to the Head, ($1,800 per screen), but that's not that big of a difference. Since Stand Up Guys went a more limited route, it has more of a chance to build an audience in coming weeks, however.

The Oscar nominee box office award of the week is a...tie. Silver Linings Playbook
showed a remarkable hold, rising from fourth to third place with $8.1 million, just 15% off from last week. Argo added 300 screens and went up 16% from last week for an additional $2.1 million.

Oscar-nominated documentary The Gatekeepers got off to a decent start, averaging $22,000 per screen in two locations. Koch, the documentary about Ed Koch, the former New York City mayor who died on Friday opening day, finished with a $20,000 per screen average on two screens.

On Friday, Bridesmaids breakout star Melissa McCarthy gets a whole movie to have fun in, Identity Thief, Steven Soderbergh directs the pharmaceutical thriller Side Effects, and Top Gun unleashes those fighter jets in 3D.

'Warm Bodies' should lead during Super Bowl weekend

The Super Bowl weekend isn't as big of a movie dead zone as it used to be. Not only is there a picture targeted at female teenagers, the usual counter-programming for the football weekend, but there are also two movies aimed at adult males, though business will likely be best for those on Friday and Saturday.

Warm Bodies (3,009 theatres) follows the path tread by Twilight: a creature that should be in a horror film (vampire, zombie) is actually kind, and ends up falling in love with a teen girl. But this iteration is not just a romance, but also incorporates elements of apocalypse movies, horror/action
films, and comedies. "If Twilight were funnier, had a more
proactive heroine and an uglier hero, it might be Warm
Bodies," I sum up in my review. While marketing a zombie movie that combines so many genres might have been a challenge, it appears that Summit has done a good job explaining the film and revving up interest. The Nicholas Hoult-led picture should approach the $20 million mark, a great start, especially with Valentine's Day coming up in a couple of weeks.

Sylvester Stallone "plays to his base" in a "gratifying return to the action genre," Bullet to the Head (2,404 theatres). With Sunday returns likely to be dampened by the Super Bowl, a finish in the $8-10 million range is
expected. Critic Daniel Eagan predicts fans will be happy, but younger viewers may find themselves alienated as Stallone delivers on the action checklist with an "efficiency that borders on
the impersonal."

Competing for the adult male audience, Stand Up Guys (659 theatres) stars Oscar winners Al Pacino, Christopher Walken and Alan
Arkin. The mobster comedy offers "an entertaining yet sobering portrayal of
not-so-wise guys who do not go gently into a no-good night. THR's Duane Byrge predicts it
"should play well with older audiences with a feel for the actors
and this flavor of humor." Without a lot of support and with another film angling for the same demographic, Stand Up Guys may only round up a few million.

There will also be some new Oscar-nominated films to check out. The Gatekeepers (2 theatres) an Oscar-nominated documentary that features interviews with former leaders of Israel's secret service, Shin Bet, offers a "complicated cocktail of a film sure to send audience members out of the theatre with heads abuzz and arguments a-popping," reports FJI's Chris Barsanti. All of the Oscar-nominated shorts will play at New York City's IFC Center, including the Animated Short Films 2013, Documentary Shorts 2013, and Live Action Shorts 2013. Queue up for a marathon viewing session!

Former New York City mayor Ed Koch just passed away, and the documentary Koch (2 theatres) offers an opportunity to remember and reflect on the leader. This "comprehensive" doc is no hagiography. "Made with the former mayor's cooperation," reports THR's John DeFore, it still gives "ample screen
time to those with harsh things to say about him" Sounds like as fair a shake as a politician can get.

On Monday, we'll find out which films scored the most points with fans over the weekend (and either celebrate or commiserate on the outcome of the Ravens vs. the 49ers).