'New Moon' and 'Blind Side' gobble up a second helping

By Sarah Sluis

For the second week in a row, The Twilight Saga: New Moon took the top spot at the box office. Through the five-day Thanksgiving weekend, it earned $65.9 million, bringing its total gross to $230 million. The two-week total exceeds that of the entire run of the first Twilight movie, which never passed the $200 million mark. The blockbuster success of a franchise targeted almost exclusively to young teen girls should change the film landscape for years to come. Studios should be scurrying to replicate its success, especially given the comparative lack of female-driven blockbusters (Sex and the City and the slightly broader Mamma Mia! notwithstanding)

In second place, The Blind Side grabbed $40 million over the holiday weekend and even beat New Moon on Thanksgiving day because of its broader, family appeal. Many have compared the movie to Precious, but its heartwarming flavor is more reminiscent of last year's Christmas hit Marley & Me.

Old Dogs had a softer Thanksgiving open than a similar Disney comedy, Wild Hogs, opening at $24 million to Wild Hogs' $40 million. The first movie opened in a less competitive March timeslot, making the movie a bit of a scheduling victim, lost among the more appealing side dishes. The other male-oriented film, Ninja Assassin, opened two spots lower at $13.1 million.

As the holiday season kicks into high gear, A Christmas Carol was there to reap the seasonal cheer. The performance-capture tale went up 30% from last week, and 80% including the five-day weekend.

On the horizon, The Princess and the Frog had a promising debut in limited release, bringing in $1.1 million from just two screens thanks to high ticket prices because of a tie-in to character meet-and-greets and behind-the-scenes looks at the movie. When it opens wide on December 11th, girls who have grown up on the Disney "Princesses" merchandising line will have a chance to add another heroine to their princess collection.

Fantastic Mr. Fox, a rather different sort of children's movie, brought in $9.4 million over the five-day weekend. A quarter of the audience was under 19, suggesting the movie has greater appeal among adults and Wes Anderson fans.

The bleak The Road opened in the last spot in the top ten, earning $2 million from 111 theatres. Delayed for over a year, the movie has finally seen the light...but not much green. Unlike the last Cormac McCarthy book to be made into a movie, No Country For Old Men, this one will do considerably lighter business.

The next few weeks between Thanksgiving and New Year's will see a whole slate of quality, Academy-worthy films released and crowd-pleasing blockbusters (I can vouch for Up in the Air, but I'm still waiting to see Avatar like everyone else). Time to ring in the holiday season with some popcorn and egg nog.

'New Moon' to bring fangirls to the box office

By Sarah Sluis

The Twilight Saga: New Moon will open in over 4,000 theatres at midnight, 600 more screens than the first Twilight. Movietickets.com reported that over 2,150 screenings of the vampire romance have sold out, and the film has surpassed franchise films like Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter to become their #1 advance seller of all time. The reviews are coming in, but it's doubtful the fan base will even care. This movie is all about reliving the book with the added visuals of Robert Pattinson and Taylor Lautner, and the swoons and shrieks of your friends and fellow audience members. Plus, the sequel combines Vampire-mania with Werewolf-mania, throwing heroine Bella into a love triangle between the two man-creatures.

The Blind Side, which many have called Precious with a white, Republican savior (and thus appealing to that demographic) will open in 3,100 theatres. Sandra Bullock is in top form, but critic Michael Rechtshaffen wished that "Oher [the black homeless teen Bullock's character and her husband took in] had been presented as something other than essentially a large prop." Further separating itself from a movie like Precious, The Blind Side sticks to "proven inspirational sports-movie/fish-out-of-water

formulas while holding the inherent sociological issues to the

sidelines," despite the fact that "there also was room for more thought-provoking substance."

Planet 51 (2,600 theatres), a kind of E.T. in reverse, revolves around an astronaut who has landed in a suburban alien town. Grade-school joke: they think he's the one who's funny looking. The "Sci-Fi Lite" movie, according to critic Kirk Honeycutt, has "gentle jokes and cornball battles," and is geared more towards children than the adult-children mix more frequently seen in today's animated movies.

Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans opens in 27 theatres, and if you are near one--you need to see it. Genre-wise, it's a story of a corrupt cop (Nicolas Cage) in love with a prostitute (Eva Mendes), but director Werner Herzog takes this story places you have never even imagined. The screening I was in prompted several moments where everyone broke out in shocked laughter--whether it was because Cage was so outrageously bad, mad-scientist crazy, or because the movie did things you just aren't supposed to do on film, including alligator point-of-view shots.

Also moving into theatres on Friday is Red Cliff. Directed by John Woo, the American version compresses the two-film arc into one historical epic critic Daniel Eagan called "teeming with characters and plot twists," but "told in such a direct and vigorous style that it is never confusing."

New Moon is the hands-down winner for this weekend, but its narrower fan base is always a liability. Everyone will be watching to see how much the film drops Saturday and Sunday after its Friday open. Precious and Fantastic Mr. Fox will be expanding this runs, and Planet 51 needs to bring in audiences before The Princess and the Frog opens over Thanksgiving (though, thankfully, in a limited run).

'Winnie' and 'Selma' to highlight black history

By Sarah Sluis

With Precious and Invictus, come Selma and Winnie.

Now that Lee Daniels' Precious: Based on the Novel 'Push' by Sapphire is steaming ahead and showing all signs of being a breakout hit, the director has lined up his next project. He is in final negotiations to direct Selma, which is based on three civil rights marches led by Martin Luther King, Jr. in 1965. After three attempts (the first dubbed "Bloody Sunday" for its violent police action), demonstrators finally marched from Selma to Montgomery, Alabama. The five-day march, in support of black voting rights, is considered the apex of the civil rights movement.

The project has a lot going for it. Paul Webb, who wrote the script for Steven Spielberg's long-gestating Lincoln, penned Selma. While it has no cast, the movie already has a production start date set for this spring. Finally, Christian Colson, who produced big winner Slumdog Millionaire, will be heading up production. With a producer, director, and solid screenplay, this movie only needs a cast (which certainly will flock to the promising project) to get off the ground.

American audiences will see Invictus this December, which stars Morgan Freeman as Nelson Mandela. Now, Mandela's wife will get a turn. Jennifer Hudson announced she will star in Winnie, a biopic about Nelson Mandela's wife. While Mandela is almost universally beloved, Winnie doesn't have the same reputation. The couple separated after she was unfaithful, and her methods to abolish apartheid were considerably more violent. She almost served six years in jail after her bodyguard said she ordered him to kill a 14-year-old informer, but the sentence was later reduced to a fine. The contrast between Winnie and her husband is striking, and the filmmakers plan on showing her good and bad side. The project has a production start date of May 30th. Director Darrell J. Roodt has a South African pedigree, having helmed films such as Cry, the Beloved Country and Sarafina!

While Hollywood has been criticitzed for its portrayal (or lack of portrayal) of black characters over the years, these two projects, which come on the heels of two more high-profile films starring black actors, belie this notion. Three of the four are historical adaptations: Selma, Winnie and Invictus. Could this be the new trend? Because they're based in fact, they can be safer projects. By comparison, literary-based Precious is universal but controversial, difficult to watch, and has led many to cries of racism, stereotyping, and negative portrayals of black people, even as they commend the movie in other ways. But if Precious were a real person, I doubt these complaints of racism would be levied. Spike Lee's WWII box-office flop Miracle of St. Anna notwithstanding, historically based films may be the safest way to create a universal movie featuring black characters without having to deal with controversy that can swing the wrong way.

'2012' destroys the box-office competition

By Sarah Sluis

Disasters, it seems, are always in style. 2012 earned an astonishing $65 million over the weekend, exceeding expectations. All the CG carnage came at a steep price, $200 million in production costs, but the first-week international gross of $225 million, plus a cable deal with FX, has already steered the movie toward the black.

Coming in second place, A Christmas Carol dropped a merry 25% to $22.3 million. It also has $200 million in production costs to make back, so the movie is counting on steady audiences through the Christmas season to recoup its investment. IMAX screens alone brought in $3.1 million, continuing the trend of 3D/IMAX films being buoyed up beyond opening weekend due to the strength of the higher-priced screens.

Pirate Radio debuted right out of the top ten at $2.8 million. Because it released on just 882 screens, its per-screen average of $3,200 bested seven of the films in the top ten. The movie didn't flop, but it would have needed to at least double its per-screen average to be considered a success.

The real second-week winner was Precious: Based on the Novel 'Push' by Sapphire. The drama made the top ten while in release on under 200 screens. The only other film to do that in the past decade, according to Box Office Guru, was Paranormal Activity, which did so just weeks ago. Sometimes lightning does strike twice, but I suspect another explanation. The definition of "per-screen" may have changed--Precious was being played ten times a day, which requires more than one screen to achieve. Still, its $6 million gross and $35,000 per-screen average show the movie has a ways to go at the box office, giving it a promising forecast when it expands again this Friday.

Fantastic Mr. Fox debuted to a $65,000 per screen (though, again, playing ten times a day at each of its four "screen" locations). The stop-motion animated film will open wide over Thanksgiving. With its appeal to both kids and adults, it might be the crowd-pleasing choice, though it will have both Planet 51 and The Princess and the Frog to contend with.

This Friday, the next movie in the Twilight Saga, New Moon, will storm into over 4,000 theatres. Animated Planet 51 will provide some counter-programming for kids, and parents that don't qualify as "Twilight Moms" may want to catch feel-good The Blind Side after they drop off their rabid teenage girls at the theatre.

'2012' to blow up at the box office

By Sarah Sluis

Today, 2012 will bring disaster to 3,404 theatres nationwide. Filled with unbelievable near-death escapes, and a survival mechanism called the "atomic-age equivalent of Noah's ark," the movie's strong suit is that it doesn't take itself too seriously. With this framework, the implausibilities go down much easier. While crowds will turn out for the special effects, the disaster theme is getting old. Add in the recession, and the movie could play either way: "My world is already collapsing, so why bother to see civilization collapse?" or "Well, I should see it. It will remind me things could be worse." The doom-and-gloom spectacle is expected to open at $40 million.

A movie rescued and repackaged from its unsuccessful British release, Pirate Radio, will open in 882 theatres. Previously titled The Boat That Rocked, it bowed to a disappointing run in Britain at a considerably bloated running time. It was given to Focus Features, edited, and re-marketed, so its performance will be a reflection of the success of Focus' efforts.

Joining Where the Wild Things Are as a kiddie movie with a hipster, adult feel, Fantastic Mr. Fox opens in four theatres (NY/LA) before expanding in coming weeks. The stop-motion animated film employs a style less like Coraline and more like Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer: deliberately stilted. Our critic Ethan Alter called it "not necessarily...a great children's movie, but...a pretty fantastic Wes Anderson film." Having seen it myself, I can say it's fun to see Wes Anderson's signature style--his straight-on framing and penchant for stylized dialogue, to name two--melded with writer Roald Dahl's material and presented in stop-motion animation. By drawing in (perhaps confused) children, families, and adult Wes Anderson fans, the movie stands to make a buck without having to rob the three biggest chicken producers in town.

Opening in four theatres in New York and Washington D.C., The Messenger has already drawn warm reviews from critics, a promising sign given critic Justin Lowe's warning that the "delicate subject matter could be a tough sell in a marketplace still averse to accounts of the conflict; careful handling is required." By "gingerly [probing] wounds that are still healing with admirable empathy and insight," this war-themed film appeals both to soldiers and military families as well as those isolated from the impact of the U.S.'s wars.

Also opening today is William Kunstler: Disturbing the Universe (New York/Boston), a documentary about the civil rights lawyer who alienated almost everyone--including his two young daughters--when he started defending those guilty in the eyes of the American public, including an accused terrorist.

The kind of movie I would have enjoyed in high school, Dare, debuts today in New York and L.A. Though critic James Greenberg predicted most people won't see the movie until it hits cable, the high school-set movie is "a smart and well-observed entry in the genre [and] a cut above the usual hijinks."

On Monday, we'll see what kind of damage 2012 did on the box office, if Pirate Radio's re-marketing paid off, and if last week's big winner, Precious: Based on the Story 'Push' by Sapphire, can sustain its performance as it expands to 174 theatres.

Studios stacking the deck to create 5 nominees for Best Animated Feature

By Sarah Sluis

This year will be the ninth year of the Motion Picture Academy's "Best Animated Feature" category. Between computer animation, 3D premiums, and the incredible quality of films produced by studios like Pixar, the field will be as competitive as ever this year. Because of the volume of submissions this year, the Academy will likely boost the number of nominees from three to five. The bump in nominees happened once before, in 2002, and occurs when the number of eligible films is greater than 16. To be eligible, the movie must have a qualifying release and an Academy-produced average score of 7.5 (but on the odd scale of 6-10).

The 20 submitted features, along with my predictions, are below. The locks for nominations are bolded and underlined. Films with strong chances of being nominated are bolded.

• Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel: The first one made a surprising amount of money, though it did not secure a nomination. Don't count on the squeakquel receiving one either.



• Astro Boy: Without making a splash at the box office, a critical assent would come as a surprise.



• Battle for Terra: A clunker several years in the making. My guess to be excluded from the running.



• Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs: The crowd-pleaser could surprise with a nomination



• Coraline: A lock for a nomination. Incredible story, visuals, and stop-motion technique. Read the review here.



• Disney's A Christmas Carol: Potential nominee, which would be a first for a film using director Robert Zemeckis' performance-capture technique.



• The Dolphin - Story of a Dreamer: A straight-to-DVD film given a qualifying run to boost the amount of eligible films.



• Fantastic Mr. Fox: Potential nominee. Wes Anderson received an Oscar nomination in 2001 for his screenplay of The Royal Tenenbaums.



• Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs: The first Ice Age was nominated, but the sequel was not. The third probably won't either, despite its status as the third highest-grossing film in international box-office history..



• Mary and Max: This adult indie film has Philip Seymour Hoffman and the winners of an Oscar-winning short behind it, but it might be too low-profile.



• The Missing Lynx: a small, Spanish film unlikely to receive a nod.



• Monsters vs. Aliens: If Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs is nomination-worthy, then so is this film.



• 9: An adult-oriented movie that could receive a nomination



• Planet 51: More likely to be a box-office winner than nominee.



• Ponyo: Disney-released Spirited Away, an anime film, won in 2002, and Howl's Moving Castle was nominated in 2005. Both were directed by Hayao Miyazaki. But some felt Ponyo fell flat.



• The Princess and the Frog: If this movie resonates with viewers and Oscar voters, I predict it will be nominated.



• The Secret of Kells: The trailer animation looks uneven and not up to snuff.



• Tinker Bell and the Lost Treasure: Disney's straight-to-DVD release given a qualifying run to boost the chance on the nominees going to five.



• A Town Called Panic: The trailer looks cute, but only Sony Pictures Classics (The Triplets of Belleville and Persepolis) and the aforementioned Miyazaki films have has ever successfully secured a nomination for a foreign animated film.



• Up: a lock for nomination, and in all likelihood the winner. Read the rave review here.

Having an Academy-nominated film can certainly help boost DVD sales and rentals from inquisitive Oscar ceremony viewers (although with the DVD market tanking, maybe not so much). But this year, Up seems like a lock on the Animated Feature category. Press attention could be drawn away from the category as a whole, making nominee status not as valuable. Coraline, to me, is the only likely upset. Plus, with the Academy skewing older, the hero of Up, the old man, is one of their own. What's not to love? Even with five nominees, Pixar shows all signs of continuing their winning streak.

Len Wiseman goes from �Underworld' to �Nocturne'

By Sarah Sluis

Len Wiseman, who has been floating around different projects for the past year or so, is in talks to direct a pitch for 20th Century Fox "based on an original idea about a group of people who survive the end of the world and the mystery surrounding how they got to that position," tentatively called Nocturne.

The idea doesn't sound original at all. In fairness, they may be withholding the secret sauce. Considering the project is looking for writers, it's also possible they haven't figured out exactly what will be in the secret sauce either. Because Wiseman's been attached to a number of projects that haven't come to fruition (out of proportion, I think, to the amount of films he's actually directed), I'm skeptical of this project. Last year, for example, he was attached to direct Motorcade with Tom Cruise starring, but now that project will star Ryan Reynolds with Jon Cassar directing. He was also supposed to direct a video game adaptation Gears of War and Atlantis Rising, in which the famed city of Atlantis declares war on the world. However, this announcement does provide a good opportunity to rehash all the movies/television shows/books that have used the same plot point as Nocturne.

"Flash Forward": This brand new ABC show centers on an event where almost every person in the world has a vision of themselves six months in the future. Everyone abandons all activity and tries to figure out what their clue meant. It borrows a little bit from "Lost" and sounds strongly apocalyptic. It also is a little too similar to the "mystery surrounding how they got to that position" part of Nocturne's plot description.

2012: It's coming out this Friday, and has a soft spot for those that enjoy the architectural demolition derbies that come along with the apocalypse.

"Left Behind" series: There's a reason The Passion of the Christ earned so much money. A religion angle is not only plausible, but profitable. This popular Christian series, which was made into a movie starring Kirk Cameron, follows a group of sinners who are left behind after the Rapture for being unbelievers. It takes them some time to figure out what happened, and then to identify and usurp the Antichrist.

The Road: Coming out this fall. The apocalypse, but with two people against man-hungry cannibals with a side of post-apocalyptic depression.

The most interesting part of this spare plot description is that the characters themselves seem to be flummoxed about their position. Were they knocked out and woke up in a nuclear bunker? Did they get unplugged like in The Matrix? If it weren't for the fact that the "mystery" part was just used in "Flash Forward," I would be more forgiving of this pickup, but it will be up to the assigned writers to prove me wrong.