'American Reunion' and 'Titanic 3D' bring audiences back to the '90s

This weekend is full of throwbacks. American Reunion, the fourth film in the '90s franchise to have a theatrical release, will open in 3,191 theatres. The comedy's "main sentiment is that it’s tough to recapture your youthful abandon when you’re thirty-something, no matter how immature you might be," critic Kevin Lally reports, unimpressed with the movie as a whole. Because this weekend has Easter, Passover, and the beginning or end of Spring Break for many of those in school, an opening of $20-30 million is expected.

Fifteen years ago, Titanic was a megahit. Director James Cameron's movie returns in 3D with a 2,717-screen release, including at least some theatres showing the epic in its original 2D. The critical response to the 3D version has been generally positive. New York magazine film critic David Edelstein offers detailed analysis of the use of 3D, noting that "Cameron’s foregrounds are strong, his compositions multi-tiered, Russell Carpenter’s camerawork limpid." Certain scenes are transformed by the use of 3D. The movie released on Wednesday, and has earned $4.7 million to date. Over the weekend, it could pocket another $20 million or so as nostalgia-seekers and young audiences seek out the classic historical romance, which is something like the Gone with the Wind of our era.

If The Hunger Games drops by half, it will still end up with just under $30 million, so there is a chance the futuristic picture will top the box office, depending on the performance of Titanic 3D and American Reunion. PG-rated Mirror Mirror should hold strong given its family-friendly subject matter.

We the Party, a high school comedy with a "welter of clichés," according to FJI critic David Noh, and a predominantly black cast, will release in 59 theatres. Whit Stillman's latest, Damsels in Distress, a "droll, sophisticated take on the dopey college-comedy genre," according to our Doris Toumarkine, will also hit theatres.

On Monday, we'll see if audiences went back to Titanic and caught the 3D version, if American Reunion did as well as similar reunion comedy Grown Ups and captured a nostalgic, raunch-seeking audience, and if The Hunger Games continues to reign at the top of the box office.