Friday Halloween scares off moviegoers

By Sarah Sluis

Halloween decimated the box office this weekend.  Returning films showed huge drops on Friday, and
new releases opened to disappointing numbers that they were unable to recoup on Saturday and Sunday.  #1 release High School Musical 3, for example, dropped 90% on Friday, earning around $1 million, but then dropped only around 40% from last week for both Saturday and Sunday, earning $14 million for those two days to bring its weekend total to $15 million.  With a Halloween-free weekend, the film would have been on track to make over $20 million.

Zack and Miri Make a Porno opened at #2 with a less-than-stellar take of $10.6 million.  As with other teen-oriented flicks that receive advance buzz for their lewdness (i.e. American Pie), web comments suggest that exhibitors took extra steps to prevent underage patrons from viewing the film, including checking IDs at point of entry, that might have affected the film's gross.  Zack and Miri will have competition next week with R-rated, less objectionably titled Role Models, which might cut into the film's ability to rebound next week.

Horror picture The Haunting of Molly Hartley earned $6 million at #5 (coming in below Saw V's $10 million take at #3).  Both films did comparatively well on Halloween, earning more than #1 release HSM3, but even the scare pictures earned less on Halloween than they did on Saturday and Sunday.

Changeling pulled in $9.4 million, earning $5k per theatre; however, in terms of a Clint Eastwood or Angelina Jolie vehicle, the results are underwhelming.  The film still has room to grow, both from
increasing the scale of its release and by rebounding from the Halloween weekend.  THR's Risky Business blog, however, attributes the film's relatively weak opening to the tepid critical response of the film, noting a correlation between the RottenTomatoes scores of Eastwood's films and their box-office revenues.

Other films in the top ten included Beverly Hills Chihuahua (#6, $4.7 million), now only $8 million under Eagle Eye's total of $94 million and inching towards $100 million.  The Secret Life of Bees dropped only 33% to finish at #7 with $4 million.  Action/crime pictures Max Payne (#8, $3.7 million),  Eagle Eye (#9, $3.4 million), and Pride & Glory (#10, $3.2 million) rounded out the bottom five.  Unlike the films in the top five, these films had below-average box-office drops, averaging 30-40% less than the previous week.

This week Madagascar 2 will release, competing for the G-rated audience, along with R-rated Role Models, specialty picture and European sensation The Boy in the Striped Pajamas, Soul Men, and Repo: The Genetic Opera.  Check back on Friday for a further rundown of the week's releases.

Full box office results viewable here.

'HSM3' voted 'Most Likely to Succeed' at weekend box office

By Sarah Sluis

In the all-time top twenty for advance ticket sales, High School Musical 3: Senior Year (3,623 screens)
will rule the box office this weekend, with prognosticators estimating at least $30 million for the weekend. The series first made waves two years ago, when gift card-rich kids put the musical's singles in iTunes' top ten after Christmas.  The launch of the series into mainstream culture inspired the same mix of bafflement and resentment as when Harry Potter books hit the New York Times bestseller list. 

I always had a soft spot for Disney original movies, with their film school-inspired Busby Berkeley shots (look for them in the HSM series!) and buoyant, cheesy innocence that high schoolers and above recognize as a guilty pleasure.  The G-rated movie will have the most resonance with aspirational grade school and middle school students, who imagine their high school experience will be Just. Like. the. Movie., but certainly high schoolers will turn out to see the series they grew up with and have watched several times through its endless replays on the Disney Channel.

Horror sequel Saw V (3,060 screens) should compete for some of the older high school audience, but there are signs that the series has lost steam--unlike HSM3, which is the first big-screen version of the franchise.

Crime-and-intrigue Pride and Glory (2,585) releases this week to little fanfare.  Based on an actual corruption scandal, the film centers on a police officer, part of a family legacy of cops, who uncovers rampant corruption involving his family members.

Changeling (15 screens), Synecdoche, New York (excl. NY/LA), Let the Right One In (4 screens), and Passengers (125 screens) all open in limited release this week, with plans to expand.  Changeling has received so-so reviews, with FJI critic Daniel Eagan dismissing the film as "a period version of a movie on Lifetime," and both Eagan and the New York Times review dubious about a genre shift that occurs towards the film's climax.

Let the Right One In's Rotten Tomatoes listing boasts a lone dissenter to the sublimely fascinating Swedish horror character study, which I discussed earlier this week.

Intricate Synedoche, New York, another Charlie Kaufman world-within-a-world film, has inspired a whole new level of meta activity among critics attempting to mimic his layered realities--Wired did a "profile of a profile of Charlie Kaufman" you can check out here.

Anne Hathaway's Passengers might be a blink-and-you'll-miss-it airline crash thriller, depending on its performance and expansion from its limited release. I've Loved You So Long (NY/LA), Stranded: I've Come from a Plane that Crashed in the Mountains (1 screen, NY) and Fear(s) of the Dark (1 screen, NY) also open this week, for those in the city of skyscrapers or highways, respectively.