It's been a while since I've ranted about Michael Cieply or Brooks Barnes over at The New York Times, but Barnes' latest, "Even Hit Like 'Kick-Ass' Can Seem Miss at Debut," pissed me off all over again.

It's not the sentiment behind it: Too much attention is paid to opening weekends. I agree with that. I'd like more attention paid to movies with legs, too.

It's the numbers. They keep fudging the numbers.

Here's the lede:

LOS ANGELES — In early April, as Lionsgate prepared to release “Kick-Ass,” the movie capital buzzed that the film looked to be a smash hit. Lionsgate had acquired it for just $15 million, and surveys that track audience interest projected a $30 million opening weekend.

The movie, directed by Matthew Vaughn, instead opened with $19.8 million, and the chatter, fueled by the blogosphere, abruptly turned negative. Misfire! Bomb! Flop!

As it turns out, “Kick-Ass” is living up to its title. The picture, about a teenager who tries to become a superhero, went on to generate about $97 million in ticket sales and is on track to sell over two million copies on DVD and digital download services.

Nice Hollywood ending for "Kick-Ass." But like most Hollywood endings, it's false. Or fudged.

The movie opened with $19.8 million domestically. It closed with $97 million worldwide. Its domestic close was $48 million—not even three times its opening weekend. It may be profitable, but that's hardly a movie with legs.

Barnes keeps doing this, too. Here's a graf later in the article:

There are other recent examples of movies that were quickly deemed misses but turned into hits. “Date Night,” the 20th Century Fox comedy starring Steve Carell and Tina Fey, was branded a disappointment when it opened to $25 million. Yet it finally captured over $152 million. “The Last Song” had a $16 million opening in March — lower than expected — but went on to sell $89 million at the global box office for Walt Disney Studios.

"Date Night" opened at $25 million domestically but grossed $152 million worldwide ($98 million domestically). "The Last Song" opened at $16 million domestically and grossed $89 million worldwide ($62.9 million domestically).

It's not just that Barnes isn't comparing the same things. He's not telling his readers that he's not comparing the same things.

And if you're going to do a piece like this, on the long legs of some modern movies, why not focus on the film that has the longest legs this year? "How to Train Your Dragon" opened at $43 million domestically and grossed $217 million domestically, or five times its opening, but that film only gets a graf midway through Barnes' article. Most of the article is about LionsGate's "Kick-Ass," which didn't even gross three times its opening. Why?

Here are some past arguments I've had with Barnes/Cieply:

• What's Brooks Barnes Got Against Pixar? (June 1, 2009)
• Two Face (July 28, 2008)
• Why is The New York Times Encouraging Hollywood's Myopia? (May 16, 2008)

I guess the theme snaking through these arguments is that Barnes/Cieply cover the industry for the industry and not for moviegoers. Not sure why you would do that.

Why does Hollywood treat Labor Day as the red-headed stepchild of four-day weekends? It’s stuck there at the end of summer, the kids are going back to school, but can’t a brother get a last gasp? Instead of looking back to fun and sun, Hollywood uses the holiday to look ahead to the horrors of October and the semi-seriousness of autumn—but not with their best stuff. Usually with lousy stuff. Moviegoers respond accordingly by not showing up.

Here are the biggest box-office openers for each four-day weekend:

1. Memorial Day: "Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End": $139,802,190
2. Presidents Day: "Valentine's Day": $63,135,312
3. MLK Day: "Cloverfield" $46,146,546
4. Labor Day: "Halloween (2007)": $30,591,759

Not even close. Plus the films the studios trot out over Labor Day read like a marquee in hell: “Jeepers Creepers” (1 and 2), “Balls of Fury,” “All About Steve,” “The Wicker Man,” “Babylon A.D.” And those are the popular ones.

So consider ourselves lucky that we got “The American” this weekend and some of us (including Patricia and I—review up soon) actually went to see it. It topped the three-day weekend with $13 million and the four-day weekend with $16 million—just ahead of “Machete”’s $11 million and $14 million, and far ahead of “Going the Distance”’s $6.9 million and $8.6 million. The Justin Long-Drew Barrymore rom-com finished in fifth place. Barrymore has been with us forever but she’s still only 35, so, despite the soft open, expect more of these. Someone, by the way, should do a look at the history of the Barrymore rom-com: from Adam Sandler (9 years older) through Hugh Grant (15 years older) to Justin Long (3 years younger).

Last weeks’s 1 and 2, “Takers” and “The Last Exorcism,” finished 3 and 4, falling off, respectively, 46.9% and 63.6%. Normal falls for such films, but, given the holiday weekend, fairly steep falls.

“The Expendables,” in comparison, dropped only 30% and has now grossed $94 million; the $100 million mark is only a matter of time. “The Other Guys,” fell off only 15% to bring its cumulative take to $108 million and put “Robin Hood” ($105m) in its rearview mirror. In its headlights? “Valentine’s Day” ($110m).

In 8th place? “Eat, Pray, Love,” which fell off only 29% and has steadily climbed to a $70 million gross. No. 9, “Inception,” dropped just 7% and stands at $278m (and $696m worldwide). Somewhere in the last week, “Despicable Me” passed “Shrek Forever After.”

The totals.

Finally a request. Box Office Mojo? Your abs ads are beginning to creep me out. More reptile than man. Turn it down a notch, will ya?

Researching predictions about how 2010 summer box office would turn out, I came across this April piece from Gregory Ellwood on Hitflix.com. I'm not a fan of prognostication but he does pretty well. Here's his numbers against the actual rankings:

He predicts three of the 10 exactly right. He also predicts which five movies will be in the top five. Flip a couple ("TS3" and "IM2") and he has seven of the 10. Add "The Other Guys," which has a chance to finish the summer ranked 10th and he has 8 of the 10. That's pretty stunning. Someone call Nate Silver.

The only two he gets wrong are "Sex and the City 2," which bombed because it stunk, and "The Sorcerer's Apprentice," about which, in the "pro" section of that film, he writes, "If 'Persia' is a disappointment, Jerry Bruckheimer can't be wrong about two potential summer tentpoles can he?" Answer: Yes, he can. So "Sorcerer's" is really only there because he figured "Persia" wouldn't live up to the hype. Which it didn't.

To give you an idea what he was predicting against, here are some readers' comments at the end:

• Seeing as how the 10th movie in this list is expected to gross $110 million, I find it kinda hard to understand why Prince of Persia wasn't included. Do you think it won't even cross 100mil Greg? (It didn't: it topped out at $90.6 million domestically.)
• Not enough attn. paid to Prince of Persia here imo. (Shows what your o is worth, kid.)
  
• Prince of Persia will also make close to $200 million just on the fact that it's similar to POTC. ("Prince of the City"? Oh, "Pirates of the Caribbean." Really? It is? Even the backdrop seems diametrically opposed: sand vs. water.)
  
• Where's 'The A-Team' and 'Knight & Day'?? (Finishing 16th and 17th for the summer, respectively.)
  

On the other hand, there's this from a guy named Yun Xia. He actually gets the top 5 in the right order... but then screws up with "Sex and the City" and "Prince of Persia" and "The A-Team." Interestingly, he gets "Robin Hood"'s b.o. totals exactly right, $105 million, just not its place in the pantheon. It's higher up: 10th not 15th. Thus far. Even so: hen hao.

So did anyone screw up? Well, the folks at "Get the Big Picture" did think both "Iron Man" and "Shrek" would both beat "Toy Story," and they include both Bruckheimer films in the top 10. The also predict big for "Robin Hood." Bigger, I should say.

But, overall, most of the April 2010 predictors predicted the top 5 correctly. It's numbers 6-10 where people stumbled.

Glad to see we're not completely predictable. Yet.

Marion will haunt your dreams for thinking so highly of Bruckheimer.

"The Last Exorcism" won the weekend with $21.3 million but big deal. It made $9.4 million on Friday then kept dropping as the first-night horror crowd went elsewhere and no word-of-mouth bucked it up. Finishing second, or possibly first if these estimates are off, is "Takers," a third-rate heist film with a sixth-rate title, currently at $21 milliion. Both movies will be gone and forgotten in two weeks. They are the dregs of summer—the last gasp before the studios begin to get semi-serious in September.

If you think of the first weekend of May as the beginning of Hollywood's summer, this weekend's overall take, $113 million, was also the lowest of the summer. For the year, only the last two weekends in April did worse business.

Of the other new films, none are new films. "Avatar: Special Edition," playing in 812 theaters, grossed another $4 million, while the movie I saw this weekend, "Mesrine: L'instinct de mort," a 2008 French film starring Vincent Cassell, grossed $150K in 28 theaters. Review up tomorrow.

Of the returning films still in wide release (2,000+ theaters), the one that held up best was, again, "Inception," losing 331 theaters and dropping only 34.9%. The biggest drop among wide releases? "Piranha 3D," 57.4%, followed closely by "Vampires Suck" at 56.6%.

Milestones? "Toy Story 3" became the seventh film, and the first animated film, to gross more than $1 billion worldwide—although it's still no. 2 for the year, $12 million behind "Alice in Wonderland," which topped out at $1.024 billion this spring. Both are Buena Vista. Disney.

Near milestones? "The Twilight Saga: Eclipse" is only $2 million from $300 million domestic but it's down to 476 theaters and grossed only 490K this weekend. Looks like that vampiric hand won't gasp across the finish line.

Future milestones? "The Other Guys" pulled in another $6.6 million and needs just a push, or $700K, to cross the $100 million mark.

As summer dies, "Inception" keeps firing away.

UPDATE: RE: The estimates being off? Yes.

This was a good weekend to catch up on better movies that opened earlier in the summer—Patricia and I did this with Will Ferrell's "The Other Guys," which is pretty damned funny (review up tomorrow)—and while it can be argued that most of us did do this, since the five new releases finished second, fourth, and six through eight, still, this weekend, nearly $50 million was spent on them, with the best-reviewed of the lot, "Nanny McPhee Returns," doing worst, and the worst-reviewed of the lot, "Vampires Suck," a parody of the "Twilight" movies, doing best: $12.2 million, good enough for second place. Sad. That $50 million works out to about 6.2 million people who couldn't figure out better ways to spend their money and time. BTW: There's always an uproar when some critic doesn't like a popular movie and ruins its 100% Rotten Tomatoes rating (see: Armond White and "Toy Story 3"), but what about when a critic likes a crap movie and ruins its 0% rating? Michael Ordona, I'm looking at you and "Vampires Suck."

Everyone will say that "The Expendables" rocked this weekend (or "muscled out the competition," or "pumped itself up to no. 1"), but its numbers still fell off by 52.6%, which is the biggest fall-off of any movie that didn't lose theaters this weekend. "Scott Pilgrim," meanwhile, gained two theaters but still fell off 52.6%. Girly man.

The wide-release movie that fell off the least? "Inception," which dropped 719 screens yet dropped only 32%. It has now grossed $261m domestic, $315m abroad.

Complete weekend box office estimates here.

There are still good movies to see, people. "Restrepo" is still playing in 44 theaters, and two new docs, "The Tillman Story" and "A Film Unfinished," just opened in NY and LA. One hopes they go wider.

Meanwhile, spurred by Uncle Vinny's post, I went to see "Two in the Wave" ("Deux de la vague"), a French doc about Truffaut and Godard, which is playing at Northwest Film Forum on Capitol Hill in Seattle. It doesn't go as deeply into their films as I would like, but it does go into their history: their initial friendship and rivalry, and what broke them up in 1973: Of all things, Truffaut's "Day for Night," which I love and Godard couldn't stand. But then I can't stomach Godard after '65. Seattlities, it's playing all week. Go see it some American night.

I was wondering whether "Toy Story 3" might reach $400 million domestic (it's at $389 right now, and last week fell off by only 27% for another $14 million, so if it falls off by something similar this week, hey, that's about $10 million right there, nearly the $11 million it needs, BUT its weekend numbers are already off by 43%, SO...) when I saw its worldwide take stood at $826 million. Immediately the more interesting question became whether the movie might crack the $1 billion mark. Only six movies have ever done that. (TRIVIA: Can you name them? They'll be in the comments field at the end of this post.)

It could happen. Pixar movies tend to do better abroad than in the states, generating between 58-60% of their total from foreign sales. Right now "Toy Story 3"'s foreign component is at 52.8%. Is it lagging? Probably not. It only recently opened in France (Bastille Day, actually), Hong Kong (July 15) Spain (July 22) and the U.K. (July 23), and it doesn't open in Germany until August 5th, so the foreign money's still flowing in rather than trickling in. Put it this way: If it doesn't break a billion it'll be close.

For the weekend, yes, "Inception" fell off by only 35% and came out ahead of newcomer "Dinner with Schmucks": $27m to $23m. It's the first movie since "Alice in Wonderland" to be no. 1 at the box office three weekends in a row. Keep in mind, too: "Alice" did it in March, an easier month to stay on top, since the competition is so weak.

On the other hand, "Inception"'s competition has hardly been strong. None of the new films managed even a "fresh" rating from top critics at Rotten Tomatoes. Paramount's "Schmucks" came closest at 47%, and made $23 million in 2,922 theaters. Warner Bros.'s "Cats & Dogs: The Revenge of Kitty Galore," which I'd barely heard of (thanks niche marketing), got a 35% rating of shrugs and managed only $12 million in 3,700 theaters. That's bad. Finally, Universal's Zac Effron vehicle, "Charlie St. Cloud" (19%), grossed $12 million in 2,700 theaters. The three newbies finished second, fifth and sixth, respectively.

The totals here.

Has this been a bad summer? Last week in the Wall Street Journal, Joe Queenan had a blistering, funny, open letter to Hollywood, which included this advice:

Stop making movies like "Grown Ups," "Sex and the City 2," "Prince of Persia" and anything that positions Jennifer Aniston or John C. Reilly at the top of the marquee. Stop trying to pass off Shia LaBeouf—who looks a bit like the young George W. Bush—as the second coming of Tom Cruise. Stop casting Gerard Butler in roles where he is called upon to emote. And if "Legion" and "Edge of Darkness" and "The Back-up Plan" and "Hot Tub Time Machine" are the best you can do, stop making movies, period. Humanity will thank you for it.

I agree with almost everything he says in the piece—the Vin Diesel riff had me laughing out loud—except for the way it was marketed by WSJ: WORST YEAR EVER?

No. Not even close. At least not to me. It hurts me more when Hollywood serves us crap and we eat it all up with a smile. Remember last summer? "Transformers 2"? How's that taste now? Or the summer of 2007? "Spider-Man 3," "Shrek the Third," and all the other crappy 3s? Or the summer of 2006 when the second "Pirates of the Caribbean" ruled the seas? These were each summer's most popular movies. This summer, our most popular movie is a good movie, "Toy Story 3," while a new film, which is creative and dark and forces even adults to tax their minds as they're watching it, is now no. 1 for three weekends in a row. It'll probably wind up in the top 10 for the year. That's not a bad summer to me.

But then, I wasn't forced to watch "Grown Ups."

"Inception" was the no. 1 movie for the second week in a row, grossing an estimated $43.5 million. The initial interest in Christopher Nolan's dream thriller is apparently carrying over into either repeat viewings (to doublecheck one's own theories, or the theories of others) or new viewers (because they heard).

Its second weekend drop is, in fact, the lowest drop of the year for any no. 1 movie not named "Avatar":

Either way, it's a triumph for originality and creativity in the heat of summer. Now watch studio execs attempt to duplicate that originality.

Overall, movies may have been down from the previous week, but a lot of the returning movies still did well. "Despicable Me," at no. 3, fell off only 26%, and made another $24 million to raise its gross to $161 million.  "Toy Story 3" lost 411 theaters but fell off only 24% for another $9 million. It's at $379 million and has a real shot to become the 11th film to break the $400 million barrier. "Grown Ups" fell off only 23%; it's at $142 million.

My favorite stat: No. 10, "Predators," in 1,846 theaters, barely beat no. 11, "The Kids Are All Right," in 201 theaters: $2.8 million to $2.6 million.

Of the new films, Angelina Jolie's "Salt" finished close to "Inception" with $36 million, while Fox's "Ramona and Beezus," which I've barely heard about, finished no. 6: $8 million in 2,719 theaters. Not good.

The big news is that Christopher Nolan's "Inception," despite requiring work from moviegoers, did well at the box office: $60 million. Not sure what the word-of-mouth is from others but the word from my mouth is: "Go."

Meanwhile, "Sorcerer's Apprentice," the Disney/Bruckheimer thing starring Nicholas Cage, fared poorly with only $17 million. Yes, it opened on a Wednesday, but its total domestic take is still just $24 mil. Another faulty tentpole. Its 31% rating from the top critics at Rotten Tomatoes isn't horrible, but it only got there because reviews such as this one from Owen Gleiberman were labeled positive: "The Sorcerer's Apprentice is too long, and it's ersatz magic, but at least it casts an ersatz spell." The most important review, meanwhile, isn't even on RT. It comes from my 9-year-old, movie-reviewing nephew, Jordy, who told me over the weekend that "SA" sucked. The words from his mouth: Don't go.

So quality wins out again. One wonders when the studios will get it.

The biggest drops? "The A-Team" shed 808 theaters, down to 428, and lost 73.2% of its business. "Predators" shed no theaters, staying at 2,669, and lost 72.5% of its business. Not good for either film but particularly the latter. In fact it's the biggest second-week drop of the year. Both films, by the way, are from Fox. No surprise.

The full weekend chart can be read here.

It'll be interesting to see how "Inception" does during its second weekend. Anecdotally, I've heard from adults wanting to go back for a second viewing and teenage girls at slumber parties dissecting the intracacies of its plot. Good signs. Also bad signs. Ideas may be the most resilient parasites, as Cobb (Leo) tells us in "Inception," but Hollywood is full of its own brand of resilient parasites, who love to latch onto original ideas and turn them into crap. Expect dull, derivative movies about dreams in the near future. Fox is already probably working on one.

UPDATE: The actuals are in and "Predators" only dropped 71.7%, so its was only the second-worst second-weekend drop this year. "A Nightmare on Elm Street" (2010)—you are still champ!

Meanwhile, "Inception" grossed $62 million, not $60 million. A good word-of-mouth sign.

"Despicable Me" opened at $60 million!

What does this mean? Not much, really. It's a better opening than some thought, but it's only the sixth best opening this year, behind the obvious ("Iron Man 2"; "Toy Story 3"), and the not-so-obvious ("Clash of the Titans"). Unadjusted, it's the 69th best opening weekend ever, behind such films as "Planet of the Apes" (the 2001 version), "Hulk" (the 2003 version), and "2012" (the 2009 version).

Of those 68 movies that opened better, however, 52 opened in more theaters than "Despicable"'s 3,476. So of the 3,500-and-under crowd, its opening is 18th best. Remove sequels and it's 10th best.

But, again, that's unadjusted. Adjust, and it goes from 69th to 133th, behind such long-lasting films as "Van Helsing," "Big Daddy," "The Village," and "101 Dalmatians" (the 1996 live-action version).

Robert Rodriguez's "Predators," from Fox, the fifth in the off-again, on-again series, grossed $25 million, good enough for third place. Didn't boom, didn't bomb. Nothing to write a blog post home about.

The big news came from returning films.

The worst percentage change for any wide release was, big surprise, M. Night Shyamalan's "The Last Airbender," dropping 57% despite adding 34 theaters. Given its lousy reviews, though (7% from top critics on Rotten Tomatoes), and lousier word-of-mouth, one assumed, one hoped, it would drop more. It wound up in fifth place with $17 million. The percentage drop would've been worse, of course, but the film opened on a Thursday, its biggest day, and so had that much less to fall off from.

Meanwhile, "Toy Story 3" (99%), despite direct competition from a popular new kids' movie, fell off by only 27%, pulling in $22 million. That's fourth place. It's now the highest-grossing film of the year domestically.

Before we celebrate the long legs of quality films like "Toy Story," however, this news: the smallest percentage drop came from the Adam Sandler comedy, "Grown Ups," which didn't exactly kill with the critics (13%), but which, in its third week, still fell off by only 13%. It's now grossed $111 million domestically. That's 10th for the year and our most successful comedy. Grown ups, indeed.

Full chart here.

Once again, two movies opened wide this weekend, and once again they were no.s 1 and 2 at the box office—even though no. 1, "Twilight: Eclipse," actually opened on Wednesday (but to the best reviews of the series, 63% from top critics at RT, although indicative was Joe Morgenstern's thumbs up: "It didn't leave me cold"), while no. 2, "The Last Airbender," opened on Thursday (to horrible reviews and 7% from top critics on RT).

The other five films in 2,000+ theaters fell off in typical fashion: between 47.9% ("Karate Kid") and 52.8% ("Grown Ups").

Of the seven films playing wide this weekend, the only one out of place was "Toy Story 3." It's now in its third week but it remained ahead of the two second-week films. Like so:

A few questions from looking at the final column above. Since most major releases get a partner with whom they dance during subsequent weekends, which film partnered with "Toy Story 3" three weekends ago? And who was "Get Him to the Greek"'s partner? And what two films opened six weekends ago but has since fallen off the charts?

Answers in reverse order.

Six weekends ago, "Prince of Perisa" and "Sex and the City 2" opened together. "PP" is now 12th, in 600 theaters, and probably won't gross $90 million domestically. "SATC" is now chartless, although still playing in several local Seattle theaters, and is stuck at $93 million. 

"Get Him to the Greek" opened with "Killers," that Ashton Kutcher thing, which is still playing in 700+ theaters and made about a half mil. Total gross: $45 million ($56m worldwide).

And "Toy Story 3"'s partner? That would be "Jonah Hex," which has all but vamoosed. It's still playing in a handful of theaters but for whatever reason they're not counting its numbers. It hasn't topped $10 million domestically. It's already been tossed and forgotten.

Remember the difficulty Andy had in throwing away his toys in "Toy Story 3"? That's not Hollywood with its toys. But then they make a shittier product. And they know new ones arrive every week.

No real surprises this weekend. Of the newcomers: "Knight and Day," which looked kinda fun to me, did a blah $20 million, while "Grown Ups," which looked atrocious, grossed $41 million on the strength of urine, masturbation and Rob-Schneider-kissing-an-old-lady jokes. Yay, America! Apparently we still have money to waste.

BTW: Is Schneider's "old lady" an in-joke among the players? Writer Adam Sandler giving himself Salma Hayek as a wife and his pal Schneider an actress in her late 70s? If so, even the in-jokes in this thing suck.

The two returning b.o. champs with high Rotten Tomatoes scores continued to fare well. "Toy Story 3" and "Karate Kid" fell off by only 46 and 48 percent, respectively, and finished first and fourth respectively. After three weeks, "Karate Kid" has now grossed more than twice as much as "The A-Team" ($135m to $62m), while "Toy Story 3," after two weeks, has grossed almost as much as "Shrek Forever After" has after six weeks: $226m to $229m. "3" will pass "Shrek" today.

Among the crap films: Fox pulled "Marmaduke" from 1,385 theaters and its take dropped 60%; Lions Gate pulled "Killers" from more than 350 theaters and its take dropped 60%. But the biggest drop was for "Jonah Hex," which fell more than 70%, even though Warner Bros. didn't pull it from any of its 2,825 theaters, and even though there wasn't much to fall off 70% from. It's currently at $9.1m. Where will it end up? Double digits, probably, but I don't know if I'd bet on $12m.

Full weekend chart here.

Finally, which 2010 movies feel like bombs but aren't necessarily? Some possibilities:

• "Prince of Persia," which has grossed $86m in the U.S., but $220m overseas, for a total of $312m.
• "Robin Hood," which has grossed $103m in the U.S., but $198m overseas, for a total of $302m.
• And "Sex and the City 2," which has grossed $93m in the U.S., but $172m abroad, for a total of $265 m.

At the same time, the first "Sex and the City" grossed $262m overseas (wow!). It'll be interesting to see if "2" picks up this slack. It's currently the no. 1 movie in Austria, Bulgaria, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Israel, Italy, Lithuania, Netherlands, Slovakia, Sweden and the U.K. Inexplicably, it hasn't hit Australia yet, where it made $25m in 2008. Not so inexplicably, it hasn't hit several other countries that Box Office Mojo tracks, including Bahrain, Lebanon, United Arab Emirates and Egypt, which are watching, respectively, "The Back-Up Plan," "Nour 3iney," "Shrek Forever After" and, believe it or not, "Prince of Persia." So at least they don't have a problem with Jake Gyllenhaal in the lead.

The original "Toy Story" was in many ways about that moment in our history when the astronaut or spaceman (Buzz Lightyear) eclipsed the cowboy or sheriff (Woody) as the hero in the imaginations of boys everywhere. Pin it somewhere in the early 1960s—about the time Tom Hanks was Andy's age.

It could also be about that cultural moment when science-fiction eclipsed the western as our pre-eminent genre. Even as boys imagined themselves as astronauts, for example, Gene Roddenberry still had to pitch the original "Star Trek" as a western: "'Wagon Train' to the stars," he called it. Now it'd be the opposite. And it wouldn't sell. "It's like 'Star Trek'...but on the dusty plains!" Yeah, have fun with that.

Well, sci-fi still soars and the western has still seen better days. Sheriff Woody rides off into the sunset as perhaps our last, great, popular western hero in "Toy Story 3," while the film's main competition this past weekend, "Jonah Hex," a western, got bucked. "Toy Story 3" won the weekend with an estimated $109 million take, while "Jonah Hex" finished eighth—eighth!—with $5 million. Not even a battle. It helped that "3" was a beloved sequel, universally acclaimed (98% RT rating) and in more than 4,000 theaters, while Jonah Hex was an original, universally panned (14% RT rating), and in 2,845 theaters.

But eighth? Behind the fourth weekend of "Prince of Persia" and the third weekend of "Killers"? Yeesh.

"Hex"'s per-theater-average ($1,800) was the second worst of the summer—behind only "MacGruber," which grossed "$4 million in 2,551 theaters for $1,585 per in May. Everything went wrong for "Hex," including its title, which now seems like bad foreshadowing. What's next? "Joe Box Office Bomb"?

In other news, and despite the competition from "3," "Karate Kid" did surprisingly well, falling off only 47% and taking second place with $29 million. It's already grossed more than $100 million. "The A-Team" fell off even less, 46%, but it had less to fall off from; it grossed $13 million. "Get Him to the Greek" lost over 100 theaters but dropped only 38%, while "Shrek" couldn't handle "3" and fell by 65%.

Here's a puzzler: With "Toy Story 3" opening, and with "Shrek" as nose-holding backup, people still plunked down $2.6 million of hard-earned, global-financial-meltdown money for "Marmaduke"? But that thing's almost gone, finishing 10th, and its total domestic gross ($27 million) is about 2/3 of what "Toy Story 3" grossed on Friday alone.

"Toy Story 3," by the way, was the best opening for a Pixar movie ever—beating out "Finding Nemo," which made $70 million in May 2003. This is true even when adjusted for inflation. ("Nemo" winds up with $92 million adjusted.)

Full chart here.

And don't forget to vote for your favorite "Toy Story" movie here.

In the battle of the 1980s remakes, "The Karate Kid" kicked the butt of "The A-Team" at the U.S. box office last weekend: $56 million to $26 million. This is gratifying on several levels:

• "Kid"'s Rotten Tomatoes rating is almost 20 points higher than "A-Team"'s, 70% to 53%, or among top critics 66% to 48%, and I've been a longtime proponent of the notion that quality matters.
• Jackie Chan. I've been a fan since the days when the U.S. feared Japanese economic might rather than Chinese economic might, and I'm always happy when he does well at the U.S. box office.
• "Kid" is a formulaic underdog story. "A-Team" is a formulaic overdog story. If you're going formula, I'll take the underdog.
• "The A-Team" cost $110 million, stars three white guys and an angry black guy, and was futzed over by 11 screenwriters hired and fired by Fox, a studio which is infamous for dumbing down its product. "The Karate Kid" cost $40 million, stars a black kid and a Chinese guy, lists only one screenwriter, and its studio, Sony, was able to keep itself out of the conversation.

As for why it did well? I don't think any of the above really had much to do with it. I think it opened well for the following reasons:

• It stars a kid who looks like a kid. Kids identify.
• It's rated PG (rather than the more covetted PG-13) so kids can actually see it.
• One line from the trailer: "I get it. You're Yoda and I'm like a Jedi." 

What kid wouldn't want to go after hearing that line? It's a real-life Yoda-Luke thing!

As for the rest of the top 15? A steady if unremarkable decline for the crap May/June releases. It looks like "Sex and the City 2," currently at $84.7 million, will peter out (sorry) before $100 million. It looks like "Robin Hood," at $99.6 million, won't.

But the worst performer seems to be "Marmaduke." After 10 days, in over 3,200 theaters, its domestic box office stands at a mere $22 million. Not good for a family comedy with a budget of $50 million. But this should be expected: its RT rating is only 11%. And its studio? Fox.

"I get it: You're Yoda and I'm like a Jedi." The irony is that the old master, "Star Wars," is a Fox film, but from its wiser, 20th Century days.

Dreamworks should send a thank-you note to Fox. This weekend, Fox's "Marmaduke" opened to bad reviews (12% among RT's top critics) and weak box office ($11 million in 3,200+ theaters, or sixth place), allowing Dreamworks' tired, overweight "Shrek" to huff atop the weekend charts for the third time.

Of course if Dreamworks begins its "thank you"s there, where do they stop? Thanks, Lions Gate, for putting so much money and effort into another Ashton Kutcher movie. Thanks, New Line, for trotting out Carrie and the girls (on camels!) one time too many. Thanks, Disney, for attempting to build a franchise around a video game even though only one video-game adaptation, "Lara Croft," ever grossed over $100 million, while the streets are strewn with pieces of the rest: "Max Payne," "Doom," "BloodRayne," "Street Fighter." Thanks, everyone. 

Here's the weekend top 10. Reverse some positions and the top-10 grossing movies are also the top-10 movies in terms of availability. We're seeing what's out there. Which is why we're not seeing much:

* top critics only

A year ago "The Hangover" opened with an RT rating of 78% and grossed $44.9 million in its first three days. Pixar's "Up," in its second week, with an RT rating of 95%, finished second with $44.1 million. "Land of the Lost" and "My Life in Ruins" both received scathing reviews and died out of the gate. They keep sending us movies to die out of the gate.

Here's the good news if you just want Shrek to go away: "Toy Story 3" arrives in two weeks.

Me, I've only been seeing SIFF (Seattle International Film Festival) movies the past two weeks. Thus far? "Restrepo." Repeat: "Restrepo."

Two years ago "Sex and the City" made $59 million during its three-day opening weekend: $26M+ and $17M+ and $12M+. This year, "Sex and the City 2" is estimated to make $46 million over its four-day opening weekend (Thurs.-Sun.): $14M, $13M, $10M., $9M. Adjust for inflation and it's even worse: $63M for three days vs. $46M for four. Take out Thursday's total for "2" and its opening weekend is about half of what "1"'s was. 

Now it could be that the fashionistas are waiting until Monday to celebrate Memorial Day with the Four Horsewomen of the Apocalypse. But I doubt it. So why the comedown?

Last week I argued the latest "Shrek" faltered because the previous "Shrek" stank. There's carryover.

I'd argue that the previous "SATC" wasn't that good, either. In fact, I did argue it. But I think "SATC 2" mostly suffered because, well, it just looked awful.

I saw a clip a few weeks ago on "The Daily Show." The four women are out in the desert riding camels. Samantha complains of hot flashes, to which Carrie states the obvious: You're in the desert; you're supposed to have hot flashes. That's a joke. Then Charlotte gets a call on her cell but she's having trouble with the connection and does the "Can you hear me now?" bit. She keeps leaning and leaning. And then she falls off the camel. That's a joke, too. And that was the clip.

And I thought: "If that's the clip, what's the rest of the movie like?"

I'm probably not the only one to have this thought.

Women, I've heard, tend to pay more attention to movie critics than men. That's one of the problems Hollywood execs have with women: they care about quality.

"SATC," of course, is a fairly critic-proof franchise but not completely. It can squeak by with a not-horrible 53% rating, as the first movie garnered from top critics at RT.com. But "SATC 2" garnered a 9% rating from top critics—and it was a pretty loud 9% rating, too. People heard. Women heard.

My guess is that "2" won't gross more than $115M. If word-of-mouth is bad, as it seems to be, it might not break its $100-million budget.

In other news, "Prince of Persia" (23%) proved it was no tentpole in the desert, finishing third with $30 million.

Their loss, "Shrek"'s gain. It fell by only 38% to remain no. 1 for the weekend. The lesser of three evils.

Dreamworks' "Shrek Forever After" opened with the third-highest opening weekend of the year—behind only "Iron Man 2" and "Alice in Wonderland"—with over $70 million domestic (estimated). 

A triumph? Not really.

Here are the opening weekends for the four "Shrek" movies. All numbers are adjusted to 2010 dollars:

* Top Critics Only
** All numbers are adjusted to 2010 dollars

That's quite a comedown.

Obviously new films tend to open weaker than sequels, which is what happened with the first "Shrek." But because "Shrek" was good (86% rating on Rotten Tomatoes) it went on to gross $375 million, or no. 3 for the year.

And because "Shrek" was good, its sequel, "Shrek 2," opened gangbusters: $138 million. And because "Shrek 2" was good (88% rating on RT) it went on to gross $564 million, or no. 1 for the year. In fact, until "Dark Knight" and "Avatar" came along, it was the no. 1 movie of the decade.

And because "Shrek 2" was good, its sequel, "Shrek the Third" opened gangbusters: $140 million. But because "Shrek the Third" wasn't good (49% on RT) it went on to gross only $372 million. I know: "only." But that's a $200 million drop from the previous film.

And because "Shrek the Third" wasn't good, its sequel "Shrek Forever After," opened with half the numbers of "Shrek the Third": $71 million. And because "Shrek Forever After" isn't good, either (40%), I assume it'll gross even less. Will it gross $250 million? Will it outdo "How to Train Your Dragon," which is already at $210 million?

Other factors could be at work, of course. The world's complex. Maybe there were simply better options this weekend. Maybe people are finally tired of this 10-year-old franchise. Maybe we don't have the patience for any fourth movie.

But in general I think the above is how moviegoing works—and it tends to be ignored by the powers-that-be. If you keep making a quality version of a beloved product, people will show up. Once the quality slips, the audience slips.

BTW: When referring to "good" and "bad" versions of "Shrek," I'm talking about the general critical reception, which, I argue, and have argued, is on par with general audience reception and word-of-mouth. Me, I only saw the first "Shrek," which I didn't like.

Look, Donkey! Maybe people are finally sick of us!

Via George Lucas's Blockbusting: A Decade-by-Decade Survey of Timeless Movies Including Untold Secrets of Their Financial and Cultural Success: How much we loved movies (or not) in the first year of every decade:

* in millions
** ditto

I believe Edward Jay Epstein, in his book The Big Picture: The New Logic of Money and Power in Hollywood, said '46 or '47 was the big year in terms of weekly movie attendance. 95 million? Something like that? After the war people wanted to do nothing so much as go into a dark theater for 90 minutes. Similar to 1930, though, on this chart.

What's surprising is the reversal since George Lucas' 1970s. I didn't know that. As a percentage of population, weekly attendance hasn't risen much, going from 8% in 1970 to 9% in 2000. But percentage of populaton shouldn't matter as much as asses in the seats, which, despite TV and VHS and video games, has risen 62%. And that's not the volume of our asses, either. Plus, these are merely domestic figures. Imagine the global numbers.

It'll be interesting to see what DVDs have wrought this past decade. Or what 3-D will do to get moviegoers back into the theaters this year. "I see you" indeed.

The beautifully refurbished Heights Theater in Columbia Heights, Minn.

Last Friday I went to the opening-night showing of Roman Polanski’s “The Ghost Writer” at the Egyptian Theater about a mile from my home. It’s a fun movie, smart and adult, and so of course it’s only playing in 42 other theaters around the country. Not even one per state.

Will it go wider? It’s being distributed by Summit Entertainment L.L.C. (as opposed to L.P. (R.I.P.)), the minor studio responsible for both the “Twilight” movies and “The Hurt Locker.” Last November Summit opened the “Twilight” sequel in over 4,000 theaters and who knows how many screens. Last July it opened “The Hurt Locker” in four theaters and probably that many screens. During its entire, six-month run, “Locker” wound up making $12 million domestically, which the “Twilight” sequel most likely made by the first showing of the first day.

This isn’t an argument against “Twilight.” I’m not arguing against making money. I’m arguing against losing money.

Here’s the history of Summit since it became an L.L.C. in 2006. Sorted by U.S. gross:

* Rotten Tomatoes rating from top critics only

Look at those theater totals at places 9 through 14—compared with "The Hurt Locker" at no. 8 and with "The Ghost Writer," which just opened. I’ve been railing against this kind of thing for years. A.O. Scott railed better last August when he critiqued the general direction of movies:

Middle-aged actors and critically lauded directors look like extravagances rather than sound investments. Forty is the new dead. Auteur is French for unemployed. “The Hurt Locker” — the kind of fierce and fiery action movie that might have been a blockbuster once upon a time — is treated like a delicate, exotic flower, released into art houses and sold on its prestige rather than on its visceral power.

“The Hurt Locker” was Summit’s delicate flower last summer, and, because they released it delicately, they made money from it delicately. Now they’re treating “The Ghost Writer” the same way.

Again, the problem isn't that “The Ghost Writer” is released into 1/100th the number of theaters of “Twilight." It’s that it’s released into 1/50th the number of theaters of “Push” or “Never Back Down” or “Sorority Row” or “Sex Drive": Crap that nobody wants, nobody goes to, and which lose money. But at least these movies are given the chance to lose money. "The Hurt Locker" and "The Ghost Writer" aren't even given that chance.

Quality film, in other words, isn't just treated as its own genre. It's treated as a genre 50 times less important than the others.When the others lose money.

It's a greater mystery than the one the ghost writer solves.

To put this in perspective: When James Cameron's "Titanic" became the worldwide box office champion with $1.843 billion in 1997-98, it more than doubled the previous record set by "Jurassic Park" in the summer of 1993: $914 million.

In the 12 years since, and despite rising ticket prices , no film has gotten within 60 percent of "Titanic"'s total. "Lord of the Rings: Return of the King" reached $1.1 billion in 2003-04, the second (and awful) "Pirates" movie reached $1.06 billion in the summer of 2006, while "The Dark Knight" grossed almost exactly $1 billion two summers ago. Those are the only other movies that even reached the $1 billion mark. Basically halfway there. 

Until now. This week, "Avatar," Cameron's first movie since "Titanic," broke "Titanic"'s worldwide box office mark and currently stands at $1.861. And climbing. Fast.

Cameron's raising the bar when no one could even get close to the bar before. That's almost mean.

Early estimates have "Avatar" winning the Friday box office with $9.1 million (over "Legion"'s $6.7 million), which means several things:

1. It now has $526 million domestic. So it should pass "The Dark Knight"'s box-office total of $533 million today and thus become the second-highest-grossing domestic film (unadjusted) of all time.
2. When that happens, it'll become the highest-grossing film of the decade. Which means James Cameron has had the highest-grossing film of the decade two decades in a row. Not even Lucas (1970s) or Spielberg (1980s) can say the same.
3. On a lesser scale, and assuming no surge from "Legion," it will be no. 1 for six weekends in a row. No other film of the 2000s had better than four weekends in a row. It's the longest reign atop the weekend box office since, of course, "Titanic," in 1997.

Build it well and they will come.

"I want you to open at $75 million and then drop only one or two percent the following weekend, and never drop more than 30 percent any weekend. This is going to be a movie with legs, OK?" "OK, Skip."

The weekend actuals are in and we have a new no. 1 movie of the year! Hauling in $15.1 million, it's..."Daybreakers," the new no. 1 movie of all 2010 releases. Congratulations! Guess you can't keep a bad vampire down.

Oh, and "Avatar" was the no. 1 movie in the country again for the fourth weekend in a row and has now surpassed "Transformers 2" as the highest-grossing domestic release of 2009, while its worldwide box office is at $1.34 billion, no. 2 all-time by a mile. So, yeah, good job there, too, Jimmy C.

I keep wondering when it's going to drop big time but it's got staying power like no movie since... "Titanic." Example: It opened in the mid-$70 million range, which is less than half of "Dark Knight"'s opening weekend, and yet, four weeks later, the domestic totals of the two films are comparable: After 24 days, "Dark Knight" had $441 million, "Avatar" has $430 million. Plus "DK" was coming off a fourth-weekend total of $26 million. And remember: "The Dark Knight" actually had staying power. That's what's amazing about all of this. Cameron's movie has a real shot of beating both "Titanic" records: the $600 million it made domestically and the $1.8 billion it made worldwide. His only competition is himself.

Less than a month after it opened, James Cameron's "Avatar" is already second on the unadjusted worldwide box-office list...to James Cameron's "Titanic." Of course it's got a long way to go to be no. 1: another $700 million or so—or what only 35 films have managed to make worldwide in their entire run.

What's remarkable isn't just the fact that Cameron now has the top two films all-time; it's that almost every other top film is a sequel, or part of a trilogy, or based on an extremely popular series of books. In the top 20, you can count the originals on one hand: Cameron's "Titanic" at no. 1, Cameron's "Avatar" at no. 2, and Pixar's "Finding Nemo" at no. 19. That's it. (I was going to add "Jurassic Park" but then remembered the Crichton novel on which it's based.)

Here, from boxofficemojo, is the current top 20 worldwide list. Unadjusted:

Will "Avatar" make it to $1.5 billion? More? Variety's Clifford Coonan reports that the Chinese hen hsi hwan the film. In the U.S., meanwhile, with everyone back to school or work after the holidays, the film's weekday totals are dropping off at a 50% rate—but that's still a slower rate than other films in the top 10. We'll see how it does this weekend. There's still buzz about the film. There's backlash, too, but mostly I hear (or read on Facebook) that even if you don't like the chatter, and even if you think the storyline is too "Dances with Wolves," you need to check it out in the theater, because it's AMAZING in the theater. That's nice to hear. Cameron's getting us all back together again. Except for these folks, of course.

My take. Again.

Last Monday I wondered if James Cameron's "Avatar," already at $615 million worldwide, would eventually surpass "Lord of the Rings: Return of the King," at $1.1 billion worldwide, to become the second-highest-grossing film (unadjusted) of all time—after Cameron's "Titanic," which is no. 1 by a mile with $1.8 billion.

That question hasn't been answered but it has. Because after today "Avatar"'s worldwide b.o. is estimated at $1.01 billion: fourth all-time and spitting distance to "Lord of the Rings." So by Wednesday or Thursday, James Cameron will officially have the two highest-grossing movies of all time.

Meanwhile in the U.S. "Avatar" is already at $350 million and will shortly blow past "Transformers 2" ($402 million) to become the no. 1 movie of the year. The only question is if it can surpass "The Dark Knight" ($532 million) to become the no. 1 movie of the decade. If it does, Cameron will have had the no. 1 movie of the decade two decades in a row. No director has ever done that. Not even Spielberg, though he came close ("Jaws," "E.T.," "Jurassic").

Hollywood tends to place its bets on opening weekends but Cameron's showing everyone how short-sighted this is. "Avatar" made $77 million opening weekend. That's 28th all-time and fifth best for the year—behind "New Moon," "Transformers," "Wolverine" and "Harry Potter." But such films tend to drop like rocks (40-60 percent) that second weekend. "Avatar"? It dropped two percent, to $75 million, giving it the best second weekend of all time. Unadjusted. 

The best third weekend? "Spider-Man" at $45 million. Whoops. Scratch that. Now it's "Avatar" at $68 million.

And from here on in Cameron's just competing with himself. The record-holder for best fourth weekend is "Titanic" at $28 million. Fifth weekend? "Titanic." Sixth? Same. All the way through the 12th weekend. It's all "Titanic."

Which means weekends 2 through 12 are now all Cameron.

Cameron, by himself, is rewriting the lessons of Hollywood, and the biggest one is this: Opening weekend is for pikers.

Go to the movies this weekend? Lots of people did. Before the weekend was even half over the numbers crunchers were celebrating an all-time record (unadjusted) of $278 million, beating the weekend "The Dark Knight" opened in July 2008.

But that's not the big news to me. The big news is that "Avatar" won the weekend with a $75 million haul. If that number holds, 1) it's the second-biggest second weekend ever, after "Dark Knight"'s $75.16 million*, and, 2) that -2.6% drop from the first weekend is the 10th lowest drop between first and second weekends for a film opening in 3,000 or more theaters. And the top nine on that list? None came close to "Avatar"'s $77 million first weekend. None even came close to a $50 million opening weekend. They're mostly cartoons/family films ("Cheaper By the Dozen 2," "Bolt") that opened poorly or so-so before the holidays, then caught on during the holidays. You might say the same for "Avatar" except that it didn't open poorly or so-so. It opened phenomenally.

And continues phenomenally. After 10 days, Cameron's movie has made $212 million in the U.S. (7th-best for the year) and $402 million abroad, for a worldwide total of $615 million, or 47th best all-time (unadjusted). No. 2 on the worldwide list is "Lord of the Rings: Return of the King" at 1.1 billion. Can "Avatar" surpass that mark? If it can, Cameron will be the writer-director of the two highest-grossing films of all time. Talk about your kings of the world. Here's hoping it keeps going and wipes the stink of "Transformers 2" off the year.

More on "Avatar":

• The Minneapolis Star-Tribune's critic Colin Covert has a fun, Freudian take on "Avatar." Jake's movement from re-birth to manhood is definitely a big part of the movie—it's a hero myth, after all—but Covert's vision of Col, Quaritch as an Oedipal father in need of a major adjustment adds a fun new element for me. "Quaritch is an iconic Bad Dad," Covert writes. "He threatens to shoot Grace in the mining camp’s control room, and later physically attacks her, Trudy and Neytiri in separate incidents. Mom and dad fight a lot."
• BTW: "Avatar"'s success, following on the heels of "The Blind Side," means that two of the three biggest movies this fall feature strong women who nurture young men away from the influence of bad men and turn them into good men. A theme?
• Michael B. Laskoff has a pro-capitalistic take on both "Up" and "Avatar," but to me it's a misreading. A rather gross misreading. Carl's house in "Up" is more about the burden of dreams, or the past, than a Wordworthian getting-and-spending. And arguing that "Avatar" is pro-capitalist because Cameron invented something wonderful and new, and thus, in Laskoff's words, "has done exactly what the high priests of capitalism—from Adam Smith and Alexander Hamilton to Milton Friedman and Alan Greenspan—have always preached: allow daring, vision and capital to find one other and the extraordinary can emerge," is not only ignoring what "Avatar" is (a not-so-subtle critique of the military-industrial complex), but what capitalism is. Yes, you want daring and vision. But capital rarely finds the two. Capital is too busy chasing after what has worked before. It wants to endlessly copy the successful. There's little daring in it.

Balance sheets over blood: one of the many pro-capitalist
messages Michael Laskoff sees in "Avatar"

• Finally, a cool look, from Devin Faraci of chud.com, on how Cameron's final film differs from Cameron's original script treatment. Among the changes (SPOILERS): Jake is named Josh; Josh cries when he first walks as an avatar; the planet is always fighting the humans as if they're a virus—it doesn't just happen at the end; and there is no unobtanium. We're just messing with the Na'vi to keep them in line. It's interesting stuff, but, unlike Faraci, I agree with most of the changes Cameron eventually made. He brought a big ship in lean and tight.

* UPDATE: "Avatar" wound up grossing $75.6 million over the weekend—meaning it had the best second-weekend ever (unadjusted). It also did better abroad than the numbers originally indicated: its worldwide total now stands at $623.6 million.

A few weeks back in the New York Times Magazine, A.O. Scott asked the following question:

The rebel Hollywood of the ’70s gives way to the blockbuster-mad ’80s, which is followed by the rise of the indies in the ’90s. And then?

And then Frodo and Spider-Man, Mumblecore and midbudget Oscar bait, Will Ferrell and Sacha Baron Cohen, “The Dark Knight” and the Transformers movies, along with everything else.

Which is more smorgasbord than answer. So let’s answer the question Scott wouldn’t. What were the 2000s to film? How did this decade differ from previous decades? How will it be remembered?

Here’s my quick-and-dirty answer: the 2000s were the decade of the sequel.

Yeah, I know. The sequel? What year are you stuck in, idjit—1978? Sequels have been the driving economic force for Hollywood for years, for decades, and you’re saying that now, suddenly, this decade, we’re in “The Era of the Sequel”? Get a clue!

Except I’m talking less about how many sequels were made than how well they performed. Sure, they’ve almost always performed well; that’s why they keep getting made. But this decade? They’ve performed really well.

Here’s a chart of no. 1 box-office hits of the year that were sequels, per decade, for the last 40 years:

1970s: 0
1980s: 2
1990s: 2
2000s: 7

The two no. 1 sequels in the 1980s both came from the “Star Wars” franchise: “The Empire Strikes Back” in 1980 and “The Return of the Jedi” in 1983. Ditto his prequel, “The Phantom Menace,” in 1999. The only non-“Star Wars” sequel to go no. 1 during this period was James Cameron’s “Terminator 2” in 1991.

So basically the only time a sequel reigned atop the annual box office chart from 1970 to 2000 was when it happened a long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away.

In 2002, Lucas’ second prequel, “Attack of the Clones,” actually became the first of the “Star Wars” movies not to be the year’s most popular movie. It finished third to both “Spider-Man” and “Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers.” So it seemed we were entering a new age.

We were. The following year, the sequel to “Two Towers,” “Return of the King,” was the biggest hit of the year, and it’s been sequels ever since:

2003: “The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King”
2004: “Shrek 2”
2005: “Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith”
2006: “Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest”
2007: “Spider-Man 3”
2008: “The Dark Knight”
2009: “Transformers 2”

An argument can be made that this isn’t that big of a change. Sequels have gone from finishing second or fourth for the year to first. Big deal.

But it is different. Here’s how things used to work. Some new movie would come along and everyone would say, “Oh, dude, you gotta see this!” and everyone would go. These movies would become the no. 1 movies of the year: “The Exorcist,” “Jaws,” “Rocky,” “Star Wars,” “Raiders of the Lost Ark,” “Beverly Hills Cop,” “Batman.” And, yes, all generated sequels. But with the exception of “Star Wars”—actually even including “Star Wars”—these sequels didn’t do as well at the box office. There was usually something original people wanted to see more.

No longer. Now the original film is merely a stepping stone to the vast wealth of the sequel. Sure, the first “Pirates of the Caribbean” made $363 million inflation-adjusted dollars in 2003, but the second made $464 million in 2006. Sure, the first “Shrek” made $339 million in inflation-adjusted dollars in 2001, but “Shrek 2” brought in $510 million in 2004. And, yes, “Batman Begins” made $230 million in inflation-adjusted dollars in 2005. Three years later, “The Dark Knight” brought home $533 million.

Instead of something original, we now want the same characters, doing the same thing, in a story that either improves upon the original (“The Dark Knight,” “Spider-Man 2”) or doesn’t (“Spider-Man 3”: any of the “Pirates” sequels).

The question is why.

Part of it has to do with the way movies are rolled out now. Word-of-mouth means less, critics mean less, opening weekend means more. It’s a spectacle and people pay for the spectacle. Search the New York Times archive for the term “opening weekend” and for most of the 20th century you’ll get references to the “Wood, Field and Stream” columns of Raymond R. Camp. “Opening weekend” isn’t used to refer to the movies until 1980, in an article anticipating the release of the first “Star Wars” sequel. And opening weekends didn’t truly become currency until “Spider-Man” broke the $100 million opening-weekend mark in May 2002. That’s when even the average moviegoer took notice. Since then, Spidey’s record has been broken five times—all by sequels.

Movies are made differently now, too. Sequels are anticipated. They’re planned along with the originals. Sometimes they’re filmed along with the originals. The word “sequel” isn’t even effective anymore since we’re really dealing with four types, maybe more:

1. The traditional sequel: These usually come out once every three years. Each film contains its own dramatic arc and more-or-less ends. Examples include the “Spider-Man” movies, the “Shrek” movies, “X-Men,” “Lethal Weapon,” etc.
2. The double-whammy sequel: Several years after the success of the original, these sequels are filmed together and released within a year of each other. Usually the second sequel is of the “to be continued” variety and everything’s tied up (more or less) with the third sequel. Examples include “Back to the Future,” “Pirates of the Caribbean” and “The Matrix.”
3. The episodic sequel: These are often released every year. They’re based on popular books and follow the path of the books. Examples: “Harry Potter,” “Twilight,” possibly “Lord of the Rings.”
4. The “Wait! Let me squeeze out one more” sequel: Shows up 15 to 20 years after the last one, when the stars and/or director don’t have the options they once had, and are relying on past glories to resurrect careers. Examples: “Indiana Jones,” “Rocky” and “Rambo,” “The Godfather.”

Even if the studios are better at making and marketing sequels, however, it doesn't answer the question why are we going as often as we’re going? Because the studios are better at making and marketing sequels? Because theaters, and thus box office, are for blockbuster sequels, while the dramatic movies that don’t generate sequels are now for home viewing via PPV or Netflix? Because in the age of the Internet, we no longer see star-driven movies (“Forrest Gump,” “Jerry Maguire,” “As Good As It Gets”), or director-driven movies (Spielberg) but character-driven movies (Shrek, Batman, Harry Potter), which are easier to sequel-ize? Because after 9/11 we all became a bunch of wimps and just wanted daddy to tell us the same story over and over and over again?

All of the above?

No. 1 sequels used to be George Lucas’ province but now we’re all living in George’s world: special effects are everything, actors are nothing, things whiz by, the fun never stops. A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away, we used to go to the movies to see how people behaved on the roller coaster ride. Now we go for the roller coaster ride. If it has people on it, even better.

So what lessons can we cull from the $140 million opening-weekend of "New Moon"—the third-highest opening ever, and the highest (by far) for a non-summer film? Hint: It's not about the vampires and werewolves. To me, the biggest lesson is this: Quit ignoring girls. If you make a movie aimed at the sensibilities of teenage girls as much as "Star Wars" is aimed at the sensibilities of teenage boys, they will flock.

Here's a second, similar lesson: Plus ca change, plus c'est la meme chose. The Twilight series is trading on what made the most successful movies of all time (Gone with the Wind, The Sound of Music, Titanic) successful. Those movies gave us a girl, choosing between two guys, against a backdrop of historic tragedy. The Twilight series just leaves out the backdrop of historic tragedy, and, rather than, say, Ashley and Rhett, or Leo and the other guy, this girl is choosing between a vampire and a werewolf. OK, so some things do change. 

Final lesson? Girls are just as dopey as boys. Maybe dopier.

(Psst: Transformers 2)

OK, not dopier.

The good and bad of blogging is that there's always something to write about because there's always something online worth refuting. This is good because you always have a subject. This is bad because you always have a distraction from what you should be writing about.

Allow me to be distracted this morning.

I came across this HuffPost piece via IMDb.com, which, for some reason, thought it link-worthy. Danny Groner argues that the biggest hits of the decade are cartoonish, explosive granfalloons but the "Twilight" series is character-driven and appeals to both fortysomething parents and their tweens. Plus they're boffo box office. So Hollywood should take notice. Or already has:

Fourties [sic] these days skews younger, not older, and that's where Hollywood is seemingly heading in the next decade. Sure, new parents are bound to pop up to replace the young moms who have outgrown Dreamworks' animated films. Nevertheless, if this decade's enormous box office stats has taught us anything it's that people are willing to see twice as many movies as long as it keeps them feeling young and in touch with what's popular.

His point seems to be that Hollywood movies, driven by animation and explosions, are more popular than ever, but they can be even more popular if less attention is paid to kids, and the kids in all of us, than to tweens and the tween-parents in all of us. Or something.

Despite whatever argument that is, my disagreement with him comes earlier, when he talks about how popular movies have been in the 2000s:

It's evident that big blockbuster franchises reigned supreme in a way they never had before and nobody would have anticipated. And they did it bigger than any decade before. These so-called "kids' movies" pulled in huge numbers around the world.

So few words there, so much wrong.

1. This decade, blockbusters continued to reign supreme in the way they have since the 1970s. It's nothing new.
2. I believe this was anticipated.
3. They did it bigger than any decade before only if you don't adjust for inflation. Once you adjust for inflation, it's a different, sadder story.

I'm sure someone, somewhere, has a spreadsheet of adjusted numbers for international box office, but inflation-adjusted domestic numbers are easily accessible online. And what do they tell us? That, at least it terms of individual films, the blockbusters of this decade blocked little and busted less.

Since the advent of sound, six of the eight decades are represented in the six highest-grossing (and inflation-adjusted) domestic films of all time:

1. Gone with the Wind (1939): $1.4 billion
2. Star Wars (1977): $1.2 billion
3. The Sound of Music (1965): $1 billion
4. E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial (1982): $1 billion
5. The Ten Commandments (1956): $.9 billion
6. Titanic (1997): $.9 billion

Which decades are missing? The 1940s and the 2000s. The 1940s don't show up until no. 20, "Fantasia" ($.6 billion) while the 2000s don't show up until no. 27, "The Dark Knight" ($.5 billion). And what ranks just ahead of the biggest hit of our decade? "Thunderball," which wasn't even the biggest box-office hit of its year. It wasn't even the second-biggest box-office hit of its year. It came out in 1965 and both "The Sound of Music" and "Dr Zhivago" did better at getting our asses in the seats.

So the biggest hit of this decade ranks just behind the third-biggest-hit of 1965...and movies are more popular than ever?

I'll admit that if you toss in DVD sales and rentals, TV, PPV, etc., movies may be more popular than ever. But not in terms of box office, which is Mr. Groner's sole measure.

I'll also admit that the way blockbusters reigned supreme did change a bit this decade. But that's a discussion for another day.

If you missed yesterday and want the questions, scroll down. Or go here.

1. Which two summer releases made the most money overseas?
The correct answer is D) “Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs” and “Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince.” "Harry Potter" has grossed $625 million abroad—the 8th-most a film has made overseas—while "Ice Age 3," which grossed $195 million domestic, killed overseas, grossing $674 million, or the 3rd-most money any film has made abroad. "Ice Age 3"! Only "Lord of the Rings: Return of the King" ($742 million) and, of course, "Titanic" ($1,242 million) have grossed more abroad.

The overseas numbers thus far:

• "Ice Age 3": $674 million
• "Harry Potter": $625 million
• "Transformers 2": $430 million
• "Angels & Demons":$351 million
• "Terminator: Salvation": $236 million

2. According to the documentary “Food, Inc.,” what is added to almost everything we eat and drink?
The correct answer is A) Corn. Mark Whitacre mentions the same thing in "The Informant!"

3. In “Wolverine,” after Logan’s half-brother Victor tells him, “We can’t let you just walk away!” and Logan begins to walk away, what do the murderous team of mutants do to bring him back?
The correct answer is D) Nothing. They let him walk away.

4. Who’s Richard Greenfield?
The correct answer is C) The market analyst who downgraded Disney’s stock earlier this year because he predicted a bad outing for Pixar’s “Up," which is currently the third-highest-grossing movie in the U.S. Its overseas totals ($124 million) lag mostly because the film hasn't opened yet in Germany (late Sept.), the UK (October) and Japan (December).

5. In what way is the new “Star Trek” similar to the original “Star Wars”?
The correct answer is E) All of the above. J.J. Abrams knows you go with what works. 30 years ago.

6. “Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen” is currently ninth in terms of domestic gross, with over $401 million. But where does it place when you adjust for inflation?
The correct answer is C) 67th, just behind “Smokey and the Bandit.” But it did already pass "Twister" and "The Poseidon Adventure." So: Kudos.

7. Before Sam goes off the college in “Transformers,” what does he say to his loyal, automobile-transforming autobot Bumblebee, whom he’s leaving behind?
The correct answer is D) All of the above.

8. What is Summer’s biggest hang-up in her relationship with Tom in “(500) Days of Summer”?
The correct answer is C) She doesn’t believe in love. Or "lurve." Or "luff." Although it turns out she does. It's just that, as the saying goes, she's just not that into him.

9. In “District 9,” what is the name of the main alien protagonist?
The correct answer is C) Christopher Johnson.

10. What do the following films have in common: “In the Loop,” “The Cove,” “Paper Heart” and “Cold Souls”?
The correct answer, sadly, is C) None went wider than 100 theaters. Brother, can you spare a screen?

11. Which film opened in the most theaters without making at least $100 million?
The correct answer is D) "The Land of the Lost," which didn't even get halfway there: $49 million.

12. Of those films whose widest release was fewer than 3,000 theaters, which grossed the most?
The correct answer is C) "Julie & Julia," whose widest release was 2,528 theaters but has grossed $88 million and counting. Fifteen films that opened between May and September played in more theaters yet haven't made as much money, including "The Taking of Pelham 1-2-3," "The Final Destination," "Ghosts of Girlfriends Past," "Funny People," "Land of the Lost," "Year One," "Aliens in the Attic," "Shorts," and, of course, "Imagine That." All of those films opened in more than 3,000 theaters.

"J&J" also outdid the three other films mentioned in the multiple choice: "The Ugly Truth," "The Time Traveler's Wife" and "My Life in Ruins." Those films focus on women who have careers and search for love. "Julie & Julia" focus on women who have love and search for careers. It don't know if there's a lesson there, but it's a nice change.

We push in line at the picture show
For cool air and a chance to see
A vision of ourselves portrayed as
Younger and braver and humble and free

—Joe Henry, "Our Song"

Summer's over. We've got autumn movie posters rotating to the left and autumn movies arriving in our theaters: the semi-serious, the longshot Oscar contenders, the Halloween horror pics. Summer movie season starts the first weekend of May and ends the first weekend of September, so most postmortems have been done already. Mine is in the above quote from Joe Henry—you don't have this song? Get it—and in the overused line of Yeats' from "The Second Coming": "The best lack all conviction, while the worst/Are full of passionate intensity." The best lack all distribution while the worst show up in 4,000 theaters opening weekend.

No, it wasn't all bad news. Four of the top five grossers are either good-enough films ("Star Trek": $257m; "Harry Potter": $299m), good films ("Hangover": $273m), or great films ("Up": $291m)—but that last, "Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen," is big enough and dumb enough that it gets its stink on everything else. $401 million. Michael Bay wants what's in your wallet! He knows there's not much in your mind.

Glad "Basterds" ($105m) has legs—and not just Diane Kruger's. Glad "Julia" is still cookin' it up ($86m). Too bad about the docs: "Food, Inc." ($4m) and "The Cove" (less than $1m) deserved bigger audiences, but barely trickled into theaters; par for the course for docs. "Funny People" ($51m) deserved a bigger audience, too. "Hurt Locker" ($12m), sure, but I wasn't as ga-ga over it like some, and I get why people didn't go. But "Funny People" was funny and raunchy and it died, relatively speaking. Adam Sandler's "Big Daddy" made $163 million in 1999 ($231 million, adjusted), so where were the Sandler fans? Where were you idiots? At "Transformers," probably. Or maybe you're all big daddies now.

How about you? What did you see this summer that you recommend? What did you see that left you shaking your head? What are you going to remember? What do you wish you could forget?

Here's the image I like to carry away...

Early estimates have Quentin Tarantino's "Inglourious Basterds" making $37 million over the weekend—$14.3, $12.9 and $10.3—but it'll be interesting to see if it's not higher. Patricia and I went last night, Sunday night, at 6:30, to one of the day's dozen shows at Pacific Place in downtown Seattle, and the place was packed. I haven't seen a theater that crowded in a while—let alone on a Sunday night when everyone was supposed to be home and getting ready for the workweek. They applauded at the end, too.

UPDATE: $38 million: $14.3, $13, $10.6. Not a big leap but a hop.

It’s not so much Brooks Barnes’ argument on the front page of The New York Times this morning (“Starring in Summer’s Big Hits, Virtually Nobody”), it’s how he defends his argument.

The argument itself is a no-brainer. Yes, not many stars are in the summer’s big hits. Yes, for the most part, characters-driven movies (Harry Potter, Optimus Prime), and concept movies (“Paul Blart,” “The Hangover”), trump star-driven movies.

But Barnes proves his point by comparing this summer to 2000 and 1990. Why not be mathematically correct and focus on 1999 and 1989?

Because then he’d highlight how little has changed. The big summer movie of 1989 was “Batman,” which, while it had Jack Nicholson in the Joker’s role, was, again, a characters-driven movie. People went more for Batman than Jack. A decade later, the big hit of 1999 was “Star Wars, Episode I: The Phantom Menace,” the fourth film in the series that, you could argue, marked the beginning of the end of the star-driven movie.

Barnes also overdoes his argument—which doesn’t need much overdoing—by lumping together, or having executives lump together, all of the star-driven movies that disappointed at the box office this summer, including Adam Sandler’s “Funny People” and Johnny Depp’s “Public Enemies.” The problem? Both were directors’ films rather than stars’ film. They were perceived that way and marketed that way. And they were serious films, and serious rarely does well in summer. And “Public Enemies” didn’t do that poorly—it’s near $100 million domestic—which, even adjusted for inflation, is the sixth-highest-grossing Johnny Depp film. As famous as he is, Depp is still more actor than star to me. If he’s playing a character people like—Captain Jack—sure, they come out in droves. Otherwise, it’s “Dead Man.”

This raises another point. Weren’t star-driven movies always characters-driven movies? Fans went to see Bogart being Bogart, Redford being Redford, Cruise being Cruise. When they deviated from those roles, box office dropped.

Something is happening, surely, with moviegoers and their loyalty to stars, but the discussion the topic deserves wasn’t on the front page of today’s New York Times.

After busting out gangbusters on Friday with a $22 million opening, "G.I. Joe" hasn't fared particularly well. It was the only film, among the top 20 grossers Saturday, whose percentages dropped, and they dropped by 18 percent. Its studio's Sunday estimation was off by $1.5 million—indicating enthusiasm, such as it was, was waning even more than they thought—while it was one of only three films whose percentages dropped Tuesday. And while the other two, "Orphan" and "Funny People," dropped by 1 percent, "Joe" dropped by 7 percent. "Joe"'s torso may be buff, in other words, but his legs are weak.

The lowest-grossing film for any film to open in over 4,000 theaters is "Mission: Impossible III," which wound up making $134 million, domestic, back in 2005. "Joe" is now at $67 million. Fingers crossed.

For the first time since it opened on June 24, "Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen" made less than $2 million (domestically) in one day—when it grossed $1.7 million yesterday, down 42% from the previous Monday. I know. Cold comfort. But so far it's the only comfort I've found.

Here's the plan. We find every 14-year-old that's propeling "Transformers 2" toward the $400 million mark in the U.S., and possibly the $1 billion mark globally, and in 30 years force them to watch it again. Plus the original. Plus all sequels. Plus the '80s series. Back to back to back to back. As a way of saying thanks.

The movie's box office has fallen off, certainly, but not preciptiously liked I'd hoped. I had my fingers crossed for "Gigli" numbers (-81% during its second weekend) or at least "Wolverine" numbers (-69%), but "Transformers" only fell off by "Terminator: Salvation" numbers: -61%.

I'm hoping for better next weekend. Stop the stupidity. While we can.

"[Critics] forget what the goal of the movie ['Transformers 2'] was. The goal of the movie is to entertain and have fun. What the audience tells us is, ‘We couldn’t be more entertained and having more fun.’ They kind of roll their eyes at the critics and say, ‘You have no idea what you’re talking about.’”

—Rob Moore, vice chairman of Paramount, which is distributing "Transformers 2 for DreamWorks, in an uncredited AP article.

 The Annual Box Office Rankings for Best Picture Nominees, 1991-2008*

* Best picture winner represented in red.

Want one more?

*ditto

The problem isn't the number of nominees. The problem is the disconnect between studios, distributors, audience and the Academy. We don't make best pictures anymore. And if we do make them we don't distribute them. And if we do distribute them we don't go see them. And if all three happen, but the movie happens to be a cartoon or a superhero film, the Academy can't be bothered.

I'll say it again. The Academy is fixing something that ain't broken (the tradition of five nominees) because of something that is hugely broken. All of the above.

BTW: I charted the above for the drastic change that took place in 2004, but I never noticed —until I created this graph — how the best picture winner is almost always (eventually) the no. 1 or 2 box office hit among the five nominees. That's good to know. Or at least it was in the era of five nominees. Now it's useless knowledge.

By the way, and related to yesterday’s post: If you take all 243 films that were released superwide (into 3,000 or more theaters) from 2004 to 2008, and divide them by Rotten Tomatoes' ranking (“fresh” meaning 60 percent or better from top critics, “rotten” 59 percent or worse), and total and then average the box office for each category, this is what you get:

All Superwide Releases, 2004-2008

That's a $67 million advantage.

Are there extenuating circumstances? No doubt. "Fresh" superwide releases are more likely to open during the prime real-estate months of May, June, July, November and December—by a 66% to 47% ratio. Their marketing budgets may be bigger, too, but of course I have no data on that. (Does anyone?)

Most importantly, "fresh" films open, on average, in 231 more theaters than “rotten” films.

But even if you take away this advantage—by dividing the average box-office take by the average opening theater count—the “fresh” films are still much, much more lucrative:

All Superwide Releases, 2004-2008, by Theater Count

If you build it well, we will come.

Last week, John Lesher, the president of the Paramount Film Group, was fired and replaced by Adam Goodman, former head of production at Dreamworks SKG. Nikki Finke’s blog listed a number of offenses against Lesher, including drunkenness, while the L.A. Times said his biggest offense in his 18 months on the job wasn’t greenlighting enough pictures.

Maybe the two are related. I have no idea—I’m way the hell up in Seattle, and I don’t read much on internal studio dynamics—but the following, at least, demonstrates a problem Paramount has had for the last five years. It’s a table on how the big six studios (plus DreamWorks) fared with their superwide (3,000+ theater) releases from 2004 to 2008, ranked by average box office:

 Superwide Releases, 2004-2008, by Studio/Distributor

If you’re a regular reader you know I’m someone who believes that, with similar movies, good generally beats bad. People are more likely to go see a good popcorn movie over a bad one, and an exciting arthouse movie over a dull one. To paraphrase a famous movie line: “If you build it well, they will come.”

Paramount, according to this chart, builds them better than most, but, on average, fewer people show up.

The bigger question the table raises, though, is this: What’s up with Fox? They have the lowest percentage of fresh films and the lowest average box office per film as well. If you’re wondering what Fox's 39 superwide releases over the last five years look like, here you go. As sorted by top-critics-ranking on Rotten Tomatoes:

Fox's Superwide Releases: 2004-2008

It’s not pretty. I liked, well enough, “Mr. & Mrs. Smith,” “The Simpsons Movie” and “Marley and Me,” but there’s no standout film here, and most of their menu smells like the glop of McDonald’s. In fact, they’re the only major studio over the last five years not to release a film superwide that garnered a 90% or better rating from the top critics in the country. DreamWorks (“Wallace and Gromit”) Paramount (“Iron Man”) and Universal (“The Bourne Ultimatum”) each did it once; Sony did it twice (“Casino Royale”; “Spider-Man 2”); Warner Bros. three times (“The Dark Knight”; “The Departed”; “Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban”); and Buena Vista, with a big helping hand from Pixar, did it four times (“Ratatouille”; “WALL-E”; “The Incredibles” and “Enchanted”). Fox? Nothing. Not even close. As you can see.

Equally astonishing is the kinds of movies Fox decides to dump into 3,000+ theaters. “The Seeker”? “Meet Dave”? “Elektra”? The preeminent popular genre of the decade is the superhero film and what has Fox done with it? They’ve taken one franchise that started brilliantly (Bryan Singer’s “X-Men”) and run it into the ground, while taking one of the more famous superhero teams ever created (“The Fantastic Four”) and never got it off the ground. You could argue that Fox’s most successful superhero over the past five years isn’t Wolverine or Mr. Fantastic; it’s Spider-Pig.

In the 1930s studios had personalities. Warner Bros. was gritty gangster stuff, MGM went after glamour and sophistication, etc. Studios are corporate-run now—smaller entities within larger multinational conglomerates—so we no longer ascribe a personality to their output. Lucky for Fox.

Bummer.

Hollywood Elsewhere, via Variety, reports that Sony chief Amy Pascal has pulled the plug on "Moneyball," the Steven Soderbergh adaptation of Michael Lewis' book, which was to star Brad Pitt as Oakland A's GM Billy Beane, and which was to begin shooting Monday. Earlier this month, Patrick Goldstein, expressing enthusiasm for the project, wrote about how it would adhere closely to the book. Maybe that was the problem. Too cerebral? Too much about baseball? Neither of which (baseball, cerebral) plays well in international markets?

Jeffrey Wells, for one, is doubtful:

What this seems to mean is either that (a) Pascal doesn't believe that stars like Pitt mean all that much when it comes to opening a costly film -- that the movie itself has to have the commercial goods or it's not worth doing, or that (b) she's half-persuaded that the 46 year-old Pitt -- 50 in four and a half years! -- isn't much of a star any more. Or a combination of both.

Who knows? Maybe Pascal knew she was taking a chance with Soderbergh, and, after the relative failures of two recent Sony offerings, "Pelham" and "Year One," she wasn't in the chance-taking mood.

As I said: Bummer. With that talent, and that source material, I had high hopes the movie would be good. Certainly better than "Deuce Bigalow: European Gigilo," "Stealth," "Bewitched," "Guess Who" or "RV," all of which Sony/Columbia, and presumably Pascal, not only greenlit but opened in more than 3,000 theaters in recent years.

Thursday night I took Patricia to see “Up” because I thought she’d love it—she did, particularly Dug—and because I wanted to see it without the 3D. I’m glad we went. Movies should be big and 3D seems to make them smaller. It’s as if, in creating the appearance of density, characters become heavy tiny objects rather than light big objects. The unfurling of the balloons and the house taking off—a great cinematic moment—is much more beautiful on the flat screen. Roger Ebert agrees.

“Up,” dismissed early and long for its elderly lead character, is already past the $200 million mark, the second-highest-grossing film of the year, and looks poised to pass “The Incredibles” ($261 million) to become the second-highest-grossing Pixar pic ever. Another example that quality—certainly brand-name quality—wins in the end.

Except Variety is now attributing the success of “Up” to...what? 3D, of course:

“Up’s” boffo run is the latest example of how 3-D runs can boost a film’s bottom line through higher ticket prices. The film’s 3-D runs make up only 40% of the total screen count, yet they contribute 60% of the gross.

So how much of that 20-percent difference is in higher ticket prices and how much is in higher attendance figures? And if the latter, how many moviegoers would’ve seen the film anyway? I mean, is anyone seriously going to see “Up” because of 3D? At least Variety tempers its enthusiasm with some later-graf common sense from Disney:

Chuck Viane, Disney’s prexy of domestic distribution, said 3-D has been a boon to “Up,” but he added that the foundation of any successful pic is a good story. “3-D enhances the storytelling, and thereby, the run,” Viane said.

For really misreading stats, though, there’s Variety’s Anne Thompson. I found the article—her six lessons of summer box office—in the usual roundabout Internet way: a link on Nathaniel R.’s site to a David Poland piece critiquing Anne Thompson’s original article. Now I add to the chain.

I like Nathaniel’s caveat: “I can’t say I ‘enjoy’ David Poland’s habitual attacks on other film journos but he definitely makes good points in this article.”

As someone who’s been attacked by Poland, I couldn’t agree more. Particularly since Poland, in his attack on me, got so much wrong.

I’d argue he goes overboard here, too. He attacks all of Thompson’s six lessons and... well, most of them are pretty bad. She draws big lessons from a small sample—always a mistake—when she could’ve crunched all six of her lessons into one. Quality sells. She implies as much with her adjective choices in nos. 3 & 6: “Smart R-rated dumb male comedies sell” and “Lackluster sequels sell--but don't break out big” (italics mine). She might’ve done the same with nos. 5, 4 & 2: bad Eddie Murphy movies don’t sell; unfocused family films don’t sell; and good origin myths (“Star Trek”) trump bad origin myths (“Wolverine”).

As for her no. 1 lesson? “Originals sell”? She writes:

The very thing that the majors are most afraid of is what makes Pixar King of the Mountain, every single time: originality. While everyone else looks for easy-sell labels, Pixar relies on a very old-fashioned idea: make it good and they will come. Up scored not via marketing prowess, but through great word-of-mouth. Gross to date: $191 million and going strong. Heck yeah!

Again, I’m happy about the performance of “Up,” not to mention “The Hangover,” which—amazingly!—looks poised to go over the $200 million mark as well. And I certainly wish this lesson were true. But is it? The highest grossing film thus far this year is “Star Trek,” which is a reboot of an old movie and TV franchise. Not original. And earlier in the article Thompson herself taps the films she thinks will be the summer’s big blockbusters: “Transformers: Revenge of the...” and “Harry Potter and the Half-Blood...” Both sequels.

Here, in fact, are the 10 highest-grossing movies from the last five years:

Eight of them are sequels or reboots. The only two that are not—”Passion” and “Iron Man”—are based on previously published material. Which is to say: none are originals. You won’t see an original story on this list until no. 17—Pixar’s “The Incredibles”—and original stories remain few and far between thereafter: “Night at the Museum” (no. 19), “Hancock” (no. 24), more Pixar (“Cars,” “Wall-E,” etc.).

I’m not saying this won’t change. People flocked to musicals until they didn’t. But for the moment we live in a sequel era. We want daddy to tell us that story again.

However, if Ms. Thompson had written “Originals can sell,” well, I wouldn’t have argued with that. That’s a good lesson to get out in Hollywood.

We'll have more to say about this later, but one thing once again seems obvious: If you have a really good movie with a strong concept and no movie stars going up against a really bad movie with a weak concept and a big movie star -- the good movie wins every time. The public can no longer be hypnotized into seeing a bad movie just by the presence of a A-list star.

Kroll knew she hit pay dirt when she went to the hair salon on Saturday. She listened with delight as a pair of women relived the uproarious time they'd had seeing the film with friends the night before. "One of them said, 'I loved that guy who was missing a tooth -- he reminded me of my ex-boyfriend.' " Kroll recalled. "And then she said, 'Everyone loves that movie. My mother's going to see it now too.' "

That is what is called major league buzz -- when even grandmothers are going to see a movie whose target audience is 19-year-old boys.

It seems to be panning out. On Monday, “Hangover”’s box office fell off by only 41.9%. Most films, from Sunday to Monday, drop off in the 60s. In fact, so far this year, for a non-holiday weekend, "Hangover"'s is the second-smallest Monday dropoff for any weekend box office champion—after “Taken”’s 39% at the end of January.

Some may attribute this to school getting out and kids running amuck (and to the theater) but that 41.9% trumps the Monday fall-off for any weekend box office champ in June 2008, too.

I imagine this isn’t a great morning to be Richard Greenfield. He’s the market analyst at Pali Research who earlier this year downgraded Disney stock because he felt Pixar’s latest movie, “Up,” had a poor outlook. Brooks Barnes quoted him in the New York Times last April:

“We doubt younger boys will be that excited by the main character,” he wrote, adding a complaint about the lack of a female lead.

I wrote about this back then—slamming not only Greenfield but Barnes and the Times for getting their facts wrong by ignoring international markets—but after two months Greenfield’s quote looks even daffier.

It contains two complaints.

The first is about Carl, the lead character in “Up,” an old man in a medium designed for kids. He’s a legitimate market concern. That’s Greenfield’s territory.

The second complaint is about the lack of a female lead, which is a PC rather than a market concern. In fact, it’s the opposite of a market concern. Most movies don’t have female leads because most market analysts feel there’s no audience to support them.

Worse, “Up” has a prominent female character: Ellie, who’s the engine for the entire story. It’s such an odd comment from a market analyst. Maybe that’s why Barnes presented it without quotes.

Greenfield, I’m sure, is waiting to see how “Up” does in its second weekend, as well as internationally, before he issues his mea culpa—if in fact market analysts issue mea culpas. I doubt they do. Otherwise we’d be drowning in them. But for the record, in its opening weekend, “Up” made over $68 million, which is the second-best opening for a Pixar film, after “The Incredibles.”

Barnes’ mea culpa, such as it is, comes in his usual post-weekend box-office article in today’s Times, in which he uses the word “marketing” six times, including in the first graf:

Rapturous reviews and a colossal marketing campaign sent “Up” into the box office stratosphere over the weekend.

And then this in the fifth graf:

Strong opening weekends can be bought with big marketing campaigns, of course, so the coming weeks for “Up” and its performance overseas — where recent Pixar titles have made the bulk of their revenue — will be important in the evaluation of the film’s financial success.

Both of his statements are true—particularly the fact that strong opening weekends can be bought—but why mention all of this, and so stridently (six times), in connection with “Up”?

Was “Up”’s campaign particularly intensive? We don’t know. Barnes has no figures, just the say-so of other studios, along with some anecdotal information.

So is this the usual m.o. for Barnes? Does he often talk up the marketing campaigns of successful weekend films? Yes and no. Mostly no. In his post-“Star Trek” article, he attributed its success, in part, to a “megawatt marketing campaign”— but only once, and in the second graf. Meanwhile, he makes no mention of marketing for the opening-weekend success of such films as “Hannah Montana”, “Fast and Furious” and “Monsters vs. Aliens” earlier this year.

Does this mean those films didn’t rely on marketing to succeed? Or the relied less on marketing than "Up"? No one knows. Because no one has the figures.

Barnes’ “Up” piece, in other words, feels a little like ass-covering. He focuses on marketing to explain why a film he thought wouldn’t do well did.

Me, I would love it if every Monday Barnes gave us the marketing budgets for, say, the top five films. To compare and contrast. That would be fascinating reading. But they're not available and so all he has is adjectives (“megawatt”; “colossal”) and a seemingly scattershot approach to writing about marketing.

Here’s something, for example, Barnes doesn’t mention as a reason for the success of “Up,” but which, if I were writing that piece, might be my lead: It’s a Pixar movie. And Pixar means something to millions of moviegoers around the world. It means quality.

Another indication that quality matters a little—even in Hollywood.

“Wolverine” opened in over 4,000 theaters (and who knows how many screens) and made $85 million its opening weekend. But the movie was bad. I know: “bad.” Subjective. How about “a mess”? How about only 37% of the fanboys at Rotten Tomatoes gave it a thumbs up, while only 15% of the top critics did the same? In a way, even 15% seems too much. Shame on you Kenneth Turan, who wrote the following nothing graf as part of his review:

As directed by Gavin Hood from a script by David Benioff and Skip Woods, "X-Men Origins: Wolverine" answers all those questions and brings everyone up to speed with a brisk thoroughness. It's a solid, efficient comic book movie that is content to provide comic book satisfactions of the action and violence variety. If it doesn't rise to the heights of Christopher Nolan's "Batman" films, it doesn't stray into "Daredevil" territory either.

Yet despite being “solid” and “efficient” (and it’s neither), the following weekend “Wolverine”’s business fell off by 69%, which, as I’ve written, in unprecedented for a film that opened in more than 4,000 theaters. As of Monday, its b.o. total (domestic) was $152.4 million.

   vs. 

“Star Trek” opened a weekend later in fewer theaters, 3.849, and made less opening weekend, $75 million. But the movie was good. I know: “good.” Actually it deserves those quotes, since I don’t think the movie is all that. The best thing about it is the casting. Otherwise, the story and pacing are derivative of “Star Wars” and none of it really sticks. It’s too busy going to leave anything memorable. But the fanboys at Rotten Tomatoes drooled (95%), and critics did, too (91%), and word-of-mouth is mostly good, and so, its second weekend, it fell off by only 42.8%. As of Monday, its b.o. total (domestic) stood at $151.1 million. Once Tuesday’s numbers are in, it’ll pass the mutant for sure. “Star Trek” is still drawing over $4 million on weekdays, while “Wolverine” is down to around $1 million per day.

In other words, despite the advantage that “Wolverine” had over “Star Trek” in terms of time and theater total, “Star Trek” is already warping past it and will surely be the year’s first $200 million movie. On the strength, I would argue, of its quality.

A question for Trekkies/ers is whether this film, which is already the highest-grossing “Star Trek” film ever, can surpass the original, 1979’s “Star Trek: The Motion Picture,” in adjusted gross. To do so, it’ll have to make over $235 million. I’m not Spock, but I’d calculate the odds of that happening as pretty good.

On his “Big Picture” blog, Patrick Goldstein takes a look at DVD sales, which are currently down by 18 percent. It’s a post worth reading—particularly since he enlightens an area that the studios like to keep dark. One bit of news I found heartening: The sales of better DVDs (as judged by exit polls and critics, and exemplified, here, by “Iron Man”) do better than the sales of lamer DVDs (“Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull”). I.e., Quality matters. What I’ve been saying. What I’ll continue to say. Stay tuned.

As for why the sales of DVDs are down? Goldstein doesn’t know and he says the industry doesn’t know, either:

No one has any real answers about the DVD downturn either. Obviously the country's economic woes have played a role. The DVD business has long ago lost its novelty, so many consumers don't feel the need to stock up on as many new releases. Many consumers have turned to downloading and rentals, with Netflix in particular enjoying a burst of popularity -- a good thing for filmmakers, but not such a good thing for studios, who make a lower profit margin on rentals than sales.

You could also argue that we now live in a cultural moment where people don't want to own things as much as they want to experience them...

Again, that's my guess. Feel free to pile on.

Let's get right to it...

1. According to Box Office Mojo, 605 movies were shown commercially in the U.S. in 2008. “The Dark Knight,” obviously, made the most money: $533 million. Which of the 605 made the least?
The correct answer is A: “Rome & Jewel.” It was distributed by Emerging Pictures, played in one theater for one week, and made $470. “The Rise and Fall of Miss Thang” was a few down the line; it made $581. “OSS 117,” by the way, is a very funny takeoff on the early James Bond films and worth renting. Netflix it. The sequel is already in French theaters.

2. Let’s talk about the films that studios assumed we’d see: the films that opened superwide—in more than 3,000 theaters. Last year there were 52 such films, and almost half of them (24) grossed over $100 million. The film that grossed the least pulled in only $11 million domestically. Name it.
The correct answer is C: “Meet Dave,” starring Eddie Murphy, and distributed by Fox. “Dave” opened the weekend of July 11th in 3,011 theaters and made just $5 million ($1,744 average), then went downhill from there. On the plus side, it brought in $38 million internationally.

3. Different studios had different kinds of luck with their superwide releases.  Paramount/Dreamworks, for example, opened four films superwide last year and every one made more than $100 million domestically: “Kung Fu Panda,” “Madagascar 2,” “Tropic Thunder” and “Eagle Eye.” So which studio/distributor had the worst ratio of superwide releases (3,000+ theaters) to box-office smashes ($100+ million)?
The correct answer is D: Fox. It opened 11 films superwide and only two (“Horton Hears a Who” and “Marley & Me”) made over $100 million. Here’s the rest of what they piled on our plates:

1. “What Happens in Vegas”: $80m
2. “Jumper”: $80m
3. “The Day the Earth Stood Still”: $79m
4. “27 Dresses”: $76m
5. “Nim’s Island”: $48m
6. “Max Payne”: $40m
7. “Babylon A.D.”: $22m
8. “The X-Files: I Want to Believe”: $20m
9. “Meet Dave”: $11m

Coincidentally or not, all nine films had “rotten” Rotten Tomatoes ratings. Which is not to imply that people necessarily read RT or movie critics. Just that word gets around.

Of the other major distributors, Warner Bros. went 2 for 7, Paramount 2 for 6, Universal 3 for 5, and both Sony and Buena Vista 4 for 6.

4. One last question on the superwide openers. Of those 52 films that the studios assumed we’d see, only 17 garnered “fresh” ratings from the top critics at Rotten Tomatoes. Seven of those 17 are among the top 10 box-office hits of the year (“Dark Knight,” “Iron Man,” etc.). But how many “fresh” films are among the 10 worst-performing superwide releases?  
The correct answer is D: 0. Here are the culprits:

43. “Speed Racer”—WB—$43m—30%
44. “Max Payne”—Fox—$40m—9%
45. “Righteous Kill”—Over.—$40m—12%
46. “Star Wars: The Clone Wars”—WB—$35m—8%
47. “Semi-Pro”—NL—$33m—27%
48. “Drillbit Taylor”—Par.—$32m—25%
49. “The Love Guru”—Par.—$32m—6%
50. “Babylon A.D.”—Fox—$22m—0%
51. “The X-Files: I Want to Believe”—Fox—$20m—26%
52. “Meet Dave”—Fox—$11m—29%

Again, this is not to imply that people read RT or movie critics. Just that word gets around.

5. One 2008 release had, according to Box Office Mojo, the worst opening weekend ever for a wide release (500+ theaters). Name this film that no one went to see.
The correct answer is A: “Proud American,” a patriotic documentary/drama, written and directed by first-timer Fred Ashman, that was plopped into 750 theaters by Slowhand Cinema last September—just in time for Lehman Bros. On the Friday it opened it averaged $45 per theater, then went up to $60 on Saturday, then down to $23 on Sunday. That’s 23 bucks for the entire day. How many people is that—three? Five at the most? And not per showing. For the entire day. Think about this the next time Michael Medved starts yakkin’ about how Hollywood doesn’t make the kinds of patriotic films Americans want to see.

6. Box Office Mojo also tracks the box office of 57 countries/markets besides the U.S. In those 57 international markets, which film was the No. 1 movie in the most countries (11)?
The correct answer is: D: “Mamma Mia!” While “Indiana Jones” made the most money overseas ($469 million), followed closely by “The Dark Knight” ($468m), “Mamma Mia!” wasn’t far behind at no. 3: $458m. It was also the No. 1 movie in more countries (11) than any other 2008 film:

1. Austria ($7 million)
2. Greece ($7 million)
3. Hungary ($4.7 million)
4. Iceland ($1 million)
5. Netherlands ($9.8 million)
6. New Zealand ($5 million)
7. Norway ($16.7 million)
8. Portugal ($5 million)
9. Slovenia ($.8 million)
10. Sweden ($25 million)
11. United Kingdom ($132 million)

“Dark Knight” was the No. 1 movie in eight countries (Australia, Brazil, Mexico, Hong Kong, UAE, Egypt, Bolivia and Lebanon), “Madagascar 2” in five (Germany, Russia, Switzerland, Venezuela and Lithuania), “Quantum of Solace” in three (Finland, Nigeria and East Africa), and “Indiana Jones” in only two (Spain and Bulgaria),

7. In which of the following countries was “Sex and the City” the No. 1 movie of the year?
The answer is A: Croatia and Estonia. Insert your own joke here. I got nothing.

8. While we’re on international box office, which of the following films was not among the top five films in Egypt last year?
The correct answer is: B: “Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull,” which finished in 10th place. Which means, yes, “Body of Lies,” the Leonardo DiCaprio/Russell Crowe thriller about CIA activities in the Middle East that died in the U.S. (winding up 72nd for the year), finished, in Egypt, in 5th place for the year.

9. “Bienvenue chez les Ch'tis,” a comedy about a small provincial town in northern France written, directed and starring Danny Boon, was the no. 1 film in France last year. The No. 2 movie, “Astérix aux jeux olympiques,” made US$60m. How much did “Bienvenue” make?
The answer is D: $193 million, obliteraring all comers, and becoming, I believe, the highest-grossing film in French history. But its humor hasn’t traveled well. In this way it’s similar to “Les Visiteurs” in 1993, also a top grosser, whose humor also didn’t travel much beyond Belgium.

10. Box Office Mojo lists 932 total films in its overseas total. Which film, ironically, wound up in 932nd place?
The correct answer is A: the ironically titled “Gunnin’ for That #1 Spot,” a documentary about high school basketball players, which made just 146 bucks overseas. “I.O.U.S.A,” a chilling, worthwhile doc about national debt (and produced and distributed even before Lehman Bros, bailouts, et al.), had the second-lowest total: only 299 bucks. Yes, also ironic.

Apologies, again, for the difficulty of the questions but some of this stuff I found fascinating, particularly the superwides, "Proud American," and the international reign of "Mamma Mia!"

I always wait a few months to take on the previous year’s box office because money’s still pouring in. By now, though, it’s dribs and drabs, and it’s safe to take a fairly accurate look. Apologies for the toughness of the questions. This is a quiz less about what we know than what we can learn. Or, at least, it’s about what I learned.

2. Let’s talk about the films that studios assumed we’d see: the films that opened superwide—in more than 3,000 theaters. Last year there were 52 such films, and almost half of them (24) grossed over $100 million. The film that grossed the least pulled in only $11 million domestically. Name it.
A. “Star Wars: The Clone Wars”
B. “The Love Guru”
C. “Meet Dave”
D. “Frost/Nixon”

3. Different studios had different kinds of luck with their superwide releases. Paramount/Dreamworks, for example, opened four films superwide last year and every one made more than $100 million domestically: “Kung Fu Panda,” “Madagascar 2,” “Tropic Thunder” and “Eagle Eye.” So which studio/distributor had the worst ratio of superwide releases (3,000+ theaters) to box-office smashes ($100+ million)?
A. Warner Bros., which released “The Dark Knight.”
B. Universal, which released “The Incredible Hulk.”
C. Paramount, which released “Iron Man.”
D. Fox, which released “Marley & Me”

4. One last question on the superwide openers. Of those 52 films that the studios assumed we’d see, only 17 garnered “fresh” ratings from the top critics at Rotten Tomatoes. Seven of those 17 are among the top 10 box-office hits of the year (“Dark Knight,” “Iron Man,” etc.). But how many “fresh” films are among the 10 worst-performing superwide releases?  
A. 10
B. 7
C. 1
D. 0

5. One 2008 release had, according to Box Office Mojo, the worst opening weekend ever for a wide release (500+ theaters). Name this film that no one went to see.
A. “Proud American”
B. “Vicky Christina Barcelona”
C. “Witless Protection”
D. “Frost/Nixon”

6. Box Office Mojo also tracks the box office of 57 countries/markets besides the U.S. In those 57 international markets, which film was the No. 1 movie in the most countries (11)?
A. “The Dark Knight”
B. “Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull”
C. “Kung Fu Panda”
D. “Mamma Mia!”

7. In which of the following countries was “Sex and the City” the No. 1 movie of the year?
A. Croatia and Estonia
B. Argentina and Brazil
C. Thailand and Taiwan
D. Frost and Nixon

8. While we’re on international box office, which of the following films was not among the top five films in Egypt last year?
A. “The Dark Knight”
B. “Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull”
C. “Hancock”
D. “Body of Lies”

9. “Bienvenue chez les Ch'tis,” a comedy about a small provincial town in northern France written, directed and starring Danny Boon, was the no. 1 film in France last year. The No. 2 movie, “Astérix aux jeux olympiques,” made US$60m. How much did “Bienvenue” make?
A. $60.1m
B. $71m
C. $82m
D. $193m

10. Box Office Mojo lists 932 total films in its overseas total. Which film, ironically, wound up in 932nd place?
A. “Gunnin’ for That #1 Spot”
B. “I.O.U.S.A”
C. “You Don’t Mess with the Zohan”
D. “Frost/Nixon”

Feel free to post your guesses in the comment field. I’ll post answers later in the week.

ADDENDUM: ANSWERS

Last week I wondered how much “Wolverine”’s box office would fall off during its second weekend and suggested north of 60% wouldn’t be good news for the franchise. Well, the numbers are in. It’s 69%.

What does that mean? A 69%, second-weekend drop is the 61st-worst in boxofficemojo’s tracking period (roughly, since 1980), but even this stat is misleading. The worst second-weekend dropoff, for example, is a 2005 film called “Undiscovered,” which fell off 86.4% from its first weekend. But Lions Gate, which pushed it into 1,304 theaters that first weekend, was already pulling out, and left it in only 754 theaters its second weekend. The steep dropoff, in other words, represented more a preemptive studio strike rather than audience disinterest—although there was obviously that, too. “Wolverine,” in comparison, increased its theater total for the second weekend, by three, to 4,102 theaters.

Here’s what’s more telling. "Wolverine"'s is the worst such dropoff for any film that opened in 4,000+ theaters, beating out the May 2007 sequels, “Pirates 3” and “Spider-Man 3,” both of which dropped 61.5% their second weekend.

Expand down to films that opened in 3,000+ theaters? It’s tied, with "Elektra," for sixth-worst:

"Heighdy! See how I'm picking up the local jargon? Things going extremely well for us. Found the graves of Clyde and Buck in abandoned cemetery overgrown with weeds. One of the strangest sensations we ever had—standing six feet over Clyde. On Monday we'll see Bonnie's. ... Bob is taking a lot of pictures. Perfect Bonnie and Clyde locations! Quite uncanny to see cities and towns that look like 1932 this year."

— David Newman (with Robert Benton), in East Texas for further research for their script, "Bonnie and Clyde," May 1964. From "Pictures at the Revolution" by Mark Harris, pg. 60

I was surprised but not shocked that "X-Men Origins: Wolverine" did so well this weekend, bringing in $87 million, which, unadjusted, is the 18th-best opening weekend ever. It's a superhero movie, after all, and a popular character, and it opened in over 4,000 theaters (the 14th-most ever) and, according to Brandon Gray, on 8,300 screens (which is the Xth-most ever? Someone?). The biggest surprise, from Michael Cieply over at the Times, is the make-up of the audience: nearly 50 percent female. Although, in retrospect, it certainly makes sense, Hugh being Hugh...

No, the number to look for is how much it falls off next weekend. That's when the bad reviews (37% on RT, 44 on metacritic), and so-so word of mouth (assuming), might be felt. A drop-off of more than 60 percent (as with "Watchmen," "X-Men 3" and "Spider-Man 3") will definitely mean something in terms of what people really think of this thing.

ADDENDUM: The actuals are in and it's $85 million, which is good for 19th-best opening weekend. The movie it dropped behind? "X2: X-Men United." Any guesses as to "Wolverine"'s dropoff next weekend?

Most moviegoers don’t know from studios — particularly these days when each studio seems a bland corporate entity without the personality, or even the Eastern-European mogul, that each had back in the day.

I’m no different. Even as a critic I never paid much attention to which studio released which film. But I became aware of Fox Atomic when I was gathering info for what became that Slate article on box office last year — because 20th Century Fox seemed a case study of what was wrong with the movie industry. Its crap films (distributed by parent company Fox, mostly) got massive distribution while its good films (put out by specialty division Fox Searchlight, mostly) were barely shown anywhere. Between these two — the slovenly screw-up to Fox Searchlight’s straight-A student —was Fox Atomic, which seemed to distribute, on the 2,000-theater scale, disappointing genre films like “The Hills Have Eyes 2.”

Here, for example, is Fox’s 2007 schedule sorted by each film’s maximum distribution. Pay particular attention to the Rotten Tomatoes rating on the right:

Sad, but in a way I understood the dynamic between Fox and Fox Searchlight. The former heaved onto our plates mostly fad-laden slop while the latter parceled out, in teaspoons, cuisine for the adult palate. I didn’t agree that this was always the best thing, financially, to do. Couldn’t, say, “The Darjeeling Limited,” given proper distribution and marketing, have done better than, say, “The Seeker: The Dark is Rising”? But at least I understood how they understood it all. Give the masses goop and pray for money. Give the elites caviar and pray for awards.

But Fox Atomic? What was its point? A specialty studio that released stuff that made even Fox hold their noses? Movies that didn’t do well critically or financially?

Well, Fox Atomic is dead now, its shop closed, its employees returned to the larger Fox fold. Here’s a list of films they distributed in their short, unhappy lifetime, along with domestic box office total and Rotten Tomatoes rating. Each opened in at least 1,500 theaters:

• Turistas (2006): $7M, 15%          
• The Hills Have Eyes 2 (2007): $20M, 12%
• 28 Weeks Later (2007): $28M, 71%
• The Comebacks (2007): $13M, 10%
• The Rocker (2008): $6M, 39%
• Miss March (2009): $4M, 4%
• 12 Rounds (2009): $11M, 20%

Any death, any funeral, is a lesson. We all go sometime. What do you want to leave behind?

Hopefully it’s not “Miss March.”

Do I have the energy on this Monday, when dozens are dead from an earthquake in Italy, to get worked up over the state of the movie world? Not even the movie world, really, but the business side of the movie world? Yeah, those guys.

First New York Times writer Brooks Barnes pats Universal Studios on the back for both “Fast & Furious,” which made $72 million over the weekend, and for reviving the “Hellboy” franchise last summer, which, Barnes writes, the studio turned “into a hit after Sony Pictures Entertainment passed on making a sequel.” Apparently Barnes forgot the role Guillermo del Toro played. At the same time, his use of the term “hit” may be a slight exaggeration. Yes, the film made $34 million its opening weekend. Then it dropped off 70 percent and struggled to make $75 million. Nothing to sneeze at, but, in Hollywood terms, is that a “hit”? For a superhero film?

Richard Greenfield wouldn’t think so. In the Business section of the paper, Barnes (back again) writes how Greenfield’s firm, Pali Research, recently downgraded Disney shares because of — get this — a poor outlook for the next Pixar movie.

Whoa. So is the Pixar movie, “Up,” screening poorly? No. It’s screening extremely well.

Pali has a problem with the lead, an old man voiced by Ed Asner: “‘We doubt younger boys will be that excited by the main character,’ Greenfield wrote, adding a complaint about the lack of a female lead.”

Others pile on. “'The worries keep coming despite Pixar’s track record, because each film it delivers seems to be less commercial than the last,' said Doug Creutz of Cowen and Company."

Barnes then looks at said commerciality of Pixar’s films and agrees. Compared with the $405 million “Finding Nemo” made in 2003, he writes:

Pixar’s last two films, “Wall-E” and “Ratatouille,” have been the studio’s two worst performers, delivering sales of $224 million and $216 million respectively, according to Box Office Mojo, a tracking service.

Well, yes and no. Actually, no and no.

According to box office mojo, a tracking service, “Nemo” made $339 million domestically. The $405 million figure? Apparently that’s in all of North America. So Barnes isn’t even comparing similar box office totals.

Still, if you look at unadjusted domestic box office, yes, it appears Pixar, while still doing great business, isn't doing as well as it used to:

The last two Pixar films are stuck there at sixth and seventh, and the only reason they’re not at the bottom is because we’re not adjusting for inflation.

But that’s domestically. Other countries see films, too, right? So what does the worldwide gross of Pixar films look like? Here:

Now Pixar’s two most recent entries rank third and fourth. Hardly "each less commercial than the last."

Forget for a moment that a financial services firm thinks it’s in a situation to basically pass notes to the most successful movie studio of the past 10 years. Even within the narrow parameters in which these guys are talking — the business side of things — they don’t know what they’re talking about. How awful is that?

On the plus side, these guys did make me excited to see "Up." Opening weekend.

I posted the first "Slumdog" watch on March 21, when, during the preceeding week, almost a month after the Oscars and more than four months after it premiered, the film fell off by less than 25 percent. "Amazing," I thought. "Maybe it actually has a chance to make another $20 million and reach the top 10 for 2008 —becoming the first best-pic nominee to do so since "Lord of the Rings: Return of the King" in 2003."

And at that very point it died. The following week the film fell by over 40 percent and, with the release of the DVD on Tuesday, it's now off by over 50 percent. 

It's currently $2 million behind 15th place and it'll struggle to make that.

Shame. So make it official. Five years in a row now.

Earlier this week I postulated whether "Slumdog Millionaire" could enter the top 10 box-office hits of 2008. Here's a quick update:

Current position: 16th
B.O. total: $135.3 million
Last week's total: $6.9 million
Distance from 15th place ("Chronicles of Narnia"): $6.3 million
Distance from 10th place ("Horton Hears a Who"): $19.2 million

The good news is it's doing better than my model. Based on last weekend, I postulated a 26 percent dropoff but it did better on weekdays, comparatively, and, for the week, fell by only 24 percent.

The bad news is it lost another 500 theaters on Friday, and estimates have it dropping off 41 percent from the previous Friday.

Outlook? Not good.

1. Its theater count
2. Its screen count
3. Its per-theater average
4. Its per-screen average
5. Its marketing budget

The film industry appears to have had a hand in its recent good luck. Over the last year or two, studios have released movies that are happier, scarier or just less depressing than what came before. After poor results for a spate of serious dramas built around the Middle East (“The Kingdom,” “Lions for Lambs,” “Rendition”), Hollywood got back to comedies like “Paul Blart: Mall Cop,” a review-proof lark about an overstuffed security guard.

What-the-effin’ eff, mother-effer!?!

OK, the big problems with this graf:

1. Those serious dramas were released in the fall of 2007. “Paul Blart” was released in January 2009. Why compare these two items? Wouldn’t it make more sense to compare “Paul Blart” with what the studios released in January ’08 or ’07? Why go back to the fall of ’07 and those poor, over-commented-upon Middle East releases?
2. The phrase “got back to.” Hollywood “got back to” comedies like “Paul Blart”? Sheeeeeeeyit. Hollywood never left comedies like “Paul Blart.” These things have always been around, particularly in the early months of the year. “Blart” is certainly doing better business than most ($123 million and counting) but I’d argue it doesn’t have much to do with “Paul Blart.” I’d argue it has to do with these tough economic times. In fact, isn't that what the whole article is about?

But of course the film industry wants to take credit, at least partial credit, for this uptake in attendance, and Cieply and Barnes are obliging them with this fatuous graf that compares apples and orangutans.

Dudes: Cover the industry. Don’t cover for the industry.

I’m also amused that we get the actual movie attendance numbers in a year when actual movie attendance is up. We don’t hear a whisper of it during years (i.e., most of the time) when it’s down. More good reporting.

Some executives, speaking on condition of anonymity to protect their relationships with those who vote for prizes, have said in the last few weeks that they do not expect their studios to make any movie in the foreseeable future as a specific Oscar bet.

If honors happen to come, as they came to “The Departed,” a Warner film that was a surprise best-picture winner in 2007, so be it. But few are looking to make the next “Frost/Nixon,” a smart, critically acclaimed film that got Ron Howard a nomination as best director this year.

Look, I enjoyed “Frost/Nixon” well enough. But threatening not to make the next “Frost/Nixon” is like, I don’t know, threatening not to serve a baked potato at your next dinner party. Not many people are going to lose sleep.

Read Cieply’s entire piece. On the one hand, the lament of these executives is part of my lament: In recent years, the Academy hasn’t been nominating box-office hits for best picture. Let’s trot out that stat again. Since 1944, when the Academy finally settled on five best picture nominees, there have only been seven years when not one of the best-picture candidates was among the year’s top 10 box-office hits: 1947, 1984...and the last five years in a row.

But blaming only the Academy for this is both dishonest and hypocritical. Me, I mostly blame the studios. Here’s the bigger problem: Best pictures are no longer perceived as movies for all of us. They’ve become, as in the language above, niche pictures, and one niche of many. Here’s your gory horror, your chick flick, your urban comedy. Here’s either your gross wish fulfillment (the superstrong and superpowerful) relased into 4,000 theaters in the heat of summer, or here’s your small, sad slice of reality (the superweak) released into select cities in the dark of December. The former’s fun, the latter’s “important,” and never the twain shall meet. Anymore.

In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if the consolidation of these niches makes each niche more like itself. The gory horror film becomes more gory; the chick flick becomes pinker and fluffier; the serious film becomes deadly, sadly serious. And the idea of a best picture “for all of us” becomes just that: an idea.

Thus the primary threat above — that the majors will no longer make and/or target specific films as Oscar candidates — is amusing in two ways. One: the majors haven’t even been producing many best-picture-type movies in recent years — they leave that to the indies — so threatening not to do what they’re already not doing is, yes, not a viable threat.

More importantly, removing the "best-picture niche” may allow what elements are in that niche (seriousness, etc.) to bleed into other niches and create something that's both important and not limited. I.e., something for all of us.

It's not only not a threat; it might even be a solution.

See you in a few hours.

Using the Oscars as a prism on national consciousness is a hoary, time-worn activity perpetrated by those of us who must find meaning in sometimes marginal work. But it does seem worth at least a mention this time around that both the Academy and audiences are showering love on such upbeat movies at a rough time in history.

Slumdog Millionaire was a snowballing success prior to the Oscar nominations and Gran Torino, which received zero nominations for instance, was a hit, and neither picture's status fundamentally changed after the nominations were announced.

At the time of the nominations (Thursday, Jan. 22), how many of the best picture nominees had been seen in more than 1,000 theaters in the U.S.?    
    A. All five    
    B. Four    
    C. Three    
    D. Two    
    E. One    
    F. None   

The answer is One, “Benjamin Button,” and for a second I agreed with the reader. A second later I thought: Actually this is the most relevant question in the quiz. It’s not some factoid only the most insane person would know (see: no. 2); it’s about how isolated our supposed best pictures have become. Again: read this.

I found it particularly instructive that many of Nathaniel’s readers thought “Milk” was one of the most-distributed nominees when, as of today, it’s the least. Its theater-high was 356. Hell, every best-picture candidate expanded the weekend after the Oscars except for “Milk,” which remains in its truncated state of 250. I’m no insider or businessman but... Does that make sense? Is there a plan here? Who’s running Focus Features anyway?

Only a handful of best-picture nominees this decade haven’t been distributed into at least 1,000 theaters: “Gosford Park” (918), “Lost in Translation” (882), “The Pianist” (842), and, the winner of the least-distributed best-pic nominee of the decade, “Letters from Iwo Jima” (781). If “Milk” doesn’t expand, it will more than halve that mark.

So what is Focus Features saying? That it can sell “Brokeback” but not this? That Americans are more willing to understand the people who bombed Pearl Harbor, speaking in Japanese, than the people who opposed Prop. 8, speaking in English?

I’ve said it before, I’ll say it again, and I’ll keep saying it until someone gives me a response I understand: How good can the studios be if they can’t sell quality?

“Plus de 4 millions de Shrektateurs”

That 4 millions isn’t euros; it’s people. It’s asses in the seats. That’s how movie popularity is tabulated in France. As opposed to in the U.S. where it’s all about the dollars, and where, if you’re paying any attention at all, you have to adjust for inflation to get the true measure of a movie’s popularity.

Feel free to let each measurement stand for each culture.

So it’s the Friday after the noms and the studios are busy things. Universal, unwilling to do the heavy lifting for “Frost/Nixon” in December, is finally expanding Ron Howard’s film from 153 theaters to more than 1,000. Other films that are expanding: “Slumdog Millionaire,” “The Wrestler,” “Rachel Getting Married,” “Revolutionary Road.” There’s a pattern, and it follows the pattern of previous years, and it’s getting a little old.

That said, here’s how the best picture nominees look in terms of box office before the expansion:

Kudos to the way Paramount handled “Benjamin Button.” It put it out there in December. It didn’t wait for the Academy to bestow what it would. More congrats to Fox Searchlight who pushed “Slumdog” in the right ways.

But — and I’ve said it before — what lazy bastards over at Universal. In some ways “Frost/Nixon” is the most accessible of these films and yet it is, until the noms, the least-available. 145th??? I’m almost hoping it bites it at the box office during the next few weeks. Just to show Universal. Of course they’d probably take the wrong lesson away from the experience and stop getting involved in films like "Frost/Nixon" altogether.

Meanwhile, their art-house division, Focus Features, rumored to be on life-support, appears to be doing nothing with “Milk.” Of the little-seen best picture nominees, it’s the one that’s not expanding, and it's the one, along with "Slumdog," that's most deserving of a big audience.

Feel free to let that irony stand for the culture.

The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
Frost/Nixon
Milk
The Reader
Slumdog Millionaire

What does this mean? As I wrote last January, since the Academy finally settled on five best picture nominees in 1944, there have only been six years when there wasn’t a top 10 box office hit among the nominees: 1947, 1984...and the last four years in a row: 2004, 2005, 2006 and 2007. This year, unless “Benjamin Button” can make another $50 million without getting swamped in the process (it’s currently at $103 million), it’ll probably be five years in a row. Stunning.

In the past I didn’t quite know who to blame for this divide between supposed popularity and supposed quality. The Academy? The studios? Moviegoers? But not this year. “The Dark Knight” was a critically acclaimed, monster box office hit with tons of buzz. In terms of domestic, unadjusted dollars, it was the no. 2 movie of all time. Yes, it was about superheroes, and no superhero film has been nominated before; but before “Lord of the Rings” no fantasy film had been nominated, either. The rule sticks until something breaks it. This year? Didn’t break. And it was the year to break it. We’re not talking about crap like “Spider-Man 3.” We’re talking about a pretty good movie. One of the five best of the year? Maybe. I’d take it over “Frost/Nixon” and “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button” anyway. Don’t know about “The Reader” yet. Haven’t seen it. (Psst. It’s about the Holocaust.)

Besides, in the past, the Academy has nominated some popular but fairly suspect films for best picture. “Love Story”? “The Towering Inferno”? “Three Coins in a Fountain”? "Ghost"? It’s hardly a body to hold its nose.

Given the chance, who would I have nom'ed? I don't know. Because of the studios' idiotic system of rolling the best films out in piecemeal fashion at the end of the year, I haven't seen, oh, "Doubt" or "The Reader" or "Revolutionary Road" yet. I'd definitely nom "Milk" and "Slumdog." I'd think about "In Bruges" and the forgotten but expertly crafted and genre-busting (or genre-solildifying) "Appaloosa."

And I'd think about "The Dark Knight." More than the Academy seemed to anyway.

ADDITION: Yeah, should've known. Harvey Weinstein was the man behind the push for "The Reader," just as he was the man who pushed "Shakespeare in Love" to the crown in '98. Shame. Much talk about the next Batman villain. I suggest "Weinstein."

A friend once wrote a song called “Mr. Time,” which, in its overall sense of losing everything (inch by inch) while waiting for something, anything, to happen, I’ve always, unfortunately, identified. One stanza in particular hits home:

Tooth by tooth
You put on a smile
And stuff in a word for yourself
But every word on your own behalf
Is just an ad for something that no one needs

There’s doing and there’s selling. The great myth of America is that it’s all about doing (Horatio Alger, bootstraps, etc.), while the great reality of America is that it’s all about selling. I’m not a bad doer but I think I’m one of the worst sellers in the world. I can sell nothing, particularly myself, because of what’s articulated in “Mr. Time.” Every word on my own behalf does feel like an ad for something that no one needs.

This means, yes, I’m still thinking about Tad Friend’s New Yorker piece on Tim Palen and Hollywood marketers. Particularly these lines: “Publicity is selling what you have... Marketing, very often, is selling what you don’t have...” These are people so good at their craft they can sell what doesn’t exist. Remarkable. God, I hate them.

I do want to mention one area where I agree with marketers. It comes two-thirds of the way through the article and involves test audiences. Friend writes:

Yet testing is fraught: it rewards comedy, narrative, and familiar stars or plot elements, and often undervalues the new. Executives’ testing stories take divergent paths to the same punch line. Either they decided not to tamper with a “Pulp Fiction,” despite testing results invariably described as “the lowest scores in the studio’s history,” or they were confounded when an “Akeelah and the Bee” faltered commercially despite “the highest scores in the studio’s history.” In both scenarios, the numbers lied. “Testing is a sham,” one marketing consultant says. “All you’ve learned is what people thought of a movie they didn’t have to pay for. It does not mean they’re going to go pay for it.”

Ex-motherf---ing-actly. Particularly the line about undervaluing the new. It was the same for “Seinfeld” and the British “Office” and the American “Office”: low, low audience test scores. People didn’t get these shows. They didn’t get “Pulp Fiction.” I’ve never seen anything like this before so it can’t be any good. In this way, test audiences are actually like marketers, who, according to Friend’s article, have trouble selling the new because there’s no playbook for it. It takes a lot of luck for a “Seinfeld” to get through. One wonders how many “Seinfeld”s — and thus cash cows — get killed in the process.

So that’s the area where I agree with marketers. Here’s the area where I don’t get marketers. These are people who supposedly can sell anything — including something that doesn’t exist. They can sell crap and make us think it’s pudding. But they can’t sell quality.

The best films are sold on a limited basis, in select cities, and might, if carefully nurtured, make it into most big cities and most states. But that’s if it’s lucky and the zeitgeist is right. Otherwise, not.

I know marketers take their orders from someone else, as we all do, but some marketers, as Friend tells us, are now running the studios. Universal, run by a former marketer, is one of the worst culprits. Unless they know something I don’t, unless there’s a strategy here that I don’t see, they’re in the process of killing both “Frost/Nixon” and “Milk.”

There’s an assumption out there that people don’t want quality. There’s an assumption out there that people want (the same old) crap. I’m hardly a pollyanna but, more and more, I’m assuming the opposite.

That’s the unanswered question from Friend’s article. It’s the unasked question of marketers and admen everywhere: How good can you be if you can’t even sell quality?

After potential Oscar-nominee “Gran Torino” did so well at the box office, I checked out how the other Oscar contenders are faring:

The box office for “Dark Knight” is obviously no surprise. It’s a good film but it’s in the running because of its box office. If it had made, say, $19 million, like “Milk,” you’d be hearing crickets.

Kudos to Paramount. They put “Benjamin Button” out there and people are responding. Kudos to people.

The box office for “Slumdog Millionaire,” meanwhile, is a nice surprise but shouldn’t be. Fox Searchlight is the same studio that smartly promoted “Sideways” in 2004, “Little Miss Sunshine” in 2006, and “Juno” in 2007. Apparently they know what they’re doing. Apparently they can sell a good film with universal themes even though it’s set in a foreign country. How about that?

But WTF with Universal and its specialty division Focus Features? Two of the most talked-about films of the fall, “Milk” and “Frost/Nixon,” and moviegoers have barely had the chance to see them. Is the studio waiting for the Oscar noms before they push? What if the noms are disappointing? What if the attention goes elsewhere? What then?

Perhaps I should cut Focus Features some slack — they slipped “Brokeback Mountain” into a homophobic America in 2005 and made $83 million — and one assumes the strategy for “Milk” is similar. But then there’s this worrisome report from Patrick Goldstein.

More, Focus’ strategy with “Milk” isn’t looking at all like their strategy for “Brokeback.” Check out the theater totals for the first seven weekends of both “Brokeback” and “Milk”:

Meanwhile, I have no idea what Universal is doing with “Frost/Nixon.” Ron Howard has had a long-time relationship with the studio. He’s made 10 films for them, including five that made more than $100 million, including, from those five, two Oscar contenders (“Apollo 13”; “A Beautiful Mind”), and every one of those 10 films played on more than a thousand screens. One assumes they know what they’re doing with “F/N,” too. On the other hand, the studio’s last movie with Howard was “Cinderella Man,” which the studio opened wide and disastrously in June 2005. Maybe they’re gun shy. Or maybe, to stay with the Nixonian theme, it’s as Deep Throat says in “All the President’s Men”: “The truth is, these aren’t very smart guys, and things got out of hand."

Since the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences settled on five Best Picture nominees in 1944, there have been only six years in which no nominee was among the year's top 10 box office hits: 1947, 1984...and the last four years in a row. I wrote about this last January.

So the question: What recent top 10 box office hit has been worth nominating? Here are your choices:

2004
1.    Shrek 2
2.    Spider-Man 2   
3.    The Passion of the Christ   
4.    Meet the Fockers   
5.    The Incredibles   
6.    Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban   
7.    The Day After Tomorrow   
8.    The Bourne Supremacy   
9.    National Treasure
10.   The Polar Express

2005
1.    Star Wars: Episode III - Revenge of the Sith   
2.    The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe
3.    Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire
4.    War of the Worlds   
5.    King Kong
6.    Wedding Crashers
7.    Charlie and the Chocolate Factory   
8.    Batman Begins
9.    Madagascar
10.  Mr. & Mrs. Smith

2006
1.    Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest
2.    Night at the Museum
3.    Cars   
4.    X-Men: The Last Stand   
5.    The Da Vinci Code
6.    Superman Returns
7.    Happy Feet   
8.    Ice Age: The Meltdown   
9.    Casino Royale
10.   The Pursuit of Happyness

2007
1.    Spider-Man 3
2.    Shrek the Third
3.    Transformers
4.    Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End
5.    Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix   
6.    I Am Legend
7.    The Bourne Ultimatum   
8.    National Treasure: Book of Secrets
9.    Alvin and the Chipmunks   
10.   300  

Of these, the only movies that had a shot at a nom, really, given the Academy's traditional predilections, are "Passion of the Christ" in 2004, "The Da Vinci Code" and "The Pursuit of Happyness" in 2006, and... that's about it. "Passion" didn't make it because, some may argue, it was too political in the wrong way. I'd argue it just wasn't good enough. "Da Vinci Code"? Again, not good enough. Same director and star as "Apollo 13" but no "Apollo 13." "Happyness"? Who knows? Probably should have been nom'ed, though — over "Babel" certainly. It's one of the few films over the last five years in which art and commerce blended well enough to create the happy medium that is usually the very thing the Academy honors. But they ignored it. Or, more precisely, it didn't make their top 5. Might've been no. 6.

Non-traditional arguments can be made for "Spider-Man 2," "The Incredibles" and "Casino Royale," but each would be unprecedented (superheroes, superhero cartoons, Bond), and it still doesn't answer the question: Whatever became of the happy medium of films like "Dances with Wolves" and "Apollo 13"? Has Hollywood changed? Has the Academy? Have we?

How rare is it when at least one of the best picture nominees isn't among the year's top 10 box office hits? Since 1944, it's happened only five times: 1947, 1984...and the last three years in a row: 2004, 2005, 2006. What was once a rarity has now become routine.

However, several [Oscar campaigners] noted a belief that audiences — weary of economic crisis and political strife — are ready for a dose of fun from the entertainment industry.

The [summer movie] mix may not perfectly match the mood of an audience looking for refuge from election campaigns and high-priced gas, said Peter Sealey, a former Columbia Pictures marketing executive who is now an adjunct professor…

What movies, included in this “mix,” did Cieply specifically mention that the audience might not be in the mood for? The comedy Tropic Thunder, which quietly made $110M, and, of course, The Dark Knight, which noisily grossed $527M. Internationally, it's approaching $1 billion.

You’d think a journalist might be shy about quoting Hollywood insiders in the exact same way after dropping a bomb like that. Not here. Seriously, I encourage everyone to read Cieply’s May article. It’s instructive. Hell, it’s downright Goldmanesque. Nobody may know anything but some of us really don’t know anything.

In the end, and depending on what gets released in the next few months, I wouldn’t mind seeing Dark Knight get nom’ed. It shouldn’t win, of course (Three Coins, Love Story and Raiders didn’t win either), but it was a hugely popular, critically acclaimed film and in the past that’s been enough for the Academy.

But that’s only one part of the equation: a box-office hit will have gotten nom’ed. The other part — a weighty best picture nominee that becomes a box-office hit — will take more work. Work, I should add, the studios don’t appear interested in doing.

I’ve got a piece on MSNBC today about The Dark Knight’s box office and why it probably won’t pass Titanic’s domestic record of $600 million and why it definitely won’t pass Titanic’s worldwide gross of $1.8 billion. The latter prediction is a no-brainer and the former prediction is the result of finding a similar film (blockbuster, summer, PG-13), with similar percentage drop-offs (daily, weekly) and plugging in The Dark Knight’s original weekly total. That film is Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest (the second one) and here’s how its percentages calculate with The Dark Knight’s original numbers: 

The total? $515 million.

How accurate is this formula? It predicts $110 million for Dark Knight’s second week; the film wound up making $112 million. So not bad so far.

The Dark Knight might do better than this, of course. For one, its percentage drop-offs, thus far, aren’t quite as high as Pirates'. Plus it’s a better film, and so should have longer legs, etc., and there’s Oscar buzz. But Titanic looks safe.

Of course that's what they said in 1912. 

Repeating last year’s performance looks like a long shot, given the rest of this summer’s lineup. This batch is light on sequels, gloomy in spots (as with "The Dark Knight") and heavy on comedies...The mix may not perfectly match the mood of an audience looking for refuge from election campaigns and high-priced gas, said Peter Sealey, a former Columbia Pictures marketing executive...
— The New York Times, May 15, 2008

The success of “The Dark Knight” is an example of what can happen when an array of factors coincide...The brooding film, directed by Christopher Nolan, also fits the nation’s mood, Warner Brothers executives said.
— The New York Times, July 28, 2008

Different writers, to be sure, but it raises this question about movie audiences: Do people go to films to escape the national mood or reflect it? Or do they just go?

And just what are the "array of factors" Brooks Barnes gives in yesterday's article (via quotes with industry executives) for The Dark Knight's continued success? Let's see: 1) expertly executed promotion plan, 2) brooding film matched national mood, 3) sour economy forcing families toward cheaper entertainments like movies, and 4) the publicity following Christian Bale's questioning by the police last week.

Wow. Nothing on the stuff we talked about last week. No mention of the word "quality." No mention of the phrase "word-of-mouth." That's part of the problem with relying on quotes from industry executives. Those guys are in a bubble. They're in a town that talks about movies constantly so they can't tell the difference when people really start talking up a movie. In Seattle (or in Minneapolis, Omaha, Denver, Atlanta, Milwaukee, Portland, take your pick...), it's a little easier. One wonders if relying on industry executives for quotes about movies is a little like relying on Dick Cheney for quotes about WMDs.

Both articles also remind me of something I tell my writers in the magazines I edit: Just because someone gives you a quote, doesn't mean you gotta use it.

The Dark Knight, somewhat ironically given Batman’s origin, is no orphan as to who or what is responsible for its massive success. A lot of fathers out there. To me, yes, it’s the Batman brand, plus it’s the fact that the film is a sequel to a well-made movie, plus it’s the buzz that the new one was even better. Plus it opened in more theaters than any movie in history. That never hurts.

Now the question: How far will it go? In pure dollar terms — that is, unadjusted for inflation — it may have already passed Batman Begins (at $205 million domestic). It will surely pass Tim Burton’s original Batman ($250 million) this weekend, maybe even before, making it the most successful Batman movie ever. Then, in terms of superhero movies, it has these guys lying ahead of it:

The fact that The Dark Knight took in $24 million on a Monday is a good sign. $24 million is a good weekend for most movies. For the curious, Spider-Man’s $403 million is no. 7 on the unadjusted domestic gross list. The No. 1 movie is Titanic at $600 million. When TDK passes Spidey, we’ll talk.

In the meantime, one of the better descriptions of Heath Ledger’s performance comes to us from someone, David Denby at The New Yorker, who didn’t even like the film. Proof, if we needed it (and some of us obviously do), that it’s worth reading past your opinions:

Christian Bale has been effective in some films, but he’s a placid Bruce Wayne, a swank gent in Armani suits, with every hair in place. He’s more urgent as Batman, but he delivers all his lines in a hoarse voice, with an unvarying inflection. It’s a dogged but uninteresting performance, upstaged by the great Ledger, who shambles and slides into a room, bending his knees and twisting his neck and suddenly surging into someone’s face like a deep-sea creature coming up for air. Ledger has a fright wig of ragged hair; thick, running gobs of white makeup; scarlet lips; and dark-shadowed eyes. He’s part freaky clown, part Alice Cooper the morning after, and all actor. He’s mesmerizing in every scene. His voice is not sludgy and slow, as it was in “Brokeback Mountain.” It’s a little higher and faster, but with odd, devastating pauses and saturnine shades of mockery. At times, I was reminded of Marlon Brando at his most feline and insinuating. When Ledger wields a knife, he is thoroughly terrifying (do not, despite the PG-13 rating, bring the children), and, as you’re watching him, you can’t help wondering—in a response that admittedly lies outside film criticism—how badly he messed himself up in order to play the role this way. His performance is a heroic, unsettling final act: this young actor looked into the abyss.

Last week I got called stupid 5,001 times.

The extra came from my seven-year-old nephew, who I was picking up from golf lessons and driving to a friend’s house so I could take the two of them to, of all things, a Pokemon class for the afternoon. At the friend’s house, my nephew, all enthusiasm, wanted to get out the SUV’s side doors, but I was unfamiliar with my sister’s car — the newest car I’ve ever owned is a ’96 Honda Accord — and didn’t know there was an “Open” button located on the ceiling. “Open it!” he insisted. I held up my hands. “How do you open it?” I asked. Frustrated with an uncle whose newest car was five years older than he is, my nephew delivered the coup de grace: “Stupid!” he said. I laughed.

The other 5,000 times I got called stupid came as a result of that Slate article. My nephew gets a pass: he’s seven. The others, I assume, are a bit older.

David Poland's critique on “The Hot Blog” is indicative. His criticisms of my article — in which I wrote that, in general, a 2007 film that was well-reviewed (via Rotten Tomatoes’ rankings) made $2,000 more per screen than a 2007 film that reviewers slammed — are basically four-fold:

1. I love RT [Rotten Tomatoes]. It is a great site and a great idea [but] as a basis for statistical analysis, you should probably poll Patrick Goldstein's neighbors as soon as use those numbers for a factual analysis...
Some sympathy here. I didn’t critique RT in the Slate article. In earlier drafts, yes, but you’ve only got so much space, even online (where attention spans are shorter), and besides who wants to repeat themselves? Three and a half years ago I’d written about RT’s shortcomings in the same manner Poland did, and those shortcomings are still true, but I still say that as an attempt to quantify quality — which is what you need in a statistical analysis that uses quality as a frame of reference — it’s helpful.

2. The second HUGE mistake is, somehow, in spite of indicating a lot of knowledge in general, thinking that bulk numbers - as in, every film released on as many as 100 screens - can be used to analyze anything in a reasonable way. The math of the studio Dependents is quite different than the true indies, much less the small releases of under 300 screens and the behemoths of summer and the holiday season.
Obviously math from one place to another can’t be “different” (2 + 2... etc.), but if the box office numbers we’re getting are being calculated differently, well, that would be good to know. But Poland doesn’t continue. Maybe this “different math” is common knowledge in L.A. but it isn’t with me. Part of the reason I wrote the piece is that those Monday morning box office numbers always seem half (or less) of the story. If there’s more to the story that I’m missing, and that boxofficemojo — the site from whom I got most of my numbers — is missing, I’d like to know.

3. The biggest, perhaps, problem of all, is that after trying to take a run at this idea, and examining his data, Lundegaard didn’t just throw this junk science out. To wit… what is the leggiest wide-release movie (domestically, since it is the only stat we can use for all US releases as of now) of The Summer of 2008? Anyone? What Happens In Vegas... Rotten Tomatoes percentage? 27%.
Two things. He’s equating popularity with legs, which isn’t a bad method but has its own problems: Namely the problems he ascribes to my methodology in #2. But here’s the second and more important point: There will always be exceptions. I don’t understand why people don’t get this. All I’m saying, all the numbers are saying, is that a 2007 film that was well-reviewed (via Rotten Tomatoes’ system) generally did better, to the tune of $2,000 per screen, than a 2007 film that reviewers slammed. Are there exceptions? Of course. The tenth highest per-screen average belonged to National Treasure 2 and its 31 percent Rotten Tomatoes rating. Twelfth highest belonged to Alvin and the Chipmunks and its 24 percent rating. But when you crunch all the numbers, and despite such exceptions, the rotten films still sink below the quality films in box office.

4. And riddle me this… how can Lundegaard or anyone else assume that critics are increasing box office when “good” and “bad” are not the exclusive provenance of critics. There is no sane and knowledgeable person I know who does not accept that word of mouth is the most powerful element on the ongoing box office of a movie after the first week...
Three paragraphs later, Poland writes my answer: “There is nothing in Lundegaard’s story that suggests in any sustainable way that critics reviews have a direct cause and effect on box office in a real way.” Exactly! Because that’s not what I’m arguing. I’m arguing correlation, not causation. I’m arguing that critics, perceived as elitist, are simply fairly good barometers of popular taste. I’m arguing something fairly basic: that both critics and moviegoers like quality and don’t like crap.

Is this revelatory? In a society that dismisses quality, and that holds up crap for imitation, it certainly feels revelatory.

The studios will always try to make their numbers look good, and it’s part of our job to find out how they’re lying with them. Is my method — ranking films by the per-screen average for their entire run — the best method? I don’t know. It’s a method, a method we don’t usually see, and, maybe, a method to build on.

I’ve got a piece on Slate about movie box office and critical acclaim. If you’ve arrived here from there, apologies. It’s no fun to travel and find the same shit you saw in the last place.

The argument in the article is basically two-fold: 1) Quality films — as judged by critics’ rankings on Rotten Tomatoes — do better at the box office than people realize, and 2), as a result, critics, who are perceived as elitist, and moviegoers, who are, by their numbers, populist, are actually closer in taste than people realize. I’ve made this argument before. It’s the numbers-crunching that’s new.

While on vacation in Minneapolis, I’ve been re-reading David Mamet’s Bambi vs. Godzilla: On the Nature, Purpose, and Practice of the Movie Business. Mamet isn’t much of an essayist. He tends to wander within the confines of even a short essay — exploring four themes in four pages — but he packs a wallop, and the world, in a paragraph. It’s worth reading, or re-reading, for the paragraphs.

Mamet is an outsider who went inside; he knows how Hollywood works better than I ever will, and so it’s nice that some of my assumptions, about how audience-testing squelches innovation, and thus possible cash cows, are borne out by his experience.

Hollywood outsiders can never be sure. There’s that tendency to think, “Well, they’re professionals; surely they know what they’re doing.” Pushing against this is that great lesson from All the President’s Men: “The truth is, these aren’t very smart guys, and things got out of hand.”

We’re all involved in our self-fulfilling prophecies and maybe the numbers-crunching is mine, and maybe opening schlock in 3,000 theaters is Warner Brothers’. Who knows? But I’ll keep watching the numbers.

OK, back to vacation. 

Much talk lately about Sex and the City’s $55 million opening weekend. Most ever for a movie starring a woman! So where does it rank on the opening-weekend list? Fifty-first. Meaning the top 50 opening weekends all starred men. Or ogres or mutants or robots or lost fish. So the very thing women are bragging about shows how tangential they’ve become in Hollywood. But Sex and the City gives hope that maybe someday they’ll be as important as ogres.

What else does the top 100 opening-weekend chart show us? Nearly half of the movies (46) are sequels. In fact, nine of the top 10 openers are sequels. (Only Spider-Man, at no. 4, still holds its spot.) And all but 11 of the top 100 were released this decade.

That’s right: As if we needed further evidence, this decade is all about opening. The oldest movie on the list is Batman Returns, at no. 92, which was released way back in June 1992 and made $45 million opening weekend. By the end of our current decade (if not by the end of our current year) it should be pushed off the top 100 to make room for its descendant, The Dark Knight, as well as Hancock and who knows what else. By the end of the decade 93-95 will be from the decade.

What’s intriguing about the older films is how much they didn’t rely on their opening weekends. The big movie from 1993, Jurassic Park, took in $47 million, or only 13 percent of its final domestic gross, opening weekend. Compare that with last year’s big film, Spider-Man 3, which took in $151 million, or 45% of its final domestic gross, opening weekend. So even 16 years ago, word-of-mouth still mattered. Now the idea is to make a killing opening weekend, when the studio's take is higher, and don’t fret what follows. Including moviegoers going, “Well, that was a waste of two hours.”

Equally intriguing is what films aren't on the list: Titanic, Star Wars... The biggees.

The following is a list of the top 10 opening weekends: Two Spider-Mans, two Pirates, two Shreks. Plus a Star Wars, an Indy, a Harry and an X-Men. It's a list that could use some women. Or something that doesn't remind me of the cinematic equivalent of a Big Mac.

I’m not the first guy to not get fashion magazines. You take the world’s best-looking people, give them the world’s best make-up artists and hairstylists and photographers, airbrush out what imperfections remain...and half the time they still look like heroin addicts. But Patricia subscribes to a few of these things and sometimes they’re worthwhile. The W magazine with Charlize Theron on the cover includes an article on Ricky Gervais of The Office fame, horribly titled “Tricky Ricky,” in which we get the following:

Before The Office premiered on the BBC in 2001, Gervais recalls, the show received the lowest audience test scores in the network’s history, but he defended every word in the script. It was a similar story with the American version: Gervais remembers getting an e-mail from producer Greg Daniels saying the series had scored abysmally. “I sent back a message: ‘Brilliant, so did we,’” he says. Now, he points out, The Office is NBC’s highest-rated sitcom. “All the things I’ve ever loved, I hated at first,” Gervais adds. “the best things are an acquired taste.”

For the writer, Paul Quinn, the point of this story is that Gervais’ apparent self-assurance, “rooted in defensive smugness or genuine confidence,” helped save his greatest creation. Here’s the lesson to me: Audience testing sucks. Seriously. It was the same story for Seinfeld, which became one of the most successful sitcoms in TV history. But the initial test scores reflected an audience distaste. People didn’t like it because they didn’t get it. It wasn’t familiar.

One wonders if testers are attempting to fix this obvious problem with innovative shows and movies. Forget aesthetics for a moment. Just think of the money. These things are cash cows. Cash cows with long fucking lives. And the money people, whose job it is to find such cash cows, when confronted with them, actually try to turn them into something else.

If you don’t recognize Seinfeld and The Office and The Office for what they are, or what they might be, what good are you? How many other Seinfelds are you turning into something ordinary and short-lived? How much money are the money-people blowing?

I like crunching box-office numbers because it unwarps my perspective. It gives me a swift reality check.
 
Example. Last year I must have seen the trailer to Eagle vs. Shark a dozen times. I frequent Landmark Theater chains and they kept showing it, along with those increasingly bothersome Stella Artois ads; and while I was never interested in seeing the film (too many indie clichés), I assumed it would play in the 200-300 theater range, such as The Science of Sleep did in 2006. Nope. Topped out at 20. Twenty. Arrived June 15th, left August 5th. To me it seemed the film would never go away and yet it hardly showed up at all.

Meanwhile, movies that played in 100 times as many theaters, such as The Messengers, The Condemned, The Invisible and The Last Legion, didn’t even make a soft impression on my brain. Niche dynasties are being created without an ounce of awareness on my part. Or yours. And it’s only getting worse.

Overall, by my admittedly suspect calculations, and not including re-releases, 596 films played in U.S. theaters in 2007. They range in availability from Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End, which overwhelmed 4,362 domestic theaters last May, to the 77 films, such as Oswald’s Ghost, Primo Levi’s Journey and Looking for Cheyenne, whose widest domestic release was exactly one theater.

In quality, 2007’s films range from IMAX: Sea Monsters, which got a 100% rating from the compiled critics on rottentomatoes.com, to the three films (Constellation, Redline and Sarah Landon and the Paranormal Hour) that couldn’t even manage a marginal thumbs-up from an online critic.

I’ve been crunching box office numbers for a few years now (here are links to articles about 2004, 2005 and 2006 box office) and, despite the occasional swift reality check, generally the numbers bear out what most of us know intuitively: critically acclaimed films rarely get wide or even marginal releases, while universally despised films are spread like manure across the country. You begin to wonder, in fact, why anyone in their right mind would want to be a movie critic. The job is essentially quality control in an industry that not only doesn’t care about quality but seems to punish it. No wonder print publications, which are abandoning their own forms of quality control, are letting movie critics go.

How bad was it last year? Of those 596 films, 406 didn’t manage a marginal release (500+ theaters), and of these, 65 were so marginal they didn’t accrue the five reviews necessary to get a Rotten Tomatoes rating. But of the remaining 341 films, 215 were deemed “fresh” by Rotten Tomatoes (i.e., 60% of movie critics gave the film a positive review). In other words, if you went to a film that didn’t get a marginal release in 2007 — including La Vie En Rose, Once and The Namesake — you had a 63% chance of seeing a film most critics thought watchable.

From there, the numbers drop. A movie whose widest release was in the 500-1999-theater range? A 39% chance it was watchable. In the 2,000-2,999-theater range? 22%. Basically one in five. You have a better chance of meeting someone who thinks Pres. Bush is doing a good job than seeing a good movie that plays in 2,000 theaters.

Here’s a chart:

That spike in the 3000-theater range is a nice surprise, but it shouldn’t be. One assumes studios and distributors know what they’re doing and save their better popcorn films (a Norbit notwithstanding) for super-wide release. The critics’ numbers simply reflect that.

(And I don’t mean to imply that a Rotten Tomatoes rating is sacrosanct. One of 2007’s big disappointments for me, Spider-Man 3, buoyed, one expects, by fanboy critics and weary newspaper critics, managed a “fresh” RT rating of 62%. RT is simply a general overview — a way of quantifying quality — but there are still a few bugs in the system.)

The overall numbers are starker when you chart for initial release rather than widest release:

Now I know that trying to stop a Spider-Man or a Shrek is like trying to stop an avalanche. But at the least — at the least — these numbers should give moviegoers pause before attending a film that opens in the 2,000-theater range. Think about it logically. For films to open in this many theaters, their concept has to have some kind of widespread appeal. So why don’t they open wider? Most likely, they’re not good enough to be popcorn pictures. Consider them stale popcorn pictures.

Imagine that you only saw films that opened on 2000-2999 screens. Here’s what you would’ve seen in the first 12 weeks of 2008: One Missed Call (0% RT rating), Meet the Spartans (3%), College Road Trip (12%), First Sunday (15%), Untraceable (16%), The Eye (19%), Mad Money (20%), Welcome Home Roscoe Jenkins (25%), Never Back Down (26%), Step Up 2 the Streets (27%), Rambo (31%) and Definitely, Maybe (72%).

One out of 12. And I don’t even know about the one.

Americans have already spent over $420 million on these 12 films. Surely there’s better uses for our money, our time, our lives. This ain’t practice, people.

More later.

Discussions about box office tend to stop with Monday morning’s numbers and bad puns. So 21 “raked in the chips,” and Superhero Movie was “a superdud,” and Stop-Loss was “shot down at the box office.” Why not push the envelope? How about Stop-Loss was car bombed? Had its legs blown off? Got ambushed in an alleyway in Tikrit?

Admittedly Stop-Loss’s numbers weren’t great: $4.5 million; 8th place. But it played on only 1,291 screens, meaning its per-screen-average, while pretty sucky ($3,505), was still better than all but three films in the top 10. Unfortunately our discussions about box office don't go that far. Instead we make some bad puns and add Stop-Loss to the list of Iraq-war-film casualties: Lions for Lambs ($15 million domestic box office), Rendition ($9.7M), In the Valley of Elah ($6.7M) and poor, poor Redacted ($60K). Underperformers all. Cue taps.

Except: If Stop-Loss follows the example of these films, it will make most of its money abroad. Rendition made $14.9 million, or 61% of its total, abroad (U.K., mostly), while Lambs pulled in $41.9 million, or 74%, from foreign countries (Italy and Spain were the big spenders). Elah also made 74% of its total abroad (France and Spain, mostly), while Redacted, which couldn’t do much worse, didn’t, pulling in $600,000 (France and Spain, again), or 10 times what it earned here.

Is this something else Americans should be embarrassed about? We went into Iraq thinking it would be good entertainment, and for a while it was (Pvt. Jessica, “Mission Accomplished”), but when it turned serious we turned the channel. It was supposed to be a Jerry Bruckheimer flick, Shock and Awe, with clear heroes and villains, and it's become a complicated, hard-to-understand, morally ambiguous film out of the French New Wave. It's become Battle of Algiers.

Hollywood has tried to make it easy for us by making its Iraq War films about us, and setting the action here, in the U.S., but the source material is still that morally ambiguous, hard-to-understand, French New Wave film. So we're letting the foreigners figure it out. They're figuring it out over there so we don’t have to figure it out over here.

Yeah, we should be embarrassed. This is our national story but we can’t be bothered. Elah is a good movie but we can’t be bothered. Stop-Loss is another good movie, and it’s got handsome leads, and it’s about camaraderie, and the few sacrificing over and over again for the many, who are us, but we can’t be bothered.

How awful is that? We can't even be bothered with how little we're being bothered by the war. And how much others are sacrificing.

Thank God for France.