Unramboable
Cloverfield kicks your ass, and I’m not the only one who thinks so. Biggest. January. Open. Ever. And the 10th biggest in Paramount history (which makes me kind of sad for Paramount). Also tripling my prediction, 27 Dresses, on it’s way to a solid $60mil. take. Who said you can’t release successful films in January? (Oh, right, all of the previous Januaries.)
1/25
Wide
WHAT’S THE PITCH?
A guy uses the interwebs to kill folk.
WILL IT SUCK?
Gregory Hoblit (Primal Fear, Frequency, Fracture) has potential and one of the eighteen screenwriters did Resurrecting the Champ, which is supposed to not suck, but it’ll take a lot more than that to convince me to go see a movie where I (a) know everything from the trailer already and (b) have to watch a depiction of the Internet that will probably make Ted Stevens look like Vint Cerf.
Early buzz is mixed, which is a hell of a lot better than I expected.
HOW WELL WILL IT DO?
With Rambo sucking up most of the oxygen and Cloverfield’s second frame drawing true thriller junkies and The Eye opening the following week, this doesn’t stand a chance. $16mil.
WHAT’S THE PITCH?
If it worked for Rocky…
WILL IT SUCK?
Sly was able to write and direct the Rocky franchise back into critical acclaim for the first time in 30 years, so far be it from me to say he can’t do it again. I will remind you, however, that he did write and direct Staying Alive, arguably the best bad film ever, so it’s kind of a win-win.
HOW WELL WILL IT DO?
The only thing as high profile as this is Cloverfield, and that’ll be on its second frame. $71mil.
WHAT’S THE PITCH?
Indie You Got Served
WILL IT SUCK?
Early buzz is good and the director did the underseen Touch of Pink.
HOW WELL WILL IT DO?
No idea why they’re releasing this wide. I would think their edge is in treating this like an indie and letting word of mouth buoy a platform release. That having been said, Stomp the Yard might as well have been an indie for all its no-name cast, and it did just fine with a wide release. $27mil.
WHAT’S THE PITCH?
300 Movie
WILL IT SUCK?
By most accounts the Movie movies have been getting progressively worse, and they didn’t exactly start off as classics of American comedy.
HOW WELL WILL IT DO?
They’ve seen diminishing financial returns as well. $29mil.
Limited
WHAT’S THE PITCH?
Interweaving plot ensemble drama based upon four emotional cornerstones. What? I’m not going to tell you what they are; that would be a spoiler.
WILL IT SUCK?
The emotions are played by Forest Whitaker, Sarah Michelle Gellar, Brendan Fraser and Kevin Bacon. John Cho plays Bart. He is not one of the emotions. In spite of this all sounding like a community college drama class acting exercise, the early buzz is very good.
HOW WELL WILL IT DO?
The type of movie that, in spite of a strong cast, gets forgotten before anyone knows it was out. Just look at Feast of Love. Exactly. $4mil.
WHAT’S THE PITCH?
Woman in 80’s Romania tries to get an abortion.
WILL IT SUCK?
Has already won a crapload of awards (though to everyone’s confuzzlement, will not be an Oscar contender). Three of them were at Cannes including, oh, what’s that little one? Oh, right, the Palme D’Or.
HOW WELL WILL IT DO?
It’s hard to get better buzz for a foreign film. $2mil.
WHAT’S THE PITCH?
3D concert flick that was clearly designed to force me into an IMAX theater.
WILL IT SUCK?
That doesn’t seem to be the point. The main thing being hawked about this film is that it’s the first live action flick to be entirely shot, posted (whatever the hell that means) and edited in 3D. Mark Pellington, who helped conceive Zoo TV and directed the “Jeremy” video and thus never has to do anything else again to be eternally cool, co-directs.
I, of course, am U2’s bitch so I hereby declare this to be the greatest film ever made, sight unseen.
Early buzz, coincidentally, is quite good (although I suspect that’s just a bunch of U2 fanatics chiming in on IMDB, not that there’s anything wrong with that).
HOW WELL WILL IT DO?
Ironically, where releasing a mainstream film (Rattle and Hum) got them nowhere, releasing a 3D film on far fewer screens may show better returns. $9mil.
Next Week: Jessica Alba in a movie about a body part. No, not either of those.