Movie Box Review

Hollywood Hearts this weekend.

OPENINGS:   It turned out that THE VOW (Screen Gems/Sony) was indeed slightly more frontloaded than SAFE HOUSE (Universal), but not by enough to rob it of 1st place.  Vow's massive $41.7M haul was higher than any opening weekend for a Julia Roberts, Sandra Bullock or Katherine Heigl vehicle--ever.  (Cut to the board room at Screen Gems, where they're trying to figure out just how to do a Vow 2.)  Sony has another reason to be thrilled, too--they have Channing Tatum's 21 Jump Street opening next month.  Normally, one would say that Vow might get hurt by the similarly-aimed This Means War next weekend, but War has such bad buzz that it may not be much of a threat.  Meanwhile, Safe House's $39.3M is the 2d highest opening of Denzel Washington's career, and since its genre hits an international sweet spot, there's nothing but upside (and another sequel that seemingly can't happen, although never discount the inspiration--and desperation--of Hollywood execs).  Also celebrating today:  Ryan Reynolds, whose career was heading for life support after 2011's flops; the Safe House tally probably isn't much due to him, but in Hollywood, if you're in a hit, it's your hit.

Over in the 2d tier, the one genuinely frontloaded movie of the weekend was STAR WARS EPISODE I:  THE PHANTOM MENACE 3D (20th), as audiences, depending on their ages, either remembered or discovered just how bad it was.  (Even though Phantom Menace was the only opening to go down on Saturday, Fox is predicting it to have Sunday's lowest drop--so look for that $23M weekend number to be reduced tomorrow.)  JOURNEY 2:  THE MYSTERIOUS ISLAND (Warners), on the other hand, had a wonderfully robust 94% hike on Saturday, its $27.6M weekend total almost 25% higher than the $21M opening for the first Journey picture.  With the semi-arty The Secret World of Arrietty as the only family movie opening for Presidents Day weekend, Journey should hold up pretty well.

HOLDOVERS:  As noted yesterday, last Sunday's depressed Super Bowl Sunday grosses make this weekend's comparisons look artificially strong.  In a normal weekend, CHRONICLE (20th), THE WOMAN IN BLACK (CBS) and BIG MIRACLE (Universal) would all be down over 50%, but only Woman (just barely) crossed that line this weekend.  Those 3, along with THE GREY (Open Road), RED TAILS (20th) and UNDERWORLD AWAKENING (Screen Gems/Sony) are all headed for $50-65M totals.

OSCAR NOMINEES:  Generally good holds for the pictures in general release, as THE DESCENDANTS (Fox Searchlight), THE ARTIST (Weinstein) and HUGO (Paramount) all lost 20-30% of their theatres and went down under 25%.  The only big hit was for EXTREMELY LOUD AND INCREDIBLY CLOSE (Warners), which shed almost half its theatres and plummeted 60%.  A couple of nominees in smaller categories had modest expansions:  A SEPARATION (Sony Classics) added 5 theatres for a total of 45 and went up a couple of percentage points, and PINA (IFC) almost doubled its theatres to 67 and had a nice 35% bump.  The bare 22% increase for W.E. (Weinstein), though, meant a big reduction in per-screen as it went from 4 to 17 theatres. IN DARKNESS (Sony Classics) had an OK start with a $9700 at 3, and surprise Best Animated Film nominee CHICO & RITA (GK) got a lot of curious eyeballs with a $27K opening in 1 NY theatre.j

LIMITED RELEASE:  Not much going on, apart from the Oscar nominees above.  RAMPART (Millenium) had a decent start with a $13K average in 5 theatres, and RETURN (Dada), a very tiny movie with excellent performances by Linda Cardellini as a returning Iraq vet and Michael Shannon (for once playing a normal human being) as her husband, had a $3500 average at 2. 

You're frontloaded!  No, you're frontloaded!

OPENINGS:  The movie audience has 3 main components--men, women, kids--and a weekend that offers a strong title for each one has a good chance of being successful.  The relatively low-budget THE VOW (Screen Gems/Sony) got off to a great start (too bad it's not a great movie), with $15.4M on Friday.  That's higher than the entire opening weekend for Rachel McAdams' last soap The Notebook (which ended up grossing $81M) and higher than opening day for Channing Tatum's last dip in the soap pool Dear John (also an $80M grosser).  Meanwhile, for the guys there was the (more expensive) SAFE HOUSE (Universal), also very strong with a $13.8M Friday.  Safe House looks like it'll be the 2d highest opener of Denzel Washington's entire career (behind only American Gangster), and even though we won't know until tomorrow (or Monday) which picture edged out the other for the weekend crown, they're both big hits.

Meanwhile, the kids weren't neglected.  STAR WARS EPISODE I:  THE PHANTOM MENACE 3D (20th) scored $8.7M on Friday, and JOURNEY 2:  THE MYSTERIOUS ISLAND (Warners) wasn't far behind with $6.6M.  The consensus seems to be that Phantom will be more frontloaded with fanboys, but again this won't be determined for another day or two.

HOLDOVERS:  Note:  because of Super Bowl Sunday, all weekend-to-weekend drops will be artificially low this week.  Thanks to that, CHRONICLE (20th) and THE WOMAN IN BLACK (CBS) are both likely to be down under 50% this weekend, although BIG MIRACLE (Universal), which just couldn't find a reason to exist, may cross that mark.  Longer-running titles are dropping theatres due to all the new product in the market, so they're mostly down 50+%.

OSCAR NOMINEES:  With the rush of the nomination announcements done, these pictures are losing theatres, but otherwise holding fairly well.  THE DESCENDANTS (Fox Searchlight) lost about 22% of its theatres and should be down around 30% for the weekend, THE ARTIST (Weinstein) also shed 20% of its theatres and should drop about an equal amount at the boxoffice, and HUGO (Paramount) actually had the best hold, ejected from 30% of its theatres but down only around 20%.  The exception is EXTREMELY LOUD AND INCREDIBLY CLOSE (Warners), which lost almost half its theatres but is looking an ugly weekend drop of over 60%.

LIMITED RELEASES:  No major arrivals this week.  RAMPART (Millenium), which was unable to get a Best Actor nomination for Woody Harrelson, is headed for a mild $12K average in 5 theatres.  IN DARKNESS (Sony Classics), nominated for Foreign Film, should average around $7500 in 3.  Madonna's W.E. (Weinstein) tried an expansion to little avail, and may not even get to a $3500 average in 17.

Next weekend the studios aren't offering much for the long Presidents Day holiday:  THIS MEANS WAR (20th), which had to postpone its Valentine's Day opening because it would have been crushed by The Vow (it's also the target of one of the most brutal Hollywood Reporter reviews in recent memory), and GHOST RIDER:  SPIRIT OF VENGEANCE (Columbia/Sony) with Nicolas Cage, that eternal mark of high quality.  Also in a mid-level release is Disney's release of the Japanese (dubbed) animation THE SECRET WORLD OF ARRIETTY.  

Los Angelenos will have a chance to get advance looks at some of this year's Oscar candidates at the AFI Film Festival, which begins in just about 2 weeks.  Today the Festival announced the Gala and Special Screenings, which typically make up the bulk of the high-profile titles, and they include quite a few films featured at this fall's film festivals.

The festival begins with the world premiere of Clint Eastwood's J. EDGAR, and other Galas include THE ARTIST, Polanski's CARNAGE, MY WEEK WITH MARILYN and SHAME, as well as Luc Besson's THE LADY, which premiered at Toronto.  Special Screenings include, among others, Ralph Fiennes' film of CORIOLANUS, The Duplass Brothers' JEFF WHO LIVES AT HOME, the Dardenne Brothers' THE KID WITH A BIKE, Lars Von Trier's MELANCHOLIA, and Wim Wenders' documentary PINA, as well as RAMPART, BUTTER, I MELT WITH YOU and WE NEED TO TALK ABOUT KEVIN.  (The festival hasn't yet announced its closing-night presentaiton.)

Veterans of the AFI Festival's "free ticket" policy know that actually getting one of those tickets can be a chore--and sometimes the theatres are overbooked, meaning that even having a ticket is no guarantee of admission.  The Festival does, however, include a great many films worth the effort.

Check out SHOWBUZZDAILY'S STATUETTE STAKES roll of Awards contenders:

     PART I

Oren Moverman's first film as a director, The Messenger, was a beautifully contained, emotionally detailed story about soldiers assigned to deliver tragic news to the families of the deceased.  In his new film RAMPART, which premiered at the Toronto Film Festival, Moverman is more ambitious and, unfortunately, a victim of the sophomore jinx.

This time, Moverman co-wrote his film with celebrated novelist James Ellroy (L.A. Confidential, among many others), and for better or worse, the script is very much an Ellroy work.  The title refers to the Rampart Division police scandal of 1999, but other than thematically, that's very much in the background of the story.  The film concerns Dave Brown (Woody Harrelson, also star of The Messenger), a classic Ellroy protagonist:  a mix of good and bad cop--utterly dedicated, but prone to violence and heedless of the consequences of his actions.  He has a dismal personal life--his informal version of a Big Love lifestyle, having married first one sister (Cynthia Nixon) and then the other (Anne Heche), and now living with both--is falling apart.  And he's not nearly as smart as he thinks he is.  

Like many other Ellroy protagonists before him, Dave is the victim of a shadowy conspiracy taking place far above his head.  And as in many Ellroy novels, that conspiracy stays shadowy, complex and mostly undefined.  The idea seems to be that Dave is being made a pawn so that those in power can condemn him and distract the public from the larger Rampart scandal, but that's never confirmed or explained.  Similarly, characters turn up enigmatically--especially Robin Wright in an incomprehensible role as a woman Dave picks up one night in a bar--and their roles remain frustratingly opaque, except that they cause trouble for Dave.  The movie becomes busier and emptier as it goes along, with an inconclusive ending that resolves absolutely nothing.

It doesn't help that Moverman has come very late to the "urban thriller means jittery handheld camera" party, and the movie, powered by Bobby Bukowski's derivative digital photography, is downright annoying to watch.  (If the concept was to use that style because in 1999 it would have been state of the art, it's a stylization that doesn't work.)  Nor that the grittiness of the subject matter is constantly upstaged by the all-star cast (Look, it's Sigourney Weaver!).  

Even in these less than ideal circumstances, Moverman retains his skill with actors.  Harrelson is playing a more familiar character than the one he had in The Messenger (he's a more victimized version of Vic Mackey in The Shield), but he plays the role with all-out conviction and sly humor.  Most of the supporting actors--Weaver, Wright, Nixon,, Heche, Steve Buscemi as a weaselly DA, Ben Foster (also from The Messenger) as a homeless informant, Ice Cube as a version of Mary McDonnell's IA cop from The Closer, Ned Beatty as Dave's wired-in and possibly untrustworthy mentor, Brie Larson as Dave's bitter daughter--get some pungent dialogue from Ellroy and Moverman, and run with it.  On a scene by scene basis, the picture is often enjoyable, even if the pieces never fit together.

Rampart is a failure, but it's a quality one; Moverman aimed high and missed.  In his next try, he'd be better off developing his own vision than subordinating it to that of another creative mind, even one as talented as James Ellroy's.  This time around, he got lost in the labyrinthine streets of Ellroy's personal fictional city.