Box Office

Is being able to instantly syndicate an opinion on a film to thousands of your closest friends affecting the opening weekend of less-than-great films?

Pshaw.

Michael Sragow at the Baltimore Sun writes:

This summer, movies such as "Bruno" and " G.I. Joe" have had unexpected tumbles at the box office - just within their opening weekends - while "Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen" survived blistering critical reaction to become a blockbuster.

Box-office watchers say the dramatic swings may be caused by Twitter and other social networking sites that can blast instant raves - or pans - to hundreds of people just minutes after the credits roll.

Later in the article Gregg Kilday of the Hollywood Reporter is quoted:

"Even if you don't have Twitter, a lot of people, especially kids, have long had the ability to text each other, sometimes from within the theater," he says. "And for a lot of the mass-market movies, the potential audience will go whether friends tell them they're good or not."

Yeah but no one wants to see a panned Twitter trending topic. Unless it sucks but there are robots who turn into cars and Megan Fox is running in slo mo apparently...

Via IWantMedia.com

It seems the film 'Bruno' has placed an uncomfortably bright spotlight not just on our culture's homophobia, but our unimaginative headlines. Richard Lawson over at GAWKER calls the press out on this one, and offers a little sampling of their work:

These are from many places - the New York Times, the AP, the AFP, and others. The multiple use of "sashays" just speaks volumes about how that word will never be used to describe anything but outrageous gay men. And the topping jokes! Oh the topping jokes do, actually, indicate that people are a little more "with it" when it comes to gay man parlance (topping is a sex reference, children) than some of us thought.

According to a Fandango survey this past weekend, Watchmen watchers are mostly guys between the ages of 18 to 34. Hardly surprising. And it seems they purchase their tickets in advance- Midnight screenings on opening day are selling out across the country. Nikki Finke at DeadlineHollywoodDaily.com brings us the stats from the Fandango survey:

- 60% have read the Watchmen graphic novel
- 85% say the online clips and trailers made them more excited to see the movie
- 57% plan to see Watchmen with a group of friends
- 71% are planning a get together before or after the movie
- 85% had seen director Zack Snyder's previous movie 300 on the big screen
- 73% are male
- 65% are aged 18 to 34

Wonder what percentage still live with their mothers?

Oh, we kid because we can. Pandora still has her first edition Watchman comic books from 1986, and has been waiting for this movie for a long damn time.

Previously on FBLA:
Wil Wheaton Screened Watchmen
Good News For Nerds
Watchmen Dispute: Alan Moore's Work is Jinxed
The Watchmen Panel

What does it say about the 43rd President of the United States that even a movie associated with you tanks to new levels? Every time Dubya goes on TV, the stock market plunges. Now Oliver Stone's latest film finishes FOURTH in weekend box office receipts...It got beat out by Beverly Hills Chihuahua for crying out loud.

We went and watched W. in a theater this weekend. It was like having your town destroyed by a tornado then escaping into a theater to watch Twister. It wasn't the subject of the movie that was maddening and frustrating - it was the fact that after we left the theater the rubble was still falling.

Is that a recommendation? No. An explanation? Perhaps.

Sony Pictures declared a nightmare downtick in its revenue and stock today. The studio reported a 31% drop in year-on-year sales to $1.5 billion. That was because last year, the Spiderman-led studio was breaking records, while this year, even though "Hancock" cleared more than $500 million worldwide, the studio still fell back to Earth.
"Hancock" had enormous prints and advertising costs, which have not been offset by any future films.
Sony executives were sheepish about the drop.
"The losses that you see in the first quarter, again, you have to look at the pictures business holistically over the course of the year," Rob Wiesenthal, chief financial officer, said during a conference call with analysts.
If it's any solace, the tech division fell too, so the film side wasn't fully to blame for Sony's suffering.
Sony reduced its net profit forecast for fiscal 2008, which ends in March 2009, going from a May figure of $2.69 billion down to $2.23 billion. It has also dialed back its operating profit outlook from $4.83 billion in May to $4.37 billion, citing a tough environment for electronics sales, off-setting a depreciating yen.
You can't blame it all on Will Smith.

The Pineapple Express panel was moderated by producer Judd Apatow. On the panel was director David Gordon Green, writer Evan Goldberg and cast members Amber Heard, Danny McBride, Seth Rogen and James Franco.

"Can we combine a weed movie with a Jerry Bruckheimer action movie?" Was the rhetorical question offered by Apatow.

The crowd was shown some clips of the movie and let in on the fact that a lot of the dialog was improv. Seth Rogen was totally on the whole panel. A fan asked about the script to the movie being leaked early on the internet.

"If you want to read it - you're an idiot. Because you can watch it - its a movie." Said Rogen.

The thing that struck us was that the panel was very much like all Apatow movies: Seth Rogen was funny, he talked about his balls a lot and the gorgeous blond female stock character was a one dimensional prop. There's your synopsis.

Calling this gathering of geeks a Comic Convention is a huge misnomer. Calling it 'general fantasy in all mediums' is a better fit. Apparently, other attendees we talked to about three years ago the studios got the message that Comic Con was a proving ground. We've seen these folks. Their undying and enthusiastic devotion will politely ignore any injustice - Jar Jar Binks - a ridiculously oversold annual convention...

So here we are now - where it's more Hollywood preview than next issue peekaboo.

We are happy to report that Iron Man is exactly as fun and cool and action-packed-wonderful as we had hoped. Insider's tip: Stay past the closing credits to get the full Geek Experience.

A raspberry to you, Mr. Turan!

"Harold and Kumar Escape From Guantanamo Bay" is going up against "Baby Mama" this weekend. Both are scoring high on the Rotten Tomatoes poll scale. "Baby Mama" getting 89% and "Harold and Kumar" a noteworthy 78%.

Both candidates are qualified and competent comedies. They have both enlivened and energized those that are loyal to the genre. It'll be a nice competition between a guy with a foreign sounding name verses a super successful chick with crippling relationship issues.

It's an exciting race at the box office this weekend - either a minority or a woman will get top spot.

The winner is of course the American people - for once they have two good solid comedies to choose from. Yes We Can. Let the conversation begin!

Word on the street is that Baby Mama got made because she slept her way to the top and Harold and Kumar are elitists/secret Muslims. Check back here for updates.

Still it's so tough to decide which one we're going to pick! It's ridiculous! We think they should just be a double feature and be done with it. SIGH. Maybe by August, that'll be the case.

EDITOR'S NOTE: We of course, were going to really beat this metaphor to death and say that the old white male films debuting this weekend are "Rogue" and "Deal". But that would be cheap. Not that we're against cheap. It's just that we've become accustomed to denouncing it in public.

A clever spoof of Diablo Cody with spiffy dialog.

"My name means the devil in Spanish. Water is agua!"

Look at the shirt she's wearing.

My WORD - they predicted her Oscar and her DRESS!

Patricia Arquette couldn't do better.