Overheard on Friday:
Woman#1: (Defeated sounding) I have to take my son to see The Lorax.
Cheerful Female Friend: Ohhh, you can't go wrong with Dr. Seuss!"
Cheerful Female Friend has clearly not registered the atrocities Hollywood has often made from the good doctor's work. And when one thinks of the colorful wit and profound whimsy of Dr. Seuss surely mainstream heartthrobs like Zac Efron and Taylor Swift pop immediately to mind! What a, uhhhh, perfect vocal match.
But Cheerful Female Friend speaks for all of America. So testifies the box office!
BAKERS DOZEN (Estimates)
01 THE LORAX $70.7 new
02 PROJECT X $20.7 new
03 ACT OF VALOR $13.7 (cum. $45.2)
04 SAFE HOUSE $7.2 (cum. $108.2)
05 TYLER PERRY'S GOOD DEEDS $7 (cum. $25.7)
06 JOURNEY 2 THE MYSTERIOUS ISLAND $6.9 (cum. $85.6)
07 THE VOW $6.1 ($111.7)
08 THIS MEANS WAR $5.6 (cum. $41.6)
09 GHOST RIDER: SPIRIT OF VENGEANCE $4.7 (cum. $44.8)
10 THE ARTIST $3.9 (cum. $37)
11 WANDERLUST $3.8 (cum. $12.4)
12 GONE $3 (cum. $8.9)
13 CHRONICLE $1.9 (60.8)
Talking Points
Reese, Amanda, and Jen have seen better box office days
• BLONDE BUT BANKABLE? Reese Witherspoon's movies are generally expensive to make but that return on investment these days. Yikes. This Means War is still a long way from recouping its budget. Jennifer Aniston movies have always had schizophrenic box office performance but Wanderlust is definitely on the weak side of her ticket-selling. How on earth was that sperm-switching comedy more attractive to moviegoers than this one? Meanwhile Amanda Seyfried hasn't been able to scare up crowds from Gone which is weirder. It's a genre flick and can't those usually open even without a name? $8 million for a serial killer picture after two weeks? Ouch. I'm sure it doesn't help that the ads totally make it seem like something Ashley Judd was making in the early 90s.
• EXCUSE ME, BUT WHO IS PAYING TO SEE GHOST RIDER: SPIRIT OF VENGEANCE? I mean, besides our masochistic Michael C. It's already made more money than 2011's "Best Picture"... which had a big uptick post Oscar of course (The Artist's co-nominees took falls but Hugo fell only 14% despite also debuting on DVD so maybe its constant name-checking on Sunday night convinced some holdouts?)
• A SEPARATION more than doubled its screen count and had its first million dollar weekend, bringing its total to $3.7 million at the US box office. That there is a big big number for a non-genre subtitled picture.
What did you see this weekend? Was it worth the money? I was having an offline recuperation weekend so I went to see a Norwegian band at The Bitter End that one of my friends recommended called Mhoo. They're so good. Have a listen!
They told me they're going to SXSW so if you're heading to that festival check them out.
Even when I'm at non-film events I can't stop thinking of movies. While the girls were singing I kept thinking "Kiki Dunst and Leelee Sobieski should play them in a movie!"