Were there movies out there this weekend? Between the Super Bowl and Suborning Bill, movies seemed like a low priority for a change. Titanic made its $25 million. The Spice Girls managed to snap up $11 million (if anyone out there knows why, please e-mail me). The Good movies (Will Hunting and As it Gets) did good in third and fourth. Fallen fell in a pretty standard way. The only newcomer to the Top Ten was Phantoms with a weak $3.1 million open.
MILESTONES: Titanic passed Jaws‘ $260 million domestic gross to become the 10th most popular film of all time. Jaws, who had to turn down a cameo in the film due to rust, refused to comment. But a spokesperson for the mechanical shark rambled on about the box office to production cost ratio and mentioned that Quentin Tarantino had recently visited Jaws on the Universal Studio tour and they were hoping to have “good news” about a comeback in the near future.
MILLSTONES: President Clinton was getting wagged so hard by the tale of him being a dog that it could snap his presidency. New Line has decided not to capitalize on the current problems in the White House, but Iraq has. Saddam Hussein is claiming that he is now expecting an American assault on Iraq as a Clinton distraction.
ABOVE THE FRAY: Ben Affleck, Phantoms most marketable co-star and Golden Globe award-winner for co-scripting Miramax’s Good Will Hunting, was not out on the talk circuit pushing his newer film. Given that Phantoms is from Miramax division Dimension, that might be internal strategy to keep Affleck pure for Academy consideration. Or Ben’s head might be too big to talk sci-fi. Only his publicist knows for sure.
READER QUOTE OF THE DAY: From Marc A, “I don’t doubt Titanic‘s doing well, but these numbers seem impossible! I’m waiting to hear that Titanic is healing the sick this weekend.”

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