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David Poland

By David Poland poland@moviecitynews.com

Box Office Hell – May 8

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32 Responses to “Box Office Hell – May 8”

  1. Joe Leydon says:

    Next Day Air is a movie with colored people in it, right? So do you think it might do better than the white boys think?

  2. LYT says:

    I’m glad that movie is finally out so I no longer have to see trailers for it.
    I don’t understand how Mike Epps keeps getting work.

  3. jesse says:

    Epps can be pretty funny; his material is just weak sometimes. He and Charlie Murphy have a hilarious scene in “Roll Bounce” talking about what they’ll have to resort to if they lose their jobs as garbagemen.
    I have to say, I’m intrigued by Next Day Air, mainly because Roger Ebert and Nathan Rabin both gave it positive reviews (albeit alongside not very many others). And Donald Faison, Mos Def, and Epps are all potentially very funny.

  4. jesse says:

    … that said, the movie is going out on 1,000 screens at a time when the younger-male demo (no matter the race) is pretty well occupied by Star Trek and X-Men. So no, Joe, I don’t think it’s going to do better than the highest prediction on this chart.

  5. doug r says:

    They all look soft on Star Trek. I’m thinking at least a Wolverineish $85 million for Star Trek.

  6. Aladdin Sane says:

    I agree with Doug. This is the first Trek film in a long time that is so un-nerd that a guy can take his girlfriend to the film and not feel she’s gonna be totally turned off (and vice versa). Actually it may be the first Trek film period that’s entertaining to everyone, and not just sci-fi and action fans alike. Great fun. Can’t wait to see it again.

  7. Hallick says:

    “Next Day Air is a movie with colored people in it, right?”
    No, that would be “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory”.

  8. Hallick says:

    “Actually it may be the first Trek film period that’s entertaining to everyone, and not just sci-fi and action fans alike.”
    The marketing hasn’t promised anything outside of action and sci-fi, so what’s the extra element in this Star Trek (Karl Urban’s Bones McCoy notwithstanding) that wasn’t in a previous sequel? I can’t wait to see it either, but it isn’t like its being touted as having the best dialogue in years or an amazing new romance factor.

  9. chadillac says:

    Star Trek to me, compares to Sex in the City. It’s a May launch that excludes have of the major demos. It will probably be at least 20% better due to more screens and bigger midnight screenings.

  10. MarkVH says:

    “This is the first Trek film in a long time that is so un-nerd that a guy can take his girlfriend to the film and not feel she’s gonna be totally turned off (and vice versa).”
    The problem, of course, is getting her there. Mine wants absolutely nothing to do with it, and all my guy friends are in roughly the same boat. The Sex and the City comparison is apt, I think. It did well enough without the male demographic but not sensationally, and I imagine Trek will do roughly the equivalent, maybe a bit better with the PG-13 rating.

  11. The Big Perm says:

    I wouldn’t consider the other Star Trek movies “action,” really, even though there was some.
    And Hallick, this Trek’s extra element is looking like it wasn’t shot on two cheap sets. I don’t care for Trek but this looks like an actual bona fide movie with some style and real action.

  12. Josh Massey says:

    I saw it last night, and still can’t get over how disappointed I am. It wasn’t terrible, but it didn’t grab me at all. Hell, the trailer gave me goosebumps a few times, while the entire film couldn’t manage it once.

  13. Wrecktum says:

    The geeks are blinded to the reality that this Star Trek iteration will never see the high side of $70m this weekend. Hell, in my opinion it won’t see $60m, but I guess we’ll know more by the end of the day.

  14. The Big Perm says:

    I think it’ll see more than 60. That other geek film WOlverine opened to over 80 last weekend. Watchmen opened to almost 60…and this looks way more fun and whiz-bangy than the lying Watchmen commercials ever did. I could easily see 70 or more.

  15. LexG says:

    I don’t think ST is THAT female-unfriendly; Maybe he’s not the biggest household name in the world, but the “Abrams brand” has a huge “fangirl” following that trusts the name.
    Even if ST isn’t as inherently estro-tastic as “Felicity” or “Alias” or even “Lost,” there’s seemingly eight million fanatical female fans blowing up TV spoiler sites and message boards like T.W.O.P. at any given time worshipping the guy, in between offering their latest crazy “Lost” theories. You can also throw in some of the female-skewing “Heroes” fanbase that’ll come for Quinto or the young male cast in general.

  16. montrealkid says:

    One of theaters near me started showing Star Trek yesterday afternoon, and judging by the crowds I saw (some in full on Trekker gear), this will easily do $85. Oh yeah, and based bad the word of mouth will be on Wolverine the drop is going to be larger than expected.

  17. The Big Perm says:

    The crowds in Trekker gear seem the easiest to discount. Of course they will show up first thing. I wouldn’t base any numbers on that.

  18. IOIOIOI says:

    Phenomenal flick, and these folks are way too soft on the opening. This is MCN after all. They hate genre. So a softer than expected figure is required by Poland law.

  19. David Poland says:

    IO… I really don’t want to respond to your blather too much… but what the hell are you talking about this time?
    We run numbers from the same 5 independent sites every week… none from MCN… are you interested in being anything other than a troll?

  20. jeffmcm says:

    I actually am very much looking forward to seeing Next Day Air.

  21. Wrecktum says:

    Hey….color me surprised. Star Trek looks like it’s coming in with Wolverine numbers. Guess I was wrong.

  22. Joe Leydon says:

    Wrecktum: For what it’s worth: My son (age 22) had a bunch of his buddies over last night to grill burgers and steaks and play poker and watch basketball. And all of them — repeat, all of them — evidenced interest in seeing Star Trek. Go figure.

  23. LYT says:

    “what’s the extra element in this Star Trek (Karl Urban’s Bones McCoy notwithstanding) that wasn’t in a previous sequel?”
    -A young cast that are mostly attractive (fetishes for Patrick Stewart notwithstanding, the movies have generally starred old and/or sexless characters)
    -A return to humor, as indicated by Simon Pegg being in the cast (most “laughs” in the Next Gen movies involved really stupid stuff like Worf getting a zit or Data singing)
    -And yes, an added romance factor — two of the crewmembers are a couple that weren’t before.

  24. IOIOIOI says:

    David: you know what you are. Accept it already. Now go get upset about a critic losing a job, and bitch about Finke doing something. It suits you. So well.

  25. leahnz says:

    “what’s the extra element in this Star Trek (Karl Urban’s Bones McCoy notwithstanding) that wasn’t in a previous sequel?”
    bless you, hallick

  26. the keoki says:

    I saw it last night and the crowd was decidely un-trekkie and they ate it up. i work around a bunch of women and they are all saying that they are seeing it this weekend with their husbands because this one “looks like fun” and it “doesnt look like Star Trek”….

  27. Hallick says:

    A younger cast that’s mostly attractive doesn’t equal “entertaining to everyone, and not just sci-fi and action fans alike”. It would be entertaining to LexG if they were all female, but that’s about all.
    And almost all, if not all, of the previous Trek films were action films too.
    As for the J.J. Abrams factor: he’s practically a silent partner on “Lost”; “Felicity” is more than an afterthought in 2009; and if “Alias” still had some swing, Jennifer Garner’s last movie would’ve done better. Add to that the fact that “Heroes” is running on two seasons of ice cold fumes (fansites burning bright or not), so Quinto’s probably brining a statistically insignificant bump in his own right.

  28. leahnz says:

    chicks’ll dig it because of pine – that lad just oozes charisma – and possibly karl to a lesser degree (tho he’s not ‘hunky’ as bones, but i’ve heard there are plenty of converts to ‘camp karl’ after seeing ‘strek’) and even quinto has a certain appeal as spock. and like cindy lauper said so eloquently, ‘girls just wanna have fun’, and by golly ‘trek’ is all kinds of fun.

  29. Felicity is still the best thing Abrams has ever been involved with. Go figure.
    (my opinion, at least)

  30. Hallick says:

    “Felicity is still the best thing Abrams has ever been involved with. Go figure.”
    Even better than his co-writing credit on “Gone Fishin'”?

  31. yancyskancy says:

    I was in film school when Abrams became this wunderkind screenwriter du jour (as Jeffrey Abrams) with Regarding Henry (which I hated), Taking Care of Business (which I skipped) and Forever Young (also skipped). I would swear he was promoted as being younger than his actual age, though that may be faulty memory on my part. At any rate, I felt some schadenfreude when his films flopped or got bad reviews. I soon forgot about the dude, then all of a sudden I’m loving this new show, Felicity, and stunned to find he’s the creative force behind it.

  32. IOIOIOI says:

    Regarding Henry is wonderful. Ritz Crackers. That’s all I am stating.

Quote Unquotesee all »

It shows how out of it I was in trying to be in it, acknowledging that I was out of it to myself, and then thinking, “Okay, how do I stop being out of it? Well, I get some legitimate illogical narrative ideas” — some novel, you know?

So I decided on three writers that I might be able to option their material and get some producer, or myself as producer, and then get some writer to do a screenplay on it, and maybe make a movie.

And so the three projects were “Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep,” “Naked Lunch” and a collection of Bukowski. Which, in 1975, forget it — I mean, that was nuts. Hollywood would not touch any of that, but I was looking for something commercial, and I thought that all of these things were coming.

There would be no Blade Runner if there was no Ray Bradbury. I couldn’t find Philip K. Dick. His agent didn’t even know where he was. And so I gave up.

I was walking down the street and I ran into Bradbury — he directed a play that I was going to do as an actor, so we know each other, but he yelled “hi” — and I’d forgot who he was.

So at my girlfriend Barbara Hershey’s urging — I was with her at that moment — she said, “Talk to him! That guy really wants to talk to you,” and I said “No, fuck him,” and keep walking.

But then I did, and then I realized who it was, and I thought, “Wait, he’s in that realm, maybe he knows Philip K. Dick.” I said, “You know a guy named—” “Yeah, sure — you want his phone number?”

My friend paid my rent for a year while I wrote, because it turned out we couldn’t get a writer. My friends kept on me about, well, if you can’t get a writer, then you write.”
~ Hampton Fancher

“That was the most disappointing thing to me in how this thing was played. Is that I’m on the phone with you now, after all that’s been said, and the fundamental distinction between what James is dealing with in these other cases is not actually brought to the fore. The fundamental difference is that James Franco didn’t seek to use his position to have sex with anyone. There’s not a case of that. He wasn’t using his position or status to try to solicit a sexual favor from anyone. If he had — if that were what the accusation involved — the show would not have gone on. We would have folded up shop and we would have not completed the show. Because then it would have been the same as Harvey Weinstein, or Les Moonves, or any of these cases that are fundamental to this new paradigm. Did you not notice that? Why did you not notice that? Is that not something notable to say, journalistically? Because nobody could find the voice to say it. I’m not just being rhetorical. Why is it that you and the other critics, none of you could find the voice to say, “You know, it’s not this, it’s that”? Because — let me go on and speak further to this. If you go back to the L.A. Times piece, that’s what it lacked. That’s what they were not able to deliver. The one example in the five that involved an issue of a sexual act was between James and a woman he was dating, who he was not working with. There was no professional dynamic in any capacity.

~ David Simon