Preview and Projections for the Weekend of April 30, 2004
By Edward Douglas -

Greetings and welcome back to the Weekend Warrior, your weekly guide to the weekend's new movies. Tune in every Tuesday for the latest look at the upcoming weekend, and then check back on Friday for any last minute updates.

WEEKEND PROJECTIONS - final update 4.29.04

The last weekend of April is rarely a good time to release a new movie, let alone five, but the studios seem to be falling over themselves trying to get their movies out before the summer movie season kicks off next week. Few of these movies will be able to get much business away from last week's returning movies, and many people will be waiting for the big early summer movies like Van Helsing and Troy. Earlier this week, it seemed like 13 Going on 30 and Man on Fire would remain in the top 2, but Tina Fey's snarky high school comedy, Mean Girls, starring Lindsay Lohan, looks to be strong enough this weekend to offer girls and women something a bit edgier than Garner's saccharine sweet comedy. On the other hand, the Barry Levinson comedy Envy, starring hot comic actors Ben Stiller and Jack Black, might not do as well as their previous hits due to a lame premise and negative advance buzz, and the divorce court romantic comedy, Laws of Attraction, starring Julianne Moore and Pierce Brosnan, just doesn't look very original despite its talented stars. The same can be said for the cloning thriller Godsend with Robert DeNiro and Rebecca Romijn, which will likely get the least business of the bunch. After his stunning performance as Jesus in The Passion of The Christ, actor James Caviezel becomes 1920's golf legend Bobby Jones in Stroke of Genius. While it would usually get a limited release, the prominence of Caviezel and a similar marketing scheme as Gibson's Passion could help it find a decent sized audience of golf fanatics. Otherwise, the movie market is already pretty well covered and few of the new movies will need to be seen opening weekend.

TW	LW	Title	Weekend (in millions)	Change	# Of Theaters	Average	Week
1	New	Mean Girls	$14.5*	N/A	2,839	$5,107	1
2	2	13 Going On 30	$13.3	-37%	3,453	$3,927	2
3	1	Man on Fire	$13.0	-43%	2,986	$4,364	2
4	New	Envy	$9.0	N/A	2,445	$3,681	1
5	New	Laws of Attraction	$8.0	N/A	2,449	$3,267	1
6	New	Godsend	$6.3	N/A	2,323	$2,712	1
7	3	Kill Bill Volume 2	$5.5	-47%	2,742	$2,006	3
8	New	Bobby Jones: Stroke of Genius	$4.0	N/A	1,332	$3,003	1
9	4	The Punisher	$3.5	-45%	2,267	$1,458	3
10	5	Home on the Range	$2.2	-38%	2,010	$1,100	5
			Est. Weekend Total $79.20	Est. Avg. Drop-Off -42%		Est. Average PTA $3,058

*Update: With more theatres and a ton of buzz developing from talk show apperances by Lohan and Fey, Mean Girls looks strong enough to take the top spot this weekend.

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ENVY (DreamWorks Pictures)
Starring: Ben Stiller, Jack Black, Rachel Weisz, Amy Poehler, Ving Rhames, Christopher Walken
Directed by: Barry Levinson (Rain Man, The Natural, Wag the Dog, Good Morning Vietnam, Bandits)
Rated PG-13
Tagline: "Success didn't go to his head, it went to his neighbor."

Tim (Ben Stiller) and Nick (Jack Black) are best friends, neightbors and co-workers whose friendship is tested to the limit when Nick's crazy get-rich scheme--Vapoorize, a spray that makes dog doo disappear—actually makes him rich. As his friend's fame and fortune grows so does Tim's jealousy, and things escalate when a strange drifter, played by Christopher Walken, fans the flames into a raging fire.

Pairing Ben Stiller and Jack Black, currently two of the most popular comedic movie stars working today, would seem like comedy gold in most cases, because they both have growing fanbases. On the other hand, Envy, written by Larry David head writer on "Seinfeld" and star of the popular HBO sitcom "Curb Your Enthusiasm", has the dubious distinction of being a movie with some of the worst advance buzz of any other recent comedy. After a number of false starts, DreamWorks must be hoping that people will forget about that sort of thing, because they must know full well how hot their cast is based on their recent hits.

Jack Black will be vying for most of the laughs with his usual over-the-top schtick that has made him such a big star. Black is coming off his biggest hit to date, the hilarious School of Rock, which grossed over $80 million, after defeating Denzel Washington at the box office last October. Black, one half of the musical comedy duo Tenacious D, took on a number of smaller roles in movies before he got attention for stealing the show in the John Cusack romantic comedy, High Fidelity. After that, Black starred in the Farrelly Brothers' extended fat joke, Shallow Hal, which earned $23 million opening weekend and $70 million total, helping to build up his audience, so his secondary role helped the collegiate comedy, Orange County, do much better than it might otherwise. Over the next year, he recorded and toured extensively with his band and filmed Envy, which was originally scheduled to come out last May. Because it was delayed, Black's absence in theatres was pretty long before he returned to the big screen with the perfectly suited School of Rock.

Already having an impressive year with two decent size hits, MTV regular Ben Stiller received $10 million to play the straight man in Envy. His other two 2004 movies, Along Came Polly with "Friends" star Jennifer Aniston and the comedy remake of Starsky and Hutch with long-time pal Owen Wilson, grossed over $85 million despite opening in what is considered a slow movie season. This is far cry from his 2003 bomb with Drew Barrymore, The Duplex. (Ironically, Wilson's other 2004 movie, The Big Bounce, bombed earlier in the year proving that popular stars can't save a bad movie.) Although Envy will be Stiller's third movie of the year, he may be more focused on some of his other movies like Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story. He also appears in Will Ferrell's Anchorman in July, and is middle of filming Meet the Fockers, the sequel to his hit comedy, Meet the Parents, with Robert DeNiro.

Black and Stiller have gotten a lot of support from the 17 to 25 year old audiences that flock to movies every weekend, and their popularity has grown due to their prominent appearances on MTV and at highly watched award shows like this year's Oscars. DreamWorks is hoping to bank on this to help this movie, but whether the stars' popularity will keep fans from overlooking the rather lame premise and bad advance buzz this movie has been getting might be another story.

Ben Stiller/Jack Black:

Title	Release Date	Theater Count	Weekend Box Office (in millions)	Average	Total Box Office
Starsky and Hutch	3/5/04	3,185	$28.10	$8,824	$86.04
Along Came Polly	1/16/04	2,984	$27.72	$9,290	$87.86
Duplex	9/26/03	2,189	$4.62	$2,111	$9.61
Zoolander	9/28/01	2,507	$15.70	$6,262	$45.16
Meet the Parents	10/6/00	2,614	$28.62	$10,949	$166.23
The School of Rock	10/3/03	2,614	$19.62	$7,507	$81.05
Orange County	1/11/02	2,317	$15.05	$6,497	$41.03
Shallow Hal	11/9/01	2,771	$23.28	$8,401	$70.83

After his 1982 debut Diner, director Barry Levinson earned critical respect and commercial success for his dramatic films, Good Morning Vietnam and Rain Man, the latter for which he received an Oscar for directing. Envy is the first movie he's directed since the forgettable 2001 buddy crime comedy, Bandits, with Bruce Willis and Billy Bob Thornton. Envy veers even further away from his memorable early films, and it's odd that the 62-year-old veteran is directing a comedy geared towards younger moviegoers with its two stars.

High concept comedies usually work well among mass audiences, but Envy is more of a cynical black comedy along the lines of The Duplex and Death to Smoochy ­both directed by Danny DeVito, another director whose career has faltered in the 21^st Century. Based on Dave Barry's popular book, Tim Allen's dark comedy Big Trouble opened in April 2002, but it failed to find the audience of his previous hits due to the subject matter. Even hot star Ashton Kutcher couldn't save My Boss's Daughter, a high concept comedy directed by 80's comedy director David Zucker. All of these movies had popular and respected actors and well-known directors, but couldn't get past weak unmarketable premises. Picked up in turnaround from Warner Brothers (ie they didn't want to make it), Envy doesn't look much better than any of those.

Barry Levinson/Dark Comedies:

Title	Release Date	Theater Count	Previous Box Office (in millions)	Weekend Box Office (in millions)	Average	Total Box Office
Bandits	10/12/01	3,207		$13.05	$4,069	$41.52
Wag the Dog	1/9/98	1,665	$1.96	$7.78	$4,673	$43.04
My Boss's Daughter	8/22/03	2,201		$4.86	$2,206	$15.55
Big Trouble	4/5/02	1,961		$3.55	$1,808	$7.26
Death to Smoochy	3/29/02	2,164		$4.27	$1,972	$8.36

If things couldn't get any worse, DreamWorks ran test screenings for Envy last summer that were so poorly received that they moved it to a late August release where most movies go to die. For whatever reason, DreamWorks didn't feel comfortable there, so after rumors that the movie was going to be released on DVD without a theatrical release—a sure giveaway of a bad movie—DreamWorks set it for a spring 2004 release. Only a few weeks after its intended April 2^nd release, having had no advertising, DreamWorks moved it to the end of April, maybe one of the worst weekends to release a new movie.

It's very likely that reviewers will not be kind to Envy, that is, if DreamWorks even decides to show it to the critics, and Stiller and Black might not even get behind the movie by promoting it at the talk shows. Stiller has so many other big movies this year that he'd be better off focusing on them.

Bottom Line: Common sense would make one think that Jack Black and Ben Stiller make it an easy sell, but the lame premise and the overwhelming bad buzz surrounding this movie like flies around a carcass might force even their diehard fans to wait until the DVD release. While usually, the two actors would guarantee a $20 million opening, this one will be lucky to make that in its entire theatrical release. Expect an opening weekend under $9 million before bad word-of-mouth kills it off completely.

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GODSEND (Lions' Gate Films)
Starring: Robert DeNiro, Greg Kinnear, Rebecca Romijn-Stamos, Cameron Bright, Jenny Levine, Deborah Odell, Janet Bailey
Directed by: Nick Hamm (The Hole, Talk of Angels)
Rated PG-13
Tagline: "When a miracle becomes a nightmare, evil is born."

Two parents (Greg Kinnear, Rebecca Romjin-Stamos) lose their eight-year-old son in a freak accident, but a genetic research doctor (DeNiro) offers to create a clone of the boy. Raised from birth, the cloned boy begins to suffer flashbacks when he reaches his eighth birthday, causing a sinister change that makes his terrified parents wonder if they made the right choice.

If kids weren't scary enough, they've been regular fodder for horror movies dating back to the 60's horror movie, Village of the Damned. In the 70's, horror classics like The Omen and Rosemary's Baby, continued to keep moviegoers on the edge of their seat, as they found out that not all kids are sweet and innocent. That tradition continued through the 80's with Stephen King's short story Children of the Corn tried to update Village of the Damned, and director John Carpenter even tried to remake the 60's classic in 1995, neither doing very well. More recently, successful horror movies like The Ring, The Others and The Sixth Sense have used creepy kids to great effect, something that Godsend will try to use to its advantage. Godsend's plot about a boy dying and then turning bad on revival will sound familiar to anyone who read Stephen King's best-selling thriller, Pet Sematary, which spawned a successful horror movie almost exactly fifteen years ago, and a horrid sequel, which bombed a few year later.

Creepy Kids:

Title	Release Date	Theater Count	Weekend Box Office (in millions)	Average	Total Box Office
The Ring	10/18/02	1,981	$15.02	$7,580	$128.29
Bless the Child	8/11/00	2,754	$9.41	$3,417	$29.33
Village of the Damned	4/28/95	1,890	$3.22	$1,704	$8.73
The Good Son	9/24/93	1,847	$12.52	$6,779	$44.46
Pet Sematary 2	8/28/92	1,852	$4.83	$2,608	$17.05
Pet Sematary	4/21/89	1,585	$12.05	$7,603	$57.47
Children of the Corn	3/9/84	350	$2.04	$5,836	$14.56

Robert DeNiro's fans should be excited to see him return to drama for his first movie in over a year, and Godsend also has the distinction of being DeNiro's fiftieth movie in his thirty-year career. DeNiro's career highs include starring in eight of Martin Scorsese's most memorable films including Taxi Driver, Raging Bull, Goodfellas and Cape Fear. In recent years, DeNiro has been branching out into comedy with two huge hits in Analyze This with Billy Crystal ($106 million gross) and Meet the Parents with Ben Stiller ($166 million gross). His last movie, the 2002 sequel to the former, Analyze That, did not come closer to doing as well as the original, and DeNiro's last few dramas, City by the Sea and 15 Minutes, only made between $9 and 11 million their opening weekends in more theatres than Godsend. This horror thriller doesn't seem like the kind of movie that DeNiro's fans would be interested in seeing, but chances are that DeNiro's role in Godsend is minor compared to previous movies.

Former super model Rebecca Romjin-Stamos, soon to be just Romjin if she goes through with the divorce, has brought a lot of sex appeal to comic book movies like X-Men, X2 and The Punisher, but her last headlining thriller, Femme Fatale, directed by Brian De Palma, tanked in 2002, and this doesn't look that much better.

Godsend's weak link is Greg Kinnear, former host of the E! Channel's "Talk Soup", who broke into movies with the 1995 romantic comedy Sabrina. After a breakout performance as actor Bob Crane in the biodrama Auto Focus, Kinnear's literal pairing with Matt Damon in the Farrelly Brothers' Stuck on You last December failed to make a mark.

DeNiro, Romjin AND Kinnear:

Title	Release Date	Theater Count	Weekend Box Office (in millions)	Average	Total Box Office
City by the Sea	9/6/02	2,575	$8.94	$3,470	$22.43
15 Minutes	3/9/01	2,337	$10.52	$4,503	$24.38
Men of Honor	11/10/00	2,092	$13.34	$6,377	$48.75
The Punisher	4/16/04		$13.83	$5,222	$16.90
Femme Fatale	11/8/02	1,066	$2.78	$2,604	$6.59
Stuck on You	12/12/03	3,003	$9.41	$3,134	$33.45
Sabrina	12/15/95	1,821	$5.56	$3,053	$53.56

Though horror movies have done well in the last year, Godsend is more of a psychological thriller with a vague premise that doesn't make enough out of the interesting cloning angle. This omission might not matter, since the last two movies about the subject--Gattaca and Michael Keaton's Multiplicity--both bombed though neither took the horror route. Late April isn't a good time to release a horror-thriller, something Lions' Gate should have discovered with Bill Paxton's psychological thriller, Frailty. Other thrillers that didn't do well in April include the John Carpenter remake of Village of the Damned, Steven King's The Dark Half, and even Nicole Kidman's big breakout, Dead Calm. Last year, a thriller broke the negative trend when the ensemble thriller Identity topped the box office in the last week of April. (See This Week Last Year)

Lions' Gate has plenty of experience marketing lower budget horror films like Cabin Fever and House of 1,000 Corpses, but both of them had decent buzz among horror fans before they were released. The marketing for Godsend started a little late in the game with the commercials only popping up a few weeks back, and the last ditch effort might not be enough. As has become de rigueur for romantic comedies to have sneak preview screenings, Godsend is following the latest trend to release an extended clip from a horror movie online to try to generate buzz. This was already done this year with Taking Lives and Dawn of the Dead. Frankly, the clip isn't very good, featuring its female star in a semi-nude state to entice the horny male fans, interspersed with a lame, un-scary scene of their son facing demons and some slow dramatic scenes. (The ten-minute clip can be seen by clicking on the movie title above.)

The moderate release into around 2,100 theatres is higher than most Lions' Gate releases, but it doesn't show much confidence from theatre chains. It's true that the 2002 horror hit, The Ring, was initially released in fewer theatres, but DreamWorks promoted that movie well enough to create overwhelming buzz before opening weekend. Godsend's move to this year in order to do reshoots doesn't bode well either.

Bottom Line: Even with its star power, Godsend looks like a bad horror movie with a plot that sounds far too familiar. Because of this, it looks to be getting dumped in a busy weekend that is not ideal for this type of movie, and it's likely to get lost in the shuffle of new movies. Despite the resurgence in the horror genre, Godsend is going to shoot for an opening weekend around $6 million.

Other Comparisons:

Title	Release Date	Theater Count	Previous Box Office (in millions)	Weekend Box Office (in millions)	Average	Total Box Office
Gattaca	10/24/97	1,279		$4.32	$3,378	$12.35
Multiplicity	7/19/96	2,134	$1.93	$5.08	$2,381	$20.13
Cabin Fever	9/12/03	2,087		$8.63	$4,137	$21.14
Frailty	4/12/02	1,497		$4.21	$2,806	$13.08

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LAWS OF ATTRACTION (New Line Cinema)
Starring: Pierce Brosnan, Julianne Moore, Parker Posey, Michael Sheen, Frances Fisher, Nora Dunn
Directed by: Peter Howitt (Johnny English, Sliding Doors, Antitrust)
Rated PG-13
Tagline: "Getting married is a great way to fall in love."

Julianne Moore and Pierce Brosnan are rival divorce lawyers who wake up after a drunken bender in Vegas to find out they've gotten married. In order to keep their reputations intact, they must make the most of it and pretend that they're happily married…but could true love be far behind?

In a decade that has spawned a number of hit romantic comedies, Laws of Attraction has a lot of the winning combinations to be successful, including a high concept premise and popular stars branching out a bit. It also has the distinction of being geared more towards older women than other recent fare, although in the past, that demographic has not been known for running out to the box office.

Julianne Moore is appearing in her first movie since receiving two Oscar nominations in 2003 for her roles in Far From Heaven and The Hours. Even before that Moore was a highly respected actress, appearing in critically acclaimed independent films from directors like P.T. Anderson (Boogie Nights, for which she received her first Oscar nomination), the Coen Brothers (The Big Lebowsky) and Robert Altman (Short Cuts). In 2001, she received her first mainstream attention after she replaced Jodi Foster as Agent Clarice Starling in Hannibal, the sequel to The Silence of the Lambs. Although a blockbuster hit, it disappointed fans and critics, as did her next two movies, the weak sci-fi/comedy Evolution and Lasse Hallstrom's The Shipping News, which failed to get the Oscar attention of his last few movies. Starring in Todd Haynes' Far From Heaven and Stephen Daldry's The Hours helped the actress regain her critical respect, while strengthening her female fanbase.

Having first received women's attention in the early 80's in the title role of television's "Remington Steele", Pierce Brosnan finally stars in a movie that directly targets his legions of adoring older women that worship his good looks and charm. Of course, Pierce Brosnan is James Bond, having played the British secret agent for four movies over the last nine years, bringing the franchise to new heights of box office success. His first stint as Bond, Goldeneye, grossed more than $100 million, the two movies after that each grossed over $125 million, and the last movie, Die Another Day, did even better, earning $47 million opening weekend on its way to a Bond record of $165 million. In between Bond films, Brosnan has branched out a bit, appearing in smaller movies like The Thomas Crown Affair and 2001's The Tailor of Panama, and the 2002 Irish drama, Evelyn.

Julianne Moore/Pierce Brosnan:

Title	Release Date	Theater Count	Previous Box Office (in millions)	Weekend Box Office (in millions)	Average	Total Box Office
The Hours	1/17/03	402	$3.78	$4.64	$11,555	$41.60
Far From Heaven	11/8/02	259	$1.25	$1.62	$6,259	$15.90
The Shipping News	12/25/01	186		$1.25	$6,479	$11.41
Hannibal	2/9/01	3,230		$58.00	$17,958	$164.97
Magnolia	1/7/00	1,034	$0.92	$5.69	$5,503	$22.45
Die Another Day	11/22/02	3,314		$47.07	$14,204	$158.63
The Tailor of Panama	4/20/01	359	$5.17	$1.58	$4,406	$13.49
The Thomas Crown Affair	8/6/99	2,427		$14.60	$6,016	$69.30

Laws of Attraction harks back to the romantic comedies of old in which the female and male star don't get along at first, find some sort of common ground and then fall in love. Meg Ryan and Sandra Bullock have become the modern queens of this genre with movies like When Harry met Sally and Forces of Nature, but Kate Hudson got in on the act by appearing in last year's biggest romantic comedy hit (How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days), as well as one of the biggest flops (Alex and Emma).

Comparisons have been made to the movies of Katherine Hepburn and Spencer Tracy, something that will also interest older movie lovers. Ewan McGregor and Renee Zellweger tried their hand at a retro comedy with last summer's Down With Love, but that didn't do well at all. The Coen Brothers tried to make a mainstream romantic comedy with Intolerable Cruelty, starring George Clooney and Catherine Zeta-Jones, and that did okay during a similar busy weekend, but it didn't break any records for the genre. Both movies featured big stars in their follow-ups to Oscar nominated movies like Laws of Attraction.

Romantic Comedies:

Title	Release Date	Theater Count	Previous Box Office (in millions)	Weekend Box Office (in millions)	Average	Total Box Office
Intolerable Cruelty	10/10/03	2,564		$12.53	$4,885	$35.10
Alex and Emma	6/20/03	2,310		$6.11	$2,645	$14.21
Down With Love	5/16/03	2,123	$0.06	$7.00	$3,298	$20.30
How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days	2/7/03	2,923		$23.77	$8,134	$105.81
Two Weeks Notice	12/20/02	2,755		$14.40	$5,227	$88.82
Forces of Nature	3/19/99	2,058		$13.51	$6,565	$52.88
Six Days, Seven Nights	6/12/98	2,550		$16.49	$6,467	$74.31

On top of that, Laws of Attraction has been plagued with potential problems, the first of which is the fact that it has had just under a dozen screenwriters and numerous rewrites. It doesn't help that the original director dropped out of the movie a few months before filming was to start. New Line has had trouble setting on a release date moving it back and forth between March and April trying to find a good date.

Bottom Line: Laws of Attraction looks like a cute romantic comedy for older adults featuring two stars who have proven popular among that demographic, but it doesn't look strong enough to give the genre a much needed kick in the pants. Opening in more theatres than comparable movies, Laws of Attraction might be the only choice for older women and couples this weekend, but looking like too many other movies, it might get lost in the shuffle of a busy end of spring weekend. It might be able to make just over $8 million this weekend, but it won't do as well as stronger movies like Mean Girls and last week's returning favorites.

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MEAN GIRLS (Paramount Pictures)
Starring: Lindsay Lohan, Tina Fey, Lizzy Caplan, Rachel McAdams, Lacey Chabert, Daniel Franzese, Tim Meadows, Jonathan Bennett, Wai Choy, Ana Gasteyer, Olympia Lukis, Jonathan Malen, Amy Poehler, David Sazant, Amanda Seyfried, Elana Shilling
Directed by: Mark S. Waters (Freaky Friday, Head Over Heels, The House of Yes)
Rated PG-13
Tagline: "Watch your back."

For the second time this year, Lindsay Lohan plays a teen girl trying to get along at a new high school. This time, she plays a girl home schooled in Africa, whose first experience at a public school is marred by a clique of nasty girls called the Plastics, who use gossip and other torture techniques to try to ruin her social life.

Based on Rosalind Wiseman's "Queen Bees and Wannabees", a non-fiction book about high school popularity, Mean Girls is something like the ninth or tenth movie this year geared towards the teenage female set. Although the market would seem oversaturated, Mean Girls, does offer something new and worthwhile being the first movie written by Saturday Night Live head writer, Tina Fey. Seen every weekend as the co-anchor on SNL's "Weekend Update", Fey's biting humor has been one of the few saving graces of a venerable show that has fallen by the wayside. Fey was able to cull from her own experiences in high school to imbue her screenplay with lots of dark humor that could appeal to older teens than some of the other girly movies out there.

Mean Girls will only be Lohan's fourth film as a star after her debut in Disney's remake of The Parent Trap in 1998. Five years later, her next movie, a remake of Freaky Friday, did very well, earning over $100 million in the last summer. Her follow-up movie this past February, Confessions of a Teenage Drama Queen, didn't do quite so well, although it did do better than the rest of the new movies opening that weekend. Lohan clearly has experience on the subject of playing a teen. Mean Girls should be able to bring back Lohan's fans that liked Confessions, as well as widening her audience with Fey's hipster writing. Mean Girls also reunites Lohan with her Freaky Friday director, Mark S. Waters.

Lindsay Lohan:

Title	Release Date	Theater Count	Previous Box Office (in millions)	Weekend Box Office (in millions)	Average	Total Box Office
Confessions of a Teenage Drama Queen	2/20/04	2,503		$9.35	$3,736	$28.96
Freaky Friday	8/8/03	2,954	$10.90	$22.20	$7,516	$110.22
The Parent Trap	7/31/98	2,247	$5.06	$11.15	$4,962	$66.30

High school cliques and popularity have been a strong subject for teen comedies, especially during the 80's. Director Amy Heckerling built her entire career on movies about high school life including Fast Times at Ridgemont High and Clueless, both influential hits. Mean Girls is a bit darker like the cult movie Heathers, starring a young Winona Ryder and Christian Slater, which was a box office flop, but found a core audience on video and cable. The subject has also spawned television classics like "Square Pegs", starring a young Sarah Jessica Parker, "My So-Called Life", and "Freaks and Geeks". Though popular among their fans, none of them broke any records in the ratings, but all of them perfectly captured the realities of high school life during the times. Mean Girls brings back that sort of humor for a modern young audience, although more recent high school movies like Can't Hardly Wait and 10 Things I Hate About You didn't do very well, despite introducing some of today's hot young actors. The same can't be said for The New Guy, starring Road Trip's D. J. Qualls as a teen trying to make it in a new high school.

High School Life:

Title	Release Date	Theater Count	Previous Box Office (in millions)	Weekend Box Office (in millions)	Average	Total Box Office
The New Guy	5/10/02	2,687		$9.01	$3,352	$28.97
Sugar and Spice	1/26/01	2,150		$6.03	$2,802	$13.28
Bring it On	8/25/00	2,380		$17.36	$7,294	$68.25
10 Things I Hate About You	4/2/99	2,271	$3.19	$8.33	$3,668	$38.18
Can't Hardly Wait	6/12/98	1,987		$8.03	$4,041	$26.61
Clueless	7/21/95	1,653	$5.27	$10.61	$6,419	$54.79
Heathers	3/1/89	35		$0.18	$5,064	$1.11
Fast Times at Ridgemont High	8/13/82	498		$2.54	$5,111	$27.09

Unlike Lohan's last three Disney movies, Mean Girls is distributed by Paramount Pictures, who has not had many big hits geared towards the younger female market. Things have started to improve with the relative success of Julia Stiles' The Prince and Me, earning $9 million in a very busy weekend earlier this month. Mean Girls' has a PG-13 rating, compared to Lohan's previous PG fare, and Tina Fey's humor might be too dark and cynical for the younger ‘tweener fans that flocked to Lohan's last two movies. Then again, it should help get the older teens and 20-somethings that enjoy Fey's work on "Saturday Night Live". The recent commercials for Mean Girls are very funny, featuring the Plastics spouting their cliquish philosophy, an interesting marketing technique that should help. Because it's based on a real book about high school popularity, the talk show circuit like Dr. Phil has picked up on the movie, helping raise awareness for the grown-ups.

Bottom Line: Without Disney, it might be hard for this movie to get the promotion it needs to grab the younger female audience away from Jennifer Garner's 13 Going on 30, but combining Tina Fey and Lindsay Lohan with a subject matter that teen girls deal with on a daily basis should give Mean Girls a solid opening weekend between $13 and 15 million despite the oversaturated market. (Update: Looks like Lohan and Fey have been everywhere this week promoting the movie, and it apparently has far more buzz than any of the other movies, so it could end up doing well enough to take the top spot this weekend after all.)

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BOBBY JONES - STROKE OF GENIUS (Film Foundry Releasing)
Starring: James Caviezel, Claire Forlani, Jeremy Northam, Aidan Quinn, Malcolm McDowell
Directed by: Rowdy Herrington (Road House, Striking Distance)
Rated PG
Tagline: "His passion made him a legend." (Okay, can we make this ploy to capitalize on Jim Caviezel's most recent blockbuster success a little more obvious, please?)

The story of legendary golfer Bobby Jones is brought to the big screen with James Caviezel, star of The Passion of The Christ, in the title role. Though he possessed great golfing talent, Jones' temperamental nature made him an exciting addition to the sport during the 1920's, and he was able to achieve great success thanks to the support of his wife, Mary Malone Jones (Claire Forlani). He went on to found the annual golfing tournament, "The Masters".

Stroke of Genius is the latest historical drama based on a sports figure, but unlike some of the more well known sports figures like Ali, this one was independently funded and produced, a clear labor of love for all involved. Although most people won't know who Bobby Jones is, golf players and fans will know him as the ultimate golf players who helped redefine the sport during the 20's. He is still cited today as one of the most influential players in the sport, making him to golf what Seabiscuit was to horse racing.

Despite its independent roots, the movie lucked out when Caviezel agreed to play Jones, although few knew at the time that his historical biodrama, The Passion of The Christ, would become one of the highest grossing movies of all time after only two months of release. The producers and distributors of Stroke of Genius are taking full advantage of their star's recent high profile, by getting the movie into more theatres than it might otherwise, and pushing the movie based on Caviezel's performance. Caviezel has been earning respect in low-key roles over the years in movies from Frequency and Jennifer Lopez's Angel Eyes, before taking on the title role in Disney's The Count of Monte Cristo in 2002. Being cast as Jesus in Mel Gibson's controversial look at the religious icon's last days has clearly changed the actor's standing, although it did little to help his recent horror film, Highwaymen, which tanked in its limited release a few months back.

JAMES CAVIEZEL:

Title	Release Date	Theater Count	Previous Box Office (in millions)	Weekend Box Office (in millions)	Average	Total Box Office
The Passion of the Christ	2/25/04	3,043	$41.34	$83.85	$27,554	357.86
The Count of Monte Cristo	1/25/02	2,007		$11.38	$5,668	$54.23
Angel Eyes	5/18/01	2,375		$9.23	$3,884	$24.04
Frequency	4/28/00	2,621		$9.03	$3,445	$44.98

Although Caviezel might bring in some of the millions who saw The Passion, this is a movie made mainly for golf enthusiasts. Based on how much television airtime is dedicated to the sport every weekend, there must be quite a few of them, and superstars like Tiger Woods have brought even more people to the game. It's also one of the few sports—along with tennis—where anyone can play, not just athletes, making it even more popular among mass audiences.

Then again, golf is also the one sport that has not broken any records at the movies. The two most well known films about the sport are Tin Cup with Kevin Costner and The Legend of Bagger Vance, starring Will Smith and Matt Damon. Both movies opened in just over 2,000 theatres and made around $10 to 12 million opening weekend, although Tin Cup did better in the long-term. Because the movie is about a golfer from the 20's, he will be more familiar to the older male golfing crowd. The time period allows more comparison to last year's hit horse racing movie, Seabiscuit, as well as the Dennis Quaid sports movie, The Rookie, both depicting men overcoming the odds to achieve great success and fame.

GOLF/SPORTS BIOS:

Title	Release Date	Theater Count	Previous Box Office (in millions)	Weekend Box Office (in millions)	Average	Total Box Office
Legend of Bagger Vance	11/3/00	2,061		$11.52	$5,590	$30.70
Tin Cup	8/16/96	2,012		$10.13	$5,035	$53.85
Miracle	2/6/04	2,605		$19.38	$7,439	$64.25
Seabiscuit	7/25/03	1,987		$20.85	$10,495	$120.20
The Rookie	3/29/02	2,511		$16.02	$6,381	$75.60
Ali	12/28/01	2,446	$20.03	$14.71	$6,014	$58.18
The Hurricane	1/14/00	1,465	$4.06	$9.01	$6,150	$50.67

Although the movie is targeted towards older males, the romantic love story based on Jones' relationship with his supportive wife might get some older women into the movie, since it will be easier for them to lust over Caviezel than in his last one. Reviews of the movie will likely be better than the rest of this weekend's offerings, as well.

Stroke of Genius has a great trailer that will excite any golf fanatic that has seen it, but has anyone actually seen this trailer? While movie posters have popped up in theatres all over the country in the last month, the movie is still fairly low profile. Usually, this type of independent movie would get a limited release in specific target markets, but distributor Film Foundry is using a similar marketing strategy as The Passion of The Christ, going after the market that would be the most interested in the movie, golfers and golfing clubs. They've done this by offering group rates for those who want to buy entire screenings, which may have helped this movie get wider opening weekend release. One has to assume that the movie is being advertised heavily in golf magazines, if not during the more expensive television golf programs.

Bottom Line: Due to its low profile, Stroke of Genius might have trouble finding a mass audience, but its target audience of golf fanatics should help build enough word-of-mouth to sustain its business over the early summer. Look for it to get more attention after it shows up in the Top 10 with just under $4 million, stirring curiosity in those who hadn't heard about the movie.

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UNDER THE RADAR

Do you live in a major North American city? If so, there are a number of limited release movies worth checking out. And if you don't live in one of the cities in which these movies open, look for some of them to hit your area sometime in the next few months.

MICKEY (Slugger Pictures)
MONTY PYTHON'S LIFE OF BRIAN (Rainbow Film Company)
PEOPLE SAY I'M CRAZY (Palo Alto Pictures)
THE SADDEST MUSIC IN THE WORLD (IFC Films)
SINCE OTAR LEFT (Zeitgeist Films)

Harry Connick Jr. plays the father of a Little League baseball phenomenon in Mickey, based on a screenplay by novelist John Grisham and directed by Hugh Wilson, the man behind the first Police Academy movie. It opens in Texas, Virginia and Tennessee this weekend, and then expands across the South in the next few weeks.

Those looking for a different take on the life of Jesus than Mel Gibson's blockbuster may want to catch the anniversary re-release of the comedy classic, Monty Python's Life of Brian. The British troupe's irreverent look at the life of a religious icon named Brian stirred up controversy when it opened twenty-five years ago. This weekend, it's re-released in New York and Los Angeles by Henry (Festival in Cannes) Jaglom's Rainbow Films. Next week, it opens in Boston and Washington D.C.

John Cadigan is an artist suffering from schizophrenia, who made a documentary about the chaotic life inside his head and the treatment he underwent to try to gain control of his psychotic nature. People Say I'm Crazy opens theatrically in New York this weekend, and it will air on HBO/Cinemax in the fall.

Canadian auteur Guy Maddin returns with The Saddest Music in the World, starring Isabella Rossellini as a legless beer baroness in Depression era Winnipeg who stages a contest to find the saddest music in the world. Mark McKinney of "The Kids in the Hall" plays her cheerful lover who takes on both his father and his dour brother in the competition. Filmed mostly in black and white to resemble a 30's style film, this strange movie, considered to be Maddin's most mainstream film to date, opens in New York on Friday and elsewhere in May. MY REVIEW

Since Otar Left is Julie Bertucelli's familial tale about three generations of Russian women, living in a dilapidated apartment in the capital city of Tbilisi and trying to come to terms with the departure of Otar, the man of the house, who has moved to Paris. When they learn tragic news, they must decide how to tell his mother, who has been pining for him since he left. Winner of the Critics' Week Grand Prize at the Cannes Film Festival, Since Otar Left opens in New York and Los Angeles this weekend.

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THIS TIME LAST YEAR

Last year's spring movie season ended with four new movies being dumped into the last weekend of April. The only one to do well was the ensemble thriller, Identity, starring John Cusack and Ray Liotta, which knocked Adam Sandler's Anger Management out of the top spot with an opening weekend of over $16 million. The latter's $15 million weekend take did put it over the $100 million mark though, making it Sandler's fourth movie to cross that benchmark. Disney's Holes sustained a decent amount of its opening weekend business, earning another $12.5 million. Ed Burns and Dustin Hoffman starred in the crime drama, Confidence, which made a paltry $4.5 million, while the Michael Douglas family didn't do much better with the nepotistic comedy, It Runs in the Family, an equally weak effort with a $3 million take in its moderate release for a debut at #9. The lack of success of those two didn't surprise too many people. On the other hand, Bunim and Murray, producers of MTV's popular reality show "The Real World", tried to bring reality television to the movies with their spring break movie, The Real Cancun, hoping to capitalize on the profits made by Jackass: the Movie. Made for little money only a few months before release, it ended up earning less than $3 million in over 2,000 theatres despite a last minute marketing push for its sex, nudity and debauchery.

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Next week, Hugh Jackman kicks off another summer movie season as the monster hunter, Van Helsing, and Eugene Levy hunts down tween twins in the comedy-adventure, New York Minute, starring Olsen sisters, Mary-Kate and Ashley!

Copyright 2004 Edward Douglas