Preview and Projections for the Weekend of April 9, 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 4.08.04

Friday kicks off one of the busiest Easter weekends in recent memory with five new movies that will try to cover all bases that haven’t been covered by the four movies that opened last weekend, or the three that opened the weekend before that, etc. All of those other movies already in theatres leaves very few screens for the new movies, although the current boon at the box office might certainly pay off for any of them that are remotely good. This week, Western/war movie fans will be interested in Touchstone Pictures’ historical epic about The Alamo, starring Dennis Quaid and Billy Bob Thornton. It shouldn’t have trouble topping last weekend’s #1 movie, Hellboy, although it might get some competition from the R-rated comedy, The Girl Next Door, which puts young stars Emile Hirsch and Elisa Cuthbert in a modern-day version of Risky Business. Despite opening in almost 500 fewer theatres, it could very well pull an upset. Anne Hathaway of the Disney hit The Princess Diaries plays Ella Enchanted, a girls’ fairy tale about a girl who has to get a spell by her fairy godmother removed before it drives her crazy, while fans of fans of Barbershop or National Lampoon’s Vacation might look for Cedric the Entertainer’s new comedy Johnson Family Vacation, which opened on Wednesday. And then there’s the sequel that no one wanted, The Whole Ten Yards, reuniting Matthew Perry and Bruce Willis for some of the best gangster comedy since Gigli. It won’t do as well as its predecessor, averaging less per theatre than the other new movies. With no school on Friday, most movies will do slightly better opening day but not as much on Easter Sunday. The real winner for the weekend will likely be Mel Gibson’s The Passion of The Christ, which should see a big enough bump on Good Friday, the day commemorating Jesus’ death, to gross more this weekend than last on its way to $350 million. The Jennifer Garner romantic comedy, 13 Going on 30 will get sneak previews on Saturday.

TW	LW	Title	Weekend (in millions)	Change	# of Theaters	Average	Week
1	New	The Alamo	$16.5	N/A	2,609	$6,133	1
2	New	The Girl Next Door	$14.0	N/A	2,148	$6,518	1
3	1	Hellboy	$13.0	-45%	3,043	$4,272	2
4	6	The Passion of The Christ	$12.0	15%	3,203	$3,746	7
5	4	Home on the Range	$9.5	-32%	3,058	$3,107	2
6	3	Scooby-Doo 2: Monsters Unleashed	$9.0	-40%	3,130	$2,875	3
7	New	The Whole Ten Yards	$8.8	N/A	2,654	$3,265	1
8	2	Walking Tall	$8.5	-45%	2,836	$2,997	2
9	New	Ella Enchanted	$8.2	N/A	1,931	$4,247	1
10	New	Johnson Family Vacation	$6.5*	N/A	1,317	$4,935	1
			Est. Weekend Total $106.30	Est. Avg. Drop-Off -29%		Est. Average PTA $4,257

*Johnson Family Vacation's opening Wednesday gross of $1.22 million points to a weekend just over $7 million.

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THE ALAMO (Touchstone Pictures)
Starring: Dennis Quaid, Billy Bob Thornton, Jason Patric, Patrick Wilson, Emilio Echevarria, Marc Blucas, W. Earl Brown, Stephen Bruton, Rutherford Cravens, Blue Deckert, Nick Kokich, Jordi Molla, Matt O'Leary, Wes Studi
Directed by: John Lee Hancock (The Rookie)
Rated PG-13
Tagline: “You will never forget.”

A piece of American history is brought to the big screen with the 1836 standoff between two hundred Texans and the 2000-strong Mexican army of General Antonio Santa Anna in the Alamo, just outside San Antonio. Led by General Sam Houston (Quaid) and Western legends Davy Crockett (Billy Bob Thornton) and Jim Bowie, the Texans fierce battle is one that will always be remembered, as it led to the independence of the Lone Star State.

Part Western and part war movie, The Alamo is the latest in big budget Hollywood epics that will try to recreate a piece of American history for those who weren’t there. As is always the case, the amount of fiction introduced to make this an entertaining Hollywood film will likely be a point of conflict for those who see it, but the story of The Alamo battle has not been depicted on the big screen for many years, being relegated mainly to television movies and the History Channel.

Of the film’s large cast, the most recognizable star is Dennis Quaid, reunited with the director of one of his biggest recent hits, the baseball movie The Rookie, which grossed over $70 million in theatres after an Easter opening two years ago. Quaid got his start in the 80’s with movies like The Right Stuff and Innerspace, and he worked pretty consistently throughout the 80’s and 90’s, albeit with few blockbuster hits. Quaid seems to have a decent agent though, as he has gotten many roles in critically respected movies like Frequency and Steven Soderbergh’s Oscar winning Traffic. In 2002, after an ugly breakup with his wife, actress Meg Ryan, Quaid had one of the best years of his career, getting positive attention not only for The Rookie, but also as Julianne Moore’s closet case husband in the Oscar nominated Far From Heaven. Last fall, Quaid starred in the Touchstone thriller, Cold Creek Manor with Sharon Stone, which failed to make a mark in a busy weekend.

Billy Bob Thornton has a lot in common with Quaid, having not appeared in many big movies—the 1998 blockbuster, Armageddon, is a notable exception—but he has also more known for his personal life as Mr. Angelina Jolie, since their odd marriage and ultimate break-up was rumor fodder for a number of years. After a career as a musician and songwriter, Billy Bob Thornton made his cinematic mark with his 1996 directorial debut, Sling Blade, which earned him his first Oscar nomination as an actor; he won an Oscar for the screenplay. After that, Thornton appeared in a number of political films like Wag the Dog and Primary Colors, The Apostle with Robert Duvall, and then received a second Oscar nomination for Sam Raimi’s A Simple Plan. In recent years, he’s appeared in smaller indie films like the Coens Brothers’ The Man Who Wasn’t There, Monster’s Ball with Academy Award winning Halle Berry, the Sundance favorites Levity and Chrystal, as well as romantic comedies like Love Actually and Intolerable Cruelty. His biggest recent success had him playing an unruly Santa Claus in Terry Zwigoff’s hit holiday dark comedy, Bad Santa, which grossed over $60 million last November and December. Although neither actor is that big of a box office draw, the trailers and commercials are wisely not playing up the movie’s star power, or lack thereof, focusing instead on the war action and historical importance of the events depicted in the movie.

Historical war epics have been a bit hit or miss at the box office. War movies like Glory, Gettysburg, and its sequel, Gods and Generals, have not done that well in theatres due to moderate releases, while others, like Mel Gibson’s The Patriot and Martin Scorsese's Gangs of New York, fared decently. More recently, Anthony Minghella’s Cold Mountain and Tom Cruise’s The Last Samurai did decent business last December as they tried to build up Oscar buzz that never panned out for either movie.

The Alamo has a bit of weird history surrounding it, beginning with its origins as a project for Academy Award winning director Ron Howard, who decided to direct The Missing instead, although that didn’t fare well at the box office. Disney handed the reins over to director John Lee Hancock, who had success with the real-life baseball story, The Rookie, two years ago. Originally, the movie was to be released last Christmas for possible Oscar consideration but supposedly, it wasn’t testing well—rarely a good sign—and Touchstone decided to forego the chances of Oscar buzz to put more time and work into it. Unfortunately, they went from one busy holiday weekend to another as the Easter weekend slowly filled up with other movies.

Disney’s Midas touch should be in full effect, as they have gotten surprise hits from some unlikely candidates in the last year—pirate movies, Westerns, hockey flicks. They’ve also already had two moderate hits this year with “true to life” movies. The hockey movie, Miracle, about the US Hockey Team at the 1980 Winter Olympics was more based in fact than the horseracing action movie Hidalgo, but both movies told the story of men facing overwhelming odds.

A lot of the profit they’ve made in the last year will help them promote important movies like The Alamo with almost non-stop commercials, so by the time it opens on Friday, everyone will know about it. For older adults, it will be the obvious first choice, and the Easter weekend will help The Alamo bring in its decidedly older audience, some of whom will be off work on Friday. Most war movies get slapped with an R-rating for blood and violence, but The Alamo’s PG-13 rating should help it get the audiences with teens who want to see something together.

While the production has been plagued with problems, The Alamo seems like the type of historical epic that movie audiences are interested in seeing. The subject matter should hold enough interest--especially for Texans--for it to claim the top spot, although it may do so with as little as $16 to 18 million since the crowded market will divide business up fairly evenly between the new and returning movies.

Related Comparisons:

Title	Release Date	Theater Count	Previous Box Office (in millions)	Weekend Box Office (in millions)	Average	Total Box Office
Cold Creek Manor	9/19/03	2,035		$8.19	$4,025	$21.38
The Rookie	3/29/02	2,511		$16.02	$6,381	$75.60
Frequency	4/28/00	2,621		$9.03	$3,445	$44.98
Cold Mountain	12/26/03	2,163	$4.51	$14.57	$6,738	$78.38
The Missing	11/28/03	2,756	$4.40	$10.84	$3,931	$26.70
Open Range	8/15/03	2,075		$14.05	$6,771	$58.33
Gods and Generals	2/21/03	1,533		$4.68	$3,050	$12.88
Gangs of New York	12/20/02	1,504		$9.12	$6,051	$77.81
Pearl Harbor	5/25/01	3,214		$59.08	$18,382	$198.54
The Patriot	6/30/00	3,061	$9.32	$22.41	$7,321	$113.30
Dances With Wolves	11/23/90	1,053	$1.68	$9.49	$9,012	$184.21
Glory	2/16/90	801	$13.57	$2.68	$3,346	$26.59

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ELLA ENCHANTED (Miramax Films)
Starring: Anne Hathaway, Hugh Dancy, Cary Elwes, Patrick Bergin, Steve Coogan, Minnie Driver, Jennifer Higham, Eric Idle, Joanna Lumley, Aidan McArdle, Parminder Nagra, Lucy Punchy
Directed by: Tommy O’Haver (Get Over It, Billy’s Hollywood Screen Kiss)
Rated PG
Tagline: “Get enchanted.”

In this storybook fairy tale gone wrong, Anne Hathaway plays Ella, a girl given the magical gift of “obedience” by her fairy godmother at birth which turns into a curse because she can’t refuse any command, even from those who abuse this fact. To try to regain control of her life, Ella goes on a quest to get the “gift” removed, meeting ogres and giants and a dreamy prince (Hugh Dancy) along the way.

Adapted from the popular young adult novel by Gail Carson Levine by the writers of Reese Witherspoon’s 2001 hit Legally Blonde, the latest girl oriented fantasy movie is the second major movie for Anne Hathaway, star of 2001’s other breakout hit, The Princess Diaries. Together, they hope to create another movie that will have widespread appeal to younger women and girls.

Anne Hathaway is another young actress being groomed by Disney to be one of their big stars like Hillary Duff, Lindsay Lohan or Raven. She’s off to a great start due to resounding success of her first movie, which made $23 million in a busy opening weekend and grossed $100 million during the summer of 2001.Two and a half years is a long time between movies, and one has to wonder if the kids even remember The Princess Diaries or Anne Hathaway. Disney should hope so since they have a sequel coming out this fall, appropriately called The Princess Diaries 2: Royal Engagement.

The rest of the talented cast is made up of British talent few Americans will be familiar with, but who could bring much added humor to the movie. Eric Idle of the Monty Python is best known among adults, but Ella’s best friend is played by Parminder Nagra, who starred in last summer’s British soccer comedy, Bend It Like Beckham. Actress Joanna Lumley may be recognized as Edina from the British sitcom, “Absolutely Fabulous”, which found a lot of popularity on these shores, while British comic Steve Coogan got some attention for his brilliant portrayal of Tony Wilson in 24 Hour Party People. He will also play Phineas Fogg in this summer’s Disney remake of Around the World in 80 Days.

Of all the movies this weekend, this one is best suited for the Easter holiday, firstly because most kids will be off from school on Good Friday, but also because it’s the type of holiday where family films do well, and this is a fairy tale that could appeal to more than just kids. In the last few years, Disney has adapted a number of popular young adult novels for the big screen. The similar teen oriented fairy tale, Tuck Everlasting, opened in a similar number of theatres in 2002, to make just over $5 million, while Disney had a decent Easter hit last year with their adaptation of the youth novel, Holes. Last year, Peter Pan, another classic fairy tale and Disney favorite, was brought to the big screen in a live action remake, but like Ella Enchanted, the mainly British cast will not help it much in American theatres. Fortunately, Ella Enchanted has a more modern and edgy look that is reminiscent of the $267 million family blockbuster Shrek, which has a sequel coming out next month.

Although this look like the perfect Disney movie, it is being distributed by Disney’s “indie subsidiary” Miramax, who has not had much experience marketing and distributing films directed towards younger women and girls. Miramax hasn’t been able to get Ella Enchanted into as many theatres as it might if it were distributed by Disney, as it will be opening in roughly 1,200 theatres, which is only a few more than their 2002 Christmas bomb, Roberto Benigni’s Pinocchio. Miramax attached the trailer to a lot of recent movies geared towards teen girls like Confessions of a Teenage Drama Queen, and there has even been a half-hour special running on the Oxygen network.

Ella Enchanted seems like a fresh look at classic fairy tale clichés much like Shrek, but the lack of exposure with such a minimal release will make it impossible for it to make the kind of waves that Legally Blonde or The Princess Diaries did three years ago. The movie’s fiercest competition comes from last week’s The Prince and Me, which targets the same swooning teen girls. While those who saw that may see this as a good follow-up, positive word-of-mouth on Julia Stiles’ fairy tale romance might hurt this one. (Update: Theatre counts have been increased from an estimated 1,200 to over 1,900, showing more confidence in the movie by the studio and theatres.) With that in mind, Ella Enchanted should be able to make between $7 and 8 million this weekend.

Related Comparisons:

Title	Release Date	Theater Count	Previous Box Office (in millions)	Weekend Box Office (in millions)	Average	Total Box Office
The Princess Diaries	8/3/01	2,537		$22.86	$9,011	$108.24
The Prince and Me	4/2/04	2,682		$10.00	$3,729	$10.00
Confessions of a Teenage Drama Queen	2/20/04	2,503		$9.35	$3,736	$28.48
Peter Pan	12/26/03	2,813	$3.67	$11.14	$3,960	$46.40
Holes	4/18/03	2,331		$16.30	$6,993	$67.38
Pinocchio	12/27/02	1,195	$0.65	$1.15	$964	$3.67
Tuck Everlasting	10/11/02	1,185		$5.27	$4,446	$19.14
Shrek	5/18/01	3,587	$0.04	$42.35	$11,805	$267.65
The Princess Bride	9/25/87	9		$0.21	$22,915	$30.85

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THE GIRL NEXT DOOR (20^th Century Fox)
Starring: Elisha Cuthbert, Emile Hirsch, Timothy Olyphant, James Remar, Chris Marquette, Paul Dano
Directed by: Luke Greenfield (The Animal)
Rated R
Tagline: “Matt never saw her coming… but his friends had!” (That’s actually pretty funny if you think about it.)

Matthew Kidman (Emile Hirsch) is a teen over-achiever from a well-to-do community, who falls for the super sexy girl watching the house next door (Elisha Cuthbert). As they get closer, he finds out that she is secretly a porn star, something that he must try to come to terms with as he suddenly finds himself wit a lot of new male friends.

The premise of the latest comedy from the writers of National Lampoon’s Van Wilder owes a lot to Tom Cruise’s 1983 breakout hit, Risky Business. Twenty years later, they’re allowed to take this simple premise a bit father, instilling it with the type of raunchy sex humor on which older teen and college age males thrive.

Bringing this re-imagining to life are two young stars, neither of whom have had much time on the big screen, although both are thought of as stars worth watching, waiting for the right movie to come along. This may end up being it. Emile Hirsh’s first movie was the Jodie Foster produced, The Dangerous Lives of Altar Boys with Kieran Culkin, and then he played a student in the Kevin Kline academic drama, The Emperor’s Club. Elisa Cuthbert is the hot young star of the hit FOX espionage drama, “24”, and her movie appearances have been even more sparse, with rather insignificant roles in Old School and the Brit romantic comedy, Love Actually. At 21, she’s the type of hot and sexy star that guys lust over, and playing a porn star in The Girl Next Door might be able to put her over the edge on the road to superstardom.

The Girl Next Door hopes to capitalize on the success of frank teen sex comedies that have seen their biggest success with the American Pie franchise. The first movie made over $100 million in the summer of 1999, followed by two equally successful sequels. Even before that, the teen comedy Can’t Hardly Wait with Jennifer Love Hewitt and Seth Green tried to explore the trials and tribulations of trying to find love and sex as a teen, a theme that dates back to the 80’s movies of John Hughes. While it failed to make a mark at the box office, the movie helped establish the career of both stars. Other movies that tried to replicate that success include Todd Phillips’ Road Trip, which had similar appeal and buzz, although its summer opening helped it find its large audience. Comparisons could also be made to the comedy, Malibu's Most Wanted, which played up to a similar demographic when it opened last Easter.

This movie’s appeal to young males is obvious, since many guys would dream of having a porn star girlfriend—well, except for the part about her having sex with lots of other guys for money—and there’s a lot of ground that can be covered with such a premise like this one. On the other hand, the movie’s romance angle might not be so obvious, although it could help make this a viable date movie, especially to the 18 to 25 set. Emile Hirsch has the good looks and charm that Tom Cruise had all those years ago, and that could help this movie get a larger female audience than it may otherwise.

Fox has been slowly building buzz for this movie with a number of sneak previews over the last months as well as releasing a number of clips and R-rated trailers on the ‘net in order to get the interest of the testosterone driven male market. DreamWorks did this with their raunchy comedy, Eurotrip, but it failed to find an audience despite good word-of mouth. The sneak previews have helped this one quite a bit, as it’s currently averaging 7 out of 10 on IMDB's user ratings—as well as getting many positive early reviews, as seen by its 88% fresh on Rotten Tomatoes’ Tomatometer. This type of movie rarely gets that much positive critical praise, and that can only help this find a wider audience.

There is no question that The Girl Next Door is the strongest movie of the weekend with very little working against it except for the abundance of other movies. It has already been set-up as one of this year’s breakout comedy hits, although it might do more moderate business over Easter weekend, and then maintain that business over the next few weeks based on word-of mouth. Expect it to open in the Top 5 this weekend with $13 to 15 million on its way to $50 or 60 million at the box office.

Related Comparisons:

Title	Release Date	Theater Count	Weekend Box Office (in millions)	Average	Total Box Office
The Emperor's Club	11/22/02	809	$3.85	$4,755	$14.06
The Dangerous Lives of Altar Boys	6/14/02	9	$0.05	$6,111	$1.78
Old School	2/21/03	2,689	$17.45	$6,491	$75.16
Malibu's Most Wanted	4/18/03	2,503	$12.62	$5,041	$34.31
Eurotrip	2/20/04	2,512	$6.70	$2,672	$17.72
National Lampoon's Van Wilder	4/5/02	2,022	$7.30	$3,612	$21.01
Road Trip	5/19/00	2,530	$15.48	$6,119	$68.53
American Pie	7/9/99	2,507	$18.71	$7,463	$101.74
Can't Hardly Wait	6/12/98	1,987	$8.03	$4,041	$26.61

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JOHNSON FAMILY VACATION (Fox Searchlight)
Starring: Cedric the Entertainer, Bow Wow, Vanessa Williams, Steve Harvey, Solange Knowles, Gabby Soleil, Shannon Elizabeth
Directed by: Christopher Erskin (debut)
Rated PG-13
Tagline: “Take the ride.”

Cedric the Entertainer plays Nate Johnson, a family man who agrees to take his brood across country to Missouri for the annual family reunion. Can his dysfunctional family survive the trip without killing each other?

The premise for this and The Girl Next Door could be proof that Hollywood is starting to run out of ideas, since they both use similar plots to popular movies of the 80’s. Written by the guys behind the WB television show “The Hughleys”, this is an obvious attempt to reinvent Chevy Chase’s family comedy, National Lampoon’s Vacation, giving it a more urban flavor with updated humor that is right on track with what African American target audience seems to dig.

At the steering wheel for this comedy reinvention is Cedric the Entertainer, the guy who stole the show in the Barbershop movies as a crazy philosophizing barber spouting his opinion on everything. After being one of the highlights of Spike Lee’s comedy concert film, The Original Kings of Comedy, Cedric began to steal scenes in movies like the Coen Brothers’ Intolerable Cruelty and the Matthew Perry dud, Serving Sara. Cedric was also the star of a popular but short-lived sketch comedy show on FOX, which helped solidify his reign as one of the kinds of urban comedy. Barbershop is the one that most people will remember, being one of the biggest urban comedy franchises of all time. (Oddly, Cedric’s Barbershop co-star Ice Cube is also starring in a family road trip movie called Are We There Yet? If this does well, we could see more urban comedies with more traditional comedy premises.)

Cedric’s son is played by rapper Bow Wow, whose screen debut in Like Mike did well among family audiences over 4^th of July weekend a few years ago, and Johnson Family Vacation could end up being a viable option in a market where there are few movies for African American families. The movie also stars Cedric’s Original Kings of Comedy collaborator, Steve Harvey, who has appeared in more than his share of urban comedies, American Pie’s Shannon Elizabeth, and Beyonce Knowles’ sister, Solange.

Urban comedies like Barbershop have proven to be viable for studios over the last few years, though they show signs of slowing down with movies like Love Don’t Cost A Thing with Steve Harvey, and the Eddie Griffin comedy My Baby’s Daddy, two urban reinventions of 80’s comedy “classics”, which both made less than $21 million. Like most of those movies, Johnson Family Vacation is being released in a minimal amount of theatres, focusing on urban markets that could make this the first choice over some of the other fare.

Promotion for this movie by Fox Searchlight, a smaller subsidiary of 20^th Century Fox, has been scarce at best. Although they had a decent urban hit with 2002’s Brown Sugar, they failed to sell DMX’s gangsta drama, Never Die Alone, last month.

Frankly, Cedric’s fans may not even be aware that the movie is opening this Wednesday, although setting it apart from the other openers might be a good thing, allowing for word-of-mouth to build up for the weekend. (Of course, if the movie is bad, the opposite might happen.) Taking advantage of the Easter weekend, though hindered by a busy market full of comedy competition, Johnson Family Vacation should be able to bring in $2 to 3 million on Wednesday and Thursday and then another $6 to 7* million on the weekend putting it in the bottom half of the Top 10. (*update: Fox Searchlight will be releasing the movie in fewer theatres than originally projected.)

Related Comparisons:

Title	Release Date	Theater Count	Previous Box Office (in millions)	Weekend Box Office (in millions)	Average	Total Box Office
Barbershop 2	2/6/04	2,711		$24.24	$8,942	$62.58
Barbershop	9/13/02	1,605		$20.63	$12,852	$75.07
Intolerable Cruelty	10/10/03	2,564		$12.53	$4,885	$35.10
Serving Sara	8/23/02	2,154		$5.76	$2,673	$16.81
Kingdom Come	4/13/01	1,111	$2.45	$7.56	$6,806	$23.25
The Original Kings of Comedy	8/18/00	847	$0.56	$11.05	$13,046	$38.13
Like Mike	7/5/02	2,410	$6.84	$12.18	$5,054	$51.41
My Baby's Daddy	1/9/04	1,447		$7.55	$5,217	$17.32
Love Don't Cost a Thing	12/12/03	1,844		$6.32	$3,425	$21.59
Two Can Play That Game	9/7/01	1,297		$7.72	$5,953	$22.24
National Lampoon's European Vacation	7/26/85	1,546		$12.33	$7,975	$49.36
National Lampoon's Vacation	7/29/83	1,175		$8.33	$7,092	$61.39

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THE WHOLE TEN YARDS (Warner Brothers)
Starring: Bruce Willis, Matthew Perry, Natasha Henstridge, Amanda Peet, Kevin Pollak, Clara Bellar, Frank Collison, Johnny Messner, Tellulah Willis
Directed by: Howard Deutch (Pretty in Pink, The Replacements, Grumpier Old Men, The Odd Couple II, The Great Outdoors)
Rated PG-13
Tagline: “They missed each other. This time, their aim is better.”

Bruce Willis and Matthew Perry are reunited for the sequel to their 2000 gangster buddy comedy The Whole Nine Yards, as Jimmy “the Tulip” Tudeski (Willis) is pulled out of his cozy retirement of domestic bliss with Jill (Peet) to help his dentist friend, “Oz” (Perry), recover his kidnapped wife (Henstridge) from the Romanian mob led by Lazlo Gogolak, the vengeful father of a guy that Jimmy killed.

Four years after the surprise comedy hit, we get an unnecessary sequel that few people really wanted, showing that the studio and producers didn’t learn a lesson from Analyze That, the sequel to a fun gangster comedy that no one bothered to go see. “Forced” might be too kind for this one, since it looks beyond awful.

The premise for the original movie was simple enough—hapless dentist accidentally gets involved with a notorious mobster hitman; hilarity ensues. The original movie opened over a busy Presidents’ Day weekend three years ago, and it somehow lucked its way into first place with $16 million in the four days, just barely defeating the Meg Ryan-Diane Keaton comedy, Hanging Up. It ended up grossing $57 million in theatres and another $75 million in video rentals, quite a decent profit from its $24 million budget. When you double your original investment, it’s almost a given that a sequel will be proposed and they managed to get most of the cast back for the second go-round.

Matthew Perry has not made too many movies since The Whole Nine Yards, keeping busy as a regular on the hit NBC sitcom, “Friends” and a stint in rehab for an alcohol problem. His only movie during the four years was the comedy Serving Sara with Liz Hurley, which was delayed for a number of years before being released during the dreaded August dumping ground. Although his original background was also in the television sitcom realm of the popular show “Moonlighting”, Willis is not exactly known for doing straight comedy movies, as he has done a lot more action and drama films over the years. Of course, Willis will always be known for his role as Detective John McClane in the three Die Hard movies, which mixed humor into action, but his career has hit a bit of a lull lately. His most recent attempt at comedy teamed him with Bad Santa’s Billy Bob Thornton for the 2001 buddy crime comedy, Bandits.

Director Howard Deutch has already made a number of comedy sequels to movies that didn’t need to have sequels, like Grumpier Old Men and The Odd Couple II. To his credit, he also directed John Hughes’ Pretty in Pink, one of the greatest movies of the 80’s, but for the most part, he has directed hoaky comedies, so The Whole Ten Yards fits perfectly into his resume. Adding to the yuck (and not the humorous kind) factor, the movie is produced by Franchise Pictures, who has not had much luck with their previous offerings this year like David Mamet’s Spartan. They are starting to get a reputation for the bombs they’ve produced from Ballistic: Ecks vs. Sever to Driven to Get Carter, 3000 Miles to Graceland and others. The Whole Nine Yards was one of their first and only big hits, so one can understand why they’d be anxious to make a sequel.

Unfortunately, this type of dark gangster comedy just doesn’t work anymore. Analyze That should have been proof enough, but then the Ben Affleck-Jennifer Lopez romantic gangster comedy disaster, Gigli, pretty much put the nail in the coffin. Why go to the movies when you can sit and home and watch well done humor-tinged gangster drama on the fifth season of HBO’s “The Sopranos”?

Originally, the movie was to be released in a busy October weekend last year, and Easter weekend is a strange to release this sort of movie, especially when it quickly became crowded with other movies, not expecting much competition from it. (The original release of 10/10 would have been much cooler for marketing the movie, that’s for sure.) The problem is that most audience demographics are well covered from the other movies in theatres. Most guys will likely opt for Hellboy or The Alamo or The Girl Next Door, while women probably wouldn’t have much interest in this except possibly for Matthew Perry. That leaves a very limited audience.

The real killer for the movie is that most guys will remember the first movie for Amanda Peet’s memorable nude scene—could be partially responsible for the huge video rentals. With a PG-13 rating for the sequel, it probably will not be repeated, which just leaves this movie with the questionable Perry-Willis chemistry, which doesn’t hold a candle to many other popular comedy teams.

In a year where few sequels are doing better than the original movies, it’s doubtful that this tired looking gangster comedy is strong enough to get that many people back. With so much competition in the market place, it will likely get lost in the shuffle before quickly fading away. An opening weekend of $8 to 9 million is possible with a rather short run grossing less than $25 million in theatres.

Related Comparisons:

Title	Release Date	Theater Count	Weekend Box Office (in millions)	Average	Total Box Office
The Whole Nine Yards	2/18/00	2,910	$14.27	$4,903	$57.26
Hudson Hawk	5/24/91	2,071	$7.08	$3,419	$17.22
Serving Sara	8/23/02	2,154	$5.76	$2,673	$16.81
Three to Tango	10/22/99	2,234	$4.41	$1,974	$10.54
Almost Heroes	5/29/98	2,048	$2.84	$1,387	$6.18
Fools Rush In	2/14/97	1,674	$9.71	$5,800	$29.30
Bandits	10/12/01	3,207	$13.05	$4,069	$41.52
Analyze That	12/6/02	2,635	$11.03	$4,186	$31.82
Analyze This	3/5/99	2,518	$18.38	$7,299	$106.69
City Slickers 2	6/10/94	2,243	$11.52	$5,136	$43.44
City Slickers	6/7/91	1,992	$13.03	$6,541	$124.03
Grumpier Old Men	12/22/95	1,995	$7.80	$3,910	$71.52
Grumpy Old Men	12/24/93	1,244	$3.87	$3,111	$70.17

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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.

I’M NOT SCARED (Miramax Films)
SHADE (RKO Pictures)
TWENTY NINE PALMS (Wellspring Cinema)

The Italian thriller, I’m Not Scared, is about a boy who discovers something horrifying under an abandoned house just outside of town, which ultimately leads back to a conspiracy involving the entire town, including his parents. Fans of Guillermo del Toro’s The Devil’s Backbone may enjoy this foreign language thriller by director Gabriele Salvatores, based on the novel by Niccolo Ammaniti, which opens in limited release this weekend.

Stuart Townsend, Gabriel Byrne, Thandie Newton and Jamie Foxx join forces to try to take down a poker hustler called The Dean, played by Sylvester Stallone, in the con game drama, Shade, written and directed by casino performer Damian Nieman. Already scheduled for a video release date on May 25th, Shade opens in Los Angeles this weekend after a number of false starts.

Bruno Dumont’s controversial thriller, Twenty Nine Palms, follows a photographer and his French girlfriend traveling through the Joshua Tree Desert looking for a photo shoot location having nonstop fights and sex until something happens to them that leads to a shocking and unexpected end to their trip. After alienating many critics at the Toronto and Venice International Film Festivals, this cross between Irreversible and Y Tu Mama Tambien opens in New York and Los Angeles on Friday.

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THIS TIME LAST YEAR

After the success of Mr. Deeds, Adam Sandler continued his run of success, this time with the help of Jack Nicholson, in the temperamental comedy, Anger Management, which went into the weekend with strong enough buzz to earn $42 million, becoming Sandler’s biggest hit as well as setting a box office record for an April opening movie. After many delays, mainly due to problems with the MPAA, Rob Zombie’s gory horror movie, House of 1,000 Corpses, finally saw the light of day, earning almost $3.5 million in just 595 theatres placing it at seventh. Six years after his box office blockbuster, Titanic, James Cameron returned with Ghosts of the Abyss, a 3-D documentary about sunken ships, which made $1.4 million in 100 IMAX theatres. Making way for Sandler’s comedy, the rest of the returning movies had shocking drop-offs with Vin Diesel’s A Man Apart and John Travolta’s Basic taking the biggest hits.

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Next week, revenge is sweet as Uma Thurman continues her quest to Kill Bill: Vol. 2 and Marvel’s vigilante The Punisher gets another chance to take down the bad guys on the big screen. For the ladies and the cross-dressers, there’s the new Nia Vardalos comedy, Connie and Carla.

Copyright 2004 Edward Douglas