THE VILLAGE (Touchstone Pictures)
Starring: Joaquin Phoenix, Adrien Brody, Sigourney Weaver, William Hurt, Bryce Dallas Howard, Brendan Gleeson, Judy Greer, Jayne Atkinson, Michael Pitt, Cherry Jones, Celia Weston, Fran Kranz
Directed by: M. Night Shyamalan (The Sixth Sense, Unbreakable, Signs)
Rated PG-13
Tagline: “There is no turning back”

A tranquil 19^th Century village enjoys an isolated living surrounded by woods which are home to strange creatures. For many years, they remain segregated, but one day, the villagers discover that the creatures will no longer leave them alone once an impetuous young man (Joaquin Phoenix) bravely ventures forth into the forbidden territory.

It’s been two years since director M. Night Shyamalan’s last movie, the spiritual alien movie Signs that gave Mel Gibson his biggest pre-Passion of the Christ hit with a $60 million opening weekend. It was a feather in the cap for the director whose last movie Unbreakable was considered a sophomore slump, despite being his fourth movie. For his sixth film, he takes a decidedly different approach, creating a realistic 19^th Century setting and then instilling some of the elements of horror and the supernatural that his fans love.

Shyamalan has had an amazing career for his young 34-year-old life. After his first two movies as a director failed, he wrote the script for The Sixth Sense, set the minimum selling price at a million with the condition that he direct it, and surprisingly, he got what he wanted. On top of that, he got two big breaks for his thriller about a boy who sees ghost by discovering the talented young Haley Joel Osment, and then casting superstar Bruce Willis. After an impressive opening weekend, the buzz for the movie’s surprise twist helped it earn almost $300 million in theatres over the course of the summer and fall of ‘99. Shyamalan reteamed with Bruce Willis for the superhero pastiche Unbreakable with Samuel L. Jackson, which earned $45 million during its five-day Thanksgiving weekend the next year. The movie baffled so many fans of The Sixth Sense that it only ended up a disappointing $94 million. In 2002, he returned with Signs, a more traditional alien invasion storyline, used to explore spirituality and faith. Everyone has an opinion of Shyamalan and his movies, but his realistic storytelling and the humanity of his characters has gotten him dubbed the “next Spielberg” by Newsweek.

M. Night Shyamalan
Title	Release Date	Theater Count	Previous Box Office (in millions)	Weekend Box Office (in millions)	Average	Total Box Office
Signs	8/2/02	3,264		$60.12	$18,418	$225.77
Unbreakable	11/22/00	2,708	$15.90	$30.33	$11,202	$94.92
The Sixth Sense	8/6/99	2,161		$26.68	$12,346	$293.50

Shyamalan is taking a huge chance on this movie, not only because it’s a period piece, but also because he went in a different direction than his last few movies. Instead of having one big star, Night has assembled an impressive ensemble cast of Academy Award winners and nominees. When Kirsten Dunst dropped out, he decided to cast a complete unknown as his leading lady. Bryce Dallas Howard, the daughter of director Ron Howard, is a relative newcomer who has never acted in a film before and Shyamalan has shown extreme faith by casting her without even an audition. There’s a bit of irony in that casting, not only because she has been brought to films by a different director than her father, but The Village looks a lot like Ron Howard’s last movie, The Missing, a supernatural thriller set in the 19^th Century west. (Even the name is similar!) Howard had a strong cast for that film including Tommy Lee Jones and Cate Blanchett, but it didn’t even gross $30 million after a weak Thanksgiving opening, and of course, he didn’t think of casting his own daughter in one of the roles. Bryce is supported by a talented cast including returning actor Joaquin Phoenix, who carried much of Signs, holding his own against Mel Gibson. The young actor had already been recognized before that, getting an Oscar nomination for his role in Ridley Scott’s Gladiator and giving a memorable performance in the Marquis De Sade film Quills. Since Signs, Joaquin starred in Buffalo Soldiers, filmed before Signs but delayed for over year, and he provided the main voice for Disney’s animated movie, Brother Bear.

Shyamalan also brought on board two Academy Award winning actors: Adrien Brody, who won the award for Roman Polanski’s 2002 Holocaust drama The Pianist, and William Hurt, who won an Oscar for his role in 1986’s Kiss of the Spider-Woman before being nominated twice more after that. Brody first got attention in Spike Lee’s Summer of Sam, but his movies both before and after winning the Oscar have been rather low-key , few of them earning much money. Brody’s next movie will be the drama The Jacket, followed by Peter Jackson’s big budget King Kong remake. Hurt, who provided the trailer with its striking voice-over, last starred in Steven Spielberg’s A.I. (Artificial Intelligence) opposite The Sixth Sense star Haley Joel Osment, and in the adaptation of the popular book, Tuck Everlasting. Sigourney Weaver is best known as Ripley from the Aliens movies, but more recently, she appeared in movies like Disney’s Holes, the comedies Galaxy Quest and Heartbreakers, and a number of smaller movies like The Guys. All three have done interviews for the movie, but none of them are being pushed as the stars.

The Village People
Title	Release Date	Theater Count	Previous Box Office (in millions)	Weekend Box Office (in millions)	Average	Total Box Office
Brother Bear	11/1/03	3,030	$0.40	$19.40	$6,404	$84.45
Gladiator	5/5/00	2,938		$34.82	$11,852	$186.61
8MM	2/26/99	2,370		$14.25	$6,013	$36.28
The Pianist	3/28/03	773	$21.14	$2.46	$3,177	$32.52
Summer of Sam	7/2/99	1,536		$5.99	$3,900	$19.13
The Thin Red Line	1/15/99	1,528	$3.07	$9.77	$6,394	$36.39
Holes	4/18/03	2,331		$16.30	$6,993	$67.38
Heartbreakers	3/23/01	2,750		$11.80	$4,291	$40.28
Galaxy Quest	12/25/99	2,412		$7.01	$2,906	$70.26
Tuck Everlasting	10/11/02	1,185		$5.27	$4,446	$19.14
A.I. Artificial Intelligence	6/29/01	3,242		$29.35	$9,054	$78.56

Because of Shyamalan’s name and reputation, The Village is already considered one of the summer’s big blockbusters despite its rather modest $60 million budget, and in kind, Touchstone has given it one of the biggest promotional campaigns of the year. The trailers for the movie have been particularly effective, as have the commercials, as they’ve been shown non-stop for the last two months. Earlier this year, M. Night appeared during ABC’s airings of The Sixth Sense and Unbreakable to show clips and behind the scenes stuff from the movie and to further build up expectations. Last week, M. Night was the subject of a Regal Cinemas special event broadcast to theatres across the country, as he was interviewed by Joel Siegel. The Village’s oddest piece of promotion might be the recent Sci-Fi Channel documentary/expose on the director that was meant to reveal all of his hidden secrets. In actuality, it was an elaborate hoax to promote the movie with the full cooperation of Shyamalan, revealed by the network before it aired.

Despite all that promotion, Shyamalan has worked hard to keep the movie’s story tightly under wraps, something that may drive his fans nuts while building on the buzz. Last year, the movie’s twist ending was leaked on the internet, kicking off rumors that Shymalan reshot the ending to throw the rumors off, but even if this is true, it shouldn’t matter as it will get even more interest. Although the setting may not seem like the basis for a summer blockbuster, but The Village offers something different from the usual summer fare that could appeal to the widest demographic of moviegoers with younger audiences being attracted to the scares and older audiences enjoying the time period and setting.

After a weak year of money-losing ventures, Disney really needs a hit, so they’ll make sure that they have the supply to meet the demand by releasing Shyamalan’s movie in as many theatres as possible, possibly ending up in close to 3,500 theatres. Opening in a busier weekend with more direct competition than Signs and without the star power, The Village may have a harder time pulling in another $60 million opening weekend, but as the weekend’s biggest draw, opening in over 3,700 theatres it should be able to fend off the competition earning around $55 million.

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HAROLD & KUMAR GO TO WHITE CASTLE (New Line Cinema)
Starring: John Cho, Kal Penn, Anthony Anderson, Dan Bochart, Steve Braun, Brooke D'Orsay, Ethan Embry, Paula Garcés, Luis Guzmán, Neil Patrick Harris, Jon Hurwitz, Sandy Jobin-Bevans, Kate Kelton, Jamie Kennedy, David Krumholtz, Bobby Lee, Christopher Meloni, Ryan Reynolds, Hayden Schlossberg, Siu Ta, Eddie Kaye Thomas, Dov Tiefenbach, Robert Tinkler, Fred Willard, Gary Anthony Williams
Directed by: Danny Leiner (Dude, Where’s My Car?)
Rated R
Tagline: “Fast Food. High Times.”

Two losers named Harold and Kumar have a grand adventure when they get the craving for White Castle burgers on a Friday night. The problem is trying to find a White Castle, a quest that has them meeting all sorts of strange characters and getting into all sorts of trouble.

In a year where high concept comedies have been king, the time seems right for a low-brow buddy comedy to entice those who don’t like thinking too much when they watch movies. Unlike the Dumb and Dumbers and the Bill and Teds, Harold & Kumar takes an ethnic turn with two unlikely stars in John Cho and Kal Penn. Apparently, John Cho is the Asian guy from the American Pie movies—no, I don’t remember him either—and Kal Penn was that Indian guy in Malibu’s Most Wanted and National Lampoon’s Van Wilder. Neither had even close to top billing in either movie, but even that fact is being used to comedic effect in promoting the movie. What these two unlikely candidates do bring to the table is that they’ve made a dumb comedy specifically for the Asian and Indian markets that have been sorely overlooked by Hollywood in the last few years. Those markets may end up making this a surprise hit as they flock to see these no-names. (Incidentally, Cho also starred in the indie hit Better Luck Tomorrow, an Asian high school crime drama that created a lot of buzz among the young Asian community with a heavy Email campaign.) By tackling the stereotypes and the prejudices head on, Cho and Penn could very well end up becoming the Asian Bill and Ted.

That Asian and That Indian Guy
Title	Release Date	Theater Count	Previous Box Office (in millions)	Weekend Box Office (in millions)	Average	Total Box Office
Better Luck Tomorrow	4/25/03	380	$1.17	$1.03	$2,714	$3.80
American Wedding	8/1/03	3,172		$33.37	$10,520	$104.35
American Pie 2	8/10/01	3,063		$45.12	$14,729	$145.10
American Pie	7/9/99	2,507		$18.71	$7,463	$101.74
Malibu's Most Wanted	4/18/03	2,503		$12.62	$5,041	$34.31
National Lampoon's Van Wilder	4/5/02	2,022		$7.30	$3,612	$21.01
Dude, Where's My Car?	12/15/00	2,087		$13.85	$6,634	$46.72

The history of the dumb buddy comedy can be traced back to the movies of Jerry Lewis and Dean Martin or high concept comedies like Some Like It Hot, but the 80’s comedy hit, Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure, starring Keanu Reeves (who has been trying to deny it ever since) and Alex Winter, forever changed the genre’s true blueprint. Years later, the Farrelly Brothers turned the dumb comedy into an artform with their comedy hit Dumb and Dumber with Jim Carrey and Jeff Daniels, and the American Pie movies quickly picked up the slack. (Last year’s attempted prequel to the movie without the Farrellys or either original star was a disaster. )

Most of all, Harold & Kumar will try to capitalize on its similarities with Dude, Where’s My Car? a dumb comedy starring Ashton Kutcher and Sean William Scott that has become a cult hit in the years since it’s release, mainly due to the popularity of its two stars. It helps that Harold & Kumar is directed by Dude helmer Danny Leiner, who will try to bring a similar comedy spirit to it, and it features many hilarious cameos from the likes of Malibu’s Most Wanted stars Jamie Kennedy and Anthony Anderson, Van Wilder’s Ryan Reynolds and character actor Luiz Guzman, not to mention a typecast breaking appearance by “Doogie Howser” himself, Neil Patrick Harris. Of course, when Dude came out a few years ago, Kutcher and Scott were already becoming known, Kutcher from the sitcom “That 70’s Show” and Scott from the aforementioned American Pie.

Unfortunately, the genre hasn’t done very well this year when a movie doesn’t have a strong cast, as proven by disappointing flops like Eurotrip and The Girl Next Door, similar comedies with positive reviews and early buzz that only made around $6 million their opening weekends. Even the Farrelly Brothers haven’t been able to keep the dumb comedy alive as their Siamese twin comedy Stuck on You with Matt Damon and Greg Kinear didn’t do very well last December.

Dumb Stoner Comedies
Title	Release Date	Theater Count	Weekend Box Office (in millions)	Average	Total Box Office
The Girl Next Door	4/9/04	2,148	$6.00	$2,795	$14.59
Eurotrip	2/20/04	2,512	$6.71	$2,672	$17.72
Stuck on You	12/12/03	3,003	$9.41	$3,134	$33.45
Dumb and Dumberer: When Harry Met Lloyd	6/13/03	2,609	$10.85	$4,157	$26.21
Road Trip	5/19/00	2,530	$15.48	$6,119	$68.53
Half Baked	1/16/98	1,701	$6.94	$4,080	$17.37
Good Burger	7/25/97	1,887	$7.06	$3,741	$23.69
Dumb and Dumber	12/16/94	2,447	$16.36	$6,686	$127.18
Bill and Ted's Bogus Journey	7/19/91	1,620	$10.24	$6,321	$37.54
Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure	2/17/89	1,196	$6.17	$5,159	$39.92

Unlike the more successful comedies above, Harold & Kumar is rated R. This may mean racier and raunchier humor, but it also lessens the advertising opportunities and the number of teens that will be able to get in to see it. Although there are no other comedies opening this weekend, Harold & Kumar has the benefits of targeting a very distinct market of college age guys, specifically those of Asian and Indian descent, but the weekend’s big movie, The Village, is by popular Indian director M. Night Shyamalan who might pull from the same audience. New Line has high hopes of turning this into a hit, giving it a special Friday night sneak preview to get the word around. Of course, the movie also has the easiest promotional tie-in campaign ever since the fast food chain, White Castle, will be promoting this extended commercial as much as possible. Unfortunately that tie in makes the movie look like a cross between Half Baked and Good Burger, and neither of those movies did particularly well.

Although there is buzz growing for this ethnic-tinged dumb comedy, looking at the genre in the last year does not bode well for Harold & Kumar to get tons of people into theatres without the star power of a Ben Stiller or Jack Black. New Line is giving it a moderate initial release to generate buzz and find an audience, so an opening weekend between $10 and 12 million seems about right.

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THE MANCHURIAN CANDIDATE (Paramount Pictures)
Starring: Denzel Washington, Meryl Streep, Liev Schreiber, Jon Voight, Kimberly Elise, Jeffrey Wright, Ted Levine
Directed by: Jonathan Demme (Beloved, The Truth About Charlie, Philadelphia, Married to the Mob, The Silence of the Lambs)
Rated R
Tagline: “Everything is under control.”

Seventeen years after the Gulf War, Captain Ben Marco (Denzel Washington) is haunted by dreams revolving his platoon mate Raymond Shaw (Shreiber), a war hero that is being groomed as the Vice Presidential candidate by his mother, Senator Eleanor Shaw (Meryl Streep). As he tries to get answers, Marco learns of a political conspiracy that involves the Manchurian Global corporation and their devious plans for Shaw if he wins the election.

Based on Richard Condon’s best selling novel, this is the second time The Manchurian Candidate has been adapted for the big screen, the first time as a vehicle for Frank Sinatra in 1962. Although not a commercial success, it became a favorite among film buffs and paved the way for many political thrillers like Three Days of the Condor and The Parallax View, which thrived on the paranoid climate created by the Vietnam and Cold Wars.

This time, the movie has been adapted for superstar actor Denzel Washington, who stars in his third movie in the last year. There’s little need to recap Washington’s career, but other than last year’s Out of Time, all of his last few movies have grossed over $70 million, showing a definite consistency in the number of fans who go to see his movies, especially after winning his much-deserved Oscar in 2002 for Training Day. His last movie, Man on Fire, was also a remake made by a director he had worked with in the past, and it did well enough to take the top spot from Jennifer Garner’s romantic comedy 13 Going on 30, which was the weekend favorite. As a political thriller, The Manchurian Candidate harks back to Washington’s earlier work like Crimson Tide, Courage Under Fire and The Siege, but he brings a vulnerability to the character much like he did in the Nick Cassavetes directed John Q. The very nature of the movie will be of interest to Denzel’s older fans that appreciate quality acting and filmmaking, although it may have trouble getting the younger urban males who flocked to Man on Fire and Training Day.

Denzel Washington
Title	Release Date	Theater Count	Weekend Box Office (in millions)	Average	Total Box Office
Man on Fire	4/3/04	2,979	$22.75	$7,637	$77.56
Out of Time	10/3/03	3,076	$16.19	$5,262	$40.91
John Q	2/15/02	2,466	$23.61	$9,575	$71.03
Training Day	10/5/01	2,712	$22.55	$7,315	$76.26
The Siege	11/6/98	2,541	$13.93	$5,482	$40.93
Courage Under Fire	7/12/96	1,986	$12.50	$6,294	$59.00
Crimson Tide	5/12/95	2,382	$18.61	$7,813	$91.37

Washington’s supporting cast is nothing short of amazing, maybe even more impressive with the cast of The Village. Academy Award winner Meryl Streep plays the primary antagonist of the movie, as the follow-up to her multiple roles in the HBO mini-series “Angels in America” for which she won a Golden Globe and was nominated for an Emmy. She preceeded this in 2003 with highly recognized roles in Charlie Kaufman’s Adaptation and Stephen Daldry’s The Hours. Considered by many to be one of the greatest living actresses, Streep has been nominated for a record 13 Oscars and 19 Golden Globes in her almost thirty year career, and the role of Eleanor Shaw, previously played by Angela Lansbury, seems perfect for her. Streep is actually getting more attention for her performance in the movie than Denzel, possibly because it is thought to be her imitation of New York Senator Hilary Clinton.

Another prestigious actor who may finally break out with The Manchurian Candidate is Liev Schreiber, who has appeared in a number of big movies including Ransom and The Sum of All Fears, and who performed to sell-out audiences in New York’s Central Park all last summer in Shakespeare’s Henry V. Those who appreciate Shreiber’s talents consider his performance to be the best of the movie, and this is his second film with Denzel after The Hurricane. Another veteran award winning actor, 67 year old John Voigt plays Shreiber’s competition for the vice presidential position. Although he’s become more known as Angelina Jolie’s father in the last few years, he is still very active in Hollywood after being nominated for multiple Academy Awards and winning for the Vietnam drama Coming Home. Last but not least is Kimberly Elise, who co-starred with Denzel in John Q, after getting her big break in Beloved.

Denzel handpicked director Jonathan Demme to pull this cast together after the two worked together on the 1994 drama Philadelphia, a stirring drama that garnished numerous Oscar nominations as well as a win for Denzel’s co-star Tom Hanks. Demme got his start in the 70’s with chicksploitation flicks like Caged Heat and Crazy Mama, but he came into his own with his hip mid-80’s comedies like Something Wild and Married to the Mob, helping to kick off the careers of stars like Michelle Pfeiffer, Ray Liotta and others. Demme also built up a hip audience of 20-somethings with performance films like the Talking Heads’ Stop Making Sense and Swimming to Cambodia with the late Spalding Grey. The turning point in Demme’s career came when he was picked to helm the adaptation of Thomas Harris’ The Silence of the Lambs in 1991, a film that earned Demme his only Academy Award as a director. Oprah Winfrey was impressed enough to bring Demme on board for the film adaptation of the novel Beloved, although it was met with confusion and lack of interest. Four years later, Demme remade the classic Audrey Hepburn drama Charade into 2002’s The Truth About Charlie, starring Thandie Newton, Mark Wahlberg and Tim Robbins, but it also flopped at the box office. Demme seems to be going the Oliver Stone route this year, first with his documentary The Agronomist about a Haitian political refugee and now with a controversial thriller that looks into politics and conspiracy. Older adults that enjoyed the original movie and the quality of Demme’s previous work should be intrigued enough by this remake to check it out.

Jonathan Demme
Title	Release Date	Theater Count	Previous Box Office (in millions)	Weekend Box Office (in millions)	Average	Total Box Office
The Truth About Charlie	10/25/02	753		$2.27	$3,015	$5.29
Beloved	10/16/98	1,501		$8.17	$5,443	$22.84
Philadelphia	1/14/94	1,245	$0.95	$13.70	$11,004	$77.32
Silence of the Lambs	2/15/91	1,497	$1.41	$13.77	$9,198	$130.73

The original Manchurian Candidate is considered an early entry into the political thriller genre, and for many years since, politics and the Presidential election have become great fodder for movies with devout but limited audiences. On the one hand, you have crime films that revolve around the Presidency like Wesley Snipe’s Murder at 1600 and Clint Eastwood’s Absolute Power to movies that take a real-life look at politics like Barry Sonenfeld’s Wag the Dog and Primary Colors, supposedly based on then President Clinton. Although they’re not big box office draws, many of these movies get the critics behind them and ultimately, earn Oscar nominations for their cast. This was the case with 2000’s The Contender with Joan Allen and Phillip Noyce’s 2002 drama, The Quiet American, another book turned movie turned remake that earned an Oscar nomination for Michael Caine. The most recent political thriller, David Mamet’s Spartan, barely got any attention in its release earlier this year, despite a strong cast.

Political Thrillers
Title	Release Date	Theater Count	Previous Box Office (in millions)	Weekend Box Office (in millions)	Average	Total Box Office
Spartan	3/12/04	832		$2.01	$2,418	$4.36
The Quiet American	2/14/03	157	$1.69	$1.24	$7,881	$12.99
The Contender	10/13/00	1,516		$5.36	$3,536	$17.80
Primary Colors	3/20/98	1,965		$12.05	$6,132	$39.30
Wag the Dog	1/9/98	1,665	$1.96	$7.78	$4,673	$43.04
Conspiracy Theory	8/8/97	2,806		$19.31	$6,882	$76.12
Murder at 1600	4/18/97	2,152		$7.96	$3,699	$25.84
Absolute Power	2/14/97	2,568		$16.77	$6,530	$50.07
JFK	12/20/91	1,164		$5.22	$4,485	$70.41

The Manchurian Candidate will benefit from being a highly thought provoking political thriller released during an election year and being a remake will also help. Many of the recent remakes of lesser known films like The Bourne Identity, The Italian Job and even another Frank Sinatra project, Ocean’s 11, have found success with new audiences interested in seeing them updated. While the name brand may help bring in older audiences, movie buffs may not appreciate how the movie has been updated, a true double-edged sword for the movie’s success.

Adapting The Manchurian Candidate with such a well respected cast and director sounds promising, but the difficult subject matter and trying to open against M. Night Shyamalan’s higher profile thriller may be its undoing. This isn’t the type of movie that usually does well during the summer, but the political implications and the amazing cast should bring in enough interest to allow an opening weekend just under the $20 million mark with a chance of decent legs if the critics get behind it.

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THUNDERBIRDS (Universal Pictures)
Starring: Bill Paxton, Anthony Edwards, Sophia Myles, Brady Corbet, Soren Fulton, Vanessa Hudgens, Ben Kingsley
Directed by: Jonathan Frakes (Star Trek: First Contact, Star Trek: Insurrection, Star Trek: Nemesis, Clockstoppers)
Rated PG
Tagline: “Prepare for the new generation…”

Straight out of the 60s’ Saturday morning television show comes a live action reinvention of the popular sci-fi favorite. Alan Tracy (Brady Corbet) is the youngest of a family of adventurers, sworn to secrecy that his father (Bill Paxton) and four older brothers are the top-secret organization International Rescue, using high-tech vehicles, dubbed the Thunderbirds, to fight off disasters. When something happens to his family, Alan is forced to step in and create a new team with a group of his young friends to save the world.

Anyone who was a kid during the 60s and 70s will be familiar with the Thunderbirds, the low-budget sci-fi show that used marionettes as its main characters. The premise for its modern-day counterpart may be more familiar to those familiar with family live action films, since it is almost the exact same plot used by director Robert Rodriguez for his trilogy of family adventure films, Spy Kids. The three films have done decent business in the last four years with both young kids and their parents culminating in a $100 million 3-D film last summer. Since the franchise seems to have come to its conclusion, Thunderbirds hopes to pick it back up by using a familiar name brand.

Thunderbirds’ greatest coup may have been to get Academy Award winning actor Ben Kingsley, playing the movie’s bad guy. When you can get an actor of Kingsley’s caliber for a movie, you would expect many people would rush out to droves to see it. Despite being nominated for four Academy Awards and winning one for Gandhi in 1982, this isn’t the case, as his last two movies for which he was nominated, Sexy Beast and House of Sand and Fog, did only moderate business in theatres. His 2002 family film Tuck Everlasting, based on the book, did slightly better, but it tends to be overlooked. Still, being considered one of the film acting greats, Kingsley immediately brings a bit of credibility to the movie, something that will mean absolutely nothing to the kids who may or may not care about this movie. It may help sway grown-ups, though. On the other hand, Paxton does have a bit of relevant experience in kids’ movies having appeared in two of the last three Spy Kids’ films. He also has tons of experience in space and science fiction films, having appeared both in James Cameron’s Aliens and Ron Howard’s Apollo 13. Although it tanked at the box office, Paxton’s greatest achievement might have been his feature film directorial debut Frailty, which received a lot of attention from critics and earned him two major awards from the Academy of Science Fiction, Fantasy & Horror Films in 2002. His appearance in this year’s comedy bomb Broken Lizard’s Club Dread may already be forgotten, but the chances of Paxton having any effect on people’s decision to see this film are negligible at best and far less expected than Kingsley’s presence.

Kingsley & Paxton
Title	Release Date	Theater Count	Previous Box Office (in millions)	Weekend Box Office (in millions)	Average	Total Box Office
House of Sand and Fog	12/19/03	438	$0.04	$1.72	$3,928	$13.01
Tuck Everlasting	10/11/02	1,185		$5.27	$4,446	$19.14
The Triumph of Love	4/19/02	18		$0.06	$3,362	$0.45
Sexy Beast	7/6/01	134	$2.35	$0.74	$5,498	$6.95
Frailty	4/12/02	1,497		$4.21	$2,806	$13.08
Titanic	12/19/97	2,674		$28.64	$10,711	$600.79
Twister	5/10/96	2,414		$41.06	$17,009	$241.89
Apollo 13	6/30/95	2,197		$25.35	$11,538	$172.07

The adaptation is directed by Jonathan Frakes, who may be forever known as Commander William T. Riker AKA “Number One” from the Star Trek spin-off “Star Trek: the Next Generation”. His starring role on the show led to directing some of the episodes and when they brought those characters to the big screen, it wasn’t long before he made the jump to directing Star Trek films, directing two of the "Next Generation" movies. More importantly, Frakes directed Nickelodeon’s Spy Kids knock-off Clockstoppers, which tried to attract family audiences over Easter weekend 2002 by putting kids into a sci-fi action premise. It didn’t do well.

Considering Frakes’ Star Trek connections, diehard fans of the Star Trek shows may support the movie, since this is another television sci-fi property that might appeal to them with its combination of spaceships and special effects. The Trek films have shown signs of diminishing returns as diehard fans have been worn out with one bad movie after the next, and they may hold some of that against Frakes, even though he didn't direct the last movie, which may be the end of the franchise. The question is whether the “strictly for kids” look of the movie will be too annoying for older sci-fi fans, who may be more tempted to see M. Night Shyamalan’s The Village, since his movies appeal to a similar fanboy crowd. It doesn’t bode well that original Thunderbirds creator Gerry Anderson has already announced publicly that he had absolutely nothing to do with this remake of his classic show. Worst of all, the movie looks just a bit too much like the movie version of another 60’s sci-fi show, Lost in Space, a 1998 movie that left a bad taste in a lot of people’s mouths.

Jonathan Frakes / Kids Action Flicks
Title	Release Date	Theater Count	Previous Box Office (in millions)	Weekend Box Office (in millions)	Average	Total Box Office
Star Trek:Insurrection	12/11/98	2,620		$22.05	$8,416	$70.12
Star Trek: First Contact	11/22/96	2,812		$30.72	$10,925	$91.98
Clockstoppers	3/29/02	2,540		$10.11	$3,980	$36.99
Agent Cody Banks	3/14/03	3,369		$14.06	$4,175	$47.55
Spy Kids 3-D: Game Over	7/25/03	3,344		$33.42	$9,993	$111.76
Spy Kids 2: The Island of Lost Dreams	8/9/02	3,307	$8.30	$16.71	$5,053	$84.94
Spy Kids	3/30/01	3,104		$26.55	$8,552	$106.26
Lost In Space	4/3/98	3,306		$20.15	$6,095	$69.12

The movie has been pushed heavily on Saturday morning television in hopes of getting the kids excited, and there’s very little competition for the coveted kid market this weekend. The thoughts of a sci-fi action adventure might bring out the kid in some adults, but this remake of a television favorite suffers from a bit of “looks a lot like”-it is. There have already been a number of failed Spy Kids rip-offs and this doesn’t even look as good as them, so parents and kids may be skeptical enough to be wary of this film. Either way, the buzz seems fairly minimal. With a scant release into 2,000 theatres, it may be a stretch to earn more than $10 million this weekend, joining summer family flops like Around the World in 80 Days with closer to $7 or 8 million.

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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.

GARDEN STATE (Fox Searchlight/Miramax Films)
GOZU (Pathfinder Pictures)
INTIMATE STRANGERS (Paramount Classics)
PROTEUS (Strand Releasing)
SHE HATE ME (Sony Pictures Classics)

“Scrubs” star Zach Braff wrote, directed and stars in Garden State, about a heavily medicated L.A. actor who returns to New Jersey when his mother dies only to meet a quirky young woman, played by Natalie Portman, that change his view on life. Braff’s dramatic comedy, which was a hit at Sundance, opens in New York and Los Angeles on Wednesday and elsewhere else over the course of August.

In his latest film Gozu, Japanese underground director Takashi Miike (Audition, Ichii the Killer) presents a supernatural horror film involving a Yakuza gangster and his missing boss, who later turns up as a young girl. Answering the question of the birds and bees in a horrifying way, Gozu opens in New York this weekend.

Patrice LeConte, director of 2002’s Man on the Train, returns with Intimate Strangers about a beautiful but shy woman who mistakenly confides in a man whom she believes to be a psychiatrist. This drama about a complex relationship opens in New York and Los Angeles on Friday.

Proteus is a romantic period piece set in 18^th Century South Africa about a black livestock herder, arrested and imprisoned for taking cattle that was stolen by white colonizers, who falls into an affair with a Dutch sailor. Proteus opens in New York and San Francisco this weekend.

In Spike Lee’s She Hate Me, a young black exec (Anthony Mackie) is blacklisted after blowing the whistle on his company’s shady stock dealings forcing him to make a deal with his lesbian ex-fiancee (Kerry Washington) to impregnate her and her friends for money. This eclectic and topical political comedy, one of Spike Lee’s most controversial films yet, opens on Wednesday in New York and Los Angeles.

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THIS TIME LAST YEA R

Last August kicked off with the third chapter in the successful American Pie series, American Wedding. Although it was #1 at the box office, the premise of a marriage between the characters played by Jason Biggs and Alyson Hannigan did not have the same sort of raunch appeal as the first two movies, so it only earned $33 million its opening weekend, about $10 million less than the previous chapter earned two years prior. This was just another example of the diminishing return of sequels in 2003. Still, that was a huge hit compared to what was considered by many to be the biggest disaster of 2004, the aberration that will be forever mispronounced, Gigli. Starring Ben Affleck and his then fiancé Jennifer Lopez, the romantic crime comedy was trashed by the reviewers, and the moviegoing public voted with their dollars to say that they were sick of hearing about the couple. It earned under $4 million its opening weekend, a far cry from the duo’s $12 million paycheck. The Pirates of the Caribbean, Seabiscuit and Finding Nemo continued to maintain decent business through word-of-mouth with the Johnny Depp pirate movie crossing the $200 million mark.

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Next week, Tom Cruise and Jamie Foxx star in the crime drama Collateral, directed by Michael Mann, and Brittany Murphy stars in the romantic comedy Little Black Book.

Copyright 2004 Edward Douglas