Preview and Projections for the Weekend of March 26th, 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 3.25.04

Wrapping up the busy month of March, twelve new movies open this week, four nationwide and eight in limited release (See Under the Radar) and one has to wonder if the box office can sustain so many movies at once.

Scooby Doo 2: Monsters Unleashed, the sequel to the hit movie based on the popular animated cartoon shouldn’t have a problem taking the top spot, as the first big movie in a long time to be geared towards family audiences. That said, facing the sophomore jinx that has hit many a family sequel, it may not even make half as much its opening weekend as the original. The Brothers Coen return with a remake of the 1955 crime comedy, The Ladykillers, starring none other than Tom Hanks as the leader of a motley gang attempting a heist, only to be hindered by their suspicious landlady. Opening in fewer theatres than any of the Hanks’ previous movies, it might get caught up in the miasma that is Dawn of the Dead vs. The Passion of The Christ, having to settle for third or fourth place. Capitalizing on the success of its star, rapper DMX, Never Die Alone, based on the Donald Goines book, should have a decent opening weekend in its focused urban market. Kevin Smith will try to enter more mainstream territory with his romantic comedy, Jersey Girl, starring Ben Affleck as a single father who has to take care of a young girl. Smith’s dedicated fans should roll out opening weekend, despite its moderate release, putting it in direct competition with the DMX drama for a position in the bottom half of the Top 10 , although it might have a hard time getting people to forget Gigli. Sneak previews for the weekend include Walking Tall on Saturday, The Prince & Me on Saturday and Sunday and special sneaks of Hellboy in New York and Los Angeles on Friday night.

TW	LW	Title	Weekend (in millions)	Change	# Of Theaters	Average	Week
1	New	Scooby Doo 2: Monsters Unleashed	$27.0	N/A	3,312	$8,152	1
2	1	Dawn of the Dead	$14.5	-46%	2,748	$5,277	2
3	New	The Ladykillers	$12.5	N/A	1,583	$7,896	1
4	2	The Passion of The Christ	$12.0	-41%	3,168	$3,756	5
5	New	Jersey Girl	$7.5	N/A	1,520	$4,934	1
6	New	Never Die Alone	$7.1	N/A	1,161	$6,115	1
7	4	Starsky and Hutch	$6.6	-36%	2,985	$2,211	4
8	3	Taking Lives	$6.0	-48%	2,705	$2,218	2
9	7	Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind	$5.8	-29%	1,357	$4,274	2
10	6	Hidalgo	$5.3	-37%	2,667	$1,987	3
			Est. Weekend Total $107.10	Est. Avg. Drop-Off -39%		Est. Average PTA $4,682

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JERSEY GIRL (Miramax Films)
Starring: Ben Affleck, Liv Tyler, Jennifer Lopez, Raquel Castro, Jason Biggs, George Carlin, Jason Lee, Matt Damon (cameo), Stephen Root, Jennifer Schwalbach Smith, Will Smith (cameo), Mike Starr
Directed by: Kevin Smith (Clerks, Mallrats, Chasing Amy, Dogma, Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back)
Rated PG-13
Tagline: “He wanted it all…but he got more than he bargained for.”

For director Kevin Smith’s sixth movie, Ben Affleck plays Ollie Trinke, a Manhattan music publicist whose life is turned upside down when his pregnant wife (Jennifer Lopez) dies in childbirth, leaving him a single father. Moving to his father’s house in a Jersey suburb, Ollie and his daughter Gertie try to get accustomed to the new lifestyle as Ollie meets a local woman (Liv Tyler) who helps change his look on life.

Hard to believe, but it’s been over twelve years since Smith’s debut, the indie classic Clerks, and in the time since, Smith has become a bit of a cultural icon, not only from his own movies, but from his comic book writing, regular appearances on the Jay Leno show and his commercials for Panasonic. For his sixth movie, he has taken a drastic departure into the world of romantic comedies that he touched upon with Chasing Amy, the movie that helped expand his audience. Like that movie, Jersey Girl should give Smith a shot at getting more women into see his movie.

In the last year, independent directors like John Favreau (Elf) and Richard Linklater (School of Rock) have tried their hands at mainstream filmmaking to great success. It makes sense that with his newfound familiarity, one of Hollywood’s most egregious indie directors would use his personal growth to try to reach a larger audience. After the critical raves for Clerks, Smith’s attempt to turn Mallrats into a mainstream comedy didn’t work, but Chasing Amy, his twisted romantic comedy set in the world of comics got him more acclaim. His next film, Dogma, got a lot of attention due to the controversy surrounding his opinions on the Catholic church, while for Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back, he decided to wrap up the recurring characters who appeared in his previous four movies. Those last two movies grossed around $30 million at the box office, while all of Smith’s movies have continued to do well with various special edition DVD releases. Like other popular directors like Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez, Smith has created an insular fan base with his web presence, building upon a fanatic male audience that enjoys cool things like comics and genre flicks.

For Jersey Girl, Smith once again works with his best friend, Ben Affleck. While most will know Affleck for his big budget action movies with Michael Bay (Pearl Harbor) and John Woo (Paycheck), Ben Affleck starred or appeared in five of Smith’s six movies, and Jersey Girl is a much-needed return to his roots. Early in his career, Affleck played a heavy in Kevin Smith’s Mall Rats, before playing the leading man in the twisted romantic comedy, Chasing Amy and a vengeful angel in Dogma. In between those movies, he somehow became one of Hollywood’s hottest young leading men in big movies like Armageddon, Pearl Harbor and the 2002 spy thriller, The Sum of All Fears.

Despite his success, Affleck hit a bit of a wall in his career when he began a relationship with a certain Latin pop singer/actress on the set of a movie that might forever plague him. That movie was the megabomb Gigli, and it’s the biggest stumbling block that Jersey Girl faces, because Affeck’s former fiancé, Jennifer Lopez, also has a small part in this movie. For whatever reason, critics and the public turned on “Bennifer” last October, maybe because they were sick of the media’s incessant “coverage” of their relationship, which ended earlier this year. Wisely, Smith has cut down her part a bit to take the focus off of the couple and put it where it belongs, on what happens after her death. Of course, most people will think that this was intentional to lessen the ties between this movie and that one. Affleck has also been on the campaign trail to help revive his career with appearances on “Saturday Night Live” and “Dateline NBC”.

Affleck is once again paired with his Armageddon love interest, Liv Tyler, daughter of Aerosmith frontman Steven Tyler, who broke into movies during the 90’s. Those who enjoyed that aspect of Michael Bay’s blockbuster will be interested to see if their chemistry continues into Jersey Girl. More recently, Tyler was last seen in the popular Lord of the Rings trilogy as well as a rather memorable Oscar show appearance, which left many wondering, “what’s with the hair?” Needless to say, the two have chemistry that will help sell this heart-touching comedy.

Jersey Girl is not your average Kevin Smith movie, something that should be evident from the PG-13 rating, which means that he may have to soften up his dialogue, removing a few dozen “f*cks”. The movie itself is more of a chick flick, a male perspective on the Drew Barrymore vehicle, Riding in Cars with Boys, about a single mother raising a young boy. This may help Smith get more of a female audience, but it will also make it a harder sell to the legions of Kevin Smith’s diehard male fans. They might not be too happy that Smith has also put the nail in the coffins of Jay and Silent Bob, the idiotic duo that had recurring roles in his previous movies. While they became a bit of a trademark for Smith, who played Silent Bob along with Jason Mewes’ Jay, they might have kept his audience limited to juvenile males. Whether women interested in a light romantic comedy will realize that the movie is by the man responsible for some of the lowest lowbrow humor of the last decade, and whether they’d go to see it knowing that, is another story.

Wisely, Miramax is not putting all of their eggs in one basket, releasing Jersey Girl moderately even by Kevin Smith standards, but already planning weekly expansions, much like Universal did with Richard Curtis’ romantic comedy, Love Actually, last year. This should allow Smith’s fans in big cities to catch it opening week and for word-of-mouth and reviews to help it maintain its legs.

Although it’s arriving in a busy market, particularly in the larger cities, expect Smith’s diehard fans to rush out and see it, maybe even with their wives and girlfriends­hey, it’s not completely impossible, right?—which should help bring Jersey Girl an opening weekend between $6 and 8 million, more than Gigli made theatrically. If the movie is as good as some of Smith’s better movies, word-of-mouth will help it maintain a steady stream of business throughout April, as it slowly expands to the rest of the country.

Related Comparisons:

Title	Release Date	Theater Count	Previous Box Office (in millions)	Weekend Box Office (in millions)	Average	Total Box Office
Paycheck	12/26/03	2,762	$5.30	$13.46	$4,874	$53.15
Gigli	8/1/03	2,215		$3.75	$16,946	$6.07
Changing Lanes	4/12/02	2,613		$17.13	$6,716	$66.79
Pearl Harbor	5/25/01	3,214		$59.08	$18,382	$198.54
Bounce	11/17/00	1,918		$11.42	$5,954	$36.78
Forces of Nature	3/19/99	2,058		$13.51	$6,565	$52.88
Armageddon	7/3/98	3,127	$18.10	$36.09	$11,541	$201.58
Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back	8/24/01	2,765		$11.02	$3,985	$30.06
Dogma	11/12/99	1,260		$8.67	$6,881	$30.65
Chasing Amy	4/4/97	553	2.77	$1.11	$2,011	$12.00
Love Actually	11/7/03	576		$6.89	$11,955	$59.08
Riding in Cars with Boys	10/19/01	2,770		$10.80	$3,899	$29.78

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THE LADYKILLERS (Touchstone Pictures)
Starring: Tom Hanks, Marlon Wayans, Irma P. Hall, George Wallace, Ryan Hurst, Jason Weaver, Steven Root, J.K. Simmons
Directed by: Joel and Ethan Coen (Fargo, Raising Arizona, The Big Lebowski, Intolerable Cruelty, O Brother, Where Art Thou?)
Rated R
Tagline: “The greatest criminal minds of all time have finally met their match.”

The eclectic Coen Brothers return with a remake of a 1955 comedy, in which Tom Hanks plays the right honorable Dr. Goldthwait Higginson Dorr III, mastermind behind an elaborate heist who has set up shop with his motley crew in the cellar of elderly church-going woman under the guise of being a church band. When she discovers their true intentions, they realize they’ll have to get rid of her first, something that proves harder than they expect.

To elaborate on Hanks’ career would make this a rather lengthy preview, but needless to say, he is one of the most reliable box office stars in Hollywood and has been for almost a decade. Thirteen of his movies have grossed over $100 million, with four of them grossing over $200 million. The combined gross of all of his movies comes close to $3 billion in North America alone. (Ironically, the only movie that wasn’t a huge hit was his directorial debut, That Thing You Do.) Despite his success, it’s been many years since he starred in a comedy, despite making a mark in the sitcom, “Bosom Buddies”, and early comedies like Splash, The ‘Burbs and of course, how could we forget Bachelor Party? In the years since, he became one of Hollywood’s premiere dramatic actors, winning multiple Oscars, as well as a highly respected power player. After dramatic roles in The Green Mile, The Road to Perdition, and Saving Private Ryan, Hanks is returning to his roots with a crime comedy that should appeal to his long-time fans who have been hoping for him to do something a bit lighter outside of his family films (Toy Story, Toy Story 2) or romantic comedies with Meg Ryan (You’ve Got Mail). In this one, he gets to play a completely outlandish character that will allow him to stretch some new comedy muscles. (The saying “We must all have waffles forthwith” may readily become a part of people’s everyday conversation.)

Joel and Ethan Coen built themselves a strong following of movie lovers from their eccentric and original material, much of which has combined crime and comedy. From Raising Arizona to Fargo, the Coens have taken the genre to new artistic levels, even if they have not had many commercial hits. The Ladykillers covers familiar territory, even though it’s their first attempt at a remake and their second at making a commercially viable movie. Their last one, the romantic comedy, Intolerable Cruelty, even had two big box office mainstream stars, George Clooney and Catherine Zeta-Jones, but that movie failed to do much better than O Brother! Where Art Thou? a wacky Southern romp also starring Clooney that never expanded very wide. The Coens have also received a bit of Oscar attention, most notably with the kidnapping crime movie, Fargo. I t was just as quirky as this movie, thanks to performances by William H. Macy and Steve Buscemi. The Coens might be trying to branch out a bit in hopes of getting older African-American audiences with the subject matter, as well as Hanks’ co-star Marlon Wayans, who has been popular on television and in movies like the first two Scary Movies.

The success in recent years of heist remakes like the George Clooney-Brad Pitt crime caper, Ocean’s 11, which has a sequel arriving later this year, and The Italian Job with Mark Wahlberg and Ed Norton, paves the way for The Ladykilers to do well, except that it will be relying solely on Hanks, as opposed to a strong ensemble cast. Like those other movies, few Americans will be familiar with the original movie being remade, but the thought of Hanks doing a Coen Brothers movie will be enough for many of their fans, as well as Hanks’ more mainstream fans, to give this a chance,

It’s a bit odd that Disney is releasing the movie in March into only 1,500 theatres, since most of Hanks movies either get a summer or winter release, hoping to capitalize on the bigger box office and Oscars. Then again, plenty of his movies have done well despite a moderate release, most notably Forest Gump and Road to Perdition, each of which made over $20 million opening weekend in only a few hundred more theatres. Even the Elmore Leonard crime comedy, Get Shorty, did well despite a similar theatrical release, while comparisons could be made to Woody Allen’s last semi-hit, Small Time Criminals, which had a similar style of humor. Neither of them had a box office star on the caliber of Hanks. The premise of having to kill an elderly lady might seem familiar to the three or four people who saw the Ben Stiller-Drew Barrymore bomb, Duplex.

While the moderate theatre count would think that Touchstone is not fully behind the movie, the Super Bowl spot they bought to showcase it proves otherwise. The critics tend to love Hanks and the Coen Brothers, so The Ladykillers best chances will depend on whether the critics get behind it, which would be enough to convince older adults to see it. It’s also been over a year since Hanks’ last movie, Catch Me If You Can, his second collaboration with Steven Spielberg, and his fans are itching to see him again.

While The Ladykillers doesn’t look like one of the Coen Brothers’ more artistic efforts, having a popular mainstream star like Tom Hanks on board should help get their wacky humor across to older audiences, who have been sorely overlooked with the comedies of recent months. While it might be hard for it to defeat movies playing in far more theatres, it should be able to make $11 to 13 million, around the same amount as Intolerable Cruelty in fewer theatres. Either way, it’s important to never underestimate Hanks, because if there’s one actor that can help the prolific Coen Brothers get a much-deserved hit, it will be him.

Related Comparisons:

Title	Release Date	Theater Count	Previous Box Office (in millions)	Weekend Box Office (in millions)	Average	Total Box Office
Road to Perdition	7/12/02	1,797		$22.08	$12,267	$104.05
Cast Away	12/22/00	2,774		$28.88	$10,411	$233.63
The Green Mile	12/10/99	2,875		$18.02	$6,268	$136.80
You've Got Mail	12/18/98	2,691		$18.43	$6,849	$115.73
Forrest Gump	7/8/94	1,595	$8.06	$24.45	$15,329	$329.65
Intolerable Cruelty	10/10/03	2,564		$12.53	$4,885	$35.10
O Brother, Where Art Thou?	2/2/01	809	$13.38	$3.65	$4,512	$45.51
The Big Lebowski	3/6/98	1,207		$5.53	$4,582	$17.45
Fargo	4/5/96	716	$9.62	$2.54	$3,547	$24.57
The Italian Job	5/30/03	2,633		$19.46	$7,390	$105.63
Welcome to Collinwood	10/4/02	16		$0.08	$4,700	$0.31
Ocean's 11	12/7/01	3,075		$38.11	$12,393	$183.13
Get Shorty	10/20/95	1,612		$12.70	$7,878	$72.00

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NEVER DIE ALONE (Fox Searchlight)
Starring: DMX, David Arquette, Michael Ealy, Reagan Preston-Gomez, Jennifer Sky, Paige Hurd, Rhoda Jordan, Keesha Sharp, Drew Sidora
Directed by: Ernest Dickerson (Bulletproof, Bones, Juice, Surviving the Game)
Rated R

Donald Goines’ novel, “Never Die Alone” is brought to life with rapper DMX playing King David, a hardened criminal returning home to try to find peace, only to find a violent death, leaving a journalist at the scene of the murder (David Arquette) to investigate King David’s life and death, through a series of audiotapes he left behind.

Never Die Alone is the latest in the urban gangster film genre with origins that date back to John Singleton’s Boyz ‘n’ the Hood, which starred NWA rapper Ice Cube, and the movie Juice, starring the late Tupac Shakur. Both of these movies set the groundwork for a string of movies that appealed directly to a very distinct African American subculture that enjoys the edgier world of gangsta rap and the city streets, typified by the writing of Donald Goines and the music of the movie’s star.

New York rapper DMX AKA Earl Simmons was at the forefront of a new breed of aggressive rap during the late 90s, when three of his successive albums topped the Billboard album charts within the course of two years, something that was unprecedented. It didn’t take long for DMX to get into movies with smaller roles in movies like Jet Li’s Romeo Must Die. He helped revive the career of action star Steven Seagal when he teamed with him for Exit Wounds, which proved to be as successful as Romeo Must Die. (His absence from Seagal’s next movie, Half Past Dead, proved how much he brought to the equation; it stiffed without him.) Last year, DMX was paired with Jet Li once again, this time with a more prominent role in the action drama, Cradle 2 the Grave. Although it didn’t do nearly as well in the long term as his earlier movies, it did have a decent opening weekend. Although he still regularly releases records, DMX may not be as prominent now as he was a few years ago. It shouldn’t matter though, as he’s already become a bit of a legend like Tupac Shakur, who despite being dead for almost a decade, pulled people into theatres for his autobiographical documentary, Tupac: Resurrection. DMX’s words and lifestyle are allowing him to pick up where Shakur left off, bringing him his own throng of adoring fans.

Director Ernest Dickerson has plenty of experience with this type of movie, as well as working within the hip-hop community. His early career had him working as a cinematographer on some of Spike Lee’s earliest films from She’s Gotta Have It through Malcolm X. He also worked on the respectable hip hop movie, Krush Groove, Eddie Murphy’s concert film Raw, and even the cult classic The Brother From Another Planet. His directorial debut was Tupac Shakur’s breakout film, Juice, which could be seen as one of the precursors for this movie. He followed that with Surviving the Game, starring Ice-T, as well as directing Snoop Dogg in the urban horror film, Bones. There is no question that Dickerson has what they like to call “street cred” from his past experience, which Fox Searchlight should play up if they want to give DMX’s fans even more reason to see it.

While disguised as a biodrama, Never Die Alone is more of a revenge drama like last year’s A Man Apart, starring Vin Diesel as a narcotics agent hellbent on getting revenge for the murder of his wife, or next week’s remake of the 70’s movie, Walking Tall, starring wrestling giant The Rock. While the former didn’t do that well and the latter might not do much better, there certainly seems to be a market for this type of tough crime movie, as seen by the success of the John Leguizamo crime drama, Empire, in which he played a similar gangster. The look and the feel of the trailer gives one the impression that is more like a biodrama of the rapper himself, much like 8 Mile was. The Eminem drama is still one of the largest opening and grossing hip hop related movies to date, having exploded with over $51 million its opening weekend.

Never Die Alone has not received as much promotion as some of the other movies coming out this week, so one wonders if anyone, let alone DMX fans, will even know about it, let alone care much. Like similar movies, its obligatory soundtrack album should help, as it will feature new tracks from DMX, most likely namedropping himself to remind listeners that they’re not listening to Ja Rule.

Never Die Alone opens in fewer theatres than the other new movies, but they’ll be heavily focused urban areas where DMX fans will flock to see it, much like they did with Tupac: Resurrection. The movie is extremely violent supposedly, much like Goines’ book, so it’s unlikely that this will get much interest beyond urban males, but probably not nearly as much business as the early urban gangster movies of the 90’s. Still, DMX’s concentrated fanbase should help bring in $7 to 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
Cradle 2 the Grave	2/28/03	2,625		$16.52	$6,294	$34.66
Half Past Dead	11/15/02	2,113		$7.82	$3,701	$15.36
Exit Wounds	3/16/01	2,830		$18.49	$6,532	$51.76
Romeo Must Die	3/24/00	2,641	$6.59	$18.01	$6,819	$55.97
Bones	10/26/01	847	$0.74	$2.82	$3,334	$7.31
Gang Related	10/10/97	1,260	$0.85	$2.44	$1,937	$5.80
Juice	1/17/92	1,089		$8.09	$7,429	$20.15
Boyz N the Hood	7/12/91	829		$10.02	$12,087	$56.19
Tupac: Resurrection	11/14/03	801		$4.63	$5,874	$7.71
A Man Apart	4/4/03	2,459		$11.02	$4,481	$26.50
Empire	12/6/02	867		$6.28	$7,243	$17.50
8 Mile	11/8/02	2,470		$51.24	$20,745	$116.13

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SCOOBY DOO 2: MONSTERS UNLEASHED (Warner Brothers)
Starring: Matthew Lillard, Neil Fanning, Linda Cardellini, Sarah Michelle Gellar, Seth Green, Freddie Prinze, Jr., Alicia Silverstone, Peter Boyle, Nick Millard, Tim Blake Nelson
Directed by: Raja Gosnell (Scooby Doo, Big Momma’s House, Never Been Kissed)
Rated PG
Tagline: “They came. They saw. They ran.”

For their second major movie, Scooby Doo and the gang from Mystery Inc. face a masked villain who has used a machine to recreate some of their greatest past foes to terrorize the citizens of Coolville. If you need to know any more about the plot than you’ve obviously never seen the cartoon, and there’s no point reading further.

Scooby Doo is one of the most well-known and beloved cartoon characters since the debut of his first cartoon in 1969. With a very simple premise and characters, it has grown to be loved by kids and adults alike. Having had success with big screen movies featuring the Looney Tunes and some of their other comic book characters, it made sense that Warner Brothers would try to create a franchise around the sleuthing dog. Despite the failure of Josie and the Pussycats and The Adventures of Rocky and Bullwinkle, high profile movies based on cartoons, the original Scooby Doo astounded the experts by making over $50 million in a busy opening weekend and grossing over $130 million in theatres. With that success, Warner Brothers instantly jumped into a sequel knowing that it wouldn’t cost as much with the CGI development for the title character already being done.

Less than two years later, the entire cast--Matthew Lillard, Sarah Michelle Gellar, Freddie Prinze Jr, Linda Cardellini, and of course, Scooby--are back for the sequel, an adventure that looks a lot like Ghostbusters 2, with monsters running amok on the city and them having to stop them. At the center of the cast are husband and wife, Freddie Prinze Jr and Sarah Michelle Gellar as Fred and Daphne. Of course, Gellar was star of a much loved television show of her own, “Buffy the Vampire Slayer”, so playing another “mystery hunter” in the Scooby Doo movie was not exactly that big a stretch. Her few movies in between seasons included the thriller, Cruel Intentions, and a small role in Scream 2, but she will probably always be remembered as Buffy.

Her husband made a name for himself as one of the 90’s “brat pack” of teen actors who achieved instant fame and ardor, in Prinze’s case, in horror movies like I Know What You Did Last Summer, and teen romantic comedies like She’s All That. Actor Matthew Lillard was also a member of that group, having played wacky neurotic characters in thrillers from Scream and Thirteen Ghosts. Many thought his impersonation of Shaggy was eerie. Like Ben Stiller and Owen Wilson, the two actors have appeared in many movies together over the years, but it’s a strange relationship since they seem so different as actors. The group is rounded out by Linda Cardelini’s Velma, her most noteworthy role being her debut as the star of Todd Solonz’s Welcome to the Dollhouse.

Regardless, the cast has very little to offer towards this movie’s success, since they essentially are just playing the characters from the show. Business will depend on how many people liked them in the roles the first time around, and that might be the movie’s biggest problem. Although kids may have loved the original movie, older audiences didn’t, something obvious from the 5.0 (out of 10) rating on imdb.com and the awful rating of 27% on rottentomatoes.com. When a movie does that well at the box office, but is that poorly received, you have to figure that not as many people will rush out to see the sequel. For further proof, I give you Lara Croft Tomb Raider: The Cradle of Life.

Family related sequels tend to not do as well as the original movie, with very few exceptions. Some classic examples of this were the sequels to the hit family films, The Addams Family and 101 Dalmations. An even better example would be the live action movies based on The Flintstones, another popular cartoon. The first movie, starring John Goodman and Rosie O’Donnell, did very well, but when most of the cast bowed out for the sequel, Viva Rock Vegas, there was less chance of it doing as well, despite opening in 500 more theatres than the original. The six years in between movies certainly didn’t help matters. While Scooby Doo 2 has reassembled the entire cast, it will still be facing the sophomore jinx that destroyed Addams Family Values, the sequel to the hugely successful family hit based on the cartoon and television show.

Another more recent example of the sophomore jinx would be Agent Cody Banks 2: Destination London, which was rush-released to take advantage of the mild success of the original. Unlike that movie, Scooby Doo 2 features the same much beloved character as the original cartoons and movie, so there will always be built-in audience of fans. Of course, one might have also thought about that when Looney Tunes: Back in Action failed to attain the success of the previous movie, Space Jam.

Despite knowing what they’re up against, Warner Brothers hasn’t put as much promotion into the sequel as they did the original movie. Instead of a coveted summer release, it’s being released in the middle of spring, probably a week too late to capitalize on spring break. Working in its favor is Warner Brothers’ decision to attach the second trailer for Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban to it and they’d be wise to promote that fact.

It’s doubtful that Scooby Doo 2 will match the success of the first movie in its opening, if only because the premise seems weak. The youngest kids probably won’t car either way since they’re not as into Scooby Doo as their parents, and though there is little other family fare, the parents who didn’t like the first one will try to avoid bringing their kids to the sequel. That said, it should be able to top the box office, although it might be with less than half the opening of the original movie, somewhere between $26 and 28 million, and less than $100 million overall.

Related Comparisons:

Title	Release Date	Theater Count	Previous Box Office (in millions)	Weekend Box Office (in millions)	Average	Total Box Office
Scooby-Doo	6/14/02	3,447		$54.16	$15,712	$153.29
The Flintstones in Viva Rock Vegas	4/28/00	3,040		$10.52	$3,461	$35.23
The Flintstones	5/27/94	2,498		$37.18	$14,884	$130.53
Ghostbusters II	6/16/89	2,410		$29.47	$12,228	$112.49
Ghostbusters	6/8/84	1,339		$13.58	$10,140	$229.24
Looney Tunes: Back in Action	11/14/03	2,903		$9.32	$3,209	$20.95
Space Jam	11/15/96	2,650		$27.53	$10,389	$90.44
Addams Family Values	11/19/93	2,577		$14.12	$5,479	$46.29
The Addams Family	11/22/91	2,411		$24.20	$10,037	$113.50
102 Dalmatians	11/22/00	2,704		$19.89	$7,355	$66.90
101 Dalmatians	11/29/96	2,794		$33.50	$11,990	$136.19
Josie and the Pussycats	4/13/01	2,556	$1.53	$4.56	$1,784	$14.25
The Adventures of Rocky and Bullwinkle	6/30/00	2,458		$6.81	$2,771	$26.00

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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.

DOGVILLE (Lions’ Gate Films)
A FOREIGN AFFAIR (Innovation Films)
MAYOR OF THE SUNSET STRIP (First Look Pictures)
NATIONAL LAMPOON’S LADY KILLERS (Delfino Entertainment)
NED KELLY (Focus Features)
SHADE (RKO Pictures)
TWO MEN WENT TO WAR (Indican Picures)
THE 2004 OSCAR SHORTS (Apollo Cinema)

In Lars von Trier’s latest difficult masterpiece Dogville, Nicole Kidman plays a fugitive who seeks refuge in a small town in the Rocky Mountains, only to be used and blackmailed by the “friendly community”. Von Trier’s controversial statement on American small town life features an all-star cast including Paul Bettany, James Caan, Patricia Clarkson, and Lauren Bacall . After being delayed for years, Dogville finally opens in New York and Los Angeles this weekend with potential for future expansion. Check out my review.

After the death of their mother, two Midwest brothers, played by David Arquette and Tim Blake Nelson, join a “Romance Tour”, a matchmaking trip to Russia, to try to find a woman to do their housecleaning in A Foreign Affair. This oddball comedy, which also stars Emily Mortimer, opens in limited release this weekend.

Mayor of the Sunset Strip is a documentary about the life and career of influential Los Angeles radio D.J. Rodney Bingenheimer, who was responsible for breaking many bands in the States from early 70’s glam rock to modern rock bands like Coldplay. His interesting life of success and solitude is the focus of the latest film from George Hickenlooper (Hearts of Darkness) that opens in Los Angeles on Friday.

To make a busy weekend even more confusing, National Lampoon release their latest comedy called Lady Killers, which is just a bit too close to the name of the new Coen Brothers comedy. Its unfortunate premise involves two losers who get involved with two sexy but deadly septuagenarian—yes, that means that they’re in their seventies--women in hopes of inheriting their fortune. Proving how far they have fallen since their heyday, National Lampoon’s latest gets a limited release this weekend.

Heath Ledger stars as legendary 19^th Century Australian criminal, Ned Kelly, in Gregor Jordan’s retelling of the Robin Hood like thief who became the object of a nationwide bounty on his head when falsely accused of committing a crime. With a cast that includes some of Australian’s finest, including Orlando Bloom, Naomi Watts and Geoffrey Rush, Ned Kelly opens in limited release this weekend. Check out my full review.

Stuart Townsend, Gabriel Byrne, Thandie Newton and Jamie Fixx 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. Although originally slated for a video only release, it shouldn’t be too surprising that Shade’s theatrical release kicks off in Las Vegas this weekend. Like other recent Stallone fare, its release won't be too far off, as it's already set for May 25.

Based on Raymond Foxall’s novel “Amateur Commandos”, Two Men Went To War is the true story of two of England’s Army Dental Corps, who leave their menial medical posts to join the war effort in France with a daring raid on a German radar station in 1942. Instead of being declared heroes, they were branded as deserters and liars on their return to England. This British film opens in New York and Los Angeles this weekend.

Few people get to see the live action and animated shorts nominated for Academy Awards, so Apollo Cinema has collected three of the former and two of the latter for The 2004 Oscar Shorts, featuring the winner for Best Animated Short, Adam Elliot’s “Harvey Krumpet”, as well as some of the other nominees. The 2004 Oscar Shorts will open at the Cinema Village in New York and should do the rounds across the country. Check the official site for where you can see this worthwhile collection. My review.

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THIS TIME LAST YEAR

After three weeks at #1, the Steve Martin-Queen Latifah cross-cultural comedy, Bringing Down the House, was dethroned by the Chris Rock-Bernie Mac political comedy, Head of State, which claimed the top spot with $13.5 million, despite opening in fewer theatres than the other two movies. Those movies, the sci-fi special effects movie, The Core, and the Samuel Jackson-John Travolta military thriller, Basic, did only moderately well with $12 and $11.5 million respectively. Still, with so few non-summer weekends having four movies making over $11 million is a rarity, so the box office was fairly evenly distributed. Despite being knocked out of the top spot, Bringing Down the House crossed the $100 million mark in its fourth weekend, while Chicago took advantage of its Oscar wins the previous weekend to bring its total gross up to $144 million.

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Next week, HELLBOY!!!!!!!!!!! And a couple other movies that don’t matter nearly as much: The Rock stars in the revenge drama remake Walking Tall, Julia Stiles stars in the romance The Prince & Me, and Disney releases their animated farmyard comedy Home on the Range.

Copyright 2004 Edward Douglas