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THE BATTLE CRY!
(If you have anything to say about this or anything else written in the column, feedback and Email is always welcome, and almost always responded to.)

Well, that didn’t take long. Summer’s barely a week old and I’m already sick of it. Nothing against Tom Cruise or Mission: Impossible III, which I thought was just fine, it’s just annoying to think of all the small movies I’m going to write about that are going to get lost in the shuffle of the big blockbusters coming out over the next few weeks.

With that in mind, I was going to write about that this week, but instead, I’m going to feed off a discussion on another message board/Blog, because I thought it was an interesting topic that ties into questions I’ve always had about movie ratings. No, not the PG, R, MPAA thing, but the actual review ratings that critics give movies, whether it be stars, a letter grade or my favorite, some number out of 10.

So let’s say a critic gives Mission: Impossible III four stars, and he gives some Oscar nominated movie four stars later this year. Which one do you think will end up on his/her Top 10 and which will be omitted? Yup, that’s right. Somehow, a summer popcorn flick can get the critics’ highest or second highest rating, and still not be considered worthy enough to make their top 10. The only reason I mention this is because it’s something I’ve been guilty of for many years. I loved movies like Batman Begins, 40-Year-Old Virgin, Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire and the like but when it came time to make my list, I decided to go with the more dramatic films and the better docs. It’s stuff like this that had me doing separate top 10 lists a few years ago, and most of the movies above would end up as honorable mentions.

It's really almost impossible to judge a documentary the same way as you might a dramatic feature or a comedy or a horror film. They’re all just different kinds of movies. Comedies are supposed to make you laugh, horror movies are supposed to scare you, dramas are supposed to move you and documentaries should inform you. If they’re poorly made but they have some effect on you, doesn’t that mean that they should get higher marks because they worked? Far too often, critics will go into a winter/spring comedy, judging it on a par with the previous December’s Oscar fodder, which is quite ludicrous. How can you even compare the two? Shouldn’t something like The Pink Panther be compared on the same scale as other dumb comedies like Benchwarmers? And if that’s the case, it should get rated higher depending how many laughs it gets out of them, whether it be dumb slapstick laughs or genuinely funny ones.

There’s also the matter of critics who can appreciate the filmmaking or acting skills in a movie, but disagree with what the movie seems to be saying or implying, the message, and give it low marks because of it. That’s always seemed kind of strange to me, too.

Not sure why this stuff bothers me so much, not only for my own work but also others, but it always makes me wonder why with rare exceptions, summer movies can’t be held to the same standards as fall Oscar fodder. Then again, let's not forget that Crash came out in the middle of the summer last year. I gave it 10/10, put it high in my Top 10 list, and then it ended up winning the Oscar for best picture. So obviously, there’s no reason why summer releases can’t be as good as the movies that come out in November or December, so let's hope we get some this year.

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THE CHOSEN ONE:

RUSSIAN DOLLS (IFC Films)
Starring Romain Duris, Cécile de France, Audrey Tautou, Kelly Reilly, Zenedine Soualem, Aïssa Maïga
Written and directed by Cédric Klapisch (L’Auberge Espagnole)
Genre: Comedy, Romance, Drama
Story: As he nears his 30^th birthday, Xavier (Romain Duris), the central character in Cédric Klapisch’s L’Auberge Espagnole, has been working as a writer in France, but he’s still in contact with many of the people he roomed with in Spain five years earlier including his former obsession Martine (Audrey Tautou), now a single mother; the wacky lesbian Isabelle (Céceile de France); and the British beauty Wendy (Kelly Reilly).

I recommend this new romantic comedy sequel to L’Auberge Espagnole with a bit of trepidation. I think that fans of the original movie will enjoy seeing some of the characters again, and others should appreciate Xavier’s search for love and his relationships with various women, but in some ways, it lacked some of the magic of L’Auberge. That first film really was quite magical, a breakout hit in France, earning seven César (French Oscar) nominations and winning one for Cécile De France, as “most promising actress.” Surprisingly, most of the actors have returned to their roles after going on to greater success after appearing in the original. Last year, L’Auberge star Romain Duris appeared in the excellent crime thriller The Beat That My Heart Skipped, and Cécile De France starred in the horror-thriller High Tension and Around the World in 80 Days, while Kelly Reilly was recently seen au naturel in Stephen Frears’ underrated Mrs. Henderson Presents. Of course, Audrey Tautou was coming off her worldwide hit Amelie back in 2002, and she was already on her way to becoming a superstar when she appeared in L’Auberge Espagnole, which preceded her turn in the thriller Dirty Pretty Things. (Tautou will get appear in her most high profile movie next week, when she stars opposite Tom Hanks in The Da Vinci Code.) It’s pretty amazing that she took the time to return to her character from L’Auberge, even though she plays a smaller part in the story than last time. It’s nice seeing all of these great actors back together again, but in some ways, you can tell that some of them feel like they were taking a step back. Still, there’s enough fun bits in the movie to appeal to those who enjoy French romantic comedies. It opens on Wednesday at select theatres.

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NEW THIS WEEK:

POSEIDON (Warner Bros.)
Starring Josh Lucas, Kurt Russell, Emmy Rossum, Jacinda Barrett, Mike Vogel, Jimmy Bennett, Mia Maestro, Andre Braugher, Richard Dreyfuss
Directed by Wolfgang Petersen (The Perfect Storm, Troy, Das Boot); Written by Mark Protosevich (The Cell, upcoming I Am Legend, John Carter of Mars)
Genre: Action, Adventure, Drama, Thriller
Rated PG-13 (for intense prolonged sequences of disaster and peril)
Tagline: “May Day”
Story: On New Year’s Eve, the luxury cruise ship Poseidon is hit by an enormous wave that flips it upside-down stranding thousands of passengers underwater.
Mini-Review: Impressive stunts and massive set pieces are the driving force of this film that

For the most part, it sufferse from some of the same problems as the original, since when it's not in full gear, it tends to drag. None of this cast is going to be nominated for an Oscar, and Lucas may further cement his position as the "worst actor in the history of acting." Still, it's better than a movie like this should be, and that's saying something. Rating: 6/10

Ah, yes. The disaster movie. As much real human tragedy there is in the world, you just can’t keep moviegoers away from theatres, when they get to see lots of death and destruction on a massive scale, and it gives directors a chance to flex their effects and budgetary muscle. Disaster movies like Jan de Bont’s Twister, Michael Bay’s Armageddon, the similar Deep Impact and Roland Emmerich’s The Day After Tomorrow have all done wonders at bringing people into theatres, with the latter earning $186 million after an $85 million 4-day

For director Wolfgang Petersen, it’s another chance to explore his fixation with boats and water that started way back with his first Oscar-nominated film Das Boot in 1981, and continuing into his 2000 hit The Perfect Storm. Even his last movie, the Greek epic Troy, had a prominent boat scene, but Poseidon takes his obsession to the next level, as he remakes Irwin Allen’s classic 1972 disaster movie, The Poseidon Adventure, based on Paul Gallico’s novel. The movie successfully began a long run of disaster films like Earthquake and The Towering Inferno, and considering the recent success of original disaster films, it seemed almost rife for the remake treatment with Peterson spending almost $160 million to do it.

Unlike Peterson’s last two films, Poseidon doesn’t have the added box office draw of a major star like George Clooney or Brad Pitt, instead relying more on the combined efforts of an ensemble cast, much like the original. The most bankable star is probably Kurt Russell, making a return to action-adventure movies after an extensive foray into family films like last year’s Sky High and Dreamer. For Russell, this movie is a return to the type of movie that he's been very popular in like when he starred in the 1991 Ron Howard action-drama Backdraft. He’s joined by an actor who Hollywood has hoped to turn into a bankable star, Josh Lucas, although he’s yet to make any waves (sorry for the bad pun) with his last few movies. At least this year’s basketball drama, Glory Road, did better than the high-flying Rob Cohen action film Stealth did last summer.

If things weren’t bad enough for 19-year-old Emmy Rossum, being killed in Clint Eastwood’s Mystic River, being wooed by a hideous murderer in Joel Schumacher’s version of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s Phantom of the Opera, and then facing the end of the world in The Day After Tomorrow, she picked the wrong time to go on a boat cruise. She’s joined by former “Real World” star, Australia’s own supermodel Jacinda Barrett, who has been seen in movies like Ladder 49 and Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason. The cast is rounded out by HBO regulars, Freddy Rodríguez from “Six Feet Under” and Dillon from “Entourage,” though neither is featured prominently, and my personal hero, Richard Dreyfuss--anyone who punches Devin Faraci is okay by me!--whose lengthy career dates back over 30 years to summer blockbusters like Steven Spielberg’s Jaws.

Most young folks will probably not have seen the original Poseidon Adventure, if they’ve even heard of it, so they’ll be more drawn to the type of watery destruction that they know Peterson can deliver. Oddly, Irwin Allen’s movie was remade just last year for a Hallmark Channel TV movie, starring has-beens like Rutger Hauer, Steve Guttenberg and Adam Baldwin, but that shouldn’t detract people from a version made on a much grander scale. To show that off, Warner Bros. will be opening Poseidon in IMAX theatres, as well as regular theatres, and that might end up being a huge draw, this being the first big budget disaster movie to open in the larger IMAX format. The marketing and promotion for the movie has been in full gear for months with the most prominent selling piont being the very inventive posters that have been everywhere.

Unfortunately, the movie hasn’t been tracking that well in terms of public awareness and interest, at least when compared to the blockbusters surrounding it like M:i:III and The Da Vinci Code, and Peterson is really the movie’s only big name draw. (Shame that WB isn’t really mentioning him in the commercials, though.) It's doubtful that this will do as well as Petersen's last movie Troy without any real star power, but it also doesn't have the stigma of that movie's R-rating. It seems that moviegoers who avoided M:i:III and those who have already seen it will be looking for something else to see this weekend, and the short running time should mean there are enough screenings for a good amount of walk-in business.

Why I Should See It: Lots of watery death and destruction!!
Why Not: Can’t we just see that by turning on the news for free?
Projection: $35 to 38 million on its way to $120 million by summer’s end.

JUST MY LUCK (20^th Century Fox)
Starring Lindsay Lohan, Chris Pine, Faizon Love, Missi Pyle, Samaire Armstrong, McFly
Directed by Donald Petrie (How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days, Miss Congeniality, Welcome to Mooseport); Written by I. Marlene King (Now and Then, “If These Walls Could Talk”), Amy B. Harris (“Sex and the City”)
Genre: Comedy, Romance
Rated PG-13 (for some brief sexual references)
Tagline: “Good luck charm. Bad luck magnet.”
Story: Ashley Albright (Lindsay Lohan), the luckiest woman in the world with a great job and everything going her way, meets Jake (Chris Pine), a chronic loser, at a costume party, but when they kiss, his bad luck is transferred to her and vice versa. Suddenly, Ashley’s life isn’t going so well, and she needs to find Jake and try to get her luck back from him.

Lindsay Lohan is back!! Yeah, I know it doesn’t seem like she’s really gone away, but this is her first movie since last year’s Herbie Fully Loaded, and it’ll be a good test to see if she has what it takes to have another summer hit on par with Freaky Friday or Mean Girls. (You can read more about what Ms. Lohan has been up to in our Star Spotlight this week)

Although Just My Luck will probably appeal mainly to teen girls, it’s a more grown-up role for Lohan that takes her further into romantic comedy territory, maybe in hopes she can fill the shoes of older actresses like Meg Ryan, Kate Hudson, or Sandra Bullock. For this high premise comedy about a lucky woman who suddenly finds her luck gone after kissing a masked loser, Lohan has been teamed with director Donald Petrie, who has quite a few successful romantic comedies under his belt like Miss Congeniality and How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days. The movie also gets Lohan away from her lifelong connections to Disney, bringing her to 20^th Century Fox, who haven’t really had that much success in the genre.

Lohan’s male co-star Chris Pine hasn’t done much, although he played a similar hunky love interest in The Princess Diaries 2: Royal Engagement, and has appeared on various TV shows. Just My Luck also co-stars another TV favorite, Samaire Armstrong, who has been on shows like “Entourage” and “The O.C.” and more recently starred in the horror flick Stay Alive.

This might be a good time for another movie geared towards women, since the last big romantic comedy Failure to Launch, has already left theatres, and there’s certainly room for a movie like this to do well against the more male-driven blockbusters. Unfortunately, it seems to be fairly low profile compared to Lohan’s last few movies. Fortunately, Fox wisely attached the trailer to Ice Age: The Meltdown, a movie that has been seen by more people than any other film this year, so at least the film’s audience will know it’s out there. It might have trouble getting many screens or much attention away from the much higher profile Poseidon, but Lohan’s box office star power is bonafide, which will make this the first choice for women not interested in watching a boat flip upside-down.

Why I Should See It: Seems like a strong comedy premise for Lohan, which might help get her out of the ‘strictly for teens’ market.
Why Not: Petrie’s resume seems to include a lot of schticky slapstick humor, which is rather prevalent in the trailers and commercials.
Projection: $11 to 13 million opening weekend on its way to $40 million.

GOAL! THE DREAM BEGINS (Touchstone Pictures)
Starring Kuno Becker, Stephen Dillane, Alessandro Nivola, Anna Friel, Marcel Iures, Sean Pertwee
Directed by Danny Cannon (Judge Dredd, I Still Know What You Did Last Summer, various “CSI” shows); Written by Adrian Butchart (I Love Your Work), Mike Jefferies
Genre: Action, Sports, Drama
Rated PG (language, sexual situations and some thematic material including partying)
Tagline: “Every dream has a beginning.” (Now let’s see if anyone cares enough to see this, so maybe it will have a middle and an end, as well.)
Story: Santiago Muñez (Kuno Becker) is a poor Mexican immigrant, living in L.A., when he’s discovered by a British football (AKA soccer) scout (Dillane), who brings him to England to try out for Newcastle United. Despite lots of hardships and obstacles, Santiago will do everything he can to achieve his dream of being a football star.
REVIEW

Buena Vista continues its connections to the world of sports, this time with a movie that takes place in the world of professional football (soccer, to Americans) with the full support of the international football league FIFA. It’s a fairly ambitious project, being the first part of a planned trilogy of movies that follows the young Mexican-American Santiago as he makes his way through the way of professional football. It’s a bit of a gamble thinking that it might find success in the United States, where the sport just isn’t nearly as popular it is in other countries.

The movie is the English debut of Kuno Becker, a Mexican television star who probably isn’t very well known here, although maybe he has some appeal among Mexican and Latino-Americans--him being an immigrant might have particular resonance with that audience, and there should be a potential crossover with football fans in that market, too. Stephen Dillane appears in his second Disney sports drama, after having played Shia LaBeouf’s arch-rival in The Greatest Game Ever Played, while Alessandro Nivola, the underrated star of last year’s Junebug, plays a hot shot veteran of the Newcastle team who helps Santiago on the way. You may have trouble finding anyone who knows who any of these three actors are, so it’s really going to be relying more on the appeal of the sport than the stars.

Fortunately, a lot of younger kids are learning how to play soccer these days, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that their parents would take them to see a movie about the sport, especially considering how Eurocentric this one is. Last year, Will Ferrell found a bit of success in the same weekend with his comedy Kicking & Screaming, but that movie really brought in its audience because of its star. After tons of delays by Miramax, back when they were still with Disney, Steven Chow’s Asian hit Shaolin Soccer failed to find any audience, maybe since they couldn’t decide between dubbing or subtitles. Goal! has similar issues, because a lot of it is told via subtitles, and the rest involves heavy British accents and slang that kids just won’t get. In fact, it’s pretty amazing that Touchstone was able to get a PG rating for this despite there being quite a bit of the drinking and swearing you might expect from a movie about British soccer stars.

The movie has already been released in nine other countries, including the UK, France and Spain, where it’s earned roughly $17 million, not great for a movie about a beloved sport. Still, the sequel Goal! Living the Dream… has already completed production, and one has to assume that it will be completed and released, however poorly the first movie does here. It would be a shame if they’re unable to finish the planned trilogy, although one can expect that DVD rentals and sales will eventually help.

Disney/Touchstone are obviously nervous about a movie geared towards Europeans having any sort of interest with audiences here, which might explain why they’re only giving it a moderate release into 1,000 theatres. Disney’s golf drama The Greatest Game Ever Played opened in a similar number of theatres last September and ended up grossing $15 million after a $3.6 million opening weekend, and that was probably a better marketed than this film. Then again, I’d hate to underestimate the appeal of the movie as I did with Touchstone’s gymnastics movie Stick It, since that found a decent opening weekend audience despite weak marketing.

Why I Should See It: Football/soccer is really the only sport that anyone should care about.
Why Not: I’m probably one of the few Americans who thinks that.
Projection: $2 to 4 million on its way to $10 million tops.

KEEPING UP WITH THE STEINS (Miramax Films)
Starring Daryl Sabara, Jami Gertz, Jeremy Piven, Doris Roberts, Garry Marshall, Cheryl Hines, Richard Benjamin, Daryl Hannah
Directed by Scott Marshall (Spin Cycle); Written by Mark Zakarin (“The L Word”)
Genre: Family, Comedy
Rated PG-13 (for some crude language, nudity and brief drug references)
Tagline: “Something’s not quite kosher.”
Story: 13-year-old Benjamin Fiedler (Spy Kids’ Daryl Sabara) is about to be bar-mitzvahed but his parents (Jeremy Piven, Jami Gertz) are driving him crazy with their exorbitant plans to try to compete with another family. To stir things up, Benjamin invites his estranged grandfather (Garry Marshall) and young girlfriend (Daryl Hannah) to the bar mitzvah, knowing that it will force his father and grandmother to deal with their own family issues.
REVIEW

In a year that’s been all about “keeping it in the family”--example: Thank You for Smoking, directed by Ivan Reitman’s son Jason--Scott Marshall, son of legendary producer/director Gary Marshall, directs his first feature film after working as second unit director and actor in his father’s projects. And what a cast he’s assembled for it, including his own father playing a key role in his first movie in some time. Of course, there’s a bit of irony that the Marshalls would do a movie about a bar mitzvah, since neither of them are Jewish, but apparently, a lot of the rest of their cast is, including former Spy Kid Sabara, “Entourage” star Jeremy Piven, Doris Roberts from “Everybody Loves Raymond,” and teen television star Jami Gertz. It’s quite a mixed ensemble cast, rounded out by Daryl Hannah and Richard Benjamin, but like Miramax’s other recent comedy, Kinky Boots, this will have a very specific audience--Jewish families--but might have trouble getting their interest away from the more prominent studio films.

Why I Should See It: Those who have ever gone through their own bar-mitzvah woes might enjoy laughing at how it’s taken to the extreme in Scott Marshall’s debut.
Why Not: Did he really have to have a scene showing his father’s naked ass? (That’s rhetorical.)

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STAR SPOTLIGHT: Lindsay Lohan

From child model to teen star to pop singer and superstar, the story of Lindsay Lohan might make a good movie in itself, but she certainly wouldn’t have gotten where she is today if not for Walt Disney Studios, who first cast the model in their 1998 remake of The Parent Trap.

Despite that doing decently, it would be another six years before they gave Lohan another gig, casting her opposite Jamie Lee Curtis in their 2003 remake of Freaky Friday, which grossed over $100 million and raised Lohan’s awareness among teen and ‘tween girls, turning her into a bankable star.

As hard as it is to believe, it’s quite impressive that Lohan’s career was basically built on five movies, because that’s all she’s done so far. Freaky Friday was followed by the weaker Confessions of a Teenage Drama Queen, but two months later, she starred in the high school comedy Mean Girls, penned by “Saturday Night Live”’s Tina Fey, which would become her first big solo non-remake hit. Escaping from Disney wouldn’t be that easy though, as she returned to the fold to start opposite the famed VW Bug in Herbie Fully Loaded, which had a weak opening last summer, but ultimately earned over $75 million.

Despite having appeared in only one movie in the last two years, the husky-voiced redhead has been all over the tabloids, getting into fights with the paparazzi, dealing with a divorce between her dysfunctional parents, and getting into feuds with other actresses. Ms. Lohan has also spent a lot of time nursing a profitable career as a pop star with her second album debuting at #20 on the Billboard charts last December.

Her new movie Just My Luck, is more of the type of high-premise romantic comedy that we’d see older actresses do, and it’s unclear if the premise will be as easy to sell as that of her 2004 comedy Mean Girls, although it should offer suitable counter-programming to Poseidon and last week’s M:i:III. Then again, like Tom Cruise, Lohan’s extracurricular activities might prove a turn-off to all but her most diehard fans, and this movie’s appeal might be limited to younger girls. Lohan will get another chance with the grown-ups when she appears in Robert Altman’s A Prairie Home Companion next month.

Title	Release Date	Theater Count	Previous Box Office (in millions)	Weekend Box Office (in millions)	Average	Total Box Office
Herbie Fully Loaded	6/24/05	3,521	$5.04	$12.71	$3,610	$75.39
Mean Girls	4/30/04	2,839		$24.43	$8,606	$86.05
Confessions of a Teenage Drama Queen	2/20/04	2,503		$9.35	$3,736	$29.30
Freaky Friday	8/8/03	2,954	$10.90	$22.20	$7,516	$110.22
The Parent Trap	7/31/98	2,247	$5.06	$11.15	$4,962	$66.30

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ALSO IN LIMITED RELEASE:

British actor Richard E. Grant wrote and directed WAH-WAH (Roadside Attractions), based on incidents from his own childhood living in Southeast Africa during the late ‘60s. About a Boy’s Nicholas Hoult plays a teen trying to deal with a drunken father played by Gabriel Byrne, and mother figures, Miranda Richardson and Emily Watson, who enter and exit his life. Opens in select cities this Friday. Mini-Review: While I’m sure these stories were important enough to first time filmmaker Richard E. Grant to make a movie out of it, it’s pretty much all over the place, jumping between humor and drama in a way that’s not altogether comfortable. Emily Watson, complete with American accident, is the best part of the movie, while Byrne and Richardson tend to overact, with lots of yelling and crying, in the more dramatic sequences. So little is made out of the African setting, clearly the most interesting part of the movie, that it makes you wonder why they bothered to set the story, let alone shoot it, there. Rating: 5.5/10

DEAD MAN’S SHOES (Magnolia Pictures) is a revenge thriller starring Paddy Considine (In America) as a military man who returns home to discover that his mentally-challenged younger brother has been abused and tormented by local drugdealers, so he goes about getting even with them. Directed by Shane Meadows (Once Upon a Time in the Midlands), it opens at New York’s Cinema Village on Friday. Mini-Review: This gritty, blood-laden revenge thriller is fascinating in its ability to bring back memories of Sam Peckinpah’s Straw Dogs and ‘70s classics like Walking Tall, but it also has a surprising amount of very funny built-in humor. It creates for a rather strange film, one that desperately needs subtitles. After an hour, the endless killing starts to wear you down a bit and it hits a bit of a lull until a surprising twist that makes things a bit clearer. Not a great film, but certainly an interesting experiment in genre-blending. Rating: 6/10

Filmmaker Sidney Pollack’s SKETCHES OF FRANK GEHRY (Sony Pictures Classics) is a documentary about the renowned and eclectic architect, who has designed some of the most unusually structured buildings of the last half-century. It opens at the Landmark Sunshine in New York, as does GIULIANI TIME (K Video Productions), an investigative documentary into Rudy Giuiliani’s eight years as the mayor of New York City, culminating in his stepping-up to handle the events of September 11, 2001.

SAVING SHILOH (New Dog Distribution), the third film in the series about the beagle named Shiloh, has a sixth-grader named Marty and his family trying to help the dog’s owner Judd Travers after the truck accident from the previous film, although the town suspects Judd of killing someone. It will open in select cities.

This week’s Pioneer Theatre offering is LIGHT FROM THE EAST, a documentary about the trip by New York’s La Mama theatre group, including filmmaker Amy Grapell, to the newly freed Ukraine to put on a production of “Light from the East,” while dealing with the new political climate that follows the fall of Communism. Opens on Thursday as part of their “Brave New Europe” program.

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THIS WEEKEND IN BOX OFFICE HISTORY:

Not really much to say about the second weekend in May, although the success of Wolfgang Peterson’s Troy and the disaster movie Twister certainly bode well for his remake of Poseidon this weekend. After that, there’s a triplet of high concept comedies including Eddie Murphy’s Daddy Day Care, Jennifer Lopez’s Monster-in-Law and Will Ferrell’s soccer comedy Kicking & Screaming, the latter two opening last year. Five years ago, a young man named Heath Ledger made his solo debut in the medieval adventure A Knight’s Tale and then the following year, veteran actress Diane Lane had a breakout Oscar-nominated hit with the thriller Unfaithful. Also, this year was the release of the famous John Travolta Scientology-fiction bomb Battlefield: Earth, which had an ultra-wide release into over 3,300 theatres, a lot for 2000, but barely made any money and tanked pretty badly after word got around how bad it was.

Title	Release Date	Theater Count	Weekend Box Office (in millions)	Average	Total Box Office
Troy	5/14/04	3,411	$46.87	$13,739	$133.23
Twister	5/10/96	2,414	$41.06	$17,009	$241.89
Daddy Day Care	5/9/03	3,370	$27.62	$8,197	$103.55
Monster-in-Law	5/13/05	3,424	$23.11	$6,748	$82.93
Kicking & Screaming	5/13/05	3,455	$20.16	$5,835	$52.58
A Knight's Tale	5/11/01	2,980	$16.51	$5,541	$56.08
Unfaithful	5/10/02	2,613	$14.07	$5,383	$52.75
The Horse Whisperer	5/15/98	2,039	$13.69	$6,714	$75.37
Battlefield: Earth	5/12/00	3,307	$11.55	$3,493	$21.47

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TW	LW	Title	Weekend (in millions)	Change	# Of Theaters	Average	Week
1	New	Poseidon	$36.8	N/A	3,555	$10,352	1
2	1	Mission Impossible III	$24.5	-49%	4,059	$6,036	2
3	New	Just My Luck	$12.3	N/A	2,541	$4,841	1
4	2	RV	$7.0	-36%	3,536	$1,980	3
5	3	An American Haunting	$3.0	-49%	1,703	$1,762	2
6	4	Stick It	$2.8	-50%	2,009	$1,369	3
7	5	United 93	$2.7	-48%	,1870	$1,444	3
8	New	Goal! The Dream Begins	$2.5	N/A	1,007	$2,483	1
9	6	Ice Age: The Meltdown	$2.3	-44%	1,879	$1,224	7
10	10	Hoot	$2.2	-38%	3,018	$729	2
11	7	Silent Hill	$1.9	-52%	1,550	$1,006	3
			Est. Weekend Total $97.95	Est. Avg. Drop-Off -46%		Est. Average PTA $3,020

Next week, Ron Howard’s The Da Vinci Code, starring Mr. Tom Hanks! And on the completely opposite side of the acting spectrum, there’s wrestler Kane in the thriller See No Evil. Somewhere in the middle are all of the actors providing voices for DreamWorks’ latest animated comedy, Over the Hedge.