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THE BATTLE CRY!

Part of me feels like this week’s rant is something that I’ve already done before, but that’s kind of appropriate because I’m really starting to wonder if there’s any point to all of these remakes I keep writing about.

In the last few years, I’ve had many chances to ask this question of actors and filmmakers who make these movies, and I almost always get the same answer: that they wanted to do something different with the premise for new and younger audiences who might not have seen the original.

Of course, anyone who wasn’t born when the original movies came out could just as easily get the DVDs on Netflix, and I’d hope that at least a few of the younger horror fans will do just that in order to know the roots of these remakes, but one has to wonder whether any of the original movies will stand up to the test of time. After all, many of them were never that great in the first place. These were cult films, midnight movies that were effective in their shocks and scares because at the time, they were new and original, offering chilling ideas that hadn’t been seen at the time. Those of us who were young at the time were probably just as excited about the thought of seeing nudity and gore, both of which have been upped drastically for the newer versions of those movies. Thirty years later, a lot of these things have become horror clichés, the type that are spoofed and satired by clever filmmakers like Eli Roth, Wes Craven, James Gunn, Edgar Wright and Scott Glosserman, who end up making much better movies than those still trying to rehash old premises.

While remakes like The Italian Job and Ocean’s 11 and yes, even The Departed, have done something new or original with the concepts and improved them by casting some of today’s strongest actors, the horror genre hasn’t been so lucky. Maybe I’m just too much of a horror snob or a curmudgeon, but it doesn’t seem like any of the recent horror remakes have been able to surpass the originals or make them that much better. Sure, the filmmakers have a lot more money to work with and up-to-date ideas and technology to make more timely films, and it certainly makes good financial sense, since a remake can be done fairly cheaply and make back its money long before its DVD release. But really, have any of the recent remakes achieved anything that will make people remember them in 20 to 30 years time, as they have the originals? Probably not, and it’s a shame that the ease of remaking something often keeps filmmakers from trying out original horror ideas, so there aren’t nearly as many new ideas as there were back in the '70s.

Of course, anyone who’s seen the original movies can’t help but spend the entire movie comparing the remakes to them, even if it’s subconsciously, and you have to wonder when younger moviegoers will get sick of being force-fed new versions of their parents’ classics and they’ll stop being profitable. I don’t expect this week’s remake offering, The Hitcher, to have any problems making back its presumably small production budget, but there has to be some boundaries and eventually, someone will try to remake something that moviegoers consider sacred and get burnt for it. It hasn’t happened yet, but you know it’s coming.

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THE WEEKEND PREDICTIONS: (final update 1.18)

TW	LW	Title	Weekend (in millions)	Change	# Of Theaters	Average	Week
1	New	The Hitcher	$17.6	N/A	2,831	$6,217	1
2	1	Stomp the Yard	$11.3	-48%	2,051	$5,510	2
3	2	Night at the Museum	$11.0	-39%	3,483	$3,158	5
4	4	Dreamgirls	$7.7	-6%	2,214	$3,568	6
5	3	The Pursuit of Happyness	$5.9	-33%	3,066	$1,924	6
6	5	Freedom Writers	$4.8	-36%	2,286	$2,100	3
7	24	The Queen	$4.4	300%	1,586	$2,774	17
8	6	Children of Men	$3.8	-41%	1,524	$2,493	4
9	16	Pan's Labyrinth	$3.3	65%	609	$5,419	2
10	7	Alpha Dog	$3.1	-48%	1,292	$2,399	2
			Est. Weekend Total $73.10	Est. Avg. Drop-Off -26%		Est. Average PTA $3,556

Following a busy Martin Luther King Jr. holiday weekend, things slow down this weekend with only one new movie in wide release, that being the Platinum Dunes remake of the '80s thriller The Hitcher, starring Sean Bean (AKA Boromir from Lord of the Rings) in the menacing title role. With no competition, the lone horror flick should bring in enough of its indented young audience to be the #1 movie, even if its R-rating and lower theatre count might keep it from hitting the $20 million mark.

The returning movies shouldn’t drop too much, with Dreamgirls getting a nice bump from its Golden Globe wins last night and the usual suspects AKA Ben Stiller’s Night at the Museum and Will Smith’s The Pursuit of Happyness, continuing to bring in business. Others should slowly start slipping away to be gone from the Top 10 with the introduction of four new movies next weekend.

Otherwise, the movies that win Golden Globes like The Queen, Babel, The Last King of Scotland and The Departed, should show up in more theatres this weekend. And who knows? Maybe one or two of them will get into the Top 10. One movie that's defintiely going to make a mark is Guillermo del Toro’s dark fantasy tale Pan’s Labyrinth, which has been getting rave reviews and many critics’ awards as the best foreign film. It's likely to be nominated for an Oscar next Tuesday, but on Friday, it will expand into over 500 theatres, enough to get into the Top 10.

Last year, the sequel Underworld: Evolution slammed into 3,200 theatres where it made nearly $27 million, an average of $8,374 per theatre, while Golden Globe winner Brokeback Mountain expanded nationwide into 1,194 theatres, allowing it to make $7.4 million as it moved up to 5^th place. The only other new movie over the weekend was the spiritual drama End of the Spear, which made $4.7 million in just 1,159 theatres, enough to end up in 8^th place, while another movie about natives, Terrence Malick’s The New World wound up outside the Top 10 with just $4 million. The returning movies held-up well with the Weinstein Company’s animated debut Hoodwinked! moving up a spot to 2^nd place with $10.4 million, followed by Glory Road and Last Holiday with $8.7 million each. The Top 10 movies grossed $87 million, although it’s doubtful that The Hitcher can make enough on its own for this weekend to come close to that amount.

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THE CHOSEN ONE: THE ITALIAN (ITALIANETZ) (Sony Classics)
Starring Kolya Spiridonov, Denis Moiseenko, Sasha Syrotkin, Andrei Elizarov, Vladimir Shipov, Polina Vorobjeva, Olga Shuvalova, Yuri Itskov, Mariya Kuznetsova, Dariya Lesnikova, Nikolai Reutov
Directed by Andrei Kravchuk (The Christmas Miracle); Written by Andrei Romanov (Chelyabumbiya, Mechenye)
Genre: Drama, Family, Foreign
Rated PG-13
Story: A 6-year-old Russian orphan named Vanya (Kolya Spiridnov) is about to be adopted by a young Italian couple, making him the envy of his peers, but he decides to run away from the orphanage to try to find his real mother before he’s taken from the country.

I knew very little about the Russian entry to the ’06 Oscars going in, except that for the longest time, I assumed this was an Italian movie because of its title—actually, “The Italian” is what the other kids at the orphanage half-mockingly dub the film’s young protagonist. The movie is one of those wonderful surprises that come along every once in a while, an old-fashioned family film about a young impressionable boy, trying to find his real mother while being chased by corrupt minders who only see him as a payday from the rich Italian couple looking to adopt him. Andrei Kravchuk’s Russia is a grimy, gritty and crime-filled place, certainly not one where you’d want a young child wandering alone, but there’s something charming and gripping about this emotional tale. It had a pretty big impact on me, since it reminded me of the family adventure movies I remember as a youth, having a very simple premise about a resourceful young protagonist who experiences all sorts of adversity in his quest to find his true mother. It also reminded me a bit of Zhang Yimou’s Riding Alone for Thousands of Miles, a terrific foreign film (also released by Sony Classics) which could be enjoyed by the whole family but went mostly unseen last year. Young Kolya Spidinov is an amazing young actor, one of those kids who seems to have no idea he’s in a movie, so he literally becomes the character, and he’s surrounded by a great cast of satellite characters like Olga Shuvalova as a young prostitute who helps Vanya escape and Maria Kuznetsova as the Madam of the orphanage who will do anything to get Vanya back before the Italian couple returns for him.

The Italian will open in New York and L.A. this weekend, and it’s well worth seeking out.

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THE HITCHER (Rogue Pictures)
Starring Sean Bean, Sophia Bush, Zachary Knighton, Neal McDonough
Directed by Dave Meyers (lots of music videos, including Master P’s Foolish); Written by Jake Wade Wall (When a Stranger Calls), Eric Bernt (Highlander: End Game, Romeo Must Die)
Genre: Drama, Horror, Thriller
Rated R
Tagline: “Never Pick Up Strangers”
Plot Summary: A young couple (Sophia Bush, Zachary Knighton) hit the road on their way to spring break, but when they pick up the mysterious John Ryder (Sean Bean), they’re subjected to a nightmarish journey after he kills someone and frames them for the murder.
Of Note: Michael Bay’s Platinum Dunes, the remakers of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre and The Amityville Horror, go after the 1986 thriller of the same name

Pros: It seems like every week we’re writing about some horror remake or another, and here’s another one from Michael Bay’s Platinum Dunes, the producers of two of the more successful outings, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (2003) and The Amityville Horror (2005), and it uses a similar formula as the former to try to interest older teens that may never have seen or heard of the original movie.

The premise of the original movie offered suitable terror back in a time when people were still hitchhiking and picking up hitchers a lot. (Around the same time, HBO had a popular horror-thriller show called “The Hitchhiker,” but that was a very different animal.) Twenty years later, that trend seems to have died down maybe because teens are smarter, but it’s still a great premise that should offer enough terror that older teens will be able to relate to, as much as teen girls did when they went to see When a Stranger Calls last year. (The movie’s even co-written by the guy who wrote that remake, though I’m not sure that’s a good thing.) Oddly, the original Hitcher had a 2003 straight-to-video sequel, though it’s doubtful that had much of an effect on the decision to remake the original movie.

The 1986 film starred legendary Dutch actor Rutger Hauer in the title role, and for the remake, he’s replaced by England’s Sean Bean, a fine actor who has shown a lot of range, going back to his role as the main baddie in the Michael Douglas thriller Don’t Say a Word, followed by his memorable role as Boromir in Peter Jackson’s The Lord of the Rings trilogy. He also starred in Troy, National Treasure and a couple decent movies that bombed (North Country, The Island) and has been a regular in thrillers like Flightplan and Silent Hill, so he’s definitely a recognizable face among genre fans. The film also stars Sophia Bush from “One Tree Hill,” who appeared in last year’s Stay Alive and the surprise hit John Tucker Must Die, and newcomer Zachary Knighton.

Like The Amityville Horror, the Rogue Pictures release has lucked into an amazingly quiet weekend with no other new movies and few strong returning movies in theatres that might lessen its business. With that in mind, this is one of Rogue’s widest releases with over 2,500 theatres, and if you add a smart marketing campaign that makes it look like The Texas Chainsaw Massacre remake, and it should be a strong draw among guys and girls under 25, even if the older folks are more skeptical. With little else to see, The Hitcher has a strong chance at being the #1 movie, much like Amityville and the 2003 horror film Darkness Falls, both which were the only new movies in the weeks they were released.

Cons: Sean Bean’s really the only known star in the movie, and even he hasn’t proven himself as a box office draw, plus it’s not like his name is mentioned in ads. Even if that’s rarely an issue with horror movies these days (just look at the numbers below for proof), one has to think that having someone in the movie that can do the talk show rounds might help get more people into theatres.

The horror remakes have gotten out of control in the three plus years since The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, and they certainly have been showing the signs of diminishing returns as seen by recent attempts like Black Christmas and Pulse. On the other hand, the ones based on known properties have done fairly well and it seems like $30 million is the minimum gross they can achieve; on a movie like this, that’s still profitable. The Hitcher deliberately looks a lot like The Texas Chainsaw Massacre crossed with the 2001 flop Joy Ride, but if it’s anything like the original movie, younger horror fans looking for a lot of gore might be disappointed by the more psychological aspect of the horror.

This one is directed by another first-time feature director who comes from the world of music videos, and while we’ve seen many directors break out of that mold to do greater things (like the directors of Little Miss Sunshine), one has to be a bit wary when almost every single one of these horror remakes is the works of a first-timer.

The Hitcher’s R-rating might hurt a little bit among the teen audience that often flocks out to movies like this when there’s nothing else to see, and it’s not getting as wide a release as Platinum Dunes’ last two horror remakes (i.e. over 3,000). The smaller genre division of Focus won’t be able to back the movie with as much money as a major studio like New Line or Sony either.

While The Hitcher should be #1, it’s not been that uncommon around this time of year for movies to be #1 without grossing very much. That was the case with Darkness Falls (#1 with just $12 million) and other movies, the most memorable example being Ewan McGregor’s early film Eye of the Beholder in 2000, which was #1 while making less than $6 million!

Comparisons:

Title	Release Date	Theater Count	Previous Box Office (in millions)	Weekend Box Office (in millions)	Average	Total Box Office
Black Christmas	12/25/06	1,544	$7.19	$3.72	$2,412	$15.22
The Hills Have Eyes	3/10/06	2,620		$15.71	$5,996	$41.78
When a Stranger Calls	2/3/06	2,999		$21.61	$7,205	$47.86
The Fog	10/14/05	2,972		$11.75	$3,955	$28.00
House of Wax	5/6/05	3,111		$12.08	$3,882	$32.05
The Amityville Horror	4/15/05	3,323		$23.51	$7,074	$64.26
Dawn of the Dead	3/19/04	2,745		$26.72	$9,735	$58.89
The Texas Chainsaw Massacre	10/17/03	3,016		$28.09	$9,315	$80.15
Darkness Falls	1/24/03	2,837		$12.02	$4,239	$32.54
Eye of the Beholder	1/28/00	1,751		$5.96	$3,404	$16.35
Wolf Creek	12/23/05	1,749		$4.91	$2,806	$16.12
Joy Ride	10/5/01	2,497		$7.35	$2,944	$21.97

Why I Should See It: If you missed the original and are still dumb enough to pick up hitchhikers.
Why Not: Do people even hitchhike anymore? (As someone who never drives, I wouldn’t even know.)
Projections: $15 to 18 million opening; $40 million total.

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OTHER LIMITED RELEASES:

ALONE WITH HER (IFC Films) ­ Colin Hanks (son of Tom) is an obsessive stalker who falls for a young woman (Ana Claudia Talancón) he sees walking her dog at a park and proceeds to rig her apartment with obtrusive hidden cameras that monitor her every move. The official selection of the Tribeca Film Festival opens at New York’s IFC Center on Wednesday, as well as being part of their IFC First Take pay-per-view program. REVIEW
MAFIOSO (Rialto) - Alberto Lattuada’s Italian black comedy gets rereleased in New York on Friday, having not been seen in this country since its limited release in the early ’60s (actually, it played during the New York Film Festival, too). It stars Sordi (The White Sheik) as a car salesman who returns home to Sicily only to be tapped as a hitman for the local don.
SACCO AND VANZETTI (First Run Features) - Peter Miller’s documentary about the biased murder trial of two Italian immigrants, Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti, in Boston during the early '20s with their prison writings voiced by John Turturro and Tony Shaloub. It will open in Boston on Sunday, then in New York on March 23 and L.A. on April 6.

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Next week, things get busy again with four new movies including Joe Carnahan’s third film Smokin’ Aces, the fantasy spoof Epic Movie, Jennifer Garner’s return in Catch and Release, and a werewolf romance movie called Blood and Chocolate. (Such a tough choice.) (Note: I'll be in Park City, UT for the Sundance Film Festival next week, so The Weekend Warrior may be delayed... or in a different format.)

Copyright 2007 Edward Douglas


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