A below-expectations turn-out for Angels & Demons and good word-of-mouth for Star Trek helped make it a surprisingly close battle for the weekend’s #1 spot. Studio estimates have the Dan Brown sequel at $48 million, beating out Trek by about $5 million. $48 million is nothing to sneeze at, but The Da Vinci Code opened to $77 million in the same weekend two years ago, which indicates that the anticipation for the sequel probably wasn’t there to the extent necessary to sustain a blockbuster franchise. I am sure that the third Robert Langdon novel due this fall will see its way to the screen — but maybe it’ll be a little cheaper, and released sometime other than the summer. Star Trek , on the other hand, is turning out to be the perfect summer film. It dropped off just 43% in its second weekend, which is bloody fantastic for a movie that opened to $75 million. It’s already the highest-grossing Trek entry, but that’s kind of a no-brainer. If word-of-mouth keeps it afloat, it will end up as one of the biggest movies of the summer. With no new contenders hitting their demographic, the holdover family offerings — 17 Again and Monsters vs. Aliens — saw tiny drops, but that may change next week. Monsters vs. Aliens is also currently the biggest grosser of 2009, but that will change soon too. The full top 10 after the jump. Filed under: New Releases , Box Office Continue reading Weekend Box Office: ‘Demons’ Barely Beats Out ‘Trek’ Permalink | Email this | Comments

A below-expectations turn-out for Angels & Demons and good word-of-mouth for Star Trek helped make it a surprisingly close battle for the weekend’s #1 spot. Studio estimates have the Dan Brown sequel at $48 million, beating out Trek by about $5 million. $48 million is nothing to sneeze at, but The Da Vinci Code opened to $77 million in the same weekend two years ago, which indicates that the anticipation for the sequel probably wasn’t there to the extent necessary to sustain a blockbuster franchise. I am sure that the third Robert Langdon novel due this fall will see its way to the screen — but maybe it’ll be a little cheaper, and released sometime other than the summer. Star Trek , on the other hand, is turning out to be the perfect summer film. It dropped off just 43% in its second weekend, which is bloody fantastic for a movie that opened to $75 million. It’s already the highest-grossing Trek entry, but that’s kind of a no-brainer. If word-of-mouth keeps it afloat, it will end up as one of the biggest movies of the summer. With no new contenders hitting their demographic, the holdover family offerings — 17 Again and Monsters vs. Aliens — saw tiny drops, but that may change next week. Monsters vs. Aliens is also currently the biggest grosser of 2009, but that will change soon too. The full top 10 after the jump. Filed under: New Releases , Box Office Continue reading Weekend Box Office: ‘Demons’ Barely Beats Out ‘Trek’ Permalink | Email this | Comments

Movie audiences this weekend, as expected, heavily favored movies about guys with claws: 1. X-Men Origins: Wolverine - Neither an early internet leak nor hundreds of awful reviews could stop Hugh Jackman-cuts-through-things from grossing $87 million . 2. Ghosts of Girlfriends Past - $15.3 million . It’s like no one even cares about Matthew McConaughey learning valuable lessons by magically revisiting his sexual past. 3. Obsessed - $12.2 million . With so many losing their jobs, Americans needed to be reminded how great it was before the economic crash, when everyone had a great career, a hot temp at work obsessed with them, and Beyonce as a wife. 4. 17 Again - $6.4 million . Ah, to be 17 again. I would waste so much time playing StarCraft , again. 5. Monsters vs. Aliens - $5.8 million . Still? Weekend Box Office Results [Box Office Mojo]

Many hard-earned money rectangles were spent this weekend, many of them going towards seeing these five films: 1. 17 Again - A respectable $24.1 million , proving Zac Efron can do more than play a singing, dancing high school basketball player. He can also play a high school basketball player who is secretly older. 2. State of Play - 14.1 million taut, thrilling dollars. 3. Monsters Vs. Aliens - $12.9 million , holding onto the third place position for the second straight week. Guess they didn’t get the memo that third place is second place loser : NO FEAR. 4. Hannah Montana: The Movie - $12.7 million , giving it over $50 million in total. I’d think that would be enough profit to warrant a sequel, so here’s what I’m thinking: Hannah Montana gets so popular that the character within the movie is offered her own movie. Meta! But there’s a problem: the producers notice Miley on the street and demand she plays Hannah’s sister! How is she going to work that out when they’re the same person??? Ut-oh! Pretty good, right? 5. Fast and Furious - $12.3 million and FURIOUS. Weekend Box Office Results [Box Office Mojo]

Hey, have you ever thought why movies destroy Planet Earth so often? Lisa Kennedy of The Denver Post did, and not only could she not understand why, but she concluded that doing so was very unethical because it’s scary . If you can’t help but relish or understand the War Against the Machines, she begs you to at least think of the children: “Even films pitched to the kids aren’t safe. A lavish action sequence in the enjoyable 3-D spectacle Monsters vs. Aliens gleefully wrecks the Golden Gate Bridge. As beloved as it is by critics, the opening scenes in WALL-E of an uninhabitable metropolis suggest filmmakers don’t think hard enough about the impact visions of apocalyptic or post-cataclysmic landscapes might have on developing imaginations. Too often, they’re feeding the pleasures of their own inner kid or teen.” You know, call me crazy but I think Andrew Stanton actually really thought about that opening sequence. I believe he may have had a specific meaning in mind, something along the lines of “if you keep throwing away stuff, you’ll eventually run out of room.” I even think he handled it relatively gently by introducing a dancing robot. No? He was all about flaunting his CGI skills? My bad. Sorry kids, here’s a new toy to numb your emotional trauma. Throw it away when you’re bored. No, trash doesn’t pile up — it turns into rainbows! I’ll freely admit that disaster movies can make annihilation pretty damn insipid, but complaining that Watchmen or WALL-E is irresponsible for showing devastation not only misses the point, but suggests someone is determined to live in a fluffy delusion where landfills don’t even exist (let alone fill up!) and nuclear weapons shower us with lollipops instead of radiation poisoning. Filed under: Sci-Fi & Fantasy , Thrillers , Newsstand , Fan Rant Continue reading Watch Out, Filmmakers! The End of the World is Scary! Permalink | Email this | Comments

I know what you were watching at the theaters this weekend! 1. Hannah Montana The Movie - $34 million . I’m sort of proud I have such a vague understanding of the multiple personas of Miley Cyrus, but at the same time, it’s so enormously popular that I also feel really out of touch. This is Tamagatchis all over again. 2. Fast and Furious - $28.8 million . Vin Diesel fans are legion. 3. Monsters Vs. Aliens - $22.6 million . Not every kid wanted to see Hannah Montana . That shit’s for girls, dude. 4. Observe and Report - $11 million –now the second highest grossing mall security guard movie in America! 5. Knowing - $6.7 million , meaning, even in its fourth week, Nicolas Cage interpreting worrying numbers beat: 8. Dragonball Evolution - $4.7 million . Yikes! Weekend Box Office Results [Box Office Mojo]

You gotta respect Hannah Montana . Where her comrades in arms, the Jonas Brothers, were just recently defeated, she has emerged bloodied but victorious. Her $34 million weekend is roughly on par with her own concert film, which opened to $31 million last February on about a quarter of the screens — I think that range pretty well represents the Hannah Montana brand’s draw at this point in time. Concert Tour dropped pretty swiftly after that, topping out at $65 million; the narrative film may have slightly better legs, though last fall’s High School Musical 3 faded out pretty quickly too. The weekend’s neatest trick is the $11 million for Observe and Report : not a standout opening for Seth Rogen (though slightly stronger than Zack and Miri Make a Porno ), but impressive considering that Observe & Report is basically a twisted art film that doesn’t belong in wide release by any traditional measure. Don’t get me wrong, I’m thrilled that Warners managed to pull this off; I just wanted to highlight the achievement. Given that the movie has even freaked out much of the usually hardy critical community, I’m dying to see how and if it holds up at the box office. The other R-rated comedy that premiered at SXSW, I Love You, Man , has thrived, dropping 17% in its 4th week on its way to a cheerful $75 million. But that movie is, oh, 50 times more accessible. As for Fox’s Dragonball Evolution : not so much. I think they might have been a couple years too late in capitalizing on the brand, as the kids who were really into the franchise when it was hot grew up a bit and lost interest. $4.6 million stings. More, and the top 10, after the jump. Filed under: New Releases , Box Office Continue reading Weekend Box Office: Another Notch on ‘Hannah Montana’’s Belt Permalink | Email this | Comments

1. Fast and Furious - $72.5 million ? That’s ridiculous. I swear, it’s like no one’s seen Vin Diesel drive a sweet car before. 2. Monsters vs. Aliens - $33.5 million , a 44% drop since last week, probably in response to the lackluster ending. The monsters using a laptop to upload a virus into the alien mothership was pretty far fetched. If Macs and PCs aren’t even fully compatible, what are the chances we could plug in a Powerbook and upload a functioning virus? 3. The Haunting in Connecticut - $9.6 million . It’s just so hard to take a haunting in Connecticut seriously when we now know Connecticut’s greatest threat is its psychotic ape population. 4. Knowing - I am slightly disappointed that Adventureland only made $6 million but Nicolas Cage-predicts-disasters-with-numbers still pulled in $8.1 million in its third week. Such is Cage’s power. 5. I Love You, Man - Male-on-male non-sexual affection earns another $7.9 million . Weekend Box Office Results [Box Office Mojo]

Seth Rogen stars in the No. 1 movie in America, ema href=”http://movies.tvguide.com/monsters-vs-aliens/296965?rss=movie-news”Monsters vs. Aliens/a,/emnbsp;along with heavy-hitters Reese Witherspoon, Kiefer Sutherland, Hugh Laurie, Will Arnett and Rainn Wilson. Check out TV Guide Network’s chat with the hilarious cast and find out which actor likens his brainless blob of a character to Rush Limbaugh, and who would like to be considered for a role as the next emBond/em villain. Watch the video after the jump! br /brpa href=”http://movies.tvguide.com/movie-news/video-meet-cast-1004647.aspx?rss=movie-news”Read More /a/pbr /brpstrongstrongOther Links From TVGuide.com/strong/strongul lia href=”http://movies.tvguide.com/monsters-vs-aliens/296965?rss=movie-news”Monsters Vs. Aliens/a/li /ul

1. Monsters vs. Aliens - $58.2 million That expensive 3-D SuperBowl ad seems to have worked out better for Monsters vs. Aliens than it did for whatever Sobe drink those geckos were dancing about. 2. The Haunting in Connecticut - $23 million . Connecticut is to this haunting as New York is to Seinfeld . Believe it. 3. Knowing - $14.7 million . Come on, down to third place in it second week? Do you guys not realize how often Nicolas Cage gives intense, dumbfounded stares in this one? You need to keep seeing it every weekend if we’re going to make it our national movie. 4. I Love You, Man - $12.6 million , BRO. 5. Duplicity - $7.6 million , meaning this film is officially not successful enough to warrant creating a cute combination nickname for the hypothetical coupling of Julia Roberts and Clive Owen. Weekend Box Office Results [Box Office Mojo]