This weekend school is out for the Christmas holiday and movie studios are ready for the feast. Yes, it's the Christmas holiday as far as studios are concerned. After all, next week movies roll out on Tuesday instead of Friday in honor of the event. But I get ahead of myself.
National Treasure: Book of Secrets [Read the CB Review] is poised to storm theaters as the easy lock for the weekend's top film. Not only does it have everything you could want in a popcorn action flick, it has the one element that American audiences adore the most: it's a sequel! If there's one thing this summer has taught us, it's that sequels to popular movies generally make pretty good money, even if they completely suck. That's not to say Book of Secrets is a bad movie, just that it's quality is irrelevant. Look for it to possibly even top the record opening I Am Legend [Read the CB Review] achieved last week.
There are four other movies opening in wide release and there's no way of guessing how they'll stack up against each other. The most visible contenders are Tim Burton's wretchedly dark Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street [Read the CB Review] and the oddball Kasdan/Apatow brainchild Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story [Read the CB Review]. Either one could take the number two spot, but frankly either one could fumble as well. Holiday crowds are finnicky folks.
The remaining two, neither of which likely stands a snowball's chance in Florida of making the top five, are depressingly sweet romance flick P.S. I Love You [Read the CB Review] and heady war drama Charlie Wilson's War [Read the CB Review]. Both star Academy Award winners (Hilary Swank and Tom Hanks respectively), but neither one really screams for the attention of the masses. Only expect these to break into the weekend's upper ranks if Dewey or Sweeney tank.
In the midst of all those wide release holiday high rollers come the underdogs, the movies that are getting all the end-of-the-year awards buzz.
Last weekend Atonement [Read the CB Review] barreled it's way into the top ten with tremendous success on a hundred screens. This weekend it broadens its horizon three fold in the hopes of drawing in even more cash. In the face of such massive wide release competition the expansion isn't likely to do the movie much good. It probably won't even be able to hold it's place in the top ten.
The Kite Runner, which is the best movie nobody is going to see, is also expanding to the 300+ mark in the hopes of earning a bit more of the spotlight and and a bit more of the box office take. Not likely. After all, as good as it may be, America isn't big on being depressed during the holidays.
Expanding all the way to nearly 400 screens is the quirky comedy Juno. Even though it's about a young teenage girl getting pregnant there's little hope the recent celebrity gossip fest surrounding Jamie Lynn Spear's own teenage pregnancy announcement will help get this movie into the public eye. The movie stands a chance of sneaking into the top ten, but just barely.
