Jeff Bridges is going up against himself (and Tron Legacy) in Ethan and Joel Coen's True Grit (reviews) remake; Ben Stiller, Teri Polo and Robert De Niro lead a family reunion to meet the Little Fockers (reviews) While Director Sofia Coppola takes Stephen Dorff and Elle Fanning on a father/daughter trip Somewhere (Limited, reviews) On Saturday Jack Black goes for BIG laughs in Gulliver's Travels (reviews)
Pamela McClintock of THR
The Christmas rush continues in theaters Wednesday as threequel Little Fockers and the Coen Brothers' Western remake True Grit enter the fray while Fox Searchlight's Black Swan expands nationwide into a total of 1,461 theaters.
Little Fockers, opening in 3,536 runs domestically, has every chance of winning the Wednesday-Sunday race because Disney's Tron: Legacy is playing more narrowly than expected and Fockers is a broad comedy with cross-gender appeal.
There's concern that the 2010 holiday session has gotten off to a sluggish start for bigger studio titles, although comparisons to last year are tough because of Fox megahit Avatar.
Little Fockers is borrowing its release pattern from the 2004 sequel Meet the Fockers, which bowed on the Wednesday before Christmas (the holiday also fell on a Saturday that year). Meet the Fockers grossed $70.5 million for the five days.
However, Universal insiders expect Little Fockers to gross closer to $60 million over the five days, saying threequels often fall off.
Starring franchise players Ben Stiller and Robert De Niro, Little Fockers also sees the return of Barbra Streisand and Dustin Hoffman. Hoffman's last-minute return to the cast required reshoots.
Universal, Relativity Media and Paramount Pictures are equal partners in Fockers, which cost $100 million to make. Paramount is distributing overseas, where the film all but opens day and date.
Originally, Fox was going to open 3D family film Gulliver's Travels Wednesday opposite Fockers and True Grit. At the 11th hour, the studio decided to push back the release to Christmas Day to allow more time for marketing and distance it from other 3D titles.
Paramount opens True Grit in slightly more than 3,000 runs domestically, marking the widest opening ever for Ethan and Joel Coen, whose films usually roll out slowly. True Grit's commercial hopes draw from its cast -- Jeff Bridges, Matt Damon and Josh Brolin -- and the fact that the 1969 True Grit is a classic.
Paramount is looking for True Grit to gross about $20 million for the five days, but rival studio execs say it could do more. Film is tracking best among men...Read more....
Keith Staskiewicz of EW asks: 'Fockers' to outdraw 'True Grit'?
No comments:
Post a Comment