'U-571' Cracks Box Office Code
By Dean Goodman
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - North American moviegoers
saluted another war movie at the weekend as the submarinethriller ''U-571'' launched at No. 1, according to studio estimates
issued on Sunday.
The fiction feature, which takes place during the Second World War and stars Matthew
McConaughey, ended the two-week reign of the military courtroom drama ``Rules of
Engagement,'' which slipped to No. 3.
``U-571'' pulled in about $20.3 million for the Friday-to-Sunday period, its distributor, Universal Pictures, said. If estimates hold when final data are issued on Monday, it will rank
as the second-best April opener ever, behind the Eddie Murphy prison comedy ``Life,'' which bowed to $20.4 million last year.
``Rules of Engagement'' (Paramount), which stars Tommy Lee Jones and Samuel L. Jackson, earned $8 million, taking its 17-day total to $43 million. In between was the new
release ''Love & Basketball'' (New Line), with $8.4 million.
``U-571,'' which revolves around a bold mission to capture a secret Nazi coding device from a German submarine, also stars Bill Paxton, Harvey Keitel and rocker Jon Bon Jovi.
The audience for the $62 million movie was slightly more male than female and was split evenly on each side of the 30-year age divide, Universal Distribution President Nikki Rocco said.
McConaughey, whose recent efforts (''EDtv'' and
``Amistad'') have underperformed at the box office, has
cause for celebration since ``U-571'' marks his second-best
opener after 1997's ''Contact,'' which lifted off with $20.5
million. Universal has two other movies in the top 10: ``Erin
Brockovich'' at No. 6 and ``The Skulls'' tied at No. 9.
According to Exhibitor Relations Co., which collects the studios' estimates, the top 12 films
this weekend grossed a total of $76.6 million, up 12 percent from last weekend and up 34 percent from the year-ago weekend, when ``The Matrix'' was No. 1 with $12.6 million.
One other wide release this weekend failed to make the top 10. The teen thriller ``Gossip'' opened at No. 12 with $2.3 million, a number termed disappointing by the film's distributor,
Warner Bros.
Opening in limited release was director Sofia Coppola's ''The Virgin Suicides'' (Paramount Classics), a tale of love, lust and obsession, which grossed $238,000 from 18 theaters for a
stellar average of $13,222. By contrast, the top average in the top 10 was $7,859 for ``U-571.''
Among last weekend's new entries, actor-director Ed Norton's romantic comedy ``Keeping the Faith'' (Touchstone) enjoyed the best hold, losing just 10 percent of its audience as it
slipped two places to No. 5 with $7.3 million. Its 10-day total stands at $18.7 million.
One rank ahead was Sandra Bullock's ``28 Days'' (Columbia) with $7.4 million, a 28 percent fall from last weekend. It too was down two places as its 10-day total stood at $22.2 million.
Not so fortunate was the slasher satire ``American Psycho'' (Lions Gate), which lost 45 percent of its audience and tumbled four places to No. 11 with $2.7 million. Its 10-day total stands at $9.7 million.
Universal Pictures is a unit of Seagram Co. Ltd. (Toronto:VO.TO - news). New Line Cinema and Warner Bros. are units of Time Warner Inc. (NYSE:TWX - news). Paramount Pictures and Paramount Classics are units of Viacom Inc. (NYSE:VIA - news). Columbia
Pictures is a unit of Sony Corp. (6758.T). Touchstone Pictures is a unit of Walt Disney Co. (NYSE:DIS - news). Lions Gate Films is a unit of Lions Gate Entertainment Inc. (AMEX:LGF - news).
and Harvey "I like to show my penis in art films" Keitel star as 2 of
a group of U.S. Navy guys trying to retrieve a German code machine known as the
Enigma (at least to the Allies) off of a damaged U-Boat. The catch is the
the navy guys tricking the Germans to let them on the ship long enough to get
the machine. Of course since it is a movie, everything goes wrong and the
U.S. guys get stuck on the German sub and have to get home. Sounds like a
good cinematic romp on the high seas. And it is. U-571 is a pretty
good war picture. It did not focus too much on developing a lot of the sub
characters with only Matthew McConaman getting the most character time to be
different at the end of the film than he was at the beginning. Everyone
else stays pretty much the same. Scared crapless when they are being 
bombarded
by depth charges and torpedos. If you want to be entertained on a purely
surface level (sort of speak) then U-571 is your movie. You sit there to
see if the good guys will get the Enigma into Allied hands or will the Nazi
bastards continue to send coded messages that lead to 1000s of ships and subs to
be destroyed. There are not a lot of action sequences, just about 3 really
long bits such as the invasion of the boat, the disaster of the aftermath, and
the battle with the German destroyer which takes up most of the last half of the
movie. The acting is satisfactory, but nothing is in the script that will
cause someone to break out in an acting tour de force. If you do not think
about the several logic problems with the film, then you will like it. So,
what are the problems? Well, for one thing, there is no character
development. When people are killed or do something heroic, you still
don't know who these soldiers are. In fact there are several people that
we assume are just killed in an explosion even though we never see them
killed. About 10 minutes later you do realize that these actors are
gone. This can be frustrating for the audience especially since there are
several of these dead actors that are very familiar to the movie crowd and would
have liked to see them continue or least go out on screen. The other part
of the film that is poor
is the set up for the invasion of the German sub. The main navy guys have
to be trained as they head out to the sub and out of about 50 people, only 2 of
them can speak fluent German. Huh? You have to pretend to be from a
German ship and no one can speak German, so when the Germans see that they are
being screwed, the U.S. guys can't understand why they are getting shot
at. The other thing is the drawn out battle with the large German
ship. This battle goes on forever and the tag line of "splashes"
will have you rolling your eyes it's said so many times. Also,
believability is thrown out the water when McConadoodledoo's sub is able to go
one one one with the Super Duper German Mega Ship. If Hitler knew that he
had these inept soldiers out fighting for the super race, he would have made a
whole new set of ovens. There are some historical problems like the
British are the ones that did most of the Operation Get Enigma missions during
World War II with the United States doing it just a couple of times.
Go to the library and learn the real story if you really care. The other
thing that is a little weird is seeing Bill Paxton as the Captain. It is
difficult to take him seriously in this role. I know it would really suck
if Paxton told me I was not good enough to command a sub like he told
Mcconabongo in the movie. Overall, I did like the movie. It is
far from being the greatest war movie ever. It is pretty much a rip off of
Das Boot. Final Review: 2 1/2 stars out of 5; 6 out of 10; B-;
thumbs up. An entertaining pre-summer season movie. 
college. The catch is they both like to play basketball, but only the guy
will get respect for his talent while the girl will be laughed at for trying to
become a star in a "man's game." The movie reunites Omar Epps
and Sanaa Lathan from "The Wood" as the two ball crossed
lovers. Epps is still trying to break out as the next Cuba Gooding
Jr, while Lathan is just trying to be remembered at all. This movie did not get
a lot of publicity, but romantic movies like this with some kind of hook like
the girl trying to compete in basketball can help get guys to go with their
girlfriends. Recent publicity for the movie is also promoting that in the
big love scene between Epps and Lathan they show them breaking out a condom. The
producers believe that by showing that, then teenagers will be more apt to use a
rubber when they knock boots. I can see it now:
