THURSDAY, JANUARY 4, 2001

Tom Hanks Rings in 2001 As Box-Office Champion

By Dean Goodman

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Tom Hanks entered the new millennium as the most popular star at the North American box office, selling about $41.5 million worth of tickets to his desert island drama, ``Cast Away,'' during the four-day New Year's holiday weekend.

According to studio estimates, ``Cast Away'' (Fox) has pulled in $111.2 million from movie theaters across the United States and Canada after two weekends at No. 1. It passed the century mark on Sunday, its 10th day of release.

``Cast Away'' and several other hit films helped push overall receipts for the Friday-to-Monday period to an estimated $181.8 million, the trade paper Daily Variety reported in its Tuesday edition, quoting tracking service ACNielsen EDI.

If those numbers hold up when final data are issued on Tuesday, 2000 grosses would total $7.45 billion, Daily Variety reported, up 2 percent from the 1999 record of $7.31 billion.

Also hitting a ton was Mel Gibson's ``What Women Want'' (Paramount), which held steady at No. 2 with $25.4 million for the weekend. The romantic comedy has grossed $114.8 million after three weekends; it reached $100 million on Saturday, its 16th day.

Hanks plays a plane-crash survivor stranded on a South Pacific desert island for four years, while Gibson plays a macho ad exec who can suddenly read women's thoughts. Twentieth Century Fox is a unit of Fox Entertainment Group Inc. Paramount Pictures is a unit of Viacom Inc.

Bullock Vehicle Progresses

The Sandra Bullock comedy ``Miss Congeniality'' made good headway toward $100 million as it jumped two places to No. 3 in its second weekend, with ticket sales of $18.2 million. After 11 days, the Warner Bros. film has pulled in $45.3 million. Bullock plays an FBI agent who goes undercover at a beauty pageant. Warner Bros. Pictures is a unit of Time Warner Inc.

Snowstorms in the Northeast hurt ticket sales, studio executives said. Warner Bros. Distribution President Dan Fellman estimated ``Miss Congeniality'' could have pulled in an additional $1 million if not for the bad weather.

One-quarter of the 162 theaters showing 10th-ranked ''Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon'' were in Boston, New York and Philadelphia, said Sony Pictures Classics spokesman Tom Prassis. Director Ang Lee's Mandarin-language martial arts romance grossed $4.7 million, taking its 26-day haul to $13.6 million. The studio is a unit of Sony Corp.

Rounding out the top five were the Nicolas Cage romantic comedy ``The Family Man'' (Universal), which slipped one place to No. 4 with $16.8 million, and the Walt Disney Pictures cartoon ''The Emperor's New Groove,'' which rose one place to No. 5 with $14.5 million. Their respective totals are $43.2 million after two weekends and $50.6 million after three weekends.

Universal Pictures is a unit of Vivendi Universal, and Walt Disney Pictures is a unit of Walt Disney Co.

Over-25s See ``Horses''

Opening at No. 11 with $4.3 million was director Billy Bob Thornton's Western romance ``All the Pretty Horses,'' starring Matt Damon and rising Spanish beauty Penelope Cruz. The audience was primarily aged 25 and over, said Miramax Films spokesman David Kaminow. Miramax is a unit of Disney.

The limited-release arena included several new films. Director Steven Soderbergh's acclaimed drug drama ``Traffic'' (USA Films), starring Michael Douglas, scored $240,000 from four screens (two in New York, one each in Los Angeles and Toronto). It widens to 1,500 prints on Friday.

Kevin Costner's Cuban missile crisis drama ``Thirteen Days'' (New Line), directed by Roger Donaldson, blasted off with $175,000 from eight screens (four each in New York and Los Angeles) in its first full weekend. For a movie set in 1962, the film is pulling in a surprisingly high number of viewers aged under 25, said studio spokesman Steve Elzer. The film expands to 2,000 runs on Jan. 12.

``Shadow of the Vampire,'' a comedy revolving around the 1922 German horror film ``Nosferatu,'' scared up $150,000 from six screens (three each in New York and Los Angeles). The Lions Gate film stars arthouse favorites Willem Dafoe as actor Max Schreck and John Malkovich as director F.W. Murnau. It widens to 500 screens on Jan. 26.

USA Films is a unit of USA Networks Inc.. New Line Cinema is a unit of Time Warner. Lions Gate is a unit of Lions Gate Entertainment Inc.

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Following are the final data for the top 10 movies at the North American box office during the December 29-January 1 New Year's holiday weekend, according to studio figures released Tuesday by Exhibitor Relations Co. Inc.

Film Four-day Cumulative

1. Cast Away .......... $40,038,715 

BOX OFFICE SO FAR:  $109,689,440

2. What Women Want .......... $26,408,527 

BOX OFFICE SO FAR:  $115,761,883

3. Miss Congeniality .......... $19,187,211 

BOX OFFICE SO FAR:  $46,382,671

4. The Family Man .......... $16,746,030 

BOX OFFICE SO FAR:  $43,144,370

5. The Emperor's New Groove .......... $14,666,471 

BOX OFFICE SO FAR:  $50,812,284

6. How The Grinch Stole Christmas .......... $9,024,650 

BOX OFFICE SO FAR:  $253,367,455

7. Vertical Limit .......... $8,265,568 

BOX OFFICE SO FAR:  $51,880,114

8. Dracula 2000 .......... $7,331,064 

BOX OFFICE SO FAR:  $21,569,567

9. Dude, Where's My Car? .......... $5,847,749 

BOX OFFICE SO FAR:  $35,631,910

10. All The Pretty Horses .......... $4,860,556 

BOX OFFICE SO FAR:  $9,037,022

Reuters/Variety REUTERS

JOHN L.:  It is the beginning of a new year, a new millennium if you will and the movie houses seem to be packing them in better than expected.  My hope for the new year is that Hollywood stops releasing movies in just New York and Los Angeles for a month before releasing them wide.  It is very annoying to read about critics saying "Traffic" and "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" are the best films of the year when they can't be seen by the majority of the people.  This is one of the reasons "Almost Famous" did not do as well as it was hoped.  This week's victim of the limited release/wide release blues is "All the Pretty Horses."  It barely made it to the top ten this week.  However, that movie has other problems.  Grinch, What Women Want, and Castaway were released wide immediately and are hits.  Crouching Tiger could be among the monster successes, but for some reason the people in charge refuse to put it in theaters across the country.  I am not even sure it's playing in my state.  Quick report this week, so let me get ATPH out of the way and end this thing.

All the Pretty Horses is the latest attempt by Hollywood to make a best selling book into a profitable movie and failing.  Bridges of Madison County was a big success for Eastwood and Streep and some John Grisham films make a lot of money, but a lot of these literary works don't work.  Look at the average Stephen King opus.  Horse Whisperer directed by Robert Redford was mildly successful but not huge.  Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil bombed big time.  This week, we have a movie based on a book that was on the best seller lists for several weeks.  I work in a library and remember when it was out and very popular.  The director, Billy Bob Thorton-Jolie, seemed to want to put the entire book on film and came up with a 3 hour and 50 minute film.  The producers said uhh, no, that's too long, cut it.  It seems that the story was not epic enough to carry a film of that length like a Titanic or a Gone With the Wind so BBT had to edit the film down to 2 hours and 15 minutes.  As soon as anyone hears that, they say I'll wait for the directors cut on video.  Massive edit publicity always hurts a film especially nowadays when DVD's can show all the extra footage.  The plot has Matt Damon doing a very bad southern accent falling in love with the current hot sexy mama who no one cares about except publicists, Penelope Cruz.  It seems that her dad does not like the relationship which leads to Damon going to jail and being stabbed in the face.  The problem with putting a popular book to film is that the people who read the book are more likely to avoid the film since it is quite known that the movie is never as good as the book.  Only people that have heard that the book was good will go see it.  Another problem is a trailer that seems to show the entire film.  Bad trailers always hurt a movie.  When people want to make a popular book into a movie, they should try to stick to a network mini series where more of the book can be used.  A 4 hour movie can be stretched out to 2 to 3 nights on TV easily.  Roots was a best seller, but a 2 hour movie would not have done it justice.  Look for the uncut version in a few months on DVD.  If its not released with at least an extra 30 to 45 minutes of extra footage, it will do no better than it is doing now.

REST OF THE TOP 10 IN 10:

1.    Tom Hanks and Robert Zemekis are now the super couple of Hollywood.

2.    Mel Gibson has the honor of being the first actor to be in 3 movies to gross more than a $100 million in the same year with those being What Women Want, Chicken Run, and The Patriot.

3.    I am shocked that Castaway is making as much money as it is when most people think it is well acted but a bit lacking in any real drama.

4.    Sandra Bullock may finally have a hit on her hands with Miss Congeniality making so much money in its second week which has been unheard of for one of her films in the last several years.

5.    People really had nothing to do over the weekend to be able to keep Family Man in the top five.

6.    A couple of weeks ago it looked like Emperor's New Groove was going to bomb, but now it is becoming a solid performer.

7.    When will people start using the Grinch as a term of good cheer instead of meanness since at the end of the movie and book and cartoon he turns face and has the true Christmas spirit.

8.    Vertical Limit is still hanging in there with that extra hook still attached to the side of the mountain.

9.    Dracula 2000 is definitely being victimized by a Y2K bug of its own.

10.    Dude, where's my money back?

That is all for this week.  Check out my Year 2000 look back at the movies as well as my report on the marketing of violence to children.  Bye for now.