THURSDAY, JULY 12, 2001

Heavy petting at box office

By Carl DiOrio

HOLLYWOOD (Variety) - The Warner Bros. laffer ``Cats & Dogs'' high-tailed it to the top of the box office heap with a bright-eyed $22 million in estimated ticket sales, while the studio's much-heralded Steven Spielberg pic ``A.I. Artificial Intelligence'' plummeted a worrisome 52% to $14.1 million.

A full-blooded weekend performance by the war-of-the-pets live actioner chased the five-day total to a well-groomed $36 million. ``Cats & Dogs,'' produced for an estimated $60 million including lots of talking-critters f/x, represents Warners' biggest family-picture debut ever.

Miramax/Dimension's horror spoof ``Scary Movie 2'' scared up $21 million in estimated box office to finish No. 2. That compared with a weekend-topping $42.3 million bow for the original ``Scary Movie'' in the same frame last year.

``We're thrilled with this opening and could be poised for another sequel,'' Miramax marketing VP David Kaminow said.

Opening ``Scary 2'' Wednesday on Independence Day likely undercut opening-weekend grosses, Kaminow said, though the same could be argued for ``Cats & Dogs.'' The five-day total for ``Scary 2,'' which cost about $45 million to produce, is an estimated $34.5 million.

Third-place finisher ``A.I.,'' which Warners produced with DreamWorks, has plugged into $59.7 million over its first 10 days.

``It seems to continue the pattern of other big opening films this summer,'' Warners distribution president Dan Fellman said. ``I think we'll settle in, though. The picture is playing to a primarily adult audience, but we're playing to a little bit younger audience than we had been.''

A project of the late Stanley Kubrick taken over by Spielberg, the picture is being distributed by Warners with the studios splitting $100 million in production costs and worldwide box office. Warners also gets a distribution fee.

20th Century Fox's chopsockey actioner ``Kiss of the Dragon'' was the weekend's third opener, finishing No. 4 with $13.6 million after a Friday bow. Some observers saw the Jet Li-Bridget Fonda starrer as playing to overly similar demos as ``Scary 2,'' with both pictures skewing toward young males and doing best with urban audiences.

Fox distribution president Bruce Snyder said the ``Kiss'' performance was smack in the middle of expectations. The picture's negative cost is estimated in the low $20 millions.

Industrywide, the weekend's $130 million in total grosses represented a 10% drop from the same frame a year ago, according to data from box office tracker ACNielsen EDI. But in a year-to-date comparison, 2001 is still 7% ahead of the same span of last year.

Meanwhile, Sony's urban-skewing drama ``Baby Boy'' saw a 44% drop in its sophomore session to $4.8 million. The John Singleton-directed picture, which has an estimated $16 million negative cost, boasts 10-day haul of $20.8 million.

Disney's ``Crazy/Beautiful'' posted second-weekend numbers that were neither, but a modest 23% drop from the $13 million picture's lackluster opening was certainly helpful. Some $3.6 million in new sales moved the 10-day tally to $11.8 million.

Elsewhere, Disney's World War II epic ``Pearl Harbor'' slipped from the top 10, but the $3.2 million in weekend grosses floated the domestic total to $187 million. And Fox's quirky musical ``Moulin Rouge,'' an estimated $48 million-$50 million production, may have sung its way out of the red with another $1.4 million that danced domestic sales to $51 million.

Among specialty pictures, the Miramax laffer ``The Closet'' racked up $215,000 in expanding to 16 locations this weekend from a previous four, marking a top-shelf $13,430 per engagement.

``Everybody's Famous,'' another Miramax comedy, was less renowned among moviegoers this weekend, grossing $17,000 in four Gotham and L.A. locations for a humdrum $4,250 per theater.

Sony Classics' Vietnamese drama ``The Vertical Rays of the Sun'' shone in four Gotham and L.A. locations, reflecting $27,199 in grosses for a per-venue average of $6,800.

And Fox Searchlight's black comedy ``Sexy Beast'' grossed $714,000 in adding 25 theaters for a total 134. A per-venue average of $5,325 goosed the total to $3.1 million.

MGM execs were stoked by results of 818 sneaks in 101 markets for the studio's upcoming laffer ``Legally Blonde.''

Half of the sneaks sold out, with theaters 75% full overall, said marketing and distribution president Bob Levin. Audiences were 25% under 18, while 45% were between 18-25, Levin said.

The Reese Witherspoon starrer opens in 2,000 plus theaters on Friday. Other wide releases set to bow this weekend include Sony's video game adaptation ``Final Fantasy'' and Paramount's Robert De Niro starrer ``The Score.''

Reuters/Variety REUTERS

The top movies in North America -- July 6-8

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Following are the final data for the top 10 movies at the North American box office during the July 6-8 weekend, according to studio figures released Monday by Exhibitor Relations Co. Inc.

Film Three-day Cumulative

Title Gross Gross

1. Cats & Dogs .......... $21,707,617

BOX OFFICE SO FAR:  $35,756,549

2. Scary Movie 2 .......... $20,503,356

BOX OFFICE SO FAR:  $34,013,007

3. A.I. Artificial Intelligence .......... $14,037,488

BOX OFFICE SO FAR:  $59,573,204

4. Kiss of the Dragon .......... $13,304,027

BOX OFFICE SO FAR:  $13,304,027

5. The Fast and the Furious .......... $12,283,220 

BOX OFFICE SO FAR:  $101,385,540

6. Dr. Dolittle 2 .......... $10,466,709

BOX OFFICE SO FAR:  $71,891,189

7. Lara Croft: Tomb Raider .......... $6,727,225

BOX OFFICE SO FAR:  $115,543,168

8. Shrek .......... $6,007,027

BOX OFFICE SO FAR:  $240,560,159

9. Atlantis: The Lost Empire .......... $5,068,438

BOX OFFICE SO FAR:  $69,424,804

10. Baby Boy .......... $4,811,917

BOX OFFICE SO FAR:  $20,780,204

Reuters/Variety REUTERS

John L.:  Surprises still happen at the box office.  Scary Movie 2 was supposed to be a lock for the number one spot, but its per screen average was less than Kiss of the Dragon's.  Scary Movie 2, the definition of an unnecessary sequel.  Cats and Dogs had a fairly decent ad campaign and a neat premise so it attracted a wider audience than the other new movies.  There is a big backlash toward raunchy comedy that had previously been embraced by audiences since 1998 with There's Something about Mary.  This does not bode well for "American Pie 2."  I may get to see C&D later, but not this week.  I did catch SM2 and KOTD so full reviews are ahead.  An overview of the Summer so far is also later in the report.

Cats and Dogs is another movie about talking animals. It is a genre of film that is loved by Hollywood.  In the old days, with Francis the Mule, and Mr. Ed, they used to feed the animals peanut butter to make their lips move.  At least that was the rumor.  Special effects were very primitive and computers as we know them did not exist.  Most talking animal movies were made into Disney cartoons or weird Lancelot Link television shows.  Then, a few years ago the movie Babe came out and changed the face of live action animal animation forever.  With computers, a special effects person could animate each individual mouth on the pigs, sheep, and dogs and make it look like they were really talking.  On the surface the effects looked good, but in reality and to this day, it still looks like a third generation "Clutch Cargo" cartoon.  Dr. Doolittle 1 and 2 and the new movie Cats and Dogs are use the most advanced techniques to make this look as real as possible.  The problem is that the mouths still look like they are floating is space and not attached to the animals face.  If you can get over the disturbing effect of seeing a real animal converse then you have a better chance of enjoying these films.  Cats and Dogs was number one this week because of its interesting premise.  What if the battle between the cats and the dogs was real, and cats tried to take over the world to finally win the war.  The cats are led by Mr. Tinkles, voiced by Sean Hayes of "Will and Grace."  The dogs are led by Lou, voiced by Tobey Maguire.  Mr. Tinkles may be the strangest looking feline I have ever seen and seeing it talk in the previews creeped me out so much I did not make an extra effort to see the movie.  The war between cats and dogs has been entertainment fodder for years, with the dogs usually playing the bad guys while the cats are the victims of their cruelty.  But if you take a closer look at those old cartoons you would realize that the dogs were the victims trying to defend themselves or their territory while the cat was running rampant through the house or neighborhood chasing a much smarter opponent, usually a mouse of some sort.  The dog was very aggressive, but it was the cat who started the fight.  In the movie Cats and Dogs, the filmmakers try to explain why this rain storm of a conflict has lasted for thousands of years.  This movie has a chance to be a big success at the box office because the two most loved animals in the world are cats and dogs.  Solving the mystery of their purpose has potential to be fascinating entertainment.

SCARY MOVIE 2 - FULL REVIEW

Last years Scary Movie was one of the funniest movies I had ever seen.  The bit with the gym teacher and the love scene in Cindy's bedroom are the 2 most outrageous things I have ever witnessed on film.  When it was announced the the movie that promised there would be no sequel was going to have one, I knew I was in trouble.  Scary Movie 2 had little chance of being good with less than one year turn around time. This error in judgment is known as "I Still Know What You Did Last Summer" disease.  Sequels should have at least 2 years between them, because if they don't, you get crap like SM2.  This movie is not really a sequel to the first movie since 4 of the characters killed in that movie show up here without any explanation.  I guess they got better.  That's okay, since this is supposed to be a ridiculous comedy, to have the dead from part one come back for no reason except it being the sequel is sort of funny.  The plot is a remake of 1999's Liam Neeson, Catherine Zeta Jones, Lily Tyler horrible fest, "The Haunting."  That movie was my vote for worst film of 1999.  In Scary Movie 2, Tim Curry plays the professor doing a sleep deprivation experiment on a group of people spending the night in a haunted house.  The houseguests are Cindy (Anna Faris), Shorty (Sha...I mean Marlon Wayans), Ray (Mar... I mean Shawn Wayans), and  Brenda (Regina Hall) from the first movie, and along for the ride are Alex (Tori Spelling), Clark (Christopher Masterson), and Theo (Kathleen Robertson).  All sorts of bizarre and strange, and every once in a while, funny things happen to them as they try to fight off a ghost played by Bull from "Night Court."  The cast of the movie do what they can to make this movie enjoyable, but what it comes down to is a poor script with weak and predictable gags that really go no where.  For example, the movie begins with a spoof of "The Exorcist."  Okay, that is a fairly easy film to goof on and this movie hits most of the good spots.  The vomiting, peeing, head turning, cursing, begging for rape, and Catholic priests who act like idiots.  James Woods replaced freakin' Marlon Brando as the lead exorcist when Brando caught pneumonia.  I guess its left over remnants of the original Exorcist's movie's legendary curse.  Woods is fine here and has a couple good moments, but when the whole 10 minutes sequence is over as well as the movie, you realize that it had no purpose in the film and without it the movie would have been around 65 minutes long.  If you want to see a much better Exorcist satire, catch the Saturday Night Live sketch with Richard Pryor as the priest trying to save Larraine Newman's soul.  "Your mother sews socks that smell," and "the bed is on my foot" are 2 lines funnier than anything said or shown in Scary Movie 2.  SM2 likes to goof on recent movies and television entertainment.  For some reason, Keenan Ivory Wayans thought that making fun of a Nike commercial would be a good idea, not realizing that in 3 years, no one will understand the joke.  The weakest link line was tired the 3rd time Anne Robinson used it on the game show.  It is funny to see the "Save the Last Dance" bit just to say, "hey that's the bit from Save the Last Dance, ha  ha ha ." But then you realize that that was it, there was not extra hook to make it a satire.  It was just imitating the scene.  This is what killed the Naked Gun movies.  They stopped taking a cliche to the next level and just imitated the moment without much difference.  Unlike Scary Movie 2 whose best moments had nothing to do with specific satire, SM2 relies on it almost entirely and it fails most of the time.  The cat fight between Anna Faris and the pussy is funny at first, but why is it in the film and what is getting goofed on specifically?  I think it was either Raging Bull or ECW.  I am not a fan of drug humor, but it was funny when the marijuana plant got its revenge on Shorty the always high SM2 protagonist.  Tori Spelling's career continues to fall down the crapper as her role in this movie is pretty slim and she is only used as a way to maker her real life father, Aaron go insane.  It looks like Keenan Wayans did not have a completed script and he also cut out at least 20 minutes of material I had heard about or had seen in the movie trailers.  Beetlejuice from the Howard Stern Show was supposed to play a dying little boy who did not know his age, but that was cut out of the film.  He is still in the movie, but the joke is more "hey, it's Beetlejuice" than whatever he said being funny.  Chris Elliot is fairly amusing as the caretaker with the deformed hand.  That joke is funny for the five minutes he tries to cook dinner and then you just want him to leave.  I am a huge Elliot fan from way back in his David Letterman and "Get a Life" days and I pray that one day he will be able to do something good in a movie.  The person who stands out as being the best in the film is David Cross from "The Show" as Tim Curry's handicapped assistant.  He has some funny bits and the humor with him is the darkest.  I love offensive humor like what was done in the first film and was attempted here.  Whenever Scary Movie 2 succeeds at being outrageous, it works. There are not enough of that "holy crap, what did I just see" moments.  The sex scene from the first film is brought back, but the impact of the joke is no where near as humorous.  SM2 needed more gags, less talk, and a plot that was not so specific to "The Haunting."  This movie was obviously rushed.  It did not open as well as last year's because the first one did not need a sequel like the poster said.  I don't see there being another one a year from now.  I was very disappointed in this film and it is leaning toward one of the worst of the year, even though Anna Faris is Maxim level hot.  Final Review:  1 1/2 stars out of 5; 4 out of 10; D+; thumbs down.

KISS OF THE DRAGON - FULL REVIEW

Jet Li is a very good martial artist, but he still has a long way to go before he would be considered the next Bruce Lee.  Li should try to become his own person and not try to be the next anybody.  Jackie Chan is his own person, and Li has his own style as well.  Jet is famous for his quickness and it is showed in good form here. The movie takes place in Paris where Chinese cop, Jet Li, gets framed for 2 murders he did not commit. The true killer is Parisian policeman, Richard, played by Tcheky Kayro.  Richard (silent "d" if you're French) is a psychopath.  He is also an idiot. His plot to take out this person is so ridiculous, it hurts how the movie plays out.  None of it makes sense.  But, you have to accept it or there would be no movie.  While on the run, Li runs into a hooker with the heart of gold played by Bridget Fonda.  For some inexplicable reason, her daughter is being held captive by Richard.  So, we have to hear her wine about her little girl for 90 minutes.  She is not needed in the film.  I feel bad for Fonda who seemed to have some inherited talent, but as of late it has not been shown.  I guess Mira Sorvino is taking all of her heat.  Plots for movies like this are not the reason people go to see them.  You go to see lots of fight sequences with Jet Li kicking thugs in the face and crotch.  KOTD  has some fight scenes, but there is only one that has any wow factor to it.  Each fight is either group attacks one at a time, or one guy goes one on one.  There is not one moment in the film where you think Li can't handle himself.  The bad guys line up and they fall down.  Also, the fight sequences are very quick with none lasting more than 5 minutes.  That makes some sense in terms of the reality of the brutality since a person can only stand getting kicked in the face maybe twice before they won't get back up.  Unfortunately, that leaves a lot of time for talking and convincing Fonda not to urinate on the doorstep of a restaurant.  There are the prerequisite super thugs that wander around looking all bad ass and you know will eventually give Li his toughest battle.  They were not that tough.  These guys are the blonde super Bavarian brothers who like to break necks with their super kicks.  Their fight wil Li is very sub par and unimpressive.  The only good attack is when Li takes on a whole martial arts class.  It is in this scene you actually see old school Jet Li fighting at his best.  But, as with every other fight in the movie, there is no competition.  For Jet Li to be a martial arts superstar, he has to show some vulnerability.  If you know the bad guy will get in no significant offense, then there is no point in seeing the film.  One sided battles are boring.  Jackie Chan is successful because he shows weakness and fear so that when he does defeat the bad guys you feel that a real effort is made.  Li is too effortless when he fights and it takes away the fun.  The title of the movie refers to a certain device Li has that can take a guy out in a very horrible way as if he was kissed by a dragon.  It is not pretty, and it is not all that great a moment.  I really wanted to like Kiss of the Dragon, but it fell short of what it could have been.  Longer fight sequences, better motivations for characters, and someone that has a chance of kicking Jet Li's ass would have made this movie more interesting.  As it is, it is not really as good as "Romeo Must Die" which had a better plot and a more well rounded leading lady.  Check Li out in his Chinese movies where he is not always the super man and has trouble beating some of the people he faces.  Final Review: 2 stars out of 5; 5 1/2 out of 10; C; thumbs down.  

REST OF THE TOP 10 IN 10:

1.    A. I. may be one of the bigger Spielberg box office disappointments, but it will probably be the highest grossing Stanley Kubrick movie ever.

2.    It is amazing to me that emotions are still the hardest things for robots to figure out without going through a whole hulabaloo.

3.    The question is not does a human have the capability to love an android, but does an android have the capability of being dumber than the David robot in A. I. who does not know the difference between a fairy tale and real life.

4.    I hope Teddy from A. I. is released in time for Christmas so I can sit him on the edge of my bed and have him watch me as I sleep in on my days off.

5.    Fast and the Furious is quickly becoming the most profitable movie of the Summer since it is on its way to making about $140 million while it only cost $38 million.

6.  Eddie Murphy wants to do another Doolittle before another Nutty Professor, but I say stick with the singing donkey movie.

7.    Tomb Raider has made enough money that in 2003 or 2004 I see Tomb Raider 2: the Search for Lara's Padded Bra being released.

8.    The three main voice actors of Shrek want more money for the sequel, and after the first one has made over $240 million, I think they will get their wish.

9.     Atlantis is on track to be the biggest box office disappointment for a major animated Disney film in the post Little Mermaid era.

10.    Baby Boy is about to leave the nest of the box office top ten.

2001 MID-SUMMER REVIEW

This Summer is ahead of last year's box office totals, but the quality of films like last year's is questionable.  There are a lot of movie making a lot of money, but people do not seem as excited about what they have seen in past Summers.  The biggest hit of the season as well as the year is "Shrek."  It has surpassed all of its competition and made Disney look like Hanna-Barbera.  I don't see another movie coming out that will do better than it.  The most successful movie to come out that a lot of people were disappointed with was "The Mummy Returns."  Its action helped it make a lot of money, but its poor special effects, weak story, and pointless Scorpion King make sequels and prequels become a harder sell.  "Pearl Harbor" was supposed to be the huge event movie of the year and rival the appeal of "Titanic," but it did not happen that way.  The film changed the focus from the attack on the ships at the harbor to who would win the attack on Kate Beckinsale's lips.  The acting was just average, and some actors were wasted.  The 35 minute attack itself was well shot, but since there was never any focus on most of the victims, it was somewhat empty.  Adding the Doolittle campaign and the terrible Faith Hill ballad did not help matters either.  Moulin Rouge was not as bad as the promotional material made it looked, but audiences are not ready to accept Nicole Kidman as an actress yet let alone a singer.  John Travolta should have a Halle Berry nude scene in all of his movies so that they can get some sort of respectable box office.  Swordfish was okay, but Travolta needs to change his bad guy schtick or he will be looking to do Look Who's Talking Too Much 4.  The biggest disappointments of the Summer are "Evolution" and "Atlantis: The Lost Empire."  They had all the potential in the world to attract an audience, but their scripts and production values were just too common.  Evolution is one of the biggest bombs of the year in fact after what looked like might be a fun ride.  Duchovny is now officially box office death.  He has left his cushy television job at the wrong time.  I think he will be back to FOX soon, however.  The biggest box office surprise has been "Fast and the Furious."  Its opening weekend take was twice what anyone could even comprehend it making.  The ad campaign and trailers for that movie were very well done and tapped into that fast car market that "Gone in 60 Seconds" failed to get.  I have not been too impressed by what I have seen this Summer or this year.  Personally, the only movie I really liked was Dr. Doolittle which is only doing fairly well.  "Tomb Raider" was fun for those familiar with the video game, I am, so I liked it.  That action movie is my guilty pleasure of the year.  Any movie that makes Angelina Jolie look hot, I like.  That is a hard thing to do sometimes, especially when you have John Voigt's face.  The worst received movie has been "Pootie Tang."  It has the official dead on arrival seal of disapproval award.  Not a god awful film, but there was not enough there to attract a wide audience.  A. I. also has the potential to be a big disappointment.  If it had more of some of the pre release internet mystery, maybe things could have been better.  As it is, it is just an excuse to get Haley Joel Osment and Oscar nomination.  I still want to know the fate of Teddy gosh darnit.  The Summer has some huge movies coming out over the next few weeks like Jurassic Park 3, Planet of the Apes, and Rush Hour 2. All 3 of those will open above the $40 million mark.  If they are as good as the previews want us to believe, they could each make over a $150 million.  However, I believe at least one if not all three of them will suck since JP3 has no plot, POTA has one big battle sequence and weird makeup on Helena Carter, and Rush Hour 2 is the reverse of one, but it has my favorite actress Zhang Ziyi in it who looks great in the coming attractions so it will be very difficult for me to give that movie a bad review regardless of what happens.  As long as she is in the film for at least 15 minutes, I guarantee RH2 will get at least 3 1/2 stars from me on this site.  

Next week I have a full review of Final Fantasy: the Spirits Within and The Score with Robert Deniro and Marlon Brando.  If I am feeling expecially feisty, I might see Legally Blonde.  I hope Final Fantasy is good and makes a lot of money, but I am afraid its audience is just a bit too small.  The Score looks like your typical heist picture where everything goes wrong and everyone is cheating the other guy.  Legally Blonde looks awful to me, but is goofy enough to be a sleeper hit.  We shall see.  Bye for now.