Word: weekender
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
Instead, Shutter Island killed, and the Paramount brass looks like a winning brain trust. According to studio estimates, the movie will have earned $40.2 million in its first three days. That's the biggest debut weekend for any Scorsese picture (The Departed was his previous top opener), and any DiCaprio (yes, including Titanic). Turns out the R-rated whodunit - with Leo playing a U.S. marshal searching for a killer in an insane asylum - benefited from an effective ad spot on the Super Bowl and a week with no other new films in wide release. Scorsese's very limited competition came...
Shutter Island's success was bad news for last weekend's top three films. Valentine's Day lost 70% of last week's audience, Percy Jackson & the Olympians: The Lightning Thief 51% and The Wolfman, an expensive flop, 69%. Percy Jackson could be the only film of the trio that isn't a one-week wonder. Of the returning films in the weekend's top 15, the one with the most modest drop, 26%, was Dwayne Johnson's kid comedy Tooth Fairy, which shows how little staying power the other movies have...
Back on the weekend before Christmas, when Avatar opened to a $77 million gross, another film made its debut with $82,664 on four screens. That was Crazy Heart, an ordinary little movie that was at first scheduled to go direct to DVD. But the appealing performance by Jeff Bridges as a country-music star on the downalator charmed critics and started piling up best actor awards: from the L.A. film critics, the broadcast film critics, the Golden Globes gang and, most important, the Screen Actors Guild. Bridges is now the front runner for a Best Actor Oscar, and audiences...
...monetary traction from its awards exposure. Sorry, The Last Station, An Education and A Single Man. As for Nine, the big-budget musical with bigger Oscar hopes, it did cadge a few nominations but has earned less than Crazy Heart, despite costing eight times as much to make. This weekend's take was a sad $19,000. The movie may as well have shuttered...
There are plenty of parties left through the weekend. Friday's line-up included another round of drinks with Tim Pawlenty at Gin & Tonic (with a guest appearance by Virginia Governor Bob McDonald); a party at George, a trendy Georgetown bar; a Young Americans for Freedom (YAF) happy hour to celebrate the launch of New Guard magazine at Murphy's Pub in Woodley Park; various receptions with conservative stars such as Ann Coulter and Monica Crowley; an XPAC comedy night; and the 6th annual Reaganpalooza Saturday at the Hawk and Dove bar on Capitol Hill. "This is like our Woodstock...