wired

Would anyone besides myself be pleasantly startled if Paramount Classics’ Hustle & Flow out-performs Michael Bay’s The Island (DreamWorks) and Richard Linklater’s The Bad News Bears when all three open the weekend after next? Not a higher national gross but a much higher per-screen average, I mean. I’m not saying the Bay or the Linklater film won’t be #1 (either one could surge over the next eleven days), but the statistical fact is that The Island didn’t get that much of a benefit out of last Saturday’s nationwide sneak (60% general awarness, 25% definite interest and 2% first choice as of Sunday, 7.10). On top of this I’ve been detecting flat vibes during the showings of the Island trailer in theatres. Hustle & Flow, on the other hand, had a 44% awareness, 35% definite interest and 5% first choice last weekend — extremely decent numbers for an indie-type Sundance movie (even though Flow is actually quite the formumlaic crowd-pleaser) at this stage of the game. It’s also tracking extremely well among African-Americans. The Bad News Bears (Paramount), which still looks like to me like Bad Santa on a baseball diamond, has a huge general awareness rating (76%) but had only gathered a 20% definite interest and 2% first choice as of Sunday. Not awful but not that stupendous either. It’s always the definite interest and first-choice numbers that tell you what’s happening, and so far Hustle & Flow has the headwind….AND it’ll be sneaking nationwide this coming Saturday (7.16). I’m told Paramount is leaning toward booking it in somewhere between 900 and 1300 theatres for the 7.22 opening, and probably with a concentration on black neighborhoods. Assuming interest in this film will break down along racial lines seems short-sighted and even crass, given that Hustle & Flow strikes such a common and universal chord.

No change in tracking for the coming weekend. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (Warner Bros., 7.15), the first choice of 27% of likely moviegoers, will be the easy victor. And yet the numbers for Wedding Crashers have risen (definite interest is 17%) since last week, and the prognosis is for an opening in the mid $20 million range. It’s odd how many people have weighed in against this flawed but hugely funny film since…well, since I ran that qualified rave (first two thirds terrific, last third not-so-hot but it bounces back at the finish) last Friday. This thing is funny…what’s everyone being so pissy and cranky about?

If something like this had been in March of the Penguins, soreheads like me wouldn’t have disliked it so much. And I don’t care if it was originally posted by Movie City News columnist Ray Pride…

You can tell from reading Zach Helm’s script of Stranger Than Fiction that the movie, being directed by Marc Forster, will probably be a good score for everyone involved, including star Will Ferrell, when Columbia releases it next year. And Ferrell will kick ass in The Producers: The Movie Musical (Universal, 12.23) in the Franz Leibkind role — i.e., the one played by Kenneth Mars in Mel Brooks’ 1968 original. But it must be said right now that Ferrell is in trouble. Partly due to over-exposure (appearances in five films in ’05 not counting the un-released Winter Passing and The Wendell Baker Story). Partly because his stuff is feeling really labored and unfunny. Partly because Kicking and Screaming was awful and died. Partly because he was especially grating in Bewitched. Partly because his appearance in a forthcoming comedy is so unwelcome and groan-inducing he poisons the comic atmosphere and (temporarily) stops the film in its tracks. Is Ferrell over? Could the two-year spurt that began with ’03’s Old School and Elf, peaked with Anchorman and then received a late-inning boost from his appealing supporting performance in Melinda and Melinda be winding to a close…or am I just over-reacting to Ferrell’s death-cameo in that comedy I just referred to? What’s everyone thinking? Please send in reactions for a piece I’m going to cook up for Wednesday’s column.

Pithy observation here from New York Times critic Tony Scott in a piece about the differences in the way films are sold, absorbed and processed between the ’70s and now. “The window between the theatrical and DVD release is now shorter than a successful first run used to be,” he writes. “Even the term ‘first run’ has a ring of almost vaudevillian antiquity. There is now a pre-release sprint that leaves audiences (and journalists and publicists) winded by opening day. Three weeks later, the picture is a fading memory. Here I am still going on about War of the Worlds, which is so last week. Revenge of the Sith? Who even remembers?”

Wedding Crashers costar Owen Wilson is asked by Hollywood Hitlist columnist Gregory Ellwood about his “Butterscotch Stallion” nickname in this recently-posted interview on MSN. Owen’s reply: “I love that. It has to be one of the most ridiculous, insane nicknames, but some of my friends have really picked up on it. I think they know it’s kind of humiliating to me.”

Apologies for the Saturday screw-up, i.e., accidentially posting Jett’s reaction to The Beat That My Heart Skipped in WIRED…stupid. I did it through a dial-up in connection from Connecticut and tried right away to remove it…obviously the effort failed.

The reason Michael Bay’s The Island (DreamWorks, 7.22) is sneaking nationwide this Saturday (7.9) is because it’s not tracking very well, partly because Ewan MacGregor and Scarlett Johansson are “industry stars” who don’t put butts in seats. I hear it’s not quite the greatest film of the 21st Century, but it must be doing fairly well with Average-Joe audiences or they wouldn’t sneak it to begin with.

On the other end there’s Wedding Crashers (New Line, 7.15), a comedy that’s tracking decently but not tremendously (i.e., it’s more or less where Monster-in-Law was a week before its release) and could probably use the exposure of a nationwide sneak….but it’s not getting one. This despite the fact it’s opening only eight days from now and has been getting great word of mouth. I guess New Line is figuring they’re going to get whipped next weekend by Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (Warner Bros., 7.15) anyway, so why go nuts trying to be the #1 film when the word-of-mouth is going to be good enough to keep Wedding Crashers playing well into August.

I’m presuming Ryan Phillipe got cast in Cint Eastwood’s Flags of Our Fathers because he was exceptional in Paul Haggis’s Crash (as Matt Dillon’s rookie-cop partner), and that particular attention was paid because Haggis wrote Million Dollar Baby, etc. And I’m figuring Jesse Bradford was also brought aboard because of his performance in Chris Terrio’s Heights . I have to say I detected modest intelligence levels, at best, and a very low energy reading from Bradford’s acting in that recent, relatively unsuccessful New York drama. Look deep into Bradford’s dark eyes and there’s nobody home….blanko.

What’s with the comma in George Clooney’s Good Night and, Good Luck, the Edward R. Murrow vs. Joseph McCarthy drama that I’ve blurbed a couple of times? The comma after the “and” is there to suggest the pause that Murrow used before saying “good luck” on the air, but wouldn’t an ellipses be better? And is it “Goodnight” or “Good Night”? Pic is a Warner Independent release, having been deemed too indie-ish and dialogue-driven for regular-ass Warner Bros. It’s due in November (a friendly lady in Laura Kim’s office just told me this) and you’ve gotta figure it’ll play the Toronto Film Festival.

Here’s the best rundown I’ve read about the story and the meaning of Craig Brewer’s Black Snake Moan. It’s from Brewer himself in a long response to a question from Black Film correspondent Wilson Morales. The IMDB says the Paramount Classics film, due in ’06 with Samuel L. Jackson and Christina Ricci in the leads, is about “a white nymphomaniac” being “cured of her disorder by an older black bluesman.” Like everyone else I had interpreted the title in sexual terms (remember that actor in Full Metal Jacket exhibiting his appendage to a Vietnamese prostitute and calling it a specimen of “Alabama black snake”?) but that’s just the taking-off point.