Daily Archives: April 14, 2008

Teens Get Drunk, Regret Prom Night

Critically maligned Prom Night,
featuring both Brittany Snow (below, but on much more interesting display here) and the stone-faced intensity of yes-he-really-spells-his-name-like-that killer Johnathon Schaech, took the top spot at the domestic box office this weekend, stealing an estimated $20.8 million out of the wallets of mostly regretful 13- to 25-year-olds. The weekend’s other big new wide release, urban cop thriller Street Kings, placed second with a $12.4 million take. Ensemble blackjack flick 21, starring Jim Sturgess, continued to display staying power, taking third place with $10.4 million; this brings the movie’s total gross to just under $62 million in three weeks of release. Rounding out the top five were Nim’s Island, starring Jodie Foster and Abigail Breslin, with $9.1 million, and George Clooney’s period piece football comedy, Leatherheads, with $6.2 million.

Completing the top 10 were Dr. Seuss’ Horton Hears a Who ($5.9 million for the weekend, $139.5 million in total), the mostly derided ensemble dramedy Smart People ($4.1 million in its first frame), The Ruins ($3.4 million in its second weekend, for a total of $13.5 million), Superhero Movie, ($3.2 million, $21.3 million in total), and Owen Wilson’s Drillbit Taylor ($2 million, $28.4 million in total).

Disney Pledges Exclusively 3-D Animation

Walt Disney Studios confirmed the future face of animation in an announcement and email this week, throwing its full weight behind
three-dimensional cinema by pledging that all its future animated
releases — starting with
Bolt this November, and continuing with re-releases of the first two Toy Story films, leading up to the debut of Toy Story 3 in the summer of 2010 — will be in 3-D. Disney has now become the second studio, after Jeffrey
Katzenberg made a similar pledge at DreamWorks Animation, to vow to produce animated content exclusively in the format. The
announcement came at a New York press conference this past week, as chairman
Dick Cook and Pixar creative czar John Lasseter unveiled 10 new titles
scheduled to open between now and 2012, including a sequel to 2006’s Cars.