Four Reasons to Gives Thanks this Weekend

November 26, 2003

The Thanksgivings Long weekend is traditionally one of the busiest times of the year at the box office. And tonight there are four new movies opening competing for the holiday dollar.

The Haunted Mansion, the third movie to be based on a Disney ride opens tonight. Critically speaking, it's closer to The Country Bear at only 17% positive. But at the box office it will be more like Pirates of the Caribbean: Curse of the Black Pearl. Look for $6 million tonight and $30 million for the weekend.

Ron Howard career as a director has been very impressive with four of his last five movies hitting $100 million. The Missing has an impressive cast but reviews that are just high enough for an overall positive rating at Rotten Tomatoes. Look for $3 million tonight and $15 million for the weekend. Long legs and Oscar hype will be needed for this movie to hit $100 million.

Next on the list of Thanksgiving openers is Timeline, the latest film adaptation of a Michael Crichton novel. The critics are complaining about serious flaws in the story, not the least of which is communicating. Remember how hard it was to understand to understand Shakespeare in High school. I we were to go back more than 700 year in the past, the English spoken then would seem like a foreign language to us. This and other problems have led to the weakest reviews of an opening movie since, well, last week. Look for it to make the same as The Missing, only more front loaded, a little less than $4 million tonight and $14 million on the weekend.

Opening in the fewest theatres, (2005) but to the best reviews, (74% positive) is Bad Santa. Most of Bad Santa's publicity has come from the studio reacting to how crude it was. The controversy is a mixed blessing, but without more intentional publicity from the studio look for only $2 million tonight and $6 million for the weekend.


Submitted by:

Filed under: Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl, The Haunted Mansion, Bad Santa, The Missing, Timeline