Nicole Kidman of "Birthday Girl" |
HOLLYWOOD - Ready for some football?America always is, especially when it comes to the Super Bowl. And that's bad news this weekend for Hollywood executives.
Even a possibly mismatched Super Bowl between the St. Louis Rams and the New England Patriots will keep millions away from theater movies on Sunday.
Take, for example, the last weekend in January for the past two years. In 2001, box office receipts stood at $96.2 million during that Super Bowl weekend, when the defensive-minded Baltimore Ravens defeated the New York Giants. Business jumped a whooping 35.6 percent last weekend, to $130.5 million, all because NFL officials delayed the Super Bowl by one week following the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.
Accordingly, this weekend sees the release of two films that pose little threat to reigning box office champ Black Hawk Down.
Nicole Kidman's very public divorce last year from Tom Cruise did not hurt her standing with moviegoers. Birthday Girl arrives hot on the heels of Moulin Rouge and The Others, but the thriller is unlikely to capitalize to any great extent on their success. Birthday Girl opens at 1,000 theaters, or 2,000 theaters less than Black Hawk Down, a sign that Miramax does not have great confidence in this tale of Russian mail-order bride Kidman and her easily duped husband-to-be (Ben Chaplin).
Also, Birthday Girl is another in the long line of oft-delayed Miramax-related offerings that includes recent flops Texas Rangers and Impostor. Originally scheduled for a Sept. 15, 2000, release, Birthday Girl did not make its debut until one year later at the Venice International Film Festival. Also, making matters worst, is the Super Bowl debut of another tardy thriller, Eye of the Beholder, which somehow grabbed the No. 1 spot in 2000 with a miserable $5.9 million debut.
Slackers, this weekend's second new release, also sat on the shelf for more than one year. Original distributor Destination Films went belly up after releasing such one-word-titled flops as Bats, Beautiful and Whipped, so Sony Picture's Screen Gems rescued Slackers from direct-to-video hell. Unrelated to Richard Linklater's 1992 Gen-X classic Slacker, this college-set comedy stars up-and-coming stars Devon Sawa (Final Destination), Jason Schwartzman (Rushmore), James King (Pearl Harbor) and Laura Prepon (That '70s Show) as unmotivated students looking solely for a good time.
Aside from American Pie 2, R-rated teen comedies proved a messier proposition last year than a baked goods in Jason Briggs' lap. Tomcats, Say It Isn't So and Freddy Got Fingered tanked. Not Another Teen Movie barely crawled its way to $37.8 million during the holidays.
Also, the Super Bowl wasn't too kind to last year's teen comedy, the witless Sugar & Spice, which made a less-than-sweet $13.2 million. Slackers isn't going to overcome this indifference with any ease, especially with the PG-13 rated Orange County ($34 million through Sunday) likely to attract its fair share of teens not intrigued by the showdown in New Orleans.