SOLID START FOR 2012 BOX OFFICE — LIKE 2011

The box office rang in the new just about the way it rang in the old — sounding more like Big Ben than like Tinkerbell, its model for most of the past five months. With the Tom Cruise starrer Mission: Impossible — Ghost Protocol remaining in the lead with $29.6 million (24 percent from IMAX […]

AT THE BOX OFFICE: ON THE NINTH DAY OF XMAS

The Christmas box office may have got off to a relatively slow start, but it is bouncing back at midweek. On Tuesday, for example, Mission: Impossible — Ghost Protocol added $9.6 million to its domestic gross, which now stands at $86.2 million. Overseas it has earned another $170 million, bringing its worldwide gross to $256.2 […]

M:I — GHOST PROTOCOL A TOWERING HIT (Updated)

Paramount’s Mission: Impossible — Ghost Protocol towered above a slew of imposing openers and strong holdovers as it grossed an estimated $29.5million over the Friday-to-Sunday holiday period and $39.5 million between Friday and Monday. The film, which opened last weekend primarily in a limited number of IMAX theaters, expanded on Wednesday, and will have earned […]

A FEAST OF PLENTY AT THE BOX OFFICE

There have been scattered releases throughout the week of the some half-dozen films that are opening over the Christmas holiday — but two films aren’t opening until Christmas Day itself, the 3D horror/sci-fi film The Darkest Hour and Steven Spielberg’s War Horse. It’s hard to figure out why those two films aren’t making it into […]

LOTSA MOVIES THIS WEEKEND, BUT WHICH ONE WILL WIN?

The major Hollywood studios are mobilizing a huge marketing campaign for the Hollywood weekend, ordinarily one of the biggest of the year for the box office. With Avatar making its debut two years ago, the box office raked in $270.12 million over the three days of the Christmas weekend. Last year that figure fell to […]

MOVIE REVIEWS: THE GIRL WITH THE DRAGON TATTOO

As is the case with The Adventures of Tintin, which also opens over the Christmas holiday period, the critics are poles apart over The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. Although he gives it 3 1/2 stars, Roger Ebert in the Chicago Sun-Times concedes that he prefers the 2009 Swedish version. David Fincher, he writes, “is […]

PRODUCER DECLARES NEW YORKER CRITIC PERSONA NON GRATA

New Yorker critic David Denby has been barred from all future press screenings of films produced by Scott Rudin after Denby broke the embargo on reviews for David Fincher’s The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. Denby’s review, which will appear in this week’s edition of the magazine, describes the film as “a bleak but mesmerizing […]