chicken little Tagged Articles at Cinematical

What to make of Twilight's $70.5 million bow? Well, it's not quite Harry Potter, whose first-weekend outings have ranged from $77 million to $102. But when you consider that Twilight is basically a niche film -- certainly it has a lot less cross-demographic appeal than Harry Potter -- its success starts to seem pretty remarkable. Are there any teenage girls who didn't see it this weekend? And what will happen to it next weekend? All the fans may have seen Twilight already -- then again, many of the die-hards may grace it with repeat viewings. Given the incessant shrieking at the screening I attended, that wouldn't surprise me.

Disney's Bolt didn't take despite favorable reviews. The studio continues to have trouble getting its non-Pixar animated features off the ground as tentpoles. Its best go was Chicken Little three years ago; Bolt looks to land about on par with Meet the Robinsons. Disappointing.

What else. Quantum of Solace remains on track to be the top-grossing Bond film of all time. Just below the top 10, Slumdog Millionaire is riding a deserved wave of great word-of-mouth to a $31,000 per-screen average on 32 screens. It'll continue to expand in the coming weeks, and should hit the top 10 before long.

The full estimates after the jump.

I don't believe the hype that 3-D will dominate the movie world in the near future, but it does seem like a lot of movies are using the technology these days. The Hollywood Reporter has announced that Disney will release the animated feature Bolt, (once called American Dog) in Digital 3-D next year. Bolt features the voices of John Travolta, Woody Harrelson, and Susie Essman (who had better curb her Curb Your Enthusiasm language!). It tells "the story of a TV star dog named Bolt (Travolta) who is accidentally shipped from his Hollywood soundstage to New York, where he begins a cross-country journey through the real world." Chris Williams directs the film.

Disney has been one of the biggest supporters of 3-D. In recent years, Chicken Little, Meet the Robinsons, and the sweet, sweet Tim Burton's The Nightmare Before Christmas were all released in the format. Speaking of Nightmare, as Monika told you earlier this month, Tim Burton has signed to produce and direct 3-D versions of Alice in Wonderland and his own terrific short film, Frankenweenie for Disney. On the opposite end of the cool spectrum, Disney's next 3-D release is the Hannah Montana/Miley Cyrus: Best of Both Worlds Concert Tour, which will play in theaters Feb. 1-7. Start scalping those tickets now!

Before I get to the meat of this week's column, I have a little appetizer of an issue to discuss. The other day, I went to see American Gangster at a Regal theater and once again participated in the Guest Response System. But unlike my first experience, I actually had to use the thing this time. While pressing the "Other Disturbance" button over and over and over because of a loud toddler, then finally after too long a time receiving responses in the forms of, first, a security guard and, second, a crew of ushers, I eventually realized that there is no way to communicate what exactly is the disturbance you're alerting the staff about. I don't want to say the parents of the toddler were covering the kid's mouth each time a Regal employee scoped out the auditorium, but coincidentally there was no disturbance whenever someone was monitoring the audience. And so, despite my having the little complainer pager, I put up with two-and-a-half hours of a sporadically loud child who should have never been brought to American Gangster in the first place.

Okay, now that I've got that off my plate, it's time to address the main topic of the week:

Beowulf.

On Friday, Robert Zemeckis' new performance-capture "animated" film hits 2,800 screens across the U.S. More than 700 of those screens will show the film in digital 3-D, via IMAX, Real D or Dolby systems (yes, there's three different 3-D systems). It's apparently the largest rollout of a 3-D release ever, and it could mean big things for both Hollywood and the exhibition industry. Or it could be just another 3-D movie, no more an event than when Disney's Chicken Little came out a couple years ago touted as the first digital 3-D release to hit regular cinemas.

After the re-release of Chicken Little in 3-D proved big bucks for Disney at the box office, the studio is now gearing up to send Tim Burton's The Nightmare Before Christmas down the same path. This Halloween, Jack Skellington and company will be returning to the big screen just in time for all you ghoulish fans out there to dust off those vintage 1993 Nightmare-related costumes and wait in line ... for a long, long time.

No word yet on how the 3-D glasses will be designed for the film's run, though execs suggested that they will be weird, wacky and collectible. Disney became the first studio to jump on the Halloween season with their 3-D re-release, as Warner Bros. has already pitched a tent around the Christmas holiday with a 3-D version of The Polar Express. Ooohh, maybe Terrence Malick will release a 3-D version of The New World just in time for Thanksgiving? Or not.

Now, pardon me if I sound like someone who resides in and around the Boston area, but this whole thing sounds wicked cool! I didn't get to see what Chicken Little looked like in 3-D, but people I know were pretty impressed. Sure, I'm not a fan of the glasses (The only thing that should be touching me inside a movie theater is popcorn and/or an assortment of delicious candy), but I am a big fan of Nightmare and would love to see it up on the big screen again. Count me so in for this one.

 

• Bukowski: Born in to This - There is a morbidly fascinating fly-on-the-wall vibe that pervades John Dullaghan's profile of the late Beat writer Charles Bukowski, a base familiarity that parallels the Ham On Rye author's own inimitable hard-lived life and style. Epic in scope (and length), first-time director Dullaghan compiles dozens of meticulously screened hours of archival footage, coupling the best of it with new interviews with Bukowski survivors to present a terrifically real character study of a little-studied real character. The watchable Chuck-alike Happy Hour, starring Anthony LaPaglia as a booze-addled writer, is also just out.

Don Knotts, instantly recognizable from his multi-year runs as the jittery but lovable Barney Fife on The Andy Griffith Show and the desperately uncool Mr. Furley on Three's Company, died Friday night in a California hospital. Over the course of a career that spanned more than half a century, Knotts appeared in multiple television series and over two dozen films, usually as nerdy, high strung characters whose mannerisms were vastly different from those of the shy, soft-spoken actor. His best-known films include The Ghost and Mr. Chicken, The Shakiest Gun in the West, and The Incredible Mr. Limpet, all of which, at their cores, are warm, family films in which the shy, awkward Knotts wins the love of a girl who "can see through his nervousness to the heart of gold."

Even as he moved into old age, Knotts showed no interest in retiring, and instead continued to energetically pursue his acting career. In just the past few years, he did voice work for Chicken Little and multiple television shows, and appeared in touring stage productions and advertising campaigns. He died at 81 after dealing for more than a year with unspecified health concerns.

Ron Friedman and Steve Bencich, the scribes behind the year's Chicken Little, have reteamed with Disney to write a live-action picture called The Missing Link. The screenplay, which has not yet been written, was bought based entirely on the pitch the writers put together for the company. Let me tell you, this is one fantastic pitch - and I swear I'm not being sarcastic. Here, read it for yourself: the movie is "described as a monkey spy adventure in the vein of The Bourne Identity." I mean, holy crap.

Let's just unpack this, shall we? Monkey. Ok, that's not the best way to start, if only because it calls to mind Ed, that horrible Matt LeBlanc movie. But then it gets going. Spy. Awesome! Spies rule! Plus, they do well at the box office - maybe you've heard of a guy named James Bond? Adventure. Ok, cool. Could go either way, but some adventure movies are excellent. Then comes the real kicker: "in the vein of The Bourne Identity." And, suddenly, the whole thing just falls into place. Monkeys! Running around in Europe! Looking for their true selves! Driving cars! Killing people!

Friends, I don't want to jump the gun here, but I think we may have just found the next Snakes on a Plane.