B.O.R.E.D. - Oct 24, 2003

B.O.R.E.D.
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by Daniel Kaplan (archives)
October 24, 2003
Daniel's weekly box office report along with an excuse for his two week absence.

The following was written on October 23rd between 10:00 a.m and 11:00 a.m:

Some of you might be wondering what happened to me the last few weeks. Well I was preparing some nice excuses (the one about the alien abduction was my personal favorite) but to come clean I have to say. . . I went on vacation. I know, far less dramatic then one might hope on the Internet. Walt Disney World is hardly as interesting as a story about getting lost in the forest for three weeks and living off people's discarded Ensure cans. Anyway, I had a great time at Walt Disney World and especially watching T.V. What? Watching T.V you say? Well, as many of you know Walt Disney World has their own channels you can watch in their hotels. Previously they had one channel that would take you on an narrated tour of the resort. Now apparently then have copied the Travel Channel formula and show a Top 7 List of Must-See Attractions in Walt Disney World. First of all, where does seven come from? Seven dwarfs? Seven wonders of the ancient world? Biblical number of completeness? But the far more important questions is why is Playhouse Disney considered a must-see attraction? Since we're discussing top 7 lists, here's mine:

Top 7 Things I Learned off of Resort TV

7) Going to Animal Kingdom is "just like going to Africa but without the malaria"

6) The La Nouba song sounds a lot like My Heart Will Go On

5) Every "Top-10" program has to have a cheesy Flash animation introduction

4) That "There's one thing that Animal Kingdom is not. . .Nahtazhu!" But isn't that a double negative? Or does that rule not apply for made-up words?

3) Young children will question whether or not they have left a building

2) Don Hahn would be a rather boring Ghost Host

1) Watching elevator buttons light up to classical music is highly entertaining

One thing that concerns me at this point is Tower of Terror 4. At this rate the attraction is only 9 years old but it's drop rate has increased 4 times it's original. Using this model in just 25 years you will have an attraction that drops you 11 times, in 50 years 22 times and so on and so forth. Seems a bit excessive to me.

Classic Quote of the Week: "Bermuda? . . .you're taking us to Bermuda?? Oh boy!" Jay from No Deposit No Return

Tragic Quote of the Week: "Did we order this food to go?" "No why?" "'Cause there it goes!" Shenzi and Banzai from The Lion King

Rip Van Daniel
I leave for a few weeks and everything has changed. Disneyland has a new president, Disney Cruise Lines has a new president. California has a new governor. There's a huge freaky balloon sculpture of Madame Leouta's head in front of the theater at Downtown Disney. . . not to mention all the box office shuffling. Let's do a quick recap:

October 10/10-12
Kill Bill brought in $22 million, Good Boy! $13 million, Intolerable Cruelty $12.5 million, House of the Dead $5.7 million

October 10/17--19
Texas Chainsaw Massacre $28.1 million, Runaway Jury $11.8 million, Mystic River $10.4 million.

This Weekend:
David Zucker returns to the satire genre with Scary Movie 3. Unlike it's predecessor's this film carries a PG-13 rating which should help it's box office gross. The movie opens very wide in over 3,500 theaters. I expect the Miramax release could reach as high as $33.2 million.

Another big release is Radio from Sony Pictures. Starring Cuba Gooding Jr, Radio is inspired by a true story. It's a been a while since a nice fuzzy docudrama came out and it's also PG which might encourage some families with older children to view the film. I anticipate Radio could pull in a nice opening gross of $16.1 million.

Texas Chainsaw Massacre scored $28.1 million dollars it's opening weekend. Regular readers of this column can already recite the next sentence by memory: Horror films tend to be very frontloaded and drop off quickly. Well as repetitive as it is to keep saying that, it also happens to be the case 90% of the time. Texas Chainsaw Massacre should fall at least 52% and make $13.6 million dollars this weekend.

Runaway Jury had a disappointing first weekend of $11.8 million. However, good word of mouth should help it slip only 31% to $8.2 million.

Kill Bill and School of Rock should drop 41% and 34% respectively to gross $7.3 million.

Beyond Borders is a love story/war drama. The stars have failed lately to bring in major opening grosses, and the R rating will keep some of the more squeamish women from seeing the film. If it's unable to fully capture the "chick-flick" audience it will only gross about $6.8 million dollars.

Mystic River should coast down about 36% to $6.7 million dollars.

Intolerable Cruelty will drop about 44% to $6.5 million

With no competition in the children's market, Good Boy should continue it's solid run with a small slide of 30% to $6.2 million.

If It Were a Disney Film . . . Beyond Borders would be an epic tale of Imagineers tunneling their way under the berm to build a huge showbuilding.

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-- Daniel Kaplan
-- Posted October 24, 2003