Weekend Box Office: GI Joe: Retaliation tops Easter weekend while The Host tanks.

It was a crowded Easter weekend at the box office, as three new releases and a couple strong holdovers did battle over the frame.  Opening on Thursday to take advantage of Good Friday (IE - no school!).

G.I. Joe: Retaliation opened with a relatively solid $51.7 million over the four-day frame, for a $41.2 million Fri-Sun gross.  Any way you slice it, this is a slightly lower figure than the $54 million Fri-Sun debut of G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra back in August 2009.  Yes that film opened in late summer but this film had 3D-enhanced ticket prices, so it's basically an even comparison.  The sequel/reboot was scheduled to open in late June of last summer only to be pulled and rescheduled so that the film could be converted to 3D in order to theoretically boost foreign grosses. One can only wonder whether Paramount possibly cut off its nose to spite its face, sacrificing a prime summer slot when the buzz was hottest only to achieve an arguably lower debut than it might have achieved had it opened when intended. G.I. Joe: Retaliation probably won't cross $120 million in America, which in normal circumstances would be very bad.  More likely, Paramount knowingly sacrificed domestic strength for international muscle, which is yet another sign of the times. The current worldwide total is estimated to be about $132 million, so it's nearly halfway to the first film's entire $300 million worldwide total.  Assuming it has anything resembling legs, Paramount's risky bet may have paid off.  The new film cost less ($130 million) and the first film ($175 million), so presuming the rescheduling didn't massively add to the marketing and distribution costs, equaling or surpassing the first film's total ($150 million domestic and $150 million international) still counts as a single if not a double depending on the overall result.

The Host (1 of 3 'next Twilight's) gets 3 theme posters.

Yahoo Movies just debuted three new theme-specific posters for one of three major young-adult literature adaptations dropping this year.  The clear advantage that it has over Beautiful Creatures and The Mortal Instruments: City of Bones is that it's based of course on book written by Stephanie Meyer, she of Twilight fame.  Saoirse Ronan is the real deal, William Hurt always has my attention, and Andrew Niccol seems an uncommonly good match for the material.  This could be Open Road's shot at the big time, the same way Twilight elevated Summit Entertainment just a couple years into its existence.  Anyway, The Host debuts on March 29, 2013.  As always, we'll see. For those who care, a synopsis is after the jump.

Scott Mendelson

Comic books for boys, Young-adult literature for girls: On the coming blockbuster-tentpole gender divide...

If you've been paying attention to the various trailers being unleashed in the wake of Breaking Dawn part 2's last week, you'll notice a fevered pitch by the studios to plant their flag in the sand in the newest 'hot' sub-genre.  By that I mean the young-lit franchise adaption. In just the last week we've seen trailers for The Host (trailer and character posters) and The Mortal Instruments (trailer) as they joined the previously advertised Beautiful Creatures (trailer and poster) in the chase to become 'the next Twilight'. What we're seeing is the creation of what amounts to the next blockbuster sub-genre: the young-adult literary adaptation.  The three above films won't be the only ones coming down the pike and we may even see one or two more over the 2013 calendar year on top of the November release of Hunger Games: Catching Fire.  In basic concept they aren't all that different from traditional comic book superhero sagas: An unlikely person realizes that they are unique and have powers (or must take powers) that will allow them to protect humanity from the evil in our midst.  Both sub-genres have room for character actors and/or major movie stars in smaller roles and both have the potential to break-out and become true tent poles. But the core difference between these sub-genres is pretty obvious.  Many, if not most, of them feature female leads.

The newest 'next Twilight', The Host, gets a trailer.

 

Jake Abel - Saoirse Ronan - William Hurt - Diane Kruger - Movie Trailers - Movies Blog

Always be weary of any trailer where all of the action beats seem to come from the same scene.  As such we can presume that most of the budget went towards the daylight car chase that is highlighted several times throughout.  Otherwise, this trailer both reveals much of the narrative (at least the first half of the film) while revealing a relatively thin story.  Still, Saorise Ronan is worth seeing in pretty much anything, while old-pros like William Hurt and Francis Fisher will hopefully bring gravitas.  What's interesting is that while the likes of The Hunger Games, the Twilight Saga, and even the Harry Potter franchise were films born of many cooks (the original novelist, the screenwriter(s), and the director), The Host is both an adaptation of a Stephenie Meyer novel but a film written and directed by Andrew Niccol.  The source material is of course right in his grind house, so my biggest qualm with the trailer is that it all looks rather dull. Anyway, The Host opens on March 29th, 2013.  As always, we'll see...

Scott Mendelson