April 24th, 2007
It's a busy week for DVD releases, but the signal to noise ratio is a little high, and that made it harder to find the DVDs that were truly worthy of attention.
(And even then, I went off track a couple of times.)
As for the DVD Pick of the Week, there is really only one choice for me, The Queen - Buy from Amazon.
However, I'm also giving that honor to Burning Annie - Buy from Amazon, which would have won a few weeks ago if I had got the right information on the quality of the DVD.
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October 27th, 2004
Despite a 45% drop in its weekend haul,
Shark Tale was able easily able to earn it third first place finish on the international charts. Still early in its run, the film took home $16.2 million in 4,368 theatres in 24 markets pushing its total to $80.3 million internationally. Without any openings the film relied on strong holdovers like in the U.K. where it drop 39%, in France it was off 32% and 35% in Germany.
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June 21st, 2004
Every week films get a second chance at success from the home market; or, in some cases, a first chance at success. Pretty light week both in terms of quantity and quality. Less than 200 films on Amazon's release list and only a handful of those are worth mentioning. Of that small number,
Bad Santa, or to be more specific,
Badder Santa is the DVD pick of the week, but its dark humor is not for everyone.
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May 11th, 2004
In addition to the $51.7 million Van Helsing earned at the domestic box office, the monster movie made $55.3 million on 5,254 screens in 41 markets internationally. Not only was that easily the largest box office this weekend, but it was the best we've seen this year. Some highlights were the $9.9 million in the U.K. and $7 million in Germany. And while a $107 million opening weekend seems spectacular, this is a very expensive film to get to theatres. Combine the production budget, domestic P&A budgets, translations / dubbing / subtitles, etc. and the final cost is nearing $250 million. A strong home market will be needed before Universal sees a profit.
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May 4th, 2004
After a huge start in the international market, there was a series a steep drops for
Kill Bill: Volume 2 that all but guarantees it won't earn as much as
the original. Drops like 51% in Germany, 46% in Italy helped push the weekend total down to just $10 million in 27 markets.
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April 20th, 2004
The Passion of the Christ saw large drop-offs in many international markets but openings in nine others helped stabilize its overall box office. Maybe. I'm getting some conflicting reports on the box office figures. $14.6 or $25 is the two prevailing estimates I've found. I do believe the $25 million is for the whole week while the $14.6 million is for the weekend.
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March 22nd, 2004
For the first time this year we saw a substantial increase over the box office from this time last year that wasn't due to a single movie. This week we saw a token 1.4% increase from last weekend, but a fantastic 21.5% increase from last year. It is important to keep in mind, however, that Spring was the weakest point in 2003's box office if you take into account Seasonal Adjustments. This weekend last year was when the war in Iraq started, for instance, and this weakness continued till mid-April. So 2004 has a golden opportunity to put some distance between itself and 2003.
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March 19th, 2004
With three movies opening wide we should see a change at the top spot this week. But there are a couple of twists. Firstly, all three movies are rated R, which should help more kid friendly fare at the box office. Secondly, the movie with the best reviews is also opening in the fewest theatres.
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March 15th, 2004
It was the third weekend in a row with week-to-week drop-offs, this time it was 18.8%, which is huge for non-post holiday weekend. And only the weakness experienced this time last year is keeping 2004 above 2003's pace. This weekend it was up 10% helping the year-to-date gain increase to nearly 4%. Still not higher than inflation, but it's much better than earlier in the year.
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March 12th, 2004
2004 is starting to slow down again, as this week's group of new movies is quite weak. The only wide release with overall positive reviews really stretches the definition of wide release. And the other two releases have reviews that range from mediocre to really bad.
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March 11th, 2004
During the past week promotional websites for several movies were launched and some older ones added additional content. Here the list of this week's releases, a couple of new sites and few updates including the winner for the week,
The Ladykillers -
Official Site. If you know of any new movie websites not on this list feel free to e-mail me with the details.
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February 19th, 2004
During the past week promotional websites for several movies were launched and some older ones added additional content. Here the list of this week's releases, a couple of new sites and few updates including the winner for the week,
Confessions of a Teenage Drama Queen -
Official Site . If you know of any new movie websites not on this list feel free to e-mail me with the details.
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February 6th, 2004
During the past week promotional websites for several movies were launched and some older ones added additional content. Here the list of this week's releases, a couple of new sites and few updates including the winner for the week.
Miracle -
Official Site. If you know of any new movie websites not on this list feel free to e-mail me with the details.
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January 23rd, 2004
Each week, the studios do another dance, shuffling around the release dates of their movies in an effort to best position themselves for future success.
This week sees the sudden disappearance of Mindhunters from the schedules and new release dates for Raising Helen, Mr. 3000, The Clearing, Wicker Park, Beauty Shop, Amityville, The Notebook, Secret Window, 13 Going on 30 and Breakin' All the Rules.
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January 15th, 2004
During the past week promotional websites for several movies were launched and some older ones added additional content. Here the list of new releases, updated sites, and some upcoming releases that slipped through the cracks, including the winner for the week
Barber Shop 2 -
Official Site . If you know of any new movie websites not on this list feel free to e-mail me with the details.
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