This September? Well, let’s just see.

Bangkok Dangerous

Prediction: $10m Open, $25m Final

Actual: $8m Open, $15m Current, ~$15m Final

At some point, Hollywood will probably realize that it can’t keep bringing over talented Asian directors to make their own films but in the Hollywood way. It just doesn’t work. The past several years has seen the Asian horror genre crash and burn, especially when the original directors are brough along for the ride. And everyone bemoans the career path of John Woo. Even with the high point of Face/Off, none of his stateside work has come close to the depth or visceral enjoyment of his Hong Kong films.

This remake is really no different. Another talented Asian coming to the US and delivering a stinker. This isn’t an indication of the directoral talent, but it might not be just because of producer meddling, either. With hope it won’t unfairly malign the entire Thai film industry. Unlike Japan or Hong Kong, it doesn’t have a strong base of fan support, so there’s a chance that people will take what they’ve seen in the US and cast the same pall over the original work back at home. That would be a shame, because there are some really good Thai films.

As far as this film, though, it’s certainly in line with other shovel work from Nicholas Cage. Ultimately forgettable, it’s seen drops of at least 65% every weekend.

A suggestion: go see Killer Tattoo.

Burn After Reading

Prediction: For some inexplicable reason, I didn’t predict this. Perhaps I thought it was going to get a platform release.

Actual: $19m Open, $55m Current, ~$65m Final

The Coen Brothers’ followup to their Oscar-winning No Country for Old Men has done very, very well for them. It’s clearly not as great a film, but the business has been very strong. They scored their biggest opening (and first #1), and it’s already cruised past all their other films except No Country to be their second highest grosser.

This is a bit of a turnabout for the Coens, actually. Their work history has tended to gravitate between doing limited release films that are well regarded and strong business (for the style of release), and more commercial fare that’s flawed and not as well received. If No Country for Old Men was the limited release film done good, Burn After Reading would be the flawed commercial film. Except that unlike The Ladykillers or Intolerable Cruelty, it’s done very well for itself, despite the problems.

A good amount of credit can probably be given to the marketing department of Focus Features. Highlighting the antics of Brad Pitt did quite well to sell the film even if (upon viewing), he’s a supporting player, not the main character.

The Family that Preys

Prediction: $15m Open, $35m Final

Actual: $17m Open, $36m Current, ~$40m Final

The addition of Kathy Bates didn’t have a large effect on Tyler Perry’s latest. In fact, this is going to be slightly on the low side for him, although it’s not too out of line for expectations. Even if it’s his lowest grossing film since Daddy’s Little Girls, it’s still a massive money-maker.

Perry’s managed to make himself a cottage movie industry. He’s able to produce films at a quick rate (up to two a year), do it cheaply (I’d be amazed if any of his films have cost much more than $10m to make), and is able to consistently reap big profits. He’s probably never going to see a huge grossing-film, and might go his entire career without cracking the century mark, but that doesn’t matter. His next film is going to put his career total above $300m, and it’ll likely do so on less than $60m in total costs. Tyler Perry is gold, and even a relatively weak performance like The Family that Preys isn’t going to undermine that.

Next up has him donning the Madea fat suit again in February’s Madea Goes to Jail. Expect it to hit along the higher end of his films.

Righteous Kill

Prediction: $10m Open, $30m Final

Actual: $16m Open, $38m Current, $40m Final

This isn’t really good news, but neither is it bad. Righteous Kill has had a thoroughly lackluster box office run. Despite the hopeful promise of a good meeting between stars Pacino and DeNiro, the quality of the film wasn’t apparent and audiences didn’t latch onto it, either.

Of the four films released this weekend, it was easily the most expensive, coming in at $60m. While it probably will see a profit, eventually, it’s going to take some time after the DVD release to do so. For the two stars, this probably won’t mean a whole lot. They’re at the point in their careers when they can rest on their laurels pretty well. DeNiro’s going to get a critical bounce-back, at least, with What Just Happened and Pacino’s going to portray Salvador Dali in a film coming out next year.

Director Jon Avnet should be much more worried. He’s had Al Pacino for two films this year and both of them underwhelmed business-wise and were hammered by the critics. Such is not the combination for a long career, unless you’re self-financing (and perhaps not even then.)

The Women

Prediction: $10m Open, $40m Final

Actual: $10m Open, $26m Current, ~$28m Final

Picturehouse went all-out on this release. It premiered in more theaters than either Burn After Reading or The Family that Preys. The advertising was out there, if a bit late in coming, and was rather strong to boot. If we were just looking at promised potential, The Women might be a bit underwhelming.

However, it’s still the second biggest release from Picturehouse by a rather wide margin. It won’t get within sight of the $37m that Pan’s Labyrinth earned, but it is well past the $20m for A Prarie Home Companion. Against a $16m budget, it’s done quite well. I felt I was a bit bullish with my $10m opening, but it hit that fairly easily.

The problem is in the legs. Usually there’s an expectation that films marketed to women will have stronger legs. Conventional wisdom has it that guys are the sorts who want to see the film on opening day, but girls are willing to wait. This seemed to be the case for The Women, which had a decent hold on the second weekend. It turns out that the third weekend was the weak point. Competition took the rug out from under it and it’s not managed to recover.

Even so, a decent result, if not a spectacular one.

Lakeview Terrace

Prediction: $5m Open, $20m Final

Actual: $15m Open, $36m Current, ~$40m Final

When expectations are low, it’s easy to exceed them. For both director Neil LaBute and star Samuel L. Jackson, Lakeview Terrace is good news. The business isn’t big, but it’s big enough to be considered a success. This is especially true considering the film’s slim $20m budget. If there’s any bad news, it’s the tepid critical response. They may have tried for a taught, awards-potential thriller, but what they gave was a modestly successful but forgettable autumn thriller.

For LaBute, this cancels out The Wicker Man and gives him his biggest opening and total tally ever. He’s still a long way away from being a commercial name, but he could build on this to get something bigger.

For Jackson, it’s a nice uptick from most of his recent starring roles. In fact, it’s a bigger opening and final than the much more heavily hyped Snakes on a Plane from two years ago.

My Best Friend’s Girl

Prediction: $20m Open, $60m Final

Actual: $8m Open, $18m Current, ~$20m Final

It’s fairly easy to see where this film went wrong, but there’s a bigger question of why didn’t anything go right for it. While clearly neither Dane Cook nor Jason Biggs are a draw, this was a poor result for Kate Hudson.

Her previous two films (Fools Gold and You, Me, and Dupree) both opened north of $20 million and finished upwards of $70m. Granted, in those cases she was paired up with male leads who were more recognizable and liked than Cook. But even for her solo efforts Raising Helen and The Skeleton Key, she managed greater than $10m openings and $30m finals.

She’s not a huge draw, but she’s modestly successful. My Best Friend’s Girl isn’t even modestly acceptable, though. The combination of Hudson + Cook opened to a good $5m less than Cook + Jessica Alba. Alba’s not a rom-com draw like Hudson, though. I’m going to assume that what happened here is a mixed message. Dane Cook tells the audience that it’s frat boy humor. Jessica Alba says hot babe that frat boys like. Kate Hudson says more female empowering babe. It doesn’t quite gel with Cook’s message. She doesn’t draw guys, he turns off girls, hence nobody goes to see the movie.

Hudson’s next rom-com is Bride Wars which has her up against Anne Hathaway, which should do a lot better than this one.

Igor

Prediction: $15m Opening, $50m Final

Actual: $8m Opening, $18m Current, ~$20m Final

The primary cause for the low gross here is that the visual style of the film far outstripped the quality. Igor looks great, as a sort of cross between Pixar and Tim Burton. However the delivery leaves much to be desired, and certainly doesn’t stand in the company of either.

However, there’s a more important reason for the low final tally. Despite the small opening, Igor held up quite well in its second weekend, dropping under 35% and earning above $5m. However, in its third and fourth weekends, it’s dropped upwards of 60%.

As weak as Igor was on release, it did stand as the only family option for a couple weeks. On its third weekend it got steamrolled by chihuahuas.

Ghost Town

Prediction: $10m Opening, $25m Final

Actual: $5m Opening, $13m Current, ~$15m Final

Ironically, this was the best reviewed of the movies that weekend. The opening was pretty anemic, but we can probably chalk that up to the poor marketing. Despite apparently being a good film (and Gervais is a talented comedian), the advertising made it all seem pretty bland and forgetful, so the audience apparently forgot to go see it. Perhaps it will see some life on DVD.

This actually held up well for a couple weeks, seeing second and third weekend drops under 50%. In that sense, it’s a bit like Igor. Unlike Igor, however, there wasn’t any new comedy competition in the third weekend to account for the 66% drop. Perhaps it just saturated its potential audience by that point.

Eagle Eye

Prediction: $30m Open, $85m Final

Actual: $29m Open, $76m Current, ~$95m final

After three weeks of studios throwing everything they could at audiences to see what would really stick (Burn After Reading, really), this was the first near-certain success. While it’s arguable that Eagle Eye opened at the low end of predictions, it’s held up very well, with two weeks of sub-40% drops.

Shia LaBeouf has done fairly well to establish himself as a bona fide star. While he can’t claim Transformers or Indiana Jones as his, the success of Disturbia and now Eagle Eye has done a lot to build his personal brand, despite some of his off-screen actions. He’s managed the nice trick of appearing in both high-concept blockbusters to get his name and face out, but also strong, smaller fare where his name is the only thing really going for it. Contrast it to Orlando Bloom’s career: managed to get the first part, but hasn’t delivered on the second.

There’s a chance Eagle Eye will see a final tally upwards of $100m. But while it has been holding well, it may just run out of time before the holiday season distracts audiences. The real deadline is November 14, when Quantum of Solace arrives as the next major actioner.

Nights in Rodanthe

Prediction: $15m Open, $60m Final

Actual: $13m Open, $37m Current, ~$45m Final

While the combination of Richard Gere, Diane Lane, and Nicholas Sparks should be some sort of perfect storm for non-comedy romances, this is a slightly underwhelming result. In comparison to previous films in the genre starring Lane and Gere (separately or apart) this is going to finish up almost perfectly average. It probably won’t quite match the $52m the two earned together in 2002 with Unfaithful.

Similarly, it isn’t a great result for Sparks. It will earn more than 2002’s A Walk to Remember, but not as much as 1999’s Message in a Bottle. And it’s far behind the breakout success of The Notebook in 2004, although in that case it was bolstered by the much stronger weekday sessions of a summer release.

To be fair, the breakout potential for a romance is going to be rather limited. With romantic comedies, there’s a better chance for crossover, but without the impetus to laugh, most men will wonder what they’re supposed to be experiencing. (Whether or not this is a real reaction or an instance of societal peer pressure is a top I won’t delve into, though.)

It’s not a bad result for Nights in Rodanthe, but given the pedigree of the people involved, it does feel somewhat underwhelming.

Fireproof

Prediction: No prediction

Actual: $7m Open, $20m Current, ~$30m Final

Sometimes films will come out of nowhere. Despite being on none of the typical radars, Fireproof managed to hit number 4 in the box office its opening weekend and has held on quite well.

It does this because it fits its niche. And that niche is Christianity. For the most part, the general-movie public isn’t going to know about these releases unless they’re anomalous and have a large crossover, as happened with Passion of the Christ and The Chronicles of Narnia. There will be public perception after the fact in some cases, but it’s usually short lived.

Fireproof is notable not only because it managed a strong release, but also the legs its displayed. Relative to expectations, which were near non-existant, this is a bona fide blockbuster. It’s also helped because it cost a slim $500,000 to make. The return on investment here is huge, and it would probably serve well to the movie studios to take a lesson: they can hit the Christian market and hit it well without needing the films to be the next Passion.

Miracle at St. Anna

Prediction: $10m Open, $35m Final

Actual: $3.5m Open, $8m Current, ~$9m Final

While Spike Lee’s ability to weave stories of inner-city racial tension are well accounted, it seems he doens’t quite have the same keen hand on the keel for war films. It seems the consensus is that Lee had some strong ideas to work with here, but wasn’t able to pull them together in a strongly cohesive whole.

I wonder if there might be a wider war movie backlash at play. Films focusing on the Middle East have failed to work for the past several years, but it seems that even films about World War 2 are starting to falter. After a number of successes in the late 90s and early 00s, there have been fewer of late and those that were released haven’t gotten a toe-hold. Clint Eastwood’s twosome of Flags of our Fathers and Letters from Iwo Jima didn’t even manage $50m between them.

It could be that audiences are likely to tune out anything that has a war sensation until the war is actually over. The WW2 films succeeded in a period of high patriotism for what happened in that war. Right now, the general public is very down on the concept of Americans fighting, so they won’t really respect depictions of such, at least not directly. Transformers managed a rather positive depiction of the US Military.

Overall

September wasn’t too surprising this year. It started off with a whimper and then had weeks of the studios throwing everything at the wall to see what would stick. In the end, we’ve got two large successes (Burn After Reading and Eagle Eye), and a number of middling performances along with a few failures. On the upside for the studios, just about everything released was cheap, so most will probably see a profit in the end.

The other historically weak months have a bit of help to bolster their thresholds. January has latent holiday business, not to mention the occasional high profile release. April comes at the tail end of the fairly strong spring period, which has started to see some rather high profile blockbusters. And October has the ever successful Halloween period to drive up the scary movie business.

September doesn’t really have the latent summer business, because it’s mostly dried up by the end of August. There are occasional films which have strong business into the fall months, but these are somewhat rare. Instead it’s release tends to be littered with films that would fit right into the late August spots, but got pushed out because of the sheer volume of low-budget action films that Hollywood can churn out. There are also the early potential awards contenders, such as last year’s 3:10 to Yuma, but these films are going for the long road to profitability, not the quick recoup of investment.

With that in mind, let’s see what is in store for this year.

Weekend of September 5

The Accidental Husband

This used to be an August release, but as the last few weeks of the month filled up, Yari Film Group decided to bow out on the competition and make this one a September release. Here’s what I had to say:

A romantic comedy from fledgling distributor Yari Film Group (biggest film to date: The Illusionist). We’ve got Uma Thurman as a radio talk-show host who dispenses romance advice. Due to some internet shenanigans, she ends up married to a fireman (Jeffrey Dean Morgan) while she’s planning her own wedding to Colin Firth.

RomComs can sell very well, but they are somewhat subject to name recognition issues. For this film, there really aren’t any. Thurman is known, but her biggest films are all directed by Quentin Tarantino. With this she could be attempting to remake herself as a romantic lead, but it’s an iffy shot, especially coming from Yari.

On the upside, the shift isn’t likely to have any great effect on the overall prospects for the film. On the downside, it didn’t have especially great prospects from the get-go.

Opening: Still $5m, Final: $15m

Bangkok Dangerous

In nearly every conversation I’ve had about this film, someone has pointed out that the title sounds really, really dumb. This is a remake of a Thai action film with the same title. For whatever reason, Lionsgate chose to keep the same title (after pondering such alternatives as Big Hit in Bangkok). They probably misstepped a bit here, but it may not matter too much, in the end.

The upside for the film is that it’s being done by the same directors as the Thai original, and it looks pretty slick. So it could be a pretty good film.

The downside is twofold. This is a serious action film which political overtones, somewhat akin to last year’s The Kingdom. While it avoids tying itself to any current political hotbed, it still may turn off viewers in the same way. In addition to that, it’s starring Nicholas Cage. While he’s had a fairly successful career as an action leading man, the films he does well in tend to be strong enough to sell themselves, without requiring his everyman demeanor to pull the film along. Cage is enjoyable, but he’s not a selling point.

He’s had several films released in September, with The Wicker Man, Lord of War, and Matchstick Men all underperforming, regardless of critical reception. There probably won’t be anything too different this time around.

Opening: $10m, Final: $25m

Weekend of September 12

Righteous Kill

The big news here is Al Pacino and Robert DeNiro, together again for the first time. While the two veteran actors have been in the same film before, perhaps most famously in Godfather II and they even met up in Heat, but this time around they’re sharing significant screen time. This isn’t a minor selling-point, as the pair have something upwards of 70 years of combined experience at doing crime thrillers, so this is essentially the dream match-up for the genre.

The plot looks sufficiently bleak and convoluted, with the are they good or bad question keeping the suspense high and all the characters inhabiting a large region of grey morality that provides a successful wellspring of quality stories for movies. The Departed recently hit upon this to stunning success (and an Academy Award, finally, for director Martin Scorsese.) The hope is that Rightous Kill can probably do the same. If it’s sufficiently good, it could be an early release awards contender.

The downside here is that while there’s some reason to expect critical success, the business side isn’t necessarily going to follow. Neither Pacino nor DeNiro are known for their business might, instead tending to find success as part of ensembles or in critical darlings. DeNiro has had some success in comedies over the past decade, but outside of that, their films are modest successes at best.

Further, while The Departed did very well in this genre, it’s more the exception than the rule. Moreover, while director Jon Avnet might have directed Pacino earlier this year in 88 Minutes, he’s certainly no Scorsese, and is more known for his TV work.

Ultimately, Righteous Kill is going to rely upon its quality to generate any buzz and legs. If it’s very good it might cruise quite a ways, but that’s not the most likely scenario.

Opening: $10m, Final: $30m

Tyler Perry’s The Family that Preys

Perry is perhaps the biggest box office surprise success over the past decade. He literally exploded on the scene in 2005 with Diary of a Mad Black Woman, which opened to over $21m and managed to grab first place that weekend. This is despite the fact that it opened to less than 1500 theaters (the other two new releases had at least 1000 more), and that it was opening against the third weekend of the extremely successful Will Smith vehicle, Hitch.

With a release like that Diary was probably expected to do business around $5m or so, followed by a quick exit. I doubt anyone expected it to do $20m over its entire run, much less in three days. In the end, it earned $50m and was one of the bigger surprises of the entire year.

Perry didn’t stop there. A year later he released Madea’s Family Reunion, which hit north of $30m and finished with $63m. 2007 brought both Daddy’s Little Girls and Why Did I Get Married, which opened to $11m and $20m respectively, and finished with $31m and $55m. And this march he had Meet the Browns, which had another $20m opening and finished with $41m. Yes, he’s releasing two successful films per year, now. Next year looks to keep up the pace, with Madea Goes to Jail in February and A Jazz Man’s Blues later in the year.

It’s fairly clear that the Perry train isn’t going to stop rolling. Even the lowest earning films in Daddy’s Little Girls and Meet the Browns can’t be considered failures, especially considering the minuscule budgets. Perry’s managed to tap into his specific audience just about perfectly, and he’s achieved success because of that. This drives Hollywood nuts, because his market isn’t the typical 15-35 white male. There African American market isn’t going to be gigantic, but it’s a bit like horror films: there’s a specific audience that can be quite loyal if the product meets their standards. Perry meets those in spades.

Of course having said that, there’s a bit of concern with The Family that Preys. For one, Perry is successful but not bulletproof. His films have rather poor legs, instead pulling in the bulk of the business up front. Second, he’s mostly successful when headlining his famous Madea character. Daddy’s Little Girls didn’t feature her, and didn’t reach the same heights because of it.

Third, The Family that Preys is a bit of a change of pace for him, stepping away from the uplifting and feel-good nature of his other films to instead explore the sometimes dark relationships between two families, one black and one white. While this may possibly bring in a crossover audience, it runs the risk of alienating his core while not doing that. (Unfortunately, white audiences are rather racist towards films marketed to African Americans, and Perry has that label.)

Much like Righteous Kill, The Family that Preys is probably going to be a bit reliant upon the response for its final business tally, but the opening weekend shouldn’t be more than a tick or two below the typical Perry film.

Opening: $15m, Final: $35m.

The Women

Speaking of markets that Hollywood just doesn’t get, women comprise a big one. Sure, there’s the typical lip service, but by and large, women are of definite secondary status when it comes to films. Except for a few select genres, a woman in a leading role is going to be a rarity (there are very few Ripleys, for instance.) And in the typical headline films, they’re going to be relegated to strictly support status (Maggie Gyllenhaal’s role in the otherwise mostly exceptional The Dark Knight) or eye-candy (Megan Fox in Transformers).

When women are given more prominent roles, it’s usually in fare that is second-tier and has poorer release dates and weaker advertising. When such films fail to do boffo business (see Jodie Foster’s The Brave One from last September), it leads the studios to assume that women aren’t a good market for films.

This is really odd, because there’s ample evidence to the contrary. Just in the past couple of years, we’ve seen Hairspray, Mamma Mia!, and (especially) Sex and the City cruise easily past the century mark. And, of course, the biggest film of all time was spearheaded largely by the distaff business. Batman doesn’t have a hope of toppling Titanic. I wonder if he’d have a shot had he treated his girlfriend better.

So that brings us to The Women, a remake of a 1939 film based on a play about the comedic interplay of a group of New York socialites. Somewhat impressively, the film is directed, written, produced, and starring women. It stars Meg Ryan and Annette Bening, who bring a fair bit of name recognition, and from the trailer looks like it might be quite good.

It’s also a film that almost got shoved aside. Despite the apparent quality, it didn’t seem like it was going to get a strong release. Distributor Picturehouse is a definite indie company, and obviously can’t bring the marketing strength to bear, but it seemed up until a few months ago that this would get a minor theatrical release and then hopefully make its money back on video. Sex and the City apparently changed all that, and it should get a wide release, now.

How well it does probably depends primarily on how much public knowledge there is. If the word doesn’t get out, and it’s only barely wide (i.e. under 1000 theaters), then it’ll probalby perform like most Picturehouse flicks and end up sub $20m in the long run. However, it’s got the potential to pass Pan’s Labyrinth as the studio’s biggest film.

Somewhat refreshingly, i’s unlikely that the typical reasons to predict box office strength are going to apply here. While Ryan and Bening have name recognition, neither of them have had a really successful film since the ’90s. And that doesn’t matter at all. With hope The Women will become the strongest success of the fall season, and we might see Hollywood make some changes because of it.

Opening: $10m, Final: $40m (with a much higher potential)

Weekend of September 19

Ghost Town

This is a comedic take on the whole ‘I can see dead people’ theme that was most successfully exemplified by The Sixth Sense in 1999. That’s hardly the only film to tread those waters, as Hollywood seems to enjoy going back to it every few years, in a variety of genres from horror to romance to drama.

This time around Ricky Gervais plays a dentist who hates people and dies a little while undergoing a routine medical procedure. Because of this, he can suddenly convene with the dead. Greg Kinnear plays a ghost who befriends him. Hijinks ensue and, presumably, Gervais will find true love and learn to accept others, not necessarily in that order.

The film looks cute and Gervais is a spot-on comedic talent, so there’s no reason to believe it’s going to be terrible. However, while Hollywood likes going back to it, The Sixth Sense and Ghost are the most successful comparisons. In most cases, the films will end up with much more modest totals. Given the release date, there’s no reason to believe this is going to break out.

Opening: $10m, Final: $25m

Igor

The shine’s really coming off of the computer animation vehicle. It’s been almost thirteen years since the original Toy Story jumpstarted the medium, and while the first decade or so was an unparalleled success, the past few years have seen the stakes drop somewhat dramatically. This is somewhat expected, because early on such films were quite expensive and the studios that had the capabilities to make them were quite few and far between. Thus the ones that did had a bit of an impetus to put forth a top tier product.

More recently, other studios have jumped into the game, and that’s led to a drop in quality and thus a drop in box office potential. That’s not the entire story, as even industry king Pixar has seen grosses drop, with its last three films failing to cross the $250m mark. These aren’t failures, but they’re not stunning successes.

Even so, expectations for the smaller films doesn’t tend to be especially high. While Pixar has continued to push the technical envelope, and the budgets have remained high (Wall-E cost around $180m), many such films are quite inexpensive and can be considered successes even if they don’t garner top tier business. The Weinstein Company has worked to fit into this niche, and Igor is their third such foray. The first film they had was Hoodwinked, which was a bit of a surprise success in early 2006, earning over $50m. However, the followup Doogal didn’t impress, and failed to even reach $10m.

Plot-wise, Igor follows the title character in his quest to stop being a minion and instead make a name for himself as a mad scientist. His solution is to create life. Visually, it seems somewhere between Pixar and Tim Burton, with a fairly strong dose of cuddly creepiness. As is typical, there’s a host of celebrity voices, with John Cusack in the lead and Steve Buscemi, Eddy Izzard, and Molly Shannon providing support.

This seems like it’s going to fit in with the various fable/fairy tale humor films, such as the aforementioned Hoodwinked, but also Happily ‘n’ Ever After (a dismal failure) and Shrek, which is the gold standard for the genre. A non-CG success can be found in last year’s Enchanted.

If it’s as good as the trailer seems to indicate, it could do fairly strong business. Despite the overall weakness of the autumn box office, animation has found success. Tim Burton’s Corpse Bride earned over $50m in 2005, Open Season earned over $80m in 2006, and Shark Tale earned $160m with an early October, 2006 release (thanks, in part, to Will Smith).

Opening: $15m, Final: $50m

Lakeview Terrace

Samuel L. Jackson has been in at least three films every year going back to 2002. He’s easily been one of the most prolific actors this decade, and doesn’t show any sign of slowing down. What’s especially impressive is that while he’s often viewed as little more than a catch-phrase dropping angry man, he’s shown up in a variety of different genres and exposure levels. He’s certainly not a choosy actor, but he does seem to want to try a lot of different things.

Lakeview Terrace is a race relations film, where Jackson plays a cop in a Southern California suburb who takes a strong dislike to a interracial, newlywed couple who move in next door. It’s not likely to pull any punches, and is probably an attempt at an awards contender in the same vein as Crash. The good news is that Lakeview Terrace looks taught and gripping and might try to ask a number of hard questions for which US society does not yet have answers.

The bad news is director Neil LaBute. While a number of his early films garnered strong critical praise, he’s never done anything breakout. And his last film was The Wicker Man, which was an amazing failure at all levels except for providing fodder for YouTube comedy videos.

If LaBute can find his directorial voice from half a decade ago, it might surprise and stick around for a while. Otherwise, Lakeview Terrace will probably be quickly forgotten.

Opening: $5m, Final: $20m

My Best Friend’s Girl

Jason Biggs plays himself from any other film (read: American Pie). He’s a lovable loser with a romantic streak but no skills with the ladies.

Dane Cook is his best friend, who makes his career being a bad date so other guys will look good in comparison.

Kate Hudson is the love interest. Cook agrees to date her so she’ll see Biggs in a better light and stay with him.

This is the third straight fall rom-com for Cook, and he’s not seen any great success. 2006’s Employee of the Month (with Jessica Simpson) earned just $28m. Last year’s Good Luck Chuck (with Jessica Alba) got to just $35m. He’s mostly been viewed as a generic funnyman. Amusing, but not really a draw. Biggs is even less so. While he had success in the American Pie films, he’s had nothing that’s broken out since.

The draw here is Hudson, who’s making a name for herself in the RomCom genre. Earlier this year Fools Gold passed the $70m mark after a $21m opening, and in 2006 she had You, Me, and Dupree which did similar business. Back in 2003, she starred in How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days, which passed $100m when all was said and done.

I’m feeling slightly bullish about My Best Friend’s Girl, despite the problems that Cook and Biggs bring to the table. However, Hudson’s a strength. And there’s The Cars song, which makes for a bit of excellent advertising.

Opening: $20m, Final: $60m

Taken

The latest from Luc Besson, this film has Liam Neeson playing a father who’s out to find his abducted daughter. Neeson has the typical action thriller skills of being able to kill people in many, many often painful ways, as well as a smattering of neat spy abilities with technology.

While Besson’s probably best remembered for putting together the brilliant Leon: The Professional, his career is mostly comprised of writing low-budget actioners which tend to be all style and no substance. This isn’t bad, as it’s provided Jason Stathem a career, but there’s not much memorable to them. And Statham has the ability to draw people in to a degree. Neeson doesn’t really even that, despite having a number of top tier films to his credit, including Batman Begins and The Phantom Menace.

Mostly, though, this is a really packed weekend and something is going to be left behind. Taken seems to be veering towards the thriller rather than action aspect, which means that while it might pack a punch, it probably won’t seem as fun as the other options.

Opening: $5m, Final: $15m

Weekend of September 26

Eagle Eye

Fresh off the back-to-back $300m successes of Transformers and Indiana Jones, Shia LeBeouf takes top billing in a more modest fare, which is a modern take on the big brother concept. He’s a man on the run after being framed as a terrorist while the unseen real terrorists drive him to do bad things as they watch him through all the neat technology that makes our 21st century world interesting and, possibly, a bit scary.

While it’s not likely to create any deep thinking, Eagle Eye is probably poised to be the first big success of the fall season. LeBeouf is teamed up with directo D.J. Caruso, who also directed him in last year’s surprise spring success of Disturbia. The movie’s also produced by Steven Spielberg (director of Indiana Jones and exec producer behind Transformers) & Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman (writers of Transformers), so there’s probably not any reason to expect this one to be a bad movie, even if it’s not a brilliant one.

The advertising has been quite good thus far, making it seem taught and gripping and likely to draw people in. LeBeouf has a lot of on-screen charisma, and is able to mesh humor with terror and action strenght with a bit of a bumbling air. It’s not really any surprise that he’s being viewed as an up-and-coming top tier actor. He’s quickly becoming a draw in his own right. Costar Michelle Monaghan isn’t a large draw, but has appeared in a number of high profile action flicks like Mission Impossible III, The Bourne Supremacy, and Mr. & Mrs. Smith.

Perhaps the biggest strength here is that while it’s a action thriller, it’s avoiding any of the verboten politics that have inhabited the genre of late and spelled box office poison. Last year’s The Kingdom is a prime example, and Eagle Eye should do considerably better.

Opening: $30m, Final: $85m

Miracle at St. Anna

Spike Lee is a well regarded director, regularly tackling social issues in a thoughtful manner, with a particularly strong eye towards race. What he doesn’t have is large success. Only one film of his has even passed the $50m mark, and that was the rather mainstream, but still shockingly intelligent, Inside Man from 2006.

Miracle at St. Anna is his first foray into the war film genre. It falls in with some of his themes, as the action is centered on an all-black platoon in WWII who see action in a small Italian town. There’s also a possible mystical element that’s a bit out of line for him and a multi-decade mystery that’s hinted at.

There’s no reason to believe that the quality will be missing here. In fact, there’s a fair bet that this will be a better film than Eagle Eye. However, while Inside Man was a stunning success, Lee’s history means this is more likely to be an under-the-radar film with perhaps sleeper potential. It might be good, but it’s not likely to be big.

Opening: $10m, Final: $35m

Nights in Rodanthe

This is the fourth film based on the works of author Nicholas Sparks. Earlier films include Message in a Bottle, A Walk to Remember, and The Notebook, all of which were modest successes in the romance genre.

Romance mainstays Diane Lane and Richard Gere provide the genre starpower. It’s worth noting that romance films tend to be quite a bit more modest than romantic comedies, because there’s not nearly as much crossover appeal to get the guys in the theaters. Even so, this is star-studded between Lane, Gere, and Sparks, so there’s quite a bit of upside potential.

As a rule, romances don’t open very large, but they tend to have strong legs. It’s entirely possible that while this film won’t open as big as Eagle Eye, it may have a comparable final gross. Not likely, but possible.

Opening: $15m, Final: $60m

Overall

There’s not a whole lot out of the ordinary this September, with a few early awards hopefuls and the typical smattering of action and family fare to fill up space between the bigger August and October weekends. While 2008 has fallen behind 2007, there’s a chance that one or two of these could break out and pull the year ahead.