Nice comments LL; You're right, FP was just marketed incorrectly to both the comedy and drama seeking crowds. But I saw that Brad listed FP as an oscar best picture contender, but its still early. I stayed home because of term papers, ugh. Next week is looking boring though. G.I. Joe looks like the live action remake of Team America: World Police. Still it'll come on top because it satisfies the the action seeking crowd.

G.I. Joe ———- $40.8 mil (Mummy Tomb of the Dragon Emperor type money)
Julie and Julia — $13.8 mil (6k per theater)
HP6 ————– $11.6 mil (35% drop)
G-Force ——— $10.2 mil
Funny People — $9.4 mil (60% drop)

Hmm didn't expect this, but hopefully FP will have legs because Uni really needs some kind of hit this Summer. However PE is at $93mill domestic and will probably finish at around $98 to $100mill. On a $100 mill budget that's not bad at all, but I don't understand how people call it a flop. It maybe somewhat dissapointing, but thats what happens when you open a serious epic crime drama in the summer. Plus with the growing overseas gross it should actually turn into quite a profit when all is said and done. AS for next week it will be pretty interesting to see how much G.I. J will make with all the negative buzz, but it is getting positive reviews so far and tracking has been solid and it's expected to open with as much as $60mill or higher. I'm actually more interested in when D9 finally comes out and how it will do though.

Was I ever off on Aliens, not very good at this, but 31K theaters and you can't get double digits is a joke. Was right Funny People was not going as high as expected.

Curious about G.I Joe, the advertising budget is huge, they must have a lot of toys to sell on the self I guess.

3,100 theaters I mean. I forgot to mention G.I Joe has a perfect weekend with no competition.

gi joe will destroy all in it's path

Also briefly on Orphan I'm kinda glad it still has some legs. I saw the movie last week and enjoyed the hell out of it. It's not nearly as crappy as it looks from the previews and if there are any horror fans on this board you should deffentially check it out. It's also the BEST movie Dark Castle has ever put out.

@Steve: no competition, gonna lose the girls to julie & julia and some people to the horror/thriller a perfect getaway, and paper heart limited opens

Negative buzz? As of right now the film has an 86% approval rating on rotten tomatoes. Imagine if it maintained good reviews and wound up with 60 to 70 million. That would really bring box-office back up.

@wrongturn687: See last weeks discussion. Even if Public Enemies eventually makes money with the TV rights, Universal will not be happy. Fair or not they count on films from stars like Johnny Depp to help pay for big time money losers like Land of the Lost.

Looks like G-force will beat Bolt domestically, but I think it won't play as well overseas.

GI Joe is actually pulling in good reviews so far, and while it is probably better than Transformers, I imagine it'll pull that kind of audience as well as the kids.

@EnglishGavz: Yeah, but they're reviews for select audiences. The film is not being screened for all press. For example, no press screening prior to release here in Seattle.

Would have loved if The Hurt Locker or 500 Days of Summer had cracked the top ten. Oh, well. There's always next week. I just had a feeling that these two films could be critical AND populist hits.

@wrongturn687:

Here's the thing about "Public Enemies"; it isn't so much a flop as it is a big disappointment for the studio. The teaming of Johnny Depp & Christian Bale (according to Universal, I believe) should've made a bigger splash. Success has been mined by these noir-ish gangster dramas in the past ("Road to Perdition", "Collateral") and the big-stars should've equaled bigger box office. But it came up short. Yes, it'll make its production budget, but when you count in the promotion figures, it'll take brisk DVD/TV sales for the film to be in the black.

Well, at least "Fast & Furious" did well enough for them.

@Brad Brevet: Be honest. How many critics do you think would actually watch GI Joe with an open mind as opposed to spending the two hours thinking of which negative adjectives to use so that their quote ends up on IMDB news?

@GregM: Obviously, I would hope all of them, but I am sure you are right. I actually already bought tickets and there is a group of us heading to a midnight screening. Going to be enjoying some drinks and eats beforehand so not sure I will be doing an official review, but I am actually looking forward to it.

@Brad Brevet: Ahh, I was wondering how the $57.50 added up. Enjoy!

In international news, I was looking at the Harry Potter numbers in Norway. Then I looked at other movie's Norway box office. Their large Country Fund seems to be paying off. They're spending more than $1/week per person (the ENTIRE population!) This is more than anyone else. I say we should make more films about Vikings! :) How about Harry Potter and the Viking King, or Transformers vs. the Norse Gods!

I tried to say something not entirely positive about the G.I. Joe movie at work, and people defended it right away, so it will probably do well.

GregM, DEAD-ON about critics behaving that way. Yes, we'll all tend to have our own personal opinions about any film going in, but sometimes critics just aren't objective enough and they won't be with films like G.I. Joe. But you never know. I'm personally stoked for G.I. Joe and hitting up the midnight.

Slightly disappointed with Funny People's underwhelming opening. I hear it's the smallest opening number for a box office champ since Yes Man, back last December. Sure it didn't open as high as it, but it damn well deserves to gross higher than Bruno.

G.I. Joe will be a bomb on Portugal (my country), just like Star Trek

On EUA, this is my previsions:

1º- G.I. Joe: $45M
2º- Funny People: $14M
3º- HP 6: $10,5M
4º- G-Force: $10,1M
5º- Julie and Julia: $8,9M

They don't even call it G.I. Joe overseas, do they? In England it's called Action Man.