Look at how good Disney's doing at the movies and Finding Nemo
Disney on a roll after big weekend for "Bringing Down the House," new awards for "Chicago."
LOS ANGELES - Disney laughed all the way to the bank this weekend as moviegoers spent $31.7 million on tickets for "Bringing Down the House."
Clearly, the public's mood favored comedy over war. Disney's Steve Martin and Queen Latifah comedy arrived in first place while Revolution Studios and Columbia's war film "Tears of the Sun" starring Bruce Willis opened second with $17.2 million.
For Walt Disney Co. (DIS: Research, Estimates) investors, the movie division's success is very welcome news at a time when other Mouse House units face problems. Disney's theme parks are vulnerable to soaring gasoline prices and war in Iraq. War would also drive up news reporting costs at Disney-owned ABC-TV and would hurt advertising revenues by interrupting regular programming.
"House," a PG-13 comedy from Disney's Touchstone label, reportedly has a low-$30 millions price tag and should wind up with a nicely profitable $100-120 million domestically. By casting Martin and Latifah, Disney built-in strong appeal to both suburban and urban audiences.
"This is one of those (films) that is really going to help the bottom line," Buena Vista Distribution president Chuck Viane told me. "This has been a very good week for this company. We had a fabulous screening of 'Finding Nemo' at ShoWest. It looks like (Monday) morning we'll move into the number one position on market share."
Viane said exhibitors at the ShoWest convention in Las Vegas reacted very positively last week to their early look at "Nemo." The animated feature from Disney and Pixar Animation Studios opens wide May 30.
Focusing on "House," Viane explained, "We (sneaked it) two weeks ago. We thought word of mouth would help spin this movie over the top. Obviously, it did. More importantly, the Friday night word of mouth really (helped Saturday ticket sales). Now we're just looking forward to the legs of this movie. I think it's going to be around for a long time."
Viane said "House's" exit polls were very strong, particularly with men and women ages 18-35.
"This is the third highest March opening in history," he said. "The biggest was 'Ice Age' ($46.3 million) and then 'Blade 2' ($32.5 million). We're going to edge out number three, which was 'Liar, Liar' ($31.4 million)."
Disney's Miramax division also had reason to celebrate as its front-running Oscar contender musical "Chicago" won three of the Screen Actors Guild's five movie awards Sunday night. With $114.5 million already in, "Chicago" should do at least $125 million. It should do $150 million or more if it wins best picture.
"Chicago" enhanced its best picture Oscar prospects by winning SAG's best ensemble cast award, the guild's equivalent of a best picture vote. Because actors are the Academy's largest voting branch, the SAG awards are a key indication of what to expect Oscar night. Other SAG awards went to Renee Zellweger (actress, "Chicago"), Daniel Day- Lewis (actor, "Gangs of New York"), Catherine Zeta-Jones (supporting actress, "Chicago") and Christopher Walken (supporting actor, "Catch Me If You Can").
There was other good news on the Oscar front for Disney last week with reports that ABC will gross a record $78.3 million in Oscar telecast advertising. ABC will pay the Academy a license fee of about $47 million to telecast the show Mar. 23. A 30-second Oscar spot averaged $1.35 million versus $1.29 million last year.
Columbia wasn't shedding any tears over "Tears." "It's a very good opening for us," observed domestic distribution president Rory Bruer.
"It definitely delivered to its hardcore audience, which was (primarily) young males. (Looking at) other movies that opened to that type of gross, we should end up anywhere from $55-65 million, which would be good for us."
