“Summer films go head to head”

Per today’s LA Times:

The NBA and the NHL are in the middle of hard-fought playoffs, but basketball and hockey aren’t the only blood sports these days. The summer movie season — when Hollywood does about 40% of its annual business — is filled with nearly a dozen head-to-head showdowns, and if history is a guide, many will end with teeth on the floor.

Only a handful of summer movies enjoy the comparatively wide berth of a weekend free of competition. No significant wide release will challenge “Star Trek” this weekend, and a few other summer juggernauts will premiere against no new national releases: May 15’s “Angels & Demons” and July 17’s “Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince.”

On virtually every other summer weekend, though, moviegoers will have a choice between high-profile combatants.

The article goes through 10 weekends this summer through Aug. 7th and handicaps possible winners and losers. A few highlights:

May 22: Memorial Day weekend will provide an early clash between heavyweight franchises: “Terminator Salvation” versus “Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian.” Right now, audience tracking surveys have them neck-and-neck. Thanks to its family appeal, “Night at the Museum” takes the weekend.

June 5: Will Ferrell’s prehistoric comedy “Land of the Lost” would seem to have the weekend won, but Warner Bros. is so pleased with its raunchy bachelor party comedy “The Hangover” that it already is developing a sequel. Still, Ferrell wins handily, while “The Hangover” could become a surprise cult hit.

July 3: Michael Mann and Johnny Depp collaborate on the period gangster film “Public Enemies,” which is bound to wow critics and adult audiences. But the 3-D sequel “Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs” will be immense — three years ago, the second “Ice Age” movie opened to $68.3 million.

The Hangover (see photo above) as a “surprise cult hit?” Warner Bros. has already essentially greenlit the sequel before the original movie gets released, so is it really a surprise or a cult movie? As I posted here and here, I think The Hangover is a fantastic comedy premise, one of the best high concepts I’ve seen in years. My guess is it will be a huge success crossing $100M, no small feat for an R-rated movie.

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