Marquee History
Week 7 - 2016
By Max Braden
February 15, 2016
BoxOfficeProphets.com
This week’s batch of films opened around Valentine’s Day and the four-day President’s Day holiday weekend. The highlight is the 25th anniversary of The Silence of the Lambs.
Here are the movies that premiered on theater marquees this week...
10 years ago - February 17, 2006
Eight Below
Eight Below is a family-friendly adventure from Disney about survival in Antarctica when a dog sled team is caught in a storm. Paul Walker stars as a wilderness guide, and Bruce Greenwood plays a scientist who is injured and evacuated, leaving Walker’s dog team behind. The story then follows the dogs themselves as they make their way home through treacherous conditions. Reviews were good and audiences made Eight Below the #1 movie for the weekend with $24.9 million from 3,066 theaters. It went on to gross $81.6 million.
Date Movie
Spoofing dozens of romantic comedy movies like Bridget Jones’s Diary, Hitch, and Meet the Parents, Date Movie stars Alyson Hannigan and Adam Campbell in a date-to-marriage plot that is there more to serve the sight gags. Reviews predictably slammed the movie for its juvenile humor, but audiences who wanted to see the gags were going to go anyway. Date Movie opened at #2 with $21 million from 2,896 theaters. It grossed $48 million overall, which was not a lot compared to the Austin Powers/Scary Movie/Naked Gun franchises, but was better than similar genre spoofs like Epic Movie, Not Another Teen Movie, and Superhero Movie.
Freedomland
Samuel L. Jackson stars in this crime thriller based on the Richard Price novel as a detective who has seen it all until he investigates a carjacking and child kidnapping that leads to a community torn by racial issues. Julianne Moore plays the mother of the missing child, and Edie Falco plays the head of an organization that finds lost children. Critics saw the movie as trying too hard. Freedomland opened at #7 with $6.7 million from 2,361 theaters.
15 years ago - February 16, 2001
Down to Earth
Chris Rock stars in this remake of the 1978 fantasy comedy Heaven Can Wait, as a failing comedian who is killed in a car accident but is brought back as a rich old white businessman. The businessman is married to a woman played by Jennifer Coolidge, but inhabited by Rock he now pursues a woman played by Regina King. Reviews were poor, but it managed to be profitable thanks to Rock’s fame. Down to Earth opened at #2 behind Hannibal with $20.0 million from 2,521 theaters, and took in $64 million overall.
Recess: School’s Out
This animated adventure was based on the Disney Channel television series Recess, which was in its sixth and final season. T.J. Detweiler and his friends from the Third Street Elementary School are caught up in a plot by a rival of the school’s Principal Prickly to create a new ice age with a tractor beam. Reviews were decent, as was the audience response. Recess opened at #3 with $13.4 million from 2,624 theaters and went on to gross $36.7 million. Three direct-to-video movies followed from late 2001 to 2003.
Sweet November
This tragic romantic drama stars Charlize Theron as a terminally ill woman who is reluctant to fall for her lover played by Keanu Reeves. The film is a remake of the 1968 drama starring Sandy Davis and Anthony Newley. Critics were not impressed, and audience interest was moderate. Sweet November opened at #4 with $11.0 million from 2,268 theaters, bringing in a total gross of $25.2 million.
20 years ago - February 16, 1996
Muppet Treasure Island
This fifth movie in the franchise is based on the story of Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson. Kermit takes on the role of Captain Smollett, while Tim Curry plays Long John Silver, Billy Connolly plays Billy Bones, and Kevin Bishop plays Jim Hawkins. Miss Piggy plays Benjamina Gunn. Muppet Treasure Island turned out to be the best performing of the sequels to date, though none would match the $65 million gross of The Muppet Movie in 1979 until the 2011 reboot. Muppet Treasure Island edged out Adam Sandler’s comedy Happy Gilmore for the #2 spot behind last week’s carryover Broken Arrow with #10.1 million from 2,070 theaters. It went on to earn $34.3 million.
Happy Gilmore
Adam Sandler stars in this sports comedy as a former hockey player who enters a golf tournament in order to save his grandmother’s home from foreclosure. Happy does well with an unconventional slapshot-style drive, but needs coaching from a one-handed former pro-golfer played by Carl Weathers. His rival is Shooter McGavin, played by Christopher McDonald, and Julie Bowen plays his love interest. Bob Barker has a great cameo in which he fist-fights with Sandler, which won Best Fight at the MTV Movie Awards. Critics weren’t too impressed, and Sandler was even nominated for a Razzie Award for this performance. But while Happy Gilmore didn’t earn the large grosses Sandler’s comedies over the following ten years, it remains one of his higher-rated fan favorites on RottenTomatoes.com. Happy Gilmore opened at #3 in a dead heat with the Muppets, with $10.1 million from 2,022 theaters, and earned $38.8 million overall.
City Hall
This political and crime drama centers around John Cusack as the Deputy Mayor of New York City, who serves a popular mayor played by Al Pacino. The plot involves an investigation into a cop-mobster shootout that claimed the life of an innocent bystander, which leads to a broader scandal. Danny Aiello, Bridget Fonda, and Martin Landau co-star. Reviews were mixed. City Hall opened at #4 with $8 million from 1,815 theaters and brought in a total of $20.3 million.
Mr. Wrong
This romantic comedy stars Ellen DeGeneres as a woman who thinks she has met Mr. Right in the form of Bill Pullman until it’s clear he’s a stalker. Joan Cusack and Dean Stockwell co-star. DeGeneres was starring in the third season of her television series “Ellen,” but this movie was released a year before she famously came out as gay during the fourth season. This film received poor reviews and failed to match its budget at the box office. Mr. Wrong opened at #6 with $5.1 million from 1,487 theaters and only managed to gross $12.8 million overall.
25 years ago - February 15, 1991
The Silence of the Lambs
In 2003, the American Film Institute announced their list of “100 Years...100 Heroes & Villains” and beating out The Wicked Witch of the West, Darth Vader, and Norman Bates as the greatest villain of them all was this film’s star, Dr. Hannibal Lecter. Lecter was the product of author Thomas Harris and the novels Red Dragon (which was adapted for the 1986 film Manhunter and featured Brian Cox in the role) in 1981 and The Silence of the Lambs in 1988. Prior to the events of the film, Lecter was a renowned psychiatrist and serial killer who ate his victims. The film begins with a pursuit of another serial killer nicknamed Buffalo Bill (played by Ted Levine) who is targeting women, the most recent of whom is a Senator’s daughter. Rookie FBI profiler Clarice Starling (Jodie Foster) is brought in by her supervisor (Scott Glenn) to see what insight she can gain about Buffalo Bill from Lecter, who was his doctor.
The iconic moments in this film, directed by Jonathan Demme, are seemingly endless: the intimidating first encounter with Anthony Hopkins as Lecter; the Death’s Head moth featured on the film’s poster; Starling’s recounting of the lambs in her childhood; the brutal murders of the police; Buffalo Bill’s basement pit and dance sequence; and the chilling night-vision climax that had audiences jumping out of their seats. The film might not have been expected to be the hit that it became, but this one gripped audiences and critics.
At the Oscars a year later, it was nominated for seven awards and became only the third movie in the history of the awards to win Best Picture, Director, Screenplay, Actor, and Actress. Opening on Thursday, February 14th (Happy Valentine’s Day, Clarice.), The Silence of the Lambs took the #1 spot over Sleeping With the Enemy with $13.7 million from 1,497 theaters and just kept going for a total gross of $130 million, the fourth highest total of the year. It took 10 years for the sequel, Hannibal (covered in last week’s Marquee History) to be released, and then a prequel based on the Red Dragon novel was released in 2002.
King Ralph
John Goodman stars in this comedy as Ralph Jones, a down and out musician in Las Vegas who is discovered to be the next living heir to the British crown, brought to London to be the new king. Of course his blue collar brashness conflicts with the stuffy traditionalism of his new surroundings, and a rival, played by John Hurt, seeks to depose him. Camille Coduri plays a love interest, and Peter O’Toole plays the king’s private secretary. Reviews were weak. King Ralph opened at #3 with $8.3 million from 1,617 theaters and grossed a total of $34 million.
Nothing But Trouble
This is one of those movies that is so bad that the participants should count themselves lucky that it wasn’t career-ending. It was, in fact, the first and last time that Dan Aykroyd directed a film; he also wrote the screenplay. In it, he plays a grotesque judge who hates rich people and has complete control over his rural community. Chevy Chase and Demi Moore play a rich couple who accidentally detour through the town, are arrested for speeding, and held prisoner in the judge’s comedic house of horrors. John Candy plays the arresting officer and also plays a woman who the judge forces Chase’s character to marry. Aykroyd also plays a second character, a bizarre subhuman named Bobo who Moore’s character befriends in an attempt to escape. The hip-hop group Digital Underground (with Tupac Shakur) shows up in a cameo sequence. The film was nominated for Worst Picture, Actress, Supporting Actress, Director, Screenplay, and Supporting Actor (Aykroyd, who "won") among the Razzie Awards for that year, and had equally awful reviews at release. At the box office, Nothing But Trouble opened at #8 with $3.9 million from 1,671 theaters and only made $8.4 million overall against a $40 million budget.
30 years ago - February 14, 1986
The Delta Force
Chuck Norris stars in this R-rated action film as a former Special Forces operator who is reactivated to help a Delta Force team, headed by Lee Marvin, rescue plane hijacking hostages from held by Lebanese terrorists. Robert Forster plays the leader of the terrorists and George Kennedy plays a priest. Kennedy and Marvin both famously starred in The Dirty Dozen in 1967. The Delta Force was Marvin’s last film before his death at age 63 in 1987. The movie makes use of some buggy combat vehicles and a rocket-launching motorcycle, and notably draws on recent terrorist incidents such as Operation Eagle Claw, the failed attempt to save U.S. Iranian hostages in 1980. Reviews were mixed but audiences responded to the film as much as other Chuck Norris action flicks. The Delta Force opened at #3 behind Down and Out in Beverly Hills and The Color Purple with $5.9 million from 1,720 theaters and went on to gross $17.7 million.
Wildcats
~It’s the sport of kings / Better than diamond rings / Football~ Goldie Hawn stars in this high school sports comedy as the privileged former head of a girls track team who takes on the rough boys of an urban high school football team. The tone is mostly comedy, but Hawn’s character, Molly McGrath, also deals with being a single mom and the drama of teen pregnancy issues. This film was the debut of both Wesley Snipes and Woody Harrelson, who would go on to make multiple movies together. Hawn had a big $69 million hit with Private Benjamin in 1980, and though Wildcats didn’t reach that height, it was one of several consistent box office performers for Hawn throughout the 1980s. Wildcats opened at #4 with $5.4 million from 1,054 theaters and took in a final gross of $26.2 million.
Quicksilver
Kevin Bacon stars as a successful former stock trader who busts and becomes a bike messenger. Jami Gertz plays the love interest he saves from a gang, Paul Rodriguez plays a budding small businessman, and Laurence Fishburne plays a rival messenger named Voodoo. The film makes use of the hills of San Francisco streets for bike maneuver action, and is also a film that highlights the stock market frenzy of the mid-1980s (Wall St. was released at the end of 1987). Cycling movies were a little more popular in the '80s than they are now - thinking back to Breaking Away, American Flyers, BMX Bandits, and Rad - but the freedom and action of the bike messenger genre, if there is such a thing, was seen again recently with Premium Rush starring Joseph Gordon-Levitt in 2012. Quicksilver opened at #7 with $3.1 million from 1,251 theaters and went on to gross $7.6 million - a fraction of the $80 million gross for Footloose, Bacon’s breakthrough role two years earlier..
Come back next week for another installment of Marquee History!