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Tim Briody: I'm hesitant to call it a Jim Carrey movie as well, considering it's got the creepily animated thing going on here. But it's a really good start for something that is clearly in it for the long haul. $150 million seems like the bottom here.

Reagen Sulewski: Yeah, it's important to note that with the Thanksgiving and Christmas periods ahead of it, this film will be more than fine. It's the perfect kind of film to do a slow burn and then pick up again on the two big weekends late in the year. However, I have to think they were hoping for more off the bat considering the push they were making on the Carrey and the 3-D tech. I think in large part, people are just putting off seeing this film until the Holidays.

George Rose: My gut instinct is to say this is very bad, but the sort of legs that come with winter films really does change the name of the opening weekend box office game. $30 million is just a tad more than both The Polar Express and Beowulf made on their opening weekends (both 3-D motion capture movies), but one went on to earn over $170 million and the other tapped out at just over $80 million. Coming close to The Polar Express' $170 million will make it a decent hit while only making Beowulf's $80 million could contribute to killing the medium. And let's not forget How the Grinch Stole Christmas, another Carrey character piece based on holiday literature that opened to $50 million and went on to over $250 million, with ticket prices from almost 10 years ago. Any way you slice this it's a failure against expectations and will need stellar legs to rebound.

Kim Hollis: I maintain that we actually have to be in "wait and see" mode on this one. While the debut weekend total might be a little less than what would have been hoped, it's going to roll along through the rest of this month and December as one of the primary family films of choice and the movie that "everyone can agree on" when choosing movies to see as groups. This will be a solid performer by the time it's all said and done.

Jason Lee: The fact that the film has 3-D theatres all to itself through the release of Avatar is certainly going to be fortuitous, but it'll be interesting to see how the "too dark for kids" sentiment impacts the film's legs.

Pete Kilmer: I don't think you can classify it as a "JIM CARREY" movie. However you can, and they did, certainly use him to good effect in the marketing for this. Jason has a great point in that this movie has all the 3-D theaters to itself. The other thing to consider is that like Polar Express, this will play for years at various theaters around Christmas. The $30 million opening is solid but unspectacular...certainly not Pixar-like.

Sean Collier: Jason brings up a good point - the film is fairly dark, and I thought that it might be too spooky for younger kids more than once. If the buzz is good and parents aren't put off, I wouldn't be worried about the somewhat soft opening. I'd be sweating about word-of-mouth, though; if this thing falls out of the collective consciousness by Thanksgiving, they're sunk.

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