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Snoochie boochies!

Kim Hollis: Cop Out, the Warner Bros buddy cop movie directed by Kevin Smith, opened to $18.2 million. Does this qualify as a hit in your opinion?

Josh Spiegel: It depends who you're asking about. For Kevin Smith, this is a big hit, as it's his biggest opening weekend ever. For Tracy Morgan, it's not a bad start on having something close to a film career. For Warner Bros., it's a mild hit, in that the reviews were all pretty noxious (and, unfortunately, with good reason). For Bruce Willis, it just continues to solidify his fall from grace. The result's not bad, but there was a time when Bruce Willis was a huge star; that time has obviously passed.

Michael Lynderey: Cop Out has performed way, way, way, above my expectations, and without any particular reason that I can puzzle out. Willis doesn't guarantee a $15 million + opening, nor does Tracy Morgan, certainly. The trailers looked resoundingly average to me, and I'm the guy who thought that When in Rome and the Morgans had funny previews. Yet despite all this decidedly suspect background info, Kevin Smith's worst reviewed film as director is now going to be his highest grossing (Well, maybe the law of irony is exactly what explains this). The real question this movie poses to me is - what exactly does it take to make a decent flop these days?





Reagen Sulewski: This is the kind of result that falls into that middle-ground area of not being a hit nor a bomb. It's a respectable opening weekend number for a mid-level action film, but it'll be lucky to make $60 million total. Maybe marginally profitable, but it's ultimately going to be a footnote in everyone's careers, unless Smith somehow ends up doing more director-for-hire work. Which would be just about the most bizarre thing ever.

Calvin Trager: It's a disappointment, and we shouldn't be hesitant to call it that. Despite being profitable, Cop Out will throw under its theoretical max gross by a meaningful amount. Kevin Smith's losing streak in this regard is extended. He has a peculiar knack for taking an abstract concept and turning it into something less.

Jason Lee: Considering the film's apparent lack of anything resembling humor and the questionable box office appeal of Willis/Morgan/Smith, I consider the $18.2 million opening to be a huge success. Just based on the annoying commercials and the unfunny trailer, I would have said that this film deserved to be DOA . . . and yet, it managed to con $18.2 million out of the pockets of moviegoers. Nicely done.

Tom Macy: I'm totally surprised by this result. I thought the poster looked more like a sight gag on 30 Rock than an actual movie. This to me is a perfect demonstration of why studios care to much about to demographics. There are no comedies in release right now that don't have the prefix romantic attached to them. One could make the argument that almost any movie that claiming to supply laughs would have succeeded this weekend.

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