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Eat James L. Brooks's shorts, jerks.

Kim Hollis: How Do You Know opened to $7.5 million. Why do you think this one hasn't done any better thus far?

Brett Beach: Perhaps the National Society for Proper Deployment of Punctuation has a lot of pull with potential theatergoers? From what I gather from the reviews I have read (the positive, negative, and very negative), this is a very conventional and straightforward romantic comedy, albeit with the idiosyncratic rhythms and characters that have marked both James L Brooks' critical and commercial highs (Terms of Endearment, As Good As It Gets, Broadcast News) and lows (Spanglish, I'll Do Anything). And yet, none of the advertising seemed able to convey this, or make any of its appealing stars seem all that star-riffic. We bandy back and forth here at BOP about star power and whether it "still matters." I will simply comment that it is distressing that four commercially viable actors and one of the most honored and successful writer/producer/directors in Hollywood either collaborated on a terrible comedy costing $120 million or made a great comedy that the studio could not market to save its life. This should pull in more than Did You Hear About the Morgans' $30 million, but whether, even with the 12 Days of Christmas of looming, it can top Spanglish's underwhelming $43 million is iffy.

Michael Lynderey: It's tough to say, but the unenthused reviews, lack of mega-draws in the cast, and general lack of buzz seem to have really pulled their weight here. It'll rebound just a little over the holidays, but history is really repeating itself here with James L. Brooks, whose Spanglish also underperformed just as the Fockers were hitting town the last time around. How Do You Know is also going to be the least grossing Paul Rudd starring role since Over Her Dead Body, and that is unfortunate, but he'll bounce back.





Edwin Davies: I'm inclined to think that the mediocre-to-bad reviews had a lot to do with it. How Do You Know is the sort of film that can benefit hugely from good reviews since it's a romantic comedy with no easily defined gimmick to sell it on. Good or great reviews can persuade people to take a chance on the film when they might not otherwise really know what it has to offer. In this instance, the reviews seem to have said that it's not worth bothering with, and most of America agreed.

Reagen Sulewski: It's a bit bizarre, really - audiences apparently no longer want attractive casts spouting witty dialog in their romantic comedies. At least not those people under the age of 50. I look forward to this trio reuniting in 2030 for It's Really Complicated wherein Rudd leaves Witherspoon for Wilson.

David Mumpower: Reagen touches on something that is fascinating to me. It's Complicated earned $112.7 million domestically, $225 million globally. And we should note that How Do You Know could find renewed life thanks to the magic of December box office inflation. As of right now, though, what we can say for certain is that this is Jack Nicholson's worst opening weekend performance since the long forgotten debut of The Pledge in 2001. Relative to expectations, this is his most disappointing opening since The Evening Star, the poorly received sequel to Terms of Endearment, in 1996. There is just no way to spin what has happened here into a positive. It's almost as if the title of the film is the producers asking North American audiences, How Do You Know it's bad and going to bomb? This is James L. Brooks, movie goers, show a little f'n respect. I hope Sideshow Bob tries to kill the lot of you for this.

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