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| Meet the Avatar obsessives: the Avatards Only a month after release, Avatar is already building up an army of perhaps rather over-enthusiastic fansSometimes you've just got to stand back and give the guy some credit. James Cameron is presumably cackling inside his solid-gold mansion on the moon and guzzling buckets of 500-year-old whisky right now. His decision to spend the equivalent of the GNP of Guinea-Bissau on Avatar appears to have paid off. Like a juggernaut with no brakes the film has overtaken The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King as the second in the list of all-time worldwide box-office grossers. As Avatar chugged into the weekend, its fourth on release, the figure was at $1.31bn (ﾂ｣821.83m). It has just opened in China ($14.4m in three days) and has already scooped up $90.2m in France, $62.9m in Germany, and $58.1m in Britain. (Its tickets, as with all 3D films, are more expensive than standard.) Cameron is on target to overtake his own No 1 position: Titanic's $1.84bn (ﾂ｣1.15bn). Then he really will be king of the world.No film can rack up these figures without plenty of repeat business, and Avatar has attracted plenty of loyal supporters. It's time for Twihards, those diehard fans of Twilight, to go home; now is the era of the Avatards. This is the moniker of dubious taste being applied to the kind of people who 窶 a mere month after first finding out about them 窶 are utterly devoted to the Na'vi, the Hometree, the Toruk, and other ideas created by Cameron and his scriptwriting team. (Why has so little attention been paid to the debt Avatar owes to John Boorman's The Emerald Forest?) Sad little posts are festooning Avatar-worship sites such as naviblue.com: "Watching the wonderful world of Pandora and all the Na'vi made me want to be one of them"; "I'm trying anything to just escape this reality and live there instead, even trying to put myself into a coma so my dream world would be Pandora"; "My urge to be a Na'vi is probably the strongest thing I have ever felt". Best to move on fast.Whether Avatar is any good barely seems to matter. When the film was first released, reviewers appeared unable to resist the mounting anticipation, and disgorged oceans of admiring prose. I can't say I joined in the acclaim. I felt compelled to write a less-than-complimentary review, which resulted in streams of abuse on aggregator sites such as Rotten Tomatoes, and I've since been tagged, not entirely correctly, as "the guy that doesn't like Avatar".Graham Greene once wrote that "it is wrong to despise popularity in the cinema"; neither, though, is popularity something that should colour our judgment. The mood seems to be changing, though, with the feeling that we've got another Phantom Menace on our hands: the studios may be hoovering up our billions, but we're stuck with Jar Jar Binks and Princess Neytiri. Thanks.James CameronFilm industryAndrew Pulverguardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds guardian.co.uk |
Perry denies pregnancy rumours Katy Perry has revealed she is not pregnant. breakingnews.ie |
Avatar displays out-of-this-world staying power at UK No 1 James Cameron's film holds on to the top spot in its fifth weekend, proving immovable to new challengers Up in the Air, The Book of Eli and All About SteveThe phenomenonWith fifth-weekend takings of ﾂ｣5.52m, Avatar is demonstrating unprecedented staying power at the UK box office. The previous best fifth-weekend performance was enjoyed by James Cameron's other behemoth hit Titanic, with ﾂ｣3.66m. Even Mamma Mia!, the most notable sleeper hit of recent times, grossed ﾂ｣2.8m on its fifth weekend of release. Only one film had taken more money in total after five weekends 窶 The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King.Despite shedding 11% of its cinemas 窶 2D screens where the film has been relatively shunned by audiences 窶 Avatar's takings went up 16% from the previous weekend. The particularly severe weather over 8-10 January may have had something to do with that, dampening grosses across the board, as did the absence of commercially potent new releases over the 15-17 January period.With takings to date of ﾂ｣49.37m, Avatar still has some way to go to beat Mamma Mia! (ﾂ｣69.17m) as the biggest ever release at the UK box office. In fact, it isn't even in the top 10 all-time chart yet, but is clearly headed there very soon; it currently ranks 15th, behind Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (ﾂ｣49.87m).Holdover successAvatar isn't the only holdover release experiencing a sales surge from the previous weekend. Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel went up 26%. It's Complicated rose 18%. And Sherlock Holmes, in its fourth week of release, held dead steady. With fourth-weekend takings of ﾂ｣2.03m, Guy Ritchie's buddy flick is just the fourth 2009 release to manage four straight weekends above ﾂ｣2m, joining Avatar, Up and Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs. Not even reputed crowdpleasers The Hangover and Slumdog Millionaire managed this particular feat.The new playersOnce again, with seemingly immoveable opposition hogging the top spots, new releases struggled to make their mark. Paramount will be happy with the number achieved by Up in the Air 窶 ﾂ｣1.3m, which is a relatively healthy start for a sophisticated upscale comedy. The figure compares with a ﾂ｣1.21m opening for George Clooney's previous film, The Men Who Stare at Goats, and ﾂ｣601,000 for the first weekend of Michael Clayton. Burn After Reading debuted with ﾂ｣2.05m in October 2008, but then it did co-star Brad Pitt, and directors the Coen brothers were coming off Oscar-winning smash No Country for Old Men.The Book of Eli landed one place behind Up in the Air, with ﾂ｣1.23m. The film likewise opened at the US this weekend, with $32.8m, and by rule of thumb it might have been expected to debut here with ﾂ｣3.28m. However, it's a fact that the 10% rule simply doesn't apply to Denzel Washington movies, and the more they rest on his personal star power, the more that's the case. Recent examples: Man On Fire, ﾂ｣22.75m debut in the US, ﾂ｣656,000 in the UK; Dﾃｩjﾃ Vu, ﾂ｣20.57m opening in the US, ﾂ｣1.01m over here; Out of Time, ﾂ｣16.19m and ﾂ｣312,000 respectively. Throw in the disparity in appetites for films with religious themes, and Book of Eli actually opened more or less OK here.The losersWith toxic reviews and bad buzz from a flop US release, Sandra Bullock comedy All About Steve was a predictable underperformer: ﾂ｣275,000 from 189 screens. This column is not privy to the film's marketing budget, but since is failure was wholly anticipated, it's safe to assume that Twentieth Century Fox spent cautiously. In any case, such is the success of Avatar and The Squeakquel, nothing could dent the distributor's current celebratory mood. It's the lowest debut for a film featuring Sandra Bullock in the lead role (ie not counting Truman Capote misfire Infamous) since The Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood in 2002. Fellow new release 44 Inch Chest fared better, with a not-disgraceful ﾂ｣152,000 from 75 cinemas.The real shocker currently is Nine. With no other film in the top 15 falling more than 30%, thanks to the weather being significantly better than the previous weekend, Rob Marshall's musical plunged 56%, fuelled by a wholesale shedding of screens. Maybe audiences just aren't relating to the dilemmas of a selfish Italian film director with writer's block who has to juggle the attentions of sex bombs Penﾃｩlope Cruz, Kate Hudson, Marion Cotillard and Nicole Kidman. Just a hunch.The futureA year ago, the weekend's box office was boosted by the shock success of Slumdog Millionaire, rising to the top spot with a 44% increase in takings. And there was also strength in depth, with six titles all clearing ﾂ｣1m. That's pretty rare: since then, it's happened once in February 2009, and again this weekend (see chart below). Takings for 15-17 January are 10% up on the equivalent weekend from 2009, which was itself notably buoyant. Whether the pace can be sustained this coming weekend remains to be seen. The 3D reissue of the beloved Toy Story 2 might be considered a commercial no-brainer, but Disney will be competing for 3D screens with Avatar, and it's hard to imagine the retooled Pixar hit winning the evening showtimes that had been anticipated. Family dramas Brothers and The Boys Are Back are far from safe bets, while a battle between genre rivals Ninja Assassin (martial arts) and Armored (heist) should see the former prevail. Meanwhile, the flagging arthouse market gets a big boost from A Prophet. With its Cannes win and huge critical support, this exceptional film is surely destined to be a significant breakout hit for a foreign language title.UK top 10, 15-17 January1. Avatar, ﾂ｣5,527,039 from 441 sites. Total: ﾂ｣49,374,5162. Sherlock Holmes, ﾂ｣2,028,282 from 494 sites. Total: ﾂ｣18,829,1333. Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel, ﾂ｣1,542,970 from 492 sites. Total: ﾂ｣16,862,7024. It's Complicated, ﾂ｣1,300,580 from 439 sites. Total: ﾂ｣3,291,2575. Up in the Air, ﾂ｣1,298,023 from 325 sites (New)6. The Book of Eli, ﾂ｣1,232,001 from 385 sites (New)7. Daybreakers, ﾂ｣804,762 from 378 sites. Total: ﾂ｣2,737,3758. The Road, ﾂ｣470,652 from 157 sites. Total: ﾂ｣1,509,9759. Did You Hear About the Morgans?, ﾂ｣396,106 from 339 sites. Total: ﾂ｣2,966,2110. St Trinian's 2: The Legend of Fritton's Gold, ﾂ｣282,047 from 366 sites. Total: ﾂ｣6,545,874How the other openers didAll About Steve, 189 screens, ﾂ｣275,08344 Inch Chest, 75 screens, ﾂ｣149,176 + ﾂ｣2,995 previewsChance Pe Dance, 34 screens, ﾂ｣72,921Aayirathl Oruvan, 7 screens, ﾂ｣29,517Still Walking, 6 screens, ﾂ｣11,808OSS-117: Lost in Rio, 4 screens, ﾂ｣4,845Crude, 3 screens, ﾂ｣1,879James CameronGeorge ClooneyGuy RitchieDenzel WashingtonSandra BullockCharles Gantguardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds guardian.co.uk |
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Doherty escapes with fine after carrying heroin into court Rock musician Pete Doherty escaped with a fine today despite 窶徭tupidly窶 walking into a court with 13 wraps of heroin in his pocket. breakingnews.ie |