By Scott Bowles, USA TODAY
Add to Hollywood's list of seemingly fail-safe movie genres: the parody.
Like horror films and gross-out comedies, movies that skewer pop culture are drawing teens by the theater-full. Witness the surprising success of Epic Movie, the latest spoof to take the No. 1 spot.
Epic Movie raked in $19.2 million, according to studio estimates from box-office trackers Nielsen EDI. The movie already has nearly recouped its $23 million budget.
Like the Scary Movie franchise and last year's surprise No. 1 film Date Movie, Epic Movie was made quickly, cheaply and with little regard for critics' reactions. The movie was not screened for critics yet still took in $5 million more than most analysts projected.
"These kids, they see nearly every movie that's out there," says Bert Livingston, a vice president of 20th Century Fox, which released Epic. "And they love to see these movies get made fun of. Some people like slapstick; some people like seeing a guy fall down. The kids really enjoy parody."
Epic was an easy winner over Smokin' Aces, the violent action film starring Jeremy Piven and Ben Affleck. Aces, another relatively cheap film (it cost $17 million), took in a healthy $14.3 million.
Night at the Museum continued its strong run; it took third place and $9.5 million. Since its release a month and a half ago, Ben Stiller's comedy has earned $216.7 million.
Jennifer Garner returned to the big screen with the romantic comedy Catch and Release, which met most expectations with $8 million. The dance film Stomp the Yard was fifth with $7.8 million. Dreamgirls was sixth with $6.6 million.
Several Oscar hopefuls returned to theaters or expanded their runs leading up to the Academy Awards Feb. 25. Pan's Labyrinth was eighth with $4.5 million, followed by The Queen's $4 million. The Departed returned to 1,400 screens and did $3 million, but it was not in the top 10. Final figures are due today.
1 comment:
Man, that Kumar guy is in everything these days.
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