From HSX on today's business at LBC:

"Looks like Friday is going to wind up being a little frontloaded after all. 55 is going to be the upper limit and this may settle down in the just over 50 territory.

Biz is more or less flat to yesterday for matinee.

SHARK BOY and LAVA GIRL is not going to have an insanely nutzoidedly high multiplier, it is only marginally up."

Spy Kids 3-D did fall 5% on its first Saturday for some odd reason. I still can't figure out why.

I think that's indicated on Animosity's theater report yesterday. Most of the soldout shows on Friday were matinee business, while the business was down significantly after 7pm, and that won't change much today.

Howl's Moving Castle
Regal Fox Tower
5:10 pm

Sold Out - approx. 125 seats

The 4:15 pm one was sold out as well.


Trailers:

Some penguin documentary
Some 3-D animated movie about pigeons (with Kenny Loggins' song "Danger Zone" featured in it)
Pride and Prejudice
Chicken Little (got the biggest reaction from the crowd)


The movie - Some clapped when the Studio Ghibli "mascot"/title was shown. Even more clapped at the end.


I enjoyed the movie. In particular, I liked Bale's performance as Howl. Which surprised me since I wasn't particularly fond of his "Batman" voice in the Batman Begins trailer(s).


Grade - B+ to A-

Mr. and Mrs. Smith
9:45 pm showing, 90% sold

Trailers:

Fantastic Four - Excellent reaction, especially to all of the scenes with the fire/flame dude (sorry, I'm not educated on Fantastic Four). Either way, looks awesome to me!

Flightplan - I LOVE JODIE FOSTER!! Film looks kinda cool too! I am definately checking this one out.

The 40-Year-Old Virgin - Looks okay. Not my cup of tea. Got some reaction.

Wedding Crashers - Looks pretty good. Better looking than The 40-Year-Old Virgin, that's for sure.

The film (possible spoilers):

Absolutely fantastic and completely entertaining! The opening and ending scenes were classic, and Pitt and Jolie are wonderful together. The whole plot was just so fun, and the humour was incredible. The scene where they have come home for dinner after finding out they are assassins was wonderful tense and fun at the same time. I couldn't have asked for more! Wonderful humour, some great action, and superb chemistry between the two main actors.

I really cannot believe that Nicole Kidman was actually offered the role of Mrs. Smith first! I'm hella glad she turned it down, as she would not have been right for the role. I couldn't imagine anyone else doing it, really. Jolie was wonderful. Pitt as well. Normally, I don't usually give these action/comedy films high grades, because they all have ridiculous plots and weird dialogue, with this film being no different there. However, this delivered it so well and was just too enjoyable for me to give it anything less than a:

B+

PEACE, Mike

So, I had a double feature tonight. A good one, too.

First, I saw High Tension is a 150 seater, and it was about 20% full. Not good for a night time showing. Didn't catch any trailers; the traffic in the lobby was unbearable. Busiest night at my theater since Spider-Man 2 last July. But, anyways, this is my second viewing, and the first time I'm watching the R-rated version. I'll admit, there wasn't much different from the first time other than a few minor cuts of gory scenes. But, the movie wasn't as effective the second time, either. Right about now, I'd give it an A-. It's still a great movie, and the bloodiest movie I've ever seen, but I enjoyed it more the first time.

Then, the real fun of the night began...

Mr. and Mrs. Smith
10:30pm showing, 500 seats, completely packed.

Trailers
War of the Worlds (lots of talking)
Fantastic Four (lots of talking)
In Her Shoes (silence)
The 40-Year-Old Virgin (huge laughs)
The Dukes of Hazzard (huge laughs)
Bewitched (lots of laughs)

The audience seemed to love Mr. and Mrs. Smith. Huge laughs all throughout the movie. Clapping at the end. Fun night.

Movie
Seriously, this is, quite possibly, the most fun I've had at the theater. What a thrill ride. Going into it, I not only had very high expectations, but I had a great feeling I would enjoy it. That's very much an understatement at this point. Everything in this movie just seemed to work brilliantly. Jolie and Pitt were perfect together. Pitt's undeniable charisma and sense of humor worked very well with Jolie's sexy, yet dangerous looks. The action scenes were explosive, which is what I like, of course. The movie actually turned out to be hilarious. Funnier than most comedies I've seen this year. Vince Vaughn made a great addition to the film. Lots of memorable lines and scenes. Just a great ol' time. A

More update from notfabio at HSX:

"I wouldn't call this a FULL update but here is a followup, everything was frontloaded
-- notfabio, Jun 12, 3:03
SMITH for example, once it hit 5:00 was selling out as far in advance as 2 hours, yesterday in the 4 biggest auditoriums in the LBC through midnight. If it could have been added a 12:30 and 1am would have sold out.

Saturday matinee was only slightly stronger than Friday matinee and Saturday evening, nothing until 8:00 sold out and really just the prime 8-10:45 shows sold out and at max only 40 minutes before. Next show after old reached 3/4th's capacity and the near midnight show only reached slighty over half capacity.

I'm relatively confident it still has 50, but I'd be pretty shocked to see this drop any less than 55 percent or more next weekend, I think those who attributed Friday's biz to curiousity to see hit it on the nose. The one thing that might save it is that next weekend is the real start of Summer for most schools, but I don't really see a ton of teens rushing out to see it 2nd weekend.

SHARKBOY to be honest, really didn't have much room to go up being a single screen booking at most locations, this is going to be a short, as 3 sellouts yesterday dropped down to 1 almost, but it isn't going to be a monster short.

HONEYMOONERS was off about 20%, but then again, the LBC was like 2 and half times higher than the national average.

HIGH TENSION was on par with yesterday, but of course, with Friday's numbers was guaranteed to be
a monster short."

Here's what happened at my theater today.

Sold Out report.

Mr. and Mrs. Smith
6:30 (400 seater)
7:30 (600 seater)
8:05 (600 seater)
8:50 (300 seater)
8:50 (250 seater)
9:30 (400 seater)
10:30 (600 seater)
11:10 (600 seater)
11:55 (300 seater)
11:55 (250 seater)
12:15 (400 seater)
(Wow, this was even better than yesterday, in fact business went up 35% from Saturday (which is very rare for a summer action picture). Could a huge multiplier be in store).

Other sold out shows.

Longest Yard
7:35 (150 seater)
9:35 (300 seater)
10:35 (150 seater)

Madagascar
9:45 (90 seater)

Honeymooners
9:45 (90 seater) (overall, this went up about 30% from yesterday).

Lords of Dogtown
10:00 (90 seater)

Star Wars Ep III
8:20 (110 seater)

Monster in Law
8:45 (90 seater)

Shark Boy did not sell out any shows. The closest we did was the 4:40 show (which was 70% full in a 200 seater). Overall, it increased 90% at this theater.

Cinderella Man, the closet we got to a sold out show was the 9:40 show (which was 73% full in a 250 seater).

High Tension, the biggest show was the 9:35 (which was 65% full in a 150 seater). Overall, thanks to Friday's dismal performance, we ended up with a 25% increase.

Overall, this was the busiest day we've had all year. Looks like we are back in business.

Thats great news!! Looks like the summer has finally kicked into high gear. Maybe we can see $55m+ for Smith.

I am seeing Mr. and Mrs. Smith at a 10:55am showing. I will be back with a crowd report/review.

Maybe WOM is kicking in already... Could this be another Pirates of the Caribbean?

WOM on this pic looks to be absolutley fantastic!
I am really hoping that it allows it to pucsh past 200 million.
I saw it in a packed theatre Friday, and people seemed to love the film, and to my surprise, there was clapping at the end ( which always makes me laugh, cause really, who are they clapping for, the actors aren't there....)
Best film I have seen in a while, so let's hope it has a high multiplier!

These crowd reports for Mr. and Mrs. Smith are amazing. Way beyond what I expected for the film, which I had predicted at a maximum of $40 million opening. Looks like the long drawn out dissapointing period of the earlier part of the year has really caused people to turn out in scores for the big films later on this year?

I am a little late but...

Mr. + Mrs. Smith

Friday 8:00pm - United Artists/Regal EMERY BAY 10 - EMERYVILLE, CA

SOLD OUT - With people sitting on the stairs!

Trailers:

Dukes Of Hazzard - some talking. Not much tho.
Bewitched - talking. Huge laughs.
40 year old virgin - some talking (side note, I love how a trailer with subject matter such as getting laid and porn and such is 'approved for all audiences'.
Fantastic Four - Lots of excited talking. Laughs.

People seemed very pleased with the film when it was over. a little bit of clapping. it seems to be a real crowd pleaser. It has all the elements in it...

Mr. and Mrs. Smith
10:55am showing, 300 seater, 50% full (amazing for a showing this early)

Trailers:
- The 40 Year Old Virgin
- Red Eye
- Fantastic Four
- In Her Shoes

Movie: I loved this movie. What a great action comedy flick this is. Angelina and Brad did a great job in there roles. Thumbs WAY up!! A+

For some of the other non-Smith sellouts, I wonder how much of that was due to the roll off business from the Smiths.

Should the Smiths tried for more than 3000 theaters instead of the 2850?

Goldie, what are you talking about? Smith(s) was released in 3,424 theaters.

Was it the old trailer or the new trailer?

Must be my mistake, I thought that the theaters were Nebs last column in his weekend report.

I don't know. When I walked into the theater and was going to my seat the title appeared. So I missed that trailer.

I found that odd. I think it will perform only slightly better than The Girl Next Door.

High Tension
9:40 PM 6/11
35 People in a 250 seater

Trailers:
Dark Water
Land of the Dead
NightWatch

Movie:

Quite gory. It was ok till the two policemen watched the gas station video. It went downhill from there. Dubbing is atrocious.

D-