New

House Of Wax - 2 screens (10 showings)
Kingdom Of Heaven - 2 screens (8 showings)
Crash - 1 screen (5 showings)

Holdovers

xXx: State Of The Union - 2 screens (10 showings)
The Interpreter - 2 screens (8 showings)
The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy - 1 screen (5 showings)
A Lot Like Love - 1 screen (5 showings)
The Amityville Horror - 1 screen (5 showings)
Fever Pitch - 1 screen (5 showings)
Sahara - 1 screen (4 showings)
Guess Who/House Of D - Sharing 1 screen (3 showings for Guess Who, 2 for House)

This bodes quite well for House Of Wax. My theater never books genre fare in two screens unless their expecting big returns. Off the top of my head, from this year...

2 screens or more:
The Ring Two
Constantine
House Of Wax

1 screen:
White Noise
Alone In The Dark
Hide and Seek
Boogeyman
Cursed
The Jacket
The Amityville Horror

W00t! for HOUSE OF WAX.

C'mon, you know you can be a hit!

Hah, but I doubt HOW will open to more than $24m or whatever Constantine had.

HOW looks like a load of fun, unlike KOH. KOH looks so...boring. The trailers make it seem like the plot is lost in its own fancy visuals. Bleh.

From tonight's early screening...

House of Wax
Douglas Cinema Center -- 300-seat theater
90% full (about on part with Anacondas: The Hunt For the Blood Orchid)

Trailer:

Batman Begins (no reaction)

Film:

The crowd seemed to enjoy it, though the reaction wasn't quite as enthusiastic as some horror films I've seen (such as White Noise and The Ring Two). Still, it was more positive than Boogeyman or The Grudge. Chuckles along the way, some 'ooh's' and 'aah's,' etc. Still, the fact that the crowd was chuckling at the last-frame "twist" (moreso the way it's revealed than what it really is), probably doesn't lend itself to word-of-mouth.

Damn, an advance screening that didn't sell out? That's certainly not good news, I remember Anacondas is the only one you've been to that hasn't, and none of mine ever have.

The crowd was enthusiastic for WHITE NOISE.. =D> See?? WHITE NOISE did kick ass.. \:D/ and Wow, no reaction for BATMAN BEGINS, Another high profile movie this summer?? Hmmm..

Edwards Mira Mesa Stadium 18

New
Crash (5 showings)
House of Wax (2 screens, 9 showings)
Kingdom of Heven (3 screens, 12 showings)

Holdovers
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (2 screens, 10 showings)
XXX: State of the Union (2 screens, 9 showings)
The Interpreter (2 screens, 8 showings)
A Lot Like Love (5 showings)
The Amityville Horror (5 showings)
Fever Pitch (2 showings)/Guess Who (3 showings)
Kung Fu Hustle (5 showings)
Sahara (5 showings)
Sin City (4 showings)

I'm pretty sure I'll see Crash this weekend, can't wait.

2 wax
2 heaven
1 crash

dropping XXX, amityville, robots, guess who

At our 16-screen theater, Kingdom of Heaven and House of Wax both get 2 screens, while Crash gets 1.

But, I'm shocked by my local theater. House of Wax and Crash each get one (yay, Crash is playing close by!), but Kingdom of Heaven gets a special, 2-screen treatment. Keep in mind, this is a 10 screen theater, and the last time two screens were given to any movie in this theater was with Spider-Man 2.

It's probably because of the lack of product in the marketplace. The only five movies I'd picture a theater would really like to have this weekend are the three new releases, Hitchhiker and The Interpreter

Which makes me believe that both Hitchhiker and The Interpreter should have good holds since they are PG-13. Definitely sub 40% for The Interpreter, and Hitchhiker's drop won't be as hard as its small Friday-to-Saturday increase would suggest.

Checked some of the bigger theaters in L.A., and it looks good for House of Wax, which is getting almost equal amount of screens and showings as Kingdom of Heaven. Being 1 hour shorter also helps. At this point, I'm siding with Zing on its opening gross.

AMC Mercado 20:

Kingdom of Heaven - 3 screens (11 showings)
House of Wax - 2 screens (9 showings)
Crash - 1 screen (5 showings)

New
Crash - 1 screen (5 showings)
House of Wax - 3 screens (14 showings)
Kingdom of Heaven - 3 screens (12 showings)

Holdovers
The Amityville Horror - 1 screen (5 showings)
Beauty Shop/Guess Who - 1 screen (2 showings each)
Fever Pitch - 1 screen (4 showings)
Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy - 3 screens (14 showings)
The Interpreter - 2 screens (7 showings)
Kung Fu Hustle - 1 screen (5 showings)
A Lot Like Love - 1 screen (5 showings)
Sahara - 1 screen (4 showings)
Sin City - 1 screen (5 showings)
XXX: State of the Union - 3 screens (15 showings)

I believe this is the weekend when The Amityville Horror will be get hit really hard. It'll lose screens to make space for the three new releases. All new releases are R-rated, just like AH and House of Wax provides direct horror competition.

I expect a drop of around 55%.

At the Lloyd Center 18:

New:

Crash 1 screen (five showings)
House of Wax 2 screens (nine showings, Fever Pitch gets it's 2:30ish show and Guess Who's 10ish one)
Kingdom of Heaven 2 screens (eight showings)
I should note though that KOH gets the two giant screens, even though they almost divide them up. And Crash's room is just as big as both of House of Wax's.
Otherwise, Hitchhiker stays on two, as does The Interpreter, and xXx stays on three :???:, though they're all very small rooms. Most of the Spring leftovers are getting cut up into just having two or three shows, such as Miss Congeniality, Robots, Guess Who, and Fever Pitch.

My 18-screen theater in Albany, NY

NEW RELEASES

Kingdom of Heaven (4 screens, 16 shows) changed
House of Wax (1.66 screens, 9 shows) changed
Crash (1.5 screens, 7 shows)

HOLDOVERS

Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (2.5 screens, 13 shows)
The Interpreter (1.75 screens, 8 shows)
XXX: State of the Union (1.5 screens, 7 shows)
The Amityville Horror (1 screen, 6 shows)
A Lot Like Love (1 screen, 6 shows)
Sahara (1 screen, 5 shows)
Fever Pitch (1 screen, 5 shows)
Sin City - 3 shows
Kung Fu Hustle - 2 shows
Guess Who - 1 show

LOSING

The Pacifier
Robots
Beauty Shop
Millions
King's Ransom (after only 2 weeks)
House of D (after only 1 week)

Big-time shuffling of movies :wink:

NOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!! I won't allow it!!!!!! I'll see it again and stand alone in the theatre and flip off everyone walking by seeing House of Wax!!!! MWHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!! :bur:

At my theater.

Kingdom of Heaven - 3 screens (but only 10 showtimes, thanks to it's long running time).
House of Wax - 3 screens (13 showtimes, thanks to it's short running time).
Crash - only 1 screen (4 showtimes).

I am not surprised with House of Wax's screen count, since I know it will do good here since these kind of movies do the best at our theater.

My local theater is ten screens but sometimes has two theaters for a film. THE RING TWO was the last one. I'm not sure if KINGDOM OF HEAVEN will have two (TROY did). The only time my theater had a movie on three screens was SHREK 2 but I'm thinking STAR WARS EPISODE III will have three or even four

How can an advance screening 'sell out' since they are free showings and they're not 'selling' tickets? :wink:

Kingdom of Heaven was released today in Greece. Caught a 5.00 pm showing, maybe 10 people in the theatre.
The trailers were: Dear Wendy, Kingdom of Heaven( :???: ), Guess Who and Episode III(first time I see it on the big screen, looks great). As for the film it's a decent epic, but nowhere near Gladiator. It has the same production values, but the story isn't as interesting. The performances are good all around, except for Orlando Bloom who is weak as a leading actor. He has the same expression on his face for the entire film. The score is pretty good but something that I found strange is that they use music from The 13th Warrior at one point. Overall, the film did not bore me, but it wasn't particularly exciting either. Grade: B-

How does it compare to Troy?

Kindgom of Heaven is more serious in tone, so it gives the impression that you've seen a quality film, whereas Troy was more of a popcorn film. Personally I enjoyed Troy more.

Here's how I rate some recent epics:
Gladiator A
Braveheart A-
The Last Samurai B+
Troy B
Kingdom of Heaven B-
King Arthur C

Haven't seen Alexander yet. :wink:

Don't. [-o<

One of the few movies to actually make me feel physically sick.

I rate them:

Gladiator - A
Braveheart - A-
The Last Samurai - A-
Troy - A-
King Arthur - B
Alexander - B

Alexander is very very much a mixed bag in the sense that there are some parts in it that are simply brilliant (acting by Farrell and Kilmer, first battle scene that is better than any battle scene in Troy) and others are incredibly bad (Jolie's and Hopkins' acting, the relationship between Alexander and Hephaistion, parts of the dialogue). Overall, I thought it was decent, though.