Categories
Movies

I hope to finally see “Love And Other Drugs” this weekend!!

Box Office Preview: ‘Narnia’ should sail to No. 1
LOS ANGELES ñ During this, the most family-intensive period at the nation’s theaters, the timing couldn’t be better for Fox’s “The Chronicles of Narnia: The Voyage of the Dawn Treader” to go after the kids and parents who have made both “Tangled” and “Harry Potter 7” such huge holiday season hits.
So look for the third installment of the “Narnia” film franchise to follow its two predecessors and debut at the top of the domestic box office chart this weekend with a gross in the low $30 millions ó respectable business but somewhat lower than the $66 million and $55 million respectively earned for the previous pair of “Narnias” ó “The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe” and “Prince Caspian.”
Expected to place a strong second this weekend is the pairing of Angelina Jolie and Johnny Depp in Sony’s “The Tourist.” A remake of a 2005 French film, the mere presence of these attractive superstars ó not to mention the exotic locations, action sequences and comedic bits ó will be enough to send older fans scampering to the theaters for a gross in the low $20 millions.
A film that debuted better than expected over Thanksgiving weekend and continues to draw family audiences across the board is Disney’s “Tangled,” which ascended to the No. 1 spot last weekend and will grab a solid third place in its third outing with a gross of just over $10 million. Total receipts for the “Rapunzel” tale should cross the $110 million mark by the end of the weekend.
Certainly no holiday movie weekend would be complete without a solid dose of “Potter-mania” and fourth place will find “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Part 1” charming another $8 million to $10 million from weekend audiences as it closes in on the $260 million mark in overall domestic revenue.
The battle for fifth place will pit a burlesque dancer against a runaway train, with Sony’s “Burlesque” in its third weekend and Fox’s “Unstoppable” in its fifth weekend each expected to earn less than $5 million at the box office.