Saskatchewan turns 100, lights up sky and smiles
Saskatchewan turned 100 and thousands in the province came out to party on Sunday.
More than 100,000 firework effects were set off across the province, including an orange and green one created to look like the western red lily, the province's official flower.
"Wonderful, fantastic, incredible," exclaimed Carol Allen of Regina. "Only Saskatchewan could do that."
Saskatchewan shares its birthday with Alberta. Both entered Confederation on Sept. 1, 1905, but Saskatchewan saved its centennial party for Sunday. That was the anniversary of when the documents were signed in Regina.
Mounted RCMP officers in their red serge joined in the celebrations as did First Nations dancers wearing ancestral costumes.
Singers Brad Johner, Colin James and Canadian Idol runner-up Theresa Sokyrka kept the crowds entertained throughout the day.
"It's a very momentous occasion," said Beth Teskey, 63. "We've kept the province going for the first hundred years and the prospects are good for the next hundred."
Prime Minister Paul Martin kicked off the celebrations on Friday. He made appearances in Saskatoon, Regina and at the Flying Dust First Nation in the north.
Premier Lorne Calvert told crowds at the legislature about the values important to the province.
"We dream of a province where the values of co-operation and caring, optimism and hope are the foundation of an unbreakable social fabric," Calvert said.
"Here, in the heartland of the nation, may we always be a people with heart." Native son Brent Butt, star of television show Corner Gas, received a medal along with Gov. Gen. Adrienne Clarkson.
Butt said he was impressed by Saskatchewan's endurance and by its people.
"Anytime anything can last for 100 years that is something pretty special," said Butt. "Especially for a province like Saskatchewan to be this big of a chunk of dirt and to have less than a million people living in it, you would think it would get swallowed up somehow."
'Transporter' Tops Labor Day Box Office
LOS ANGELES - Jason Statham delivered a bigger box-office package this time, with his action sequel "Transporter 2" taking in $20.25 million to debut as the top weekend movie.
The followup's solid pay day over the four-day Labor Day weekend was more than twice the haul for "The Transporter," which took in $9.1 million in its three-day opening weekend in October 2002.
"Transporter 2" took over the No. 1 slot from "The 40-Year-Old Virgin," which slipped to second place with $16.6 million after two weekends on top, according to studio estimates Sunday. Holding strongly, "The 40-Year-Old Virgin" raised its total domestic gross to $71.9 million.
The well-reviewed "The Constant Gardener," starring Ralph Fiennes and Rachel Weisz in a John le Carre suspense thriller, premiered in third place with $10.8 million, a solid opening given that it played in just 1,346 theaters, nearly 2,000 fewer than "Transporter 2."
On the flip side were two new wide releases soundly trashed by critics and generally ignored by audiences.
"Underclassman," an action comedy starring Nick Cannon as a cop who goes undercover at a posh high school to investigate a murder, flopped with just $3.1 million.
"A Sound of Thunder," with Edward Burns and Ben Kingsley in an adaptation of Ray Bradbury's sci-fi story about time travelers who disrupt evolution on a trip to visit dinosaurs, bombed with a paltry $1.15 million.
Hollywood ended its worst summer for movie attendance since 1997 on a positive note, with overall revenues rising during the long weekend. The top 12 movies took in $96.4 million, up 16 percent from Labor Day weekend last year.
"It's somewhat ironic in the final weekend of one of the worst summers ever that we have a strong showing," said Paul Dergarabedian, president of box-office tracker Exhibitor Relations. "Hopefully, this sets a positive tone heading into the fall and holiday season."
Domestic grosses from early May through Labor Day were down 9 percent compared to summer 2004, according to Exhibitor Relations. Factoring in higher ticket prices, attendance was off 12 percent.
Labor Day typically is a slow time at theaters, yet "Transporter 2" had a record debut for the period, beating the previous high of $18.4 million held by "Jeepers Creepers 2" over the same weekend in 2003.
In just four days, "Transporter 2" nearly matched the total domestic gross of $25.3 million for "The Transporter."
The sequel features Statham's character on break from his high-octane gig as an ace deliveryman of illicit goods, but forced back into action when the boy he chauffeurs is kidnapped by terrorists in a plot to spread a virus among top drug-enforcement officials.
"People love the character," said Bert Livingston, a distribution executive for 20th Century Fox, which released both "Transporter" flicks. "It's escapism, and with all the tragedy going on in New Orleans, I think people want to get away and lose themselves for an hour and a half."
Here are the estimated ticket sales for Friday through Monday at U.S. and Canadian theaters, according to Exhibitor Relations Co. Inc. Final figures will be released Tuesday.
1. "Transporter 2," $20.25 million.
2. "The 40-Year-Old Virgin," $16.6 million.
3. "The Constant Gardener," $10.8 million.
4. "Red Eye," $9.3 million.
5. "The Brothers Grimm," $7.9 million.
6. "Four Brothers," $6.4 million.
7. "Wedding Crashers," $5.8 million.
8. "March of the Penguins," $5.4 million.
9. "The Skeleton Key," $4.1 million.
10. "The Cave," $3.7 million.
Peter Segal’s Tommy Boy
Architect of arguably the greatest comedy of the last twenty years, Peter Segal did to Tommy Boy what no other director has been able to; he successfully translated a Saturday Night Live aesthetic to the silver screen.
Penelope Spheeris came close - dangerously close - with her version of Wayne's World , but for a sheer representation of the off-the-cuff, volatile zaniness that is the signature of the best kind of SNL skits, nothing gets closer than Chris Farley's and David Spade's endlessly-rewatchable banter in Tommy Boy.
It's hard to believe it's been ten years since the release of the movie that gave us “Fat Guy in a Little Coat,” but for the anniversary, DVDfile.com sat down with Tommy Boy director Peter Segal and talked about the film's development and legacy.
- How did the idea of a 10th anniversary DVD edition of Tommy Boy come about?
It was pretty simply, actually. Lorne [Michaels] called me about a year ago and said, “I think we should do a ten year anniversary DVD.”
-Seems easy.
Yeah. And Chris Zito at Paramount Home Video is a big Tommy Boy fan, so it was a no-brainer there, and, most importantly, someone told me six years ago that Tommy Boy had made $60 million on video. It's a continual top-ten title - at least it was . So Chris saw no problem in blowing it out for a 10th anniversary edition.
- This might be a dumb question, but where did you find all this bonus material? Does Paramount keep dailies in a vault or something?
Some of the Paramount archives are in a vault in Pennsylvania; there are millions of feet of film preserved there in underground cave vaults. That's where we found the stuff.
At first we only found a portion of the dailies. Shipments would come to L.A. and my editor would look through them and recognize things that weren't in the finished films. Then bits and fragments of things would lead to more searching and so on and so on.
We spent six or eight months doing this.
- What was it like revisiting the film in this way?
It was great, especially in the development of this DVD, because the stuff between [David] Spade and Chris [Farley] that wasn't in the film was just as funny as the stuff that was.
- If it was so funny, why did you cut it?
Oh, you have to just stop at some point. Farley and Spade could go on forever, but elongated scenes in a movie like this . . . it's like eating too much ice cream. After your fortieth scoop, you're going to get sick.
- What's it like looking at the movie today?
Well, you can't really judge a movie until a few years pass. You need a certain perspective in order to evaluate what you had and what you did. We were lucky because Tommy Boy stuck in pop culture and became a DVD on everyone's shelf. I'm on team planes every once in a while - with the Boston Red Sox or the San Diego Chargers - and somebody's always playing it. It's always on cable.
So in a lot of ways, I don't quite have that hindsight perspective because Tommy Boy has never really gone away. It's gratifying and charming knowing how much the film has been ingrained in people.
- How did you get involved with the film in the first place?
I had worked with Chris Farley on an HBO special and on The Jackie Thomas Show and I thought he was one of the funniest people on the planet. I wanted to do his first starring vehicle, and right after I made Naked Gun 33 1/3.
There was this script going around town called Billy the Third - it was sketchy, a blueprint for something. Paramount had passed on me taking the project because I had too many ideas for it; I thought it needed a lot of work. Then they went to other people and no one else was interested, and then they came back to me.
Once we ripped the lid off, we decided we really wanted to gut the engine of this thing. And it became doubly difficult process because we were shooting the film in the summer and we had to finish it before SNL started back up in the fall. And we didn't quite make it. It was an arduous task for Chris and David to fly back and forth between New York and Toronto (where we were shooting the film).
- How much of the film was scripted and how much was invented on the spot?
Fred Wolf worked with Chris and David on SNL , and he'd make index cards of funny bits they did. We'd utilize that sometimes. And there was one time where we were waiting for a lighting setup when they came up with the “Does this suit make me look fat?” / “No, your face does” riff. Man, we'd take anything. I'd follow those guys around with a pad.
I'd call Fred in New York, “We're at a gas station and we need something funny!” Then he'd tell me to have Chris dance around like an idiot singing a song from Flashdance. And we'd do it. That definitely wasn't in the script.
Overall, I'd say what you see on screen in the film is 80% scripted.
- Last question: What's it like doing a commentary track for a DVD?
My first one was for Naked Gun 33 1/3 and all the way through it, I whispered like a golf announcer because, you know, you're not supposed to talk when you're watching a movie! (laughs) The best thing with commentaries is to have an actor or a writer in the room so you can construct some banter, but you wind up alone sometimes.
I think the best way to interview a director, though, is to have featurettes, like we do on this Tommy Boy DVD. That way you can show by example rather than just have people listening to a disembodied voice on a commentary track.
Stones fans jam Maritime show
MONCTON, N.B. (CP) - Steve Cole made the trek to a New Brunswick hillside to see the Rolling Stones before the final chapter is written in their long and legendary career.
Cole, a 30-year-old musician from Saint John, N.B., wasn't even born when Mick Jagger and the Stones began a rock and roll dynasty that has endured for more than 40 years.
On Saturday, the band came to a 40-hectare field at Magnetic Hill, N.B., to perform for the first time - and many believe the last time - in Atlantic Canada before an estimated crowd of 75,000 cheering fans.
"It's just one of those concerts you have to go to," said Cole.
"The Stones, that's where it's at. They're legends."
By late afternoon, Magnetic Hill was so jammed with people that the concert announcer proclaimed it "the second largest city in Atlantic Canada," after Halifax.
Fans of all ages sprawled on the grass, danced, sang and guzzled beer as musical groups such as Les Trois Accords and Our Lady Peace warmed up the crowd for the final act - the Stones.
Some of the concertgoers were even older than the Stones themselves.
Helen Sweett and her husband, both in their 70s, drove from Halifax for a once-in-a-lifetime experience.
"I've never been to an outdoor rock concert like this," she said. "I've always wanted to see what it was like. The tickets were a gift from my husband."
Jagger, 62, hasn't said whether the Stones' "Bigger Bang" world tour is, in fact, a farewell tour.
"A good thing never ends," Jagger said during the opening performance of the tour in Boston last month.
At the Moncton show, Jagger, wearing a hot pink satin jacket, gyrated and pranced like a teenager, showing no signs of tiring.
The show opened with fireworks and flashing lights in a dazzling display that had the huge crowd screaming.
"Thank you New Brunswick," Jagger hollered to cheers.
"Where else are you from - from Newfoundland and from Nova Scotia and from Prince Edward Island."
Dignitaries in the audience included Frank McKenna, Canada's ambassador to the United States.
McKenna, the former premier of New Brunswick, said the show will put the province and Moncton on the map.
"Fascinating, wonderful, fabulous," he said of the show.
The Bigger Bang tour will last into 2006, and it's an open question whether the elderly rockers - they're all in their 60s except for 58-year-old Ron Wood - can fight the vagaries of time and age to mount another world tour.
"Sense tells you they're getting old and who knows what will happen," said David Churchill, who travelled from St. John's, N.L., for the concert.
"I figured this was pretty close, so it's time to see them."
The outdoor concert at Magnetic Hill could prove the largest stop in the Stones' tour, and it was the largest in history for Atlantic Canada - a region often left off the tour schedules of high-profile bands.
The only other draw as big as the Stones at Magnetic Hill was Pope John Paul II in 1984.
The Stones' seven-storey-high stage dwarfed the still-standing stage where the late pope delivered his blessings.
Nearby is the strange, so-called "magnetic" hill where cars seem to coast uphill, thanks to an optical illusion. Magnetic Hill is one of New Brunswick's most popular tourist attractions.
But the fans didn't need magnets to draw them to the concert. They were there for the timeless attraction of the Stones' music.
"They're today's music," said Mark Lapierre of Dartmouth, N.S.
Organizers' prayers for good weather were answered.
Sunny skies and cool breezes kept concertgoers comfortable while sitting on the hillside, which forms a natural amphitheatre.
Earlier in the week, hurricane Katrina threatened to travel up the East Coast and ruin the concert. But the remnants of the storm in Canada produced only heavy rains that were quickly absorbed by the bone-dry ground.
"We couldn't have asked for better conditions," said concert organizer Donald K. Donald.
Could Robbie Williams Have "Saturday Night Fever?"
British pop singer Robbie Williams could soon be heating things up on-screen in a re-make of Saturday Night Fever. According to UK tabloid The Daily Star, the Bee Gees brothers, Robin and Barry Gibb, will be in a position to remake the disco hit that starred John Travolta back in 1977, after rights to the film's songs revert back to their ownership sometime this year. One source close to the brothers, says, "They have always wanted to remake the film and bring out a more modern version and Robbie is the ideal candidate to play Tony - he can sing, dance, is a good-looking lad and has loads of charisma." With the release of Williams' sixth album this month, the singer's popularity might just help give him that 'Fever' quality that lands him the role.
The 'Lost' Master Plan
LOS ANGELES (Zap2it.com) Those viewers who felt burned by the last few seasons of "The X-Files" and have wondered more than once what's going on with "Alias" are probably the same ones who have been fighting the temptation to become too attached when it comes to "Lost."
Watching the extras on the first season DVD set (available Tuesday, Sept. 6) does nothing to assuage these doubts. Jack (Matthew Fox) was slated to die in the first episode? Kate was supposed to be on a quest to find her husband who went to the bathroom right before the plane blew apart? If those stories were left at the wayside, what else could be in a state of flux? Does anyone know how the polar bears got there? How about the monsters? The Numbers? The Hatch? The Others?
According to executive producer Damon Lindelof, there's no need to panic.
"The big questions we have the answers to, but we are running a race that has no finish line right now," he says. "If they said, 'We want you to do four seasons of the show,' we would have sat down and planned out 88 episodes."
In other words, while the destination is set the journey could take some detours. Still, there's a limit.
"That's what happened to Chris Carter," Lindelof explains. "People look at that show and go, 'I'm disappointed with the way "X-Files" ended,' but they did 200 episodes.
"Chris Carter wanted to do four seasons and a movie, and the movie would have answered everything definitely. And Fox said, 'Great, you can leave the show, but we own the show and we're going to keep doing the show.' And he said, 'I'd rather run my own show into the ground then let somebody else do it.'
"I respect that."
Respect for the compromises that the entertainment industry demands doesn't mean that Lindelof and partners-in-crime JJ Abrams and Carlton Cuse are planning on dragging "Lost" out forever.
"We have an ending for the show: we know when it is, we know how many episodes it is," Lindelof says, "but we have to talk to the Powers That Be -- the people that pay for the show -- in order to execute that.
"I think it would be very hard if we did our ending for anyone to come in to the show after and continue."
Work out your own theories as to what such a conclusive ending could possibly entail.
Speaking of network involvement, what's with the promos? During the first season viewers knew that one of the main characters was going to die, but the ABC marketing department jumped the gun after Boone (Ian Somerhalder) suffered a horrific accident and trumpted his death before the fact. Then, they helpfully cleaned up a deliberately garbled radio transmission.
"One of the things that is a constant fight in movies and television is not wanting to give away the show," Lindelof, who doesn't see the promos until they actually run, opines. "Marketing's job is to get people to tune in and our job is to not give it away, and that sort of puts us at odds."
Getting more involved for the start of the second season, Lindelof says that he and the show's creative team worked closely with marketing to design the launch campaign, proclaiming the end result to be "very cool and very mysterious." However, once they are back into what he refers to as the "strum and drang" of writing, editing and dealing with the production of the show on a weekly basis they will turn over the reins.
"Inherently, I have to respect what they do," Lindelof continues, "and I put my frustration aside because the way that they market the show and sold the show, I'm so grateful. So every once and awhile they'll do it in a way I don't approve of, but at the end of the day lots of people are watching and that's in no small part due to the fact that they built awareness."
"Lost: Season One" will be released on DVD on Tuesday, Sept. 6. Season Two will premiere Wednesday, Sept. 21 at 9 p.m. ET on ABC.
TV on DVD Sales Continue to Soar
DVD collections of TV shows accounted for 15 percent of all DVD sales this year, even though they made up just 7 percent of the releases, Nielsen VideoScan said Thursday. Sales of the collections are up 26 percent over last year and show a continuing rise as movie rentals slow down. Sales of TV DVDs, according to Nielsen VideoScan, accounted for nearly 20 percent of all DVD sales during the week ended Aug. 21.
Apple appears poised for iTunes phone launch
SAN FRANCISCO (Billboard) - The Apple rumor mill swung into overdrive this week when the company reported it would make a big digital music announcement on Wednesday (September 7).
Most observers expect Apple Computer to unveil the iTunes-compatible mobile phone that has been in development with Motorola for more than a year. Several industry sources have identified Cingular as the wireless operator making the long-anticipated device available to subscribers.
But Apple may have more in store. One analyst says Apple also will introduce a wireless interface to the iTunes Music Store, customized for Cingular. If so, Cingular would be the first U.S. wireless operator to announce a full-song download music service.
Verizon and Sprint each have discussed launching their own wireless full-song download services before the end of the year. Should Cingular beat them to market, it would do so with the most popular music service on the Internet today.
"Cingular, with Apple and iTunes, has just spoiled that party," says Roger Entner, analyst with research firm Ovum. "It makes it very, very difficult for (Verizon and Spring)."
But Cingular has not yet upgraded its network to the same broadband speeds that Verizon and Sprint boast, meaning that downloading songs will be quite slow. A more likely scenario, at least at first, is that the Motorola iTunes phone will be able to sync with computer-based iTunes files in the same way an iPod does now.
Enthusiasts recently discovered an interface in the latest version of iTunes that lets users choose to sync with either an iPod or a mobile phone.
MENU OF OPTIONS
The iTunes phone is not the only rumored advancement of Apple's digital music strategy that could be addressed Wednesday (September 7). Other potential announcements include an iPod that supports video playback, a line of flash-based iPod Mini devices or iTunes support of a portable subscription service.
The video iPod and the flash-based Minis are considered inevitable. Apple recently changed the language in its iPod patent to include video as one of the files it can display, and iTunes already sells some music-video content.
Although initially critical of flash-based digital music players, Apple has since embraced the technology for its iPod Shuffle. Many expect the company to introduce a flash-based version of the popular iPod Mini in time for the holiday sales season. (Research firm iSuppli reported that Apple has bought as much as 40 percent of Samsung's flash-chip inventory for the second half of this year.)
A music subscription service is considered a long shot for Apple at this time, even though CEO Steve Jobs recently has relaxed his criticism of such services. Analysts generally agree that Apple will wait until there is more interest in portable subscriptions before releasing such an upgrade.
Gilliam turns on critics of blockbuster "Grimm"
VENICE (Reuters) - Terry Gilliam, under fire from the critics for his new blockbuster "The Brothers Grimm," is fed up with having to defend his first film in seven years.
After winning critical acclaim for movies like "Brazil" and "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas," the American director has been less well received for a film that cost an estimated $90 million to make.
The reaction is the latest setback for a production dogged by delays and overshadowed by a clash between Gilliam and executive producers Bob and Harvey Weinstein over casting and the film itself.
It also follows the 2000 debacle when Gilliam's "The Man Who Killed Don Quixote" was ditched due to illness and floods.
But the 64-year-old, at the Venice Film Festival where Grimm is in competition, has come out fighting.
"There are some bad reviews out there, but there are also great reviews," he told Reuters in an interview on Sunday.
"All of my films evoke wonderful and bad reviews. They've always been like that. I like that. I don't like this bland 'OK' kind of film review and Grimm is no exception.
"There are probably too many critics out there with really pathetic opinions."
Grimm casts Hollywood star Matt Damon alongside Australia's Heath Ledger as versions of the real-life Grimm Brothers, whose fairy tales became required reading for generations of children.
Critics focused largely on clunky effects, "cartoon" acting and the film's failure to generate fear and mystery.
Its apologists praise its dark re-invention of well-known fables and Gilliam's seemingly boundless imagination.
"I don't even defend the film any more. It stands on its own two legs and it would be a pity if people don't go and see it," Gilliam said. "They will just have missed out on one of the great moments of history," he added with a smile.
DAMON SAYS FILM PRE-JUDGED
Damon said reviewers had it in for the film from the start.
"I was surprised that it (the reaction) was that lukewarm in the States," he told Reuters.
"The movie was on the shelf for two years so that is a signal to the reviewers ... that something's wrong.
"Terry did a lot of press about his fights with Harvey and Bob (Weinstein) and he didn't pull any punches ... I think the damage has been done."
One area of disagreement between Gilliam and the producers was casting. Gilliam wanted Johnny Depp in Grimm, not Damon, a decision which Damon himself concedes may have backfired.
"The joke at the end of the day was on the studio, in that while we were shooting, (Depp's box office hit) 'Pirates of the Caribbean' came out, and I'm sure they were like 'Oh my god, we could have had Johnny Depp in the movie.'
"He's the biggest movie star in the world now."
Gilliam is also about to release "Tideland," a film about a young girl who escapes into her own fertile imagination.
"Children are strong," said Gilliam. "The modern world says they are these sweet little things that have to be defended against any kind of reality. Not true.
"The Grimms' fairy tales were there to test children, prepare them for the world they will grow up in and I think that's one reason why this film (Grimm) works particularly well with children."
As to what comes next for Gilliam, he said he had nothing specific planned, and joked:
"I read the reviews, my career is over. I'm a broken man. Crushed. Smashed."
'Elizabethtown' Looks at Life and Death
VENICE, Italy - Most of what happens in "Elizabethtown," will probably never happen to you — but some could, and that is the hook in the Cameron Crowe film that debuted Sunday at the Venice Film Festival.
Starting with Elizabethtown, Ky., itself, a real place between Louisville, Ky., and Nashville, Tenn., the movie is packed with very real experiences: sudden death, career failure, girlfriends who ditch their men, men who ditch their girlfriends, people who realize after loved ones are gone that they never took the time to really know them.
"Elizabethtown" was being screened, out of competition, midway through the festival, which ends Sept. 10.
The festival opened with directors — George Clooney, Ang Lee and Steven Soderbergh among them — taking pains to deny that their movies here were designed to deliver political statements.
Crowe, however, took the occasion to proclaim his movie's message.
"Elizabethtown" is about "the obsession with success and failure that we see in America," the director told reporters. "But life comes along and trumps that in a big way."
In the film, Kirsten Dunst, playing Claire, a cheerful airline hostess, delivers the same message.
But Dunst is so persistenly charming, her lead foil, Orlando Bloom, so genuinely engaging and the plot so offbeat entertaining that viewers can still have fun despite the in-your-face recipe for happiness while finding yourself.
Bloom, the British actor whose other credits include "The Lord of the Rings" and "Troy," mastered the challenge of absorbing the accents and tics of Americans ranging from West Coast career climbers to down-home folk in America's heartland.
Bloom plays Drew, whose father dies while visiting family in Kentucky. Drew is still staggering under the news that the shoe he spent eight years perfecting for the shoe company where he works has a defect that could cost the firm nearly $1 billion. His mother dispatches him to Elizabethtown to take care of his father's remains, and the rediscovery of self gets under way to the aroma of freshly baked smoked ham.
The film's creators assembled a cast of extras who look like people we could know. At least one we do: Playing Drew's exuberant, welcoming Aunt Dora who is always cooking something on the stove is Paula Deen of Food Network's "Paula's Home Cooking."
Susan Sarandon is Drew's mom, a widow who thinks she needs to be reborn and steals a long moment in the film with an unusual eulogy about her husband.
No heartland film would be complete without a road trip, and Drew's metamorphosis comes as he drives cross-country, stopping in real-life tourist attractions and monuments, including the memorial in Oklahoma City to victims of the 1995 bombing.
Hollywood Uncertain After Summer Bummer
LOS ANGELES - Americans' love affair with movies is far from over. Yet like many relationships, it seems to be suffering from a case of familiarity breeds contempt. Summer 2005 was the worst since 1997 for movie attendance, which dropped sharply and rattled the complacency of studios.
For the 18 weeks from early May through Labor Day, domestic movie grosses are expected to total $3.6 billion, down 9 percent from summer revenues of $3.96 billion last year, according to box-office tracker Exhibitor Relations. Attendance figures are even bleaker. Factoring in higher admission prices, the number of movie tickets sold should come in around 562.5 million, down 12 percent from summer 2004.
What went wrong?
"What didn't go wrong? That's the question," said Paul Dergarabedian, Exhibitor Relations president. "This was a summer that really could be characterized as under a cloud from the beginning. Usually, the first weekend in May, you have a big film that kind of kicks off the summer. It didn't happen that way this time, and that was sort of an indicator of things to come."
Some movies did score big, but the overall downturn lingered and then worsened, prompting gloom-and-doom predictions that audiences were growing tired of rising ticket prices, concession stand costs, pre-show advertising and other movie theater hassles.
With so many other entertainment choices — video games, limitless TV programming, home-theater setups — audiences may be edging away from moviehouses.
In an Associated Press-AOL News poll in June, nearly three-fourths of adults said they would prefer to stay home and watch movies on DVD, videotape or pay-per-view rather than traipse to a theater. Almost half said they think movies are getting worse.
For years, Hollywood has thrived with an if-you-film-it-they-will-come mentality, relying on an assembly line formula of explosive action films, lowbrow comedy and dippy romance.
That approach failed in summer 2005, which had far more flops than usual, among them the action thrillers "Stealth" and "The Island," the comedies "The Honeymooners," "The Bad News Bears" and "Deuce Bigalow: European Gigolo," and the historical epic "Kingdom of Heaven."
Martin Lawrence could not give tickets away to his basketball comedy "Rebound." Extreme-sports fans who seemed an obvious audience for the skateboarding flick "Lords of Dogtown" failed to show. Family crowds who made Robert Rodriguez's "Spy Kids" movies a success generally passed on his "The Adventures of Sharkboy and Lavagirl in 3-D."
Horror remakes once enjoyed a virtual can't-miss record, yet Paris Hilton was unable to pack people in for "House of Wax." Even the man who created the flesh-munching zombie subgenre could not bring in crowds, as "George Romero's Land of the Dead" dug itself an early grave.
Ron Howard reteamed with his "A Beautiful Mind" star Russell Crowe for the class-act of summer. But "Cinderella Man," the uplifting story of Depression-era boxer Jim Braddock, was a box office lightweight despite good reviews.
Summer 2005 did produce its share of big hits, led by "Star Wars: Episode III — Revenge of the Sith" at almost $380 million. Films at or near the $200 million mark included "War of the Worlds," "Batman Begins," "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory," "Wedding Crashers" and "Madagascar."
There also were a few independent hits, such as the ensemble drama "Crash" and the surprise documentary smash "March of the Penguins."
It's unclear whether such breakout hits or the success of character-driven comedies such as "Wedding Crashers" and "The 40-Year-Old Virgin" will prompt studio executives to seek fresh ideas, or whether they will fall back on the safe old summer formulas.
"In an ideal world, people would say `OK, we have to think more creatively, we have to think outside the box and come up with new and different things,'" said Steven Friedlander, head of distribution for Warner Independent Pictures, which released "March of the Penguins."
"But I'm afraid what's going to happen is, we're all going to sit in a room and say `We need more penguin movies.'" So I don't really know what lessons we're going to take out of all this."