ScottFeinberg.com

By Scott Mendelson

It’s no secret that DreamWorks films often turn out to be far more complicated than their marketing campaigns might imply. For example, Megamind’s marketing didn’t even hint at the jaw-dropping plot twist in the first twenty minutes, nor did it detail any of the major narrative turns in the third act or the ‘must there be evil to co-exist with good?’ subtext that made the movie more than just a gimmick. And Kung Fu Panda 2’s marketing sold easy-going comedy and stress-free action without hinting at the emotionally draining story at its core, while Puss In Boots sold bawdy gags instead of trippy fairy-tale adventure.

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Brandon Gray of BoxOfficeMojo.com reports that “post-Thanksgiving doldrums were in full effect over the weekend,” as is always the case after a big holiday weekend — but this year’s was down 14 percent from last year’s. Last week’s #1 “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 1” and #2 “Tangled” swapped places, but receipts for both were off more than 50% from last weekend. “The Warrior’s Way” was the sole nationwide debut last weekend (“a weak one at that”), but “Black Swan” opened in limited release on just 18 screens and took in nearly $1.4 million (its $77,000 per screen average is the highest ever for a Fox Searchlight film and the second highest of 2010 after last weekend’s showing by “The King’s Speech”).

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Brandon Gray of BoxOfficeMojo.com reports that “families were out in force” this holiday weekend, propelling “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 1” (which also won last weekend), “Tangled” (which had the second biggest Thanksgiving opening ever after “Toy Story 2“) and “Megamind” (which came in a distant third) to the top of the box-office standings. Oscar hopeful “The King’s Speech,” meanwhile, opened in extremely limited release on Friday — it played in just two theaters in Los Angeles and two theaters in New York — and still brought in nearly $350,000, good for the highest per-theater take of any film this year. Overall business, however, was “slightly down” from this same weekend last year, when “The Twilight Saga: New Moon” and “The Blind Side” dominated the pack. The estimated receipts are…

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Brandon Gray of BoxOfficeMojo.com reports that “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 1,” the seventh installment in the blockbuster franchise, took in $125 million over the weekend, outgrossing all of its predecessors and becoming the sixth highest opening of all-time. The film’s commercial success clearly validates Warner Brothers’ “unprecedented move of adapting the last book into two movies” (which Summit will try to replicate later this year with its “Twilight” franchise by splitting “Breaking Dawn” into two parts). “Megamind,” which won the box office each of the past two weekends, “slipped 45 percent to an estimated $16.2 million,” which was still good enough for second place, while “Unstoppable,” which trailed it last week, came in a distant third. The estimated receipts are…

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Brandon Gray of BoxOfficeMojo.com reports that the action-thriller “Unstoppable,” the fifth collaboration between director Tony Scott and actor Denzel Washington, “didn’t come on like a freight train,” which allowed “Megamind,” last weekend’s box-office winner,” to retain the top stop “by default.” Two other newcomers, the star-less sci-fi flick “Skyline” and the star-studded rom-com “Morning Glory,” each generated only “modest showings” in their debuts. Gray notes, “Overall business was off 11 percent from the same weekend last year when ’2012′ arrived.” The estimated receipts are…

*This Wknd’s Dom Gross / This Wknd’s Theaters / Weeks In Release / Cume Dom Gross*

Box Office Leaders

1. “Megamind” (Paramount, 11/5, PG, trailer) — $30.1 / 3,949 / 2 / $89.8
2. “Unstoppable” (20th Century Fox, 11/12, PG-13, trailer) — $23.5 / 3,207 / 1 / $23.5
3. “Due Date” (Warner Brothers, 11/5, R, trailer) — $15.5 / 3,365 / 2 / $59.0
4. “Skyline” (Universal, 11/12, PG-13, trailer) — $11.7 / 2,880 / 1 / $11.7
5. “Morning Glory” (Paramount, 11/10, PG-13, trailer) — $9.6 / 2,518 / 1 / $9.6

Other Notables in Top 25

6. “For Colored Girls” (Lionsgate, 11/5, R, trailer) — $6.8 / 2,127 / 2 / $30.9
11. “Secretariat” (Disney, 10/8, PG, trailer) — $2.2 / 2,019 / 6 / $54.7
12. “The Social Network” — $1.7 / 1,088 / 7 / $87.7
13. “Hereafter” (Warner Brothers, 10/22, PG-13, trailer) — $1.3 / 1,691 / 5 / $31.4
15. “Fair Game” (Summit, 11/5, PG-13, trailer) — $1.1 / 175 / 2 / $2.0
16. “Conviction” (Fox Searchlight, 10/15, R, trailer) — $0.6 / 493 / 5 / $6.0
18. “Inside Job” (Sony Pictures Classics, 10/8, PG-13, trailer) — $0.5 / 250 / 6 / $1.6
19. “127 Hours” (Fox Searchlight, 11/5, R, trailer) — $0.5 / 22 / 2 / $0.8
20. “The Town” (Warner Brothers, 9/17, R, trailer) — $0.4 / 375 / 9 / $90.6
21. “Despicable Me” (Universal, 7/9, PG, trailer) — $0.3 / 273 / 19 / $248.8
22. “Waiting for ‘Superman’” (Paramount Vantage, 9/24, PG, trailer) — $0.2 / 204 / 8 / $5.9
23. “Toy Story 3” (Disney, 6/18, G, trailer) — $0.2 / 241 / 22 / $414.6

Photo: “Megamind.” Credit: Paramount.

BoxOfficeMojo.com reports that this was “the highest-grossing holiday season kick-off ever (if estimates hold),” noting that “overall business improved a whopping 30 percent over the same weekend last year when ‘A Christmas Carol’ (2009) led its debut.” The estimated receipts are…

*This Wknd’s Dom Gross / This Wknd’s Theaters / Weeks In Release / Cume Dom Gross*

Box Office Leaders

1. “Megamind” (Paramount, 11/5, PG, trailer) — $47.7 / 3,944 / 1 / $47.7
2. “Due Date” (Warner Brothers, 11/5, R, trailer) — $33.5 / 3,355 / 1 / $33.5
3. “For Colored Girls” (Lionsgate, 11/5, R, trailer) — $20.1 / 2,127 / 1 / $20.1
4. “Red” (Summit, 10/15, PG-13, trailer) — $8.9 / 3,229 / 4 / $71.9
5. “Saw 3D” (Lionsgate, 10/29, R, trailer) — $8.2 / 2,808 / 2 / $38.8

Other Notables in Top 25

8. “Hereafter” (Warner Brothers, 10/22, PG-13, trailer) — $4.0 / 2,365 / 4 / $28.7
9. “Secretariat” (Disney, 10/8, PG, trailer) — $4.0 / 2,614 / 5 / $51.0
10. “The Social Network” (Columbia, 10/1, PG-13, trailer) — $3.6 / 1,860 / 6 / $85.1
12. “Conviction” (Fox Searchlight, 10/15, R, trailer) — $1.6 / 672 / 4 / $4.7
13. “The Town” (Warner Brothers, 9/17, R, trailer) — $1.2 / 801 / 8 / $89.8
15. “Fair Game” (Summit, 11/5, PG-13, trailer) — $0.7 / 46 / 1 / $0.7
18. “Waiting for ‘Superman’” (Paramount Vantage, 9/24, PG, trailer) — $0.4 / 242 / 7/ $5.4
19. “Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps” (20th Century Fox, 9/24, PG-13, trailer) — $0.4 / 353 / 7 / $51.9
20. “Despicable Me” (Universal, 7/9, PG, trailer) — $0.3 / 307 / 18 / $248.3
21. “Inside Job” (Sony Pictures Classics, 10/8, PG-13, trailer) — $0.3 / 66 / 5 / $1.0
22. “127 Hours” (Fox Searchlight, 11/5, R, trailer) — $0.3 / 4 / 1 / $0.3
23. “Toy Story 3” (Disney, 6/18, G, trailer) –$0.3 / 264 / 21 / $414.3

Photo: “Megamind.” Credit: Paramount.

Following is a rundown of films that will be opening in many theaters over the coming week. We invite you to click on: the film titles to see this site’s previous coverage of them; the trailers to get a glimpse of the films for yourself; and the comments section to share your thoughts about any or all of them. Without further ado, the new films are…

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• The Rundown: James Rocchi talks with Lane Kneedler, associate director of programming for the AFI Film Festival, about the decision to host the Los Angeles event free of charge throughout its span from Nov. 4 through the 11. Kneedler explained, “From a programming perspective, it was very liberating and encouraging… We found that audiences would go see more challenging films, would take more risks, and were more adventurous in their choices if tickets were free.” The fest kicks off at 7:30pm PST tonight with the world premiere of “Love and Other Drugs.”
• 24 Frames: Steven Zeitchik believes that studios with politically-themed flicks this year made a calculated decision to wait until after the midterm elections that took place on Tuesday — consider “Fair Game” and “Client 9: The Rise and Fall of Eliot Spitzer” (this Friday), “The King’s Speech” (11/26), “The Company Men” (12/10), and “Casino Jack” (12/17) — because “it was better to steer clear of the election traffic than to try to navigate it.” He wonders, however, if “Hollywood might have tapped into a growing interest by coming out earlier.”
• Rope of Silicon: Bred Brevet monitors the best animated feature film race as it enters its homestretch — the public has already seen “Toy Story 3” and “How to Train Your Dragon,” and will be introduced to DreamWorks’s “Megamind” this weekend and Disney’s “Tangled” over Thanksgiving holiday weekend. The last yet-to-be-released animated contender? Sony Pictures Classics’s “The Illusionist,” which won’t hit theaters until Christmas Day.
• Movie Line: S.T. VanAirsdale looks over The Weinstein Company’s newly-released poster for “The King’s Speech” and mutters, “Looks like someone needs needs more than just speech therapy.” Why does VanAirsdale feel that it’s “terrible”? He points to incorrect spelling and grammar in the tagline; poor selection and photoshopping of the image; and the absence of any mention of the fact two of the film’s three stars are previous Oscar nominees (Colin Firth and Helena Bonham Carter) and the other is a previous Oscar winner (Geoffrey Rush).
• USA Today: Claudia Puig provides her annual list of films and performances that came out prior to the awards season rush but, she feels, “should not be forgotten by Oscar.” Among those name-checked: “Nowhere Boy,” the tale of John Lennon’s teenage years in Liverpool; “The Ghost Writer,” Roman Polanski’s comeback thriller; and best supporting actor long-shot John Hawkes (“Winter’s Bone”), of whom Puig writes, “Of all the year’s performances, his keeps the viewer most on edge and off balance.”
• WaxWords: Sharon Waxman believes that few of this year’s Oscar contenders have “female characters of any great consequence,” singling out “127 Hours,” “Biutiful,” “The Fighter,” “Inception,” “The King’s Speech,” “The Social Network,” and “True Grit” as particularly egregious offenders. Waxman’s complaint is off the mark, though: female characters are central to “Biutiful” (Maricel Alvarez’s), “The Fighter” (Amy Adams’s and Melissa Leo’s) and “True Grit” (Hailee Steinfeld’s); are absent from “127 Hours” and “The Social Network” because they were largely absent from the true stories on which those films are based; and are more prevalent in awards films this year than any other in recent memory (no fewer than two dozen are in serious contention for a best actress nod).
• Awards Tracker: Tom O’Neil warns audiences not to rule out Clint Eastwood’s “Hereafter” because of its initial lukewarm critical reception, noting that Jerry Zucker’s “Ghost” (1990), another film about the afterlife, was greeted similarly but still managed to snag five Oscar nods (including one for best picture) and win two (best supporting actress for Whoopi Goldberg and best original screenplay). A key difference that Tom neglects to mention, though, is that “Ghost” was a blockbuster (it took second place at the box-office the weekend that it opened and went on to gross over $200 million internationally) whereas “Hereafter” has been a flop (it has been in wide-release for two weeks, and was in limited release before that, but has still earned back only $23 million of its $50 million budget).
• The Wrap: Jeff Sneider finds that the MPAA — on the heels of issuing surprisingly harsh ratings to “Blue Valentine” (NC-17) and “The King’s Speech” (R) — is at it again, this time slapping James L. Brooks’s upcoming rom-com “How Do You Know” with an unexpected R for “some language.” “Individuals familiar with the project have confirmed that producers are planning to appeal the rating,” Sneider reports, but no official statement has been released yet.
• The Odds: Steve Pond compliments the unconventional, simplistic creativity of Fox Searchlight’s most recent promotional mailing, two feathers, one black and one white, inside a black envelope sent from a “Nina Sayers” — the name of the character portrayed by Natalie Portman in the upcoming dramatic-thriller “Black Swan.”
• The Hollywood Reporter: Gregg Kilday previews the first Museum of Tolerance International Film Festival, which will run from November 13-22 at the Los Angeles Museum of Toleranceopen, and will open with Peter Weir’s “The Way Back,” a film about “a small group prisoners who escaped a Siberian gulag in 1940 and made their way across five countries.” Fellow awards hopeful “Made in Dagenham,” a film inspired by the true story of female factory workers in England who went on strike in the sixties seeking equal pay for equal work, will also play the festival.

Photo: Jake Gyllenhaal and Anne Hathaway in a promotional photo for “Love and Other Drugs.” Credit: 20th Century Fox.

• Gold Derby: Tom O’Neil declares “Somewhere” — the latest film from Sofia Coppola, who he says has “an overblown reputation as a filmmaker” — “D.O.A.” following its lukewarm reception at Venice and subsequent online beatings by Jeff Wells and Richard Corliss.

• Deadline New York: Mike Fleming breaks the news that Fox Searchlight has acquired Terrence Malick‘s much-anticipated “The Tree of Life” — and elected not to release it until 2011, presumably because its funds and manpower are already spread thin enough between the four films it will be pushing for awards over this year.

• The Film Experience: Nathaniel Rogers strikes back at the rather absurd New York Times editorial which essentially asked its readers “Are films bad, or is TV just better?”

• Hollywood Elsewhere: Jeff Wells reviews Ben Affleck’s crime drama “The Town,” teetering the line as he claims, “It’s not what I’d call a mediocre thing, but it’s certainly not what anyone would call a believable crime flick.”

• In Contention: Kris Tapley likes what he sees as DreamWorks Animation releases what will most likely be the final trailer of “Megamind” prior to its November 5 release date. A late threat to upset “Toy Story 3,” perhaps? If so, it would have to be really good.

• Deadline New York: Mike Fleming battles it out with fellow writer Lloyd Kaufman as the two debate the merits of films that made the IFTA’s list of the top 30 indies of the eighties.

Photo: Stephen Dorff and Elle Fanning in “Somewhere.” Credit: Focus Features.