User blog:Ceauntay/The Weekend Warrior: August 5 - 7, 2011

Greetings and welcome back to the Weekend Warrior, your weekly guide to the weekend's new movies. Tune in every Tuesday for the latest look at the upcoming weekend, and then check back on Thursday night for final projections based on actual theatre counts.

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Predictions and Comparisons -

1. Rise of the Planet of the Apes (20th Century Fox) - $47.8 million N/A

2. The Smurfs (Sony) - $21.7 million -40%

3. The Change-Up (Universal) - $18.2 million N/A

4. Cowboys & Aliens (DreamWorks/Universal) - $17.5 million -52%

5. Captain America: the First Avengers (Marvel/Paramount) - $12.7 million -49%

6. Crazy, Stupid, Love. (Warner Bros.) - $12.0 million -38%

7. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows - Part 2 (Warner Bros.) - $10.8 million -51%

8. Friends With Benefits (Screen Gems/Sony) - $4.8 million -48%

9. Jane Hoop Elementary: The Final Rush - Part 2 (Paramount) - $4.2 million -45%

10. Horrible Bosses (New Line/WB) - $4.5 million -37%

Weekend Overview

The last month of summer kicks off with two fairly high concept movies, one linked to a famous movie franchise of the '70s, the other a comedy teaming two burgeoning stars who have both done their fair share of hit comedies.

With solid brand name value from the popular franchise of the '70s and a very different CG-driven take on the concept, Rise of the Planet of the Apes (20th Century Fox), starring James Franco and Freida Pinto, hopes to offer a new take on the prequel to the '70s classic Planet of the Apes. With Andy Serkis and others doing performance capture to play the apes combined with groundbreaking computer-generated apes by Weta FX ("The Lord of the Rings"), it's a film that's created just as much interest as it has concern among fans of the earlier movies. The generally slower box office and pushback against sequels and remakes might keep the movie from the type of opening it might have done, say, three or four years ago, but it should still be able to bring a significant number of guys from 15 to 40 and older due to the connections to the sci-fi classics and due to a strong marketing campaign that focuses on the "apes attack" action. It's basically going to win the weekend with an opening between $45 and 50 million, though it will have to get good word-of-mouth to stay afloat the weekly releases of movies looking for the same genre audience.

Also opening this weekend and trying to get business away from the high-profile action-thriller is something like the sixth or seventh R-rated comedy this summer, The Change-Up (Universal) with Ryan Reynolds and Jason Bateman switching bodies for comedic results. This sort of high-concept comedy is usually relegated to PG family films so it's definitely something different trying to do it in an R-rated context. One would assume the movie would appeal mostly to 20-to-30 something guys, who will be just as interested in the Apes, but will women come to see the funny actors? Or is everyone tired of R-rated comedy after so many big hits this summer? We think this one might struggle its opening weekend but potentially bring in some word-of-mouth business because it does deliver some strong laughs.

This week's "Chosen One" is Alex Gibney and Alison Ellwood's documentary Magic Trip (Magnolia) about Ken Kesey and his 1964 road trip with the "Merry Band of Pranksters," which you can read more about below.

Last August kicked off with the Will Ferrell-Mark Wahlberg action-comedy The Other Guys (Sony), which kicked Miranda Cosgrove's iCarly: The Movie out of its roost in the top spot to take #1 with $35.5 million. Opening in fourth place (behind Christopher Nolan's Inception with $18.5 million and iCarly: The Movie with $16 million) was the 3D threequel Step Up 3D (Disney) with $15. 8 million in 2,435 theaters. The Top 10 grossed $134 million, a number which shouldn't be too hard to beat with Rise of the Planet of the Apes doing better than The Other Guys.