[Peace-discuss] Time on The Town

[C. G. Estabrook]

  Sunday, Sep. 19, 2010
Box Office: Affleck's The Town Gets an Easy A
By Richard Corliss

No more Ben Affleck jokes. No "Ben Afflecktion," or quacking his last name in 
the voice of an insurance-company duck. No South Park episodes where the actor 
falls in love with Eric Cartman's hand puppet, mistaking it for Jennifer Lopez. 
Not today, anyway; for the tabloid fodder fave of 2004 is now a star-auteur. The 
Town, the heist drama that Affleck directed and co-scripted and took the leading 
role in, was a surprise winner of this weekend's North American box office with 
$23.8 million, according to early studio estimates. Affable Ben is No. 1 again.

After a laggard Labor Day frame and last week's tepid, no-contest victory for 
the fourth Resident Evil horror film, Hollywood could finally cheer the onset of 
the fall season. Right behind The Town was the movie that prognosticators had 
said would take the weekend: the cheeky, high-IQ teen comedy Easy A, with a 
star-making role for critics' darling Emma Stone as a virginal high-school girl 
who becomes notorious because her classmates think she's a slut. The film, made 
for a mere $8 million, took in $18.2 million, and was one of five Sony pictures 
in this weekend's top 10 (along with Resident Evil: Afterlife, Takers, The Other 
Guys and Eat Pray Love.) In third place, earning $12.6 million, was Devil, the 
M. Night Shyamalan "presentation" of a horror film about people trapped in an 
elevator... with Satan.

This was the first weekend since mid-February that debut films took the first 
three slots. Mind you, back then Valentine's Day, The Wolfman and Percy Jackson 
& the Olympians earned a burly total of $119 million, more than twice the $53.6 
million that this weekend's trio amassed. Still, that's the highest take for the 
top three films in five weeks, which proves that folks will go to the movies, 
even if it's not summer, as long as they think there's something new worth seeing.

The studios smartly angled their quartet of new films to different segments of 
the audience. The Town, the one R-rated action film in the bunch, lured older 
males and upmarket audiences. Easy A appealed to teen girls; the weekend 
audience was 67% female, 49% under 18. Devil was for the young males who weren't 
all horrored out after Resident Evil: Afterlife. And the animated feature Alpha 
and Omega, which finished fifth, was a wildlife film for the kiddies. As it 
happens, the box-office returns of the four films reflected their ratings — The 
Town, 93%, Easy A, 85%; Devil, 41%; Alpha and Omega, a pathetic 15% — on the 
reviewer-sampling website Rotten Tomatoes. But Alpha and Omega had at least one 
money quote: a User Reviewer on the Internet Movie Database declared it "Best 
Wolf Movie Since Balto!"

For the mass moviegoer, though, The Town was the best Boston-based crime film 
since the 2006 The Departed, starring Affleck's old pal (and fellow 
Oscar-winner, for the Good Will Hunting screenplay) Matt Damon. Ben the director 
gave Ben the actor his biggest opening in a starring role since the $40.3 
million The Daredevil cadged back in 2003. (Last year's ensemble comedy He's 
Just Not That into You doesn't count; if your surname begins with Aff-, you will 
be first on most alphabetical cast lists.) The Town also earned more in its 
first weekend than the $20.3 million that Affleck's well-regarded directorial 
debut, Gone Baby Gone, made in its entire run. The star flogged his wares 
everywhere, from the movie's world premiere at the Venice Film Festival to last 
weekend at the Toronto Film Festival to this past week's guest spot on The Daily 
Show. (Two days later, The Town co-star Jon Hamm was also a Jon Stewart 
visitor.) No question, the door-to-door salesmanship paid off.

In indie action, Catfish, the documentary about a photographer lured into a 
Facebook relationship that is not what it seemed, opened sharply with $255,000 
on 12 screens. Never Let Me Go, the delicate science-fiction love-and-death 
story, earned $120,830 in four N.Y., and L.A. theaters, for the weekend's 
highest per-screen average. "This is a great start in a crowded market with a 
Jewish holiday," Fox Searchlight's Sheila DeLoach told Peter Knegt of IndieWire. 
DeLoach must mean that next weekend, with the High Holy Days over, and observant 
Jews again available to see movies, the box-office take should be astronomical.

Here are the Sunday estimates of this weekend's top-grossing pictures in North 
American theaters, as reported by Box Office Mojo:

1. The Town, $23.8 million, first weekend
2. Easy A, $18.2 million, first weekend
3. Devil, $12.6 million, first weekend
4. Resident Evil: Afterlife, $10.1 million; $44 million, second week
5. Alpha and Omega, $9.2 million, first weekend
6. Takers, $3 million; $52.3 million, fourth week
7. The American, $2.8 million; $32.9 million, third week
8. Inception, $2.015 million; $285.2 million, 10th week
9. The Other Guys, $2 million; $115.4 million, seventh week
10. Eat Pray Love, $1.7 million; $77.7 million, sixth week — tied with Machete, 
$1.7 million; $24.3 million, third week