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An early look at the holiday movie season - which pictures will surprise to the upside & which ones may bomb?

The holiday movie period is very different from the traditional summer blockbuster season. Some schlocky films will drive the box office, but the fall and winter months bring out adult moviegoers in droves. Last year, Walk the Line ($119 million), Brokeback Mountain ($83 million), The Family Stone ($60 million) and Memoirs of a Geisha ($57 million) were all released during this in November/December, and they successfully scored with critics and moviegoers alike.

This year is different from 2005. There are no sure things. Compare that to last year when distributors were trying to steer clear of King Kong, Narnia and Harry Potter. The bottom line is that with no real "tent pole" pictures on tap, there will be more review-driven, adult hits that will also score significantly at the box office.

Anyone can see that Casino Royale, Charlotte's Web, Santa Clause 3, Flushed Away and Night At the Museum will be blockbusters, but is there another Brokeback out there in 2006? Which films are set to over-perform and under-perform versus expectations? Which films will become surprise runaway smashes and arthouse favorites, and which ones will tank?

Sleepers - Films That Will Outperform Expectations.

Babel (Paramount Vantage) - 10/27 limited - 11/10 wide
Folks at Paramount Vantage believe that this is a shoe-in for a Best Picture nomination. In its favor is its cast, which includes Brad Pitt, Gael Garcia Bernal and Oscar winner Cate Blanchett. Working against it are the use of multiple languages, a reported tilt toward anti-Americanism and writer/director Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu's challenging storytelling style. The reviews will be terrific and when critics awards, Golden Globe nominations and ultimately Oscar nominations roll in, this film will keep clicking along.

Volver (Sony Classics) -11/3 limited - undetermined rollout
Pedro Almodovar is among the most-beloved indie directors working today, but even his most popular films - Talk To Her and All About My Mother - failed to top $10 million domestic. It's a Spanish-language film, but it will probably receive the best reviews of Almodovar's career...and that's saying something. Penelope Cruz has never looked hotter, and this is her best performance ever and a virtual lock for a Best Actress nomination at the Oscars. Its top end is $20 million domestic, but Sony Classics' methodical platform release will maximize box office.

Stranger Than Fiction ( Sony) - 11/10 wide
With a premise in the same tradition as Being John Malkovich and Adaptation, director Marc Forster (Finding Neverland, Monster's Ball) will score big with this film. Will Ferrell plays an IRS auditor who suddenly finds himself being "written into" an author's book. The cast includes Oscar winners Dustin Hoffman and Emma Thompson along with Oscar nominees Queen Latifah and Tom Hulce and rising star Maggie Gyllenhaal. Word is that this picture is smart enough for Academy voters and funny enough for Ferrell fans. This film feels like a $100 million earner to me.

For Your Consideration (Warner Independent) - 11/17 limited - expands to 550 runs on 11/22
Writer/director Christopher Guest is back with another of his ensemble mockumentaries, this time setting his sights on the making of an independent movie and three actors who begin getting award "buzz". He's got all of his regulars onboard, including Jennifer Coolidge, Eugene Levy, Fred Willard, Parker Posey, Jane Lynch and Bob Balaban. Guest had his high-water mark with Best In Show at $18.7 million domestic, but his last picture, A Mighty Wind, did a solid $17.7. This improv comedy might be too inside-Hollywood to break out, but I like the odds of possible upside surprise.

The History Boys (Fox Searchlight) - 11/22 limited - undetermined rollout
It was the toast of the 2006 Tony Awards in June, and now Nicholas Hytner (The Madness of King George) brings it to the screen. Richard Griffiths, in the role he originated on stage, plays a school headmaster overseeing a group of unruly history students who are trying to win a spot at Cambridge. Tony winner Griffiths will likely be a Best Supporting Actor nominee, and no specialty distributor handles a platform release as well as Fox Searchlight. The upside range for this one is somewhere between previous Searchlight releases Bend It Like Beckham ($32 million) and Little Miss Sunshine (currently about $50 million).

Rescue Dawn (MGM) - 12/1 limited - undetermined rollout
Werner Herzog's documentary Grizzly Man delivered a respectable $3.1 million last year. Now Herzog has adapted his 1997 doc Little Dieter Needs to Fly as a narrative film starring Christian Bale as a German-born American Navy pilot who crashes in Laos during the Vietnam War. The film focuses on the pilot's time in a POW camp, and ultimately, his escape with other inmates. This picture received raves at the Toronto International Film Festival, and a platform release starting December 1st gives it a chance for real success.

Apocalypto (Buena Vista) - 12/8 wide
All right, you can insert your Mel Gibson joke here. He may be anti-Semitic and he may be a friend of Bill W., but he does know how to take seemingly tough subjects and turn them into box office gold. Whether it's William Wallace (Braveheart did $75 million) or Jesus (The Passion of the Christ did $370 million), he is an unorthodox hitmaker. Can he make an ancient Mayan named Jaguar Paw a household name? Despite arcane subject matter and a film completely in Mayan, I refuse to bet against Mel.

Pan's Labrynth (Picturehouse) - 12/29 limited - undetermined rollout
No picture except for Volver has generated more film festival buzz than this Spanish-language historical fantasy thriller. It is unlike anything I have ever seen. Set in 1944 rural Spain, the film is about a little girl with a rich fantasy life filled with all kinds of fantastic creatures. The movie is about how she comes to terms with the repressive fascism of the time armed with only her imagination. This movie defies any explanation. I have to admit that even the distribution execs at Picturehouse aren't sure how to handle it. Is it commercial? Is it art? In the end, Guillermo del Toro (Hellboy) has made a one-of-a-kind picture, and I say it finds a way to real box office success.

Dreamgirls (Paramount) - 12/21 limited - 12/25 wide
All right, you'd have to be asleep to have not heard the deafening buzz for this Broadway adaptation. I put it on this Sleeper list because I don't know if everyone realizes how big it's going to be. One of the top three grosses of the holiday season...guaranteed. Paramount has been screening this to test audiences all summer, and the scores are through the roof. Writer/Director Bill Condon has hit this one out of the park. Expect the following Oscar nominations: Best Picture, Best Director, Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Supporting Actor - Eddie Murphy and Best Supporting Actress - Jennifer Hudson, plus a slew of technical noms. Jamie Foxx for Best Actor and Beyonce for Best Actress are also possible nominees. The low end for this movie is $150 million, and I think its likely to top the $170 million domestic that Chicago delivered in 2002.

Curse of the Golden Flower (Sony Classics) - 12/22 limited - undetermined rollout
This is the newest picture from Yimou Zhang. He previously delivered with House of Flying Daggers ($11 million) and Jet Lis Hero ($54 million). Sony Classics is booking this film into more commercial houses, and it is described as Zhang's biggest and most spectacular film yet. There is some martial arts fatigue in the marketplace, but there is real poetry in this director's films that set them apart. There will be some great per screen averages early in the run, and the focus on commercial venues will give the picture a chance to do some real box office numbers in January.
Busts - films that will underperform versus expectations.

It's been an awful year for Focus. Its films released in 2005 grossed a remarkable $200 million plus, but everything they have brought to the marketplace in 2006 has been a certifiable bomb. This Phillip Noyce-directed Apartheid drama starring Tim Robbins and Derek Luke will not bomb, but if the tepid reaction from its world premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival is any indication, it's a respectful picture that will not "catch a fire" at the box office. It will also be swamped by arthouse sure-things The Queen (Miaramax) and Little Children (New Line), which ramp up earlier and have far more buzz.

Fur: An Imaginary Portrait of Diane Arbus (Picturehouse) - 11/10 limited - rollout undetermined
Reading about this picture originally, it seemed like a promising project. Director Steven Shainberg previously scored with the quirky Secretary, the cast includes Oscar winner Nicole Kidman and Oscar nominee Robert Downey Jr. and Diane Arbus is among the most revered photographers of the 20th century. I've seen this film, and its a noble failure. Reviews will be mixed. It will not be an awards contender. And, despite a few weeks of PSA success, it won't be a significant box office player.

Tenacious D. & The Pick of Destiny (New Line) - 11/17 wide
Jack Black is back with more nonsense and I, for one, am not interested. Yes, I know that Nacho Libre did $80 million and yes, I know that Black has a solid following among 12- to 24-year-old males, a critical box office demo, but, this one feels like a self-congratulatory vanity project. The flimsy premise and opening on the same date as Casino Royale will doom this New Line offering.

Fast Food Nation (Fox Searchlight) - 11/17 limited
It's a great book from Eric Schlosser, but when I heard that Richard Linklater (Dazed & Confused, A Scanner Darkly) was turning it into a narrative film, my first thought was, "No way." He attempts to tell an impossibly big story with an ensemble cast including Greg Kinnear, Wilmer Valderrama, Ethan Hawke, Kris Kristofferson and Bobby Cannavale. The Hollywood Reporter and Variety have both weighed in saying that this film doesn't work, and the consensus is that there just isn't a cohesive, narrative storyline.

The Fountain (Warner Bros) - 11/22 wide
This much buzzed-about film from Darren Aronofsky (Pi, Requiem For A Dream) played at both the Venice Film Festival and the Toronto International Film Festival and left audiences decidedly uninspired. Despite a cast that includes Hugh Jackman and Mrs. Aronofsky, last year's Oscar winner Rachel Weisz (The Constant Gardener), this metaphysical romance is leaving festival patrons dazed and confused. When a project has been sitting around for this long and is described as "troubled", it means something.

Bug (Lions Gate) - 12/1 wide
Lionsgate is the best horror distributor in the business. From Saw to Hostel to the recent The Descent, they know how to sell a good, bloody picture. This one's got Ashley Judd as a downbeat waitress in peril. She's holed up in an Oklahoma motel room as she begins a romance with a neurotic Vietnam vet who sees bugs everywhere. It's directed by William Friedkin (The Exorcist), but those that have seen it say it's a hodgepodge mess. In January or March or October, a cheap horror flick can break through with one big weekend, but December 1st is not a good spot for a film like this.

The Pursuit of Happyness (Sony) - 12/15 wide
I've got this picture on the list of Busts not because it's going to be a bad film. In fact, I hear it's a very well-made movie and that Will Smith has a real shot at a second Best Actor nomination. At the same time, I've seen prognosticators forecast $100 million plus for this story of a single Dad trying to keep he and his son above the poverty line. That's just not realistic. His last serious role for which he received an Oscar nomination was Ali, and it finished with $58 million domestic. Don't look for more than $60 million domestic.

The Painted Veil (Warner Independent) - 12/15 limited - 12/29 top 10 markets - 01/05 top 25 markets
The Painted Veil has a great cast including Edward Norton, Naomi Watts and Live Schreiber, but it's based on a stuffy W. Somerset Maugham novel that was previously made in 1934 with Greta Garbo in the lead role, and those inside Warner Independent are not particularly high on it. It's fair to say that in terms of priorities for the rest of the year, this picture ranks fourth behind The Science of Sleep, Infamous and For Your Consideration. Director John Curran's last film was the solid, but hardly-seen We Don't Live Here Anymore, and my hunch is that this one will not be seen by that many more patrons.

Blood Diamond (Universal) - 12/15 wide
I'm a big fan of Director Ed Zwick, but this is a very tough release position. It opens on the same date as Eragon, plus it will likely be swept away by Dreamgirls, The Good Shepherd, Charlotte's Web, We Are Marshall and Night At The Museum which all come out within the following seven days. Leo DiCaprio and Djimon Hounsou team up to trek through Sierra Leone looking for a rare diamond. It's certain to be well-crafted, but it's unlikely to "cut through" when the biggest studio guns invade the multiplexes for Christmas.

Rocky Balboa (MGM) - 12/22 wide
Sylvester Stallone hasn't been relevant for over a decade. In fact, his last picture to deliver $75 million or more was Cliffhanger in 1993. There's something sad about the idea of 60-year-old Sly trying to resurrect his career with another shot at one of the great screen characters of all time, but, the aging one-time megastar will get back into the ring in this picture, and everyone involved should be completely embarrassed.

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