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More like Dreck the Halls and The Santa Crime.

Kim Hollis: Speaking of holiday projects, Deck the Halls is now at $25 million, while The Santa Clause 3: The Escape Clause is at $73.2 million. One is a hit and the other is a dog, right?

Joel Corcoran: Maybe. If I could figure out which was which...

David Mumpower: Deck the Halls doesn't even deserve the $40-$45 million it will wind up getting. That project is an abomination. As for the third Santa Clause project, it's more of a 'to be determined'. It's still $65 million behind the less successful of the two prior films. We need to see how much more staying power it has before determining its success or failure.

Reagen Sulewski: Santa Clause 3 has to be a bit troubling since it's going to end up with just 2/3 of number 2. Deck the Halls is a flop and deservedly so. It looks like they tried to make a whole movie out of one scene from Christmas Vacation.

Kim Hollis: I don't know. Deck the Halls has made about $22.2 million more than I was hoping it would.

Reagen Sulewski: I mean, don't we actually hate these people with the obnoxious Christmas displays? Who cares whose is better?

Joel Corcoran: It's a worn-out story from a tired genre. I just hope I don't have to take my nieces to The Santa Clause 7: The Non-Compete Clause.

Reagen Sulewski: I've got $4 million to wave under your nose for those story rights, Joel.

Joel Corcoran: Okay. Won't take me more than a weekend to write the script anyway.

David Mumpower: A whole weekend? Overachiever.

Apathy, party of five.

Kim Hollis: There were two other openers this week. Turistas earned only $3.5 million, while National Lampoon's Van Wilder: The Rise of Taj earned $2.3 million. Is either one anything other than a bust?

Reagen Sulewski: Van Wilder's failure is a bit of a surprise since Kal Penn's got a bit of fame, sort of a low rent Seann William Scott.

Kim Hollis: Yeah, but even Harold and Kumar was shaky - and that was with what I thought was great marketing.

David Mumpower: Both of them appear to have been released solely to remind consumers how lousy post-Thanksgiving openers are.

Reagen Sulewski: Yeah, but even at that I thought $5 or 6 million might be possible. $2 million is the "background noise" level of opening weekend. You could almost get that from wide releasing a blank screen.

Joel Corcoran: I'd rather watch a blank screen over some of these releases. Two hours of calming blankness is worthwhile during the holiday rush.

This is all Shrek's fault.

Kim Hollis: Finally, there is one other release we haven't discussed. Flushed Away earned $2.3 million and appears to be almost out of theaters with box office of just over $60 million. Should Paramount/DreamWorks and Aardman Animation be satisfied with this result?

Reagen Sulewski: As an Aardman fan, I'm a bit disappointed. They appear to be just treading water.

David Mumpower: Clearly, they aren't since Aardman Animation has made it clear they will never work with DreamWorks Animation again. To that end, it's a confusing result. It's a few million better than the $56 million Wallace & Gromit in The Curse of the Were-Rabbit earned, but it's $45 million down from Chicken Run. I get the vibe that DreamWorks does not believe in the type of movies Aardman's team makes.

Joel Corcoran: Again, I think it comes down to advance expectations. It seems like Flushed Away performed about as well as any other recent animated film. However, given the talent behind the film, I think it is a bit disappointing.

Kim Hollis: I do think it's a little tougher to sell rats and toilets than it is chickens and Mel Gibson. Or Mel Gibson circa 2000, anyway.

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