Weekend Box Office

October 26, 1999 0:53 PDT - By Brandon Gray - Box Office News

The Best Man made $9 million, enough to take the top spot over this slow weekend. This strong performance for the non-gangsta urban picture was not surprising. The fairly aggressive ad campaign featured rising stars Taye Diggs and Nia Long, and promised a good-natured romantic comedy. Similar pictures have performed well in the past. The Wood, which also starred Diggs and was also set around a wedding, opened to $8.5 million from 1,191 theaters this past July, and Soul Food opened in September 1997 with $11.2 million from 1,339 theaters.

Bringing Out the Dead didn't bring out many of the living, grossing $6.2 million from 1,936 theaters. I like to think some of its thunder was stolen by Mother, Jugs and Speed, the 1976 ambulance comedy-drama that starred Bill Cosby and Harvey Keitel. Well, that's what I was reminded of from the ad campaign. Anyway, this marks the first time Nicolas Cage failed to open a picture since he won the Oscar. Paramount has tried to mitigate the mediocre showing by claiming it as average for Martin Scorsese, citing Goodfellas as an example. Well, that picture opened in 1990 with $6.4 million from just 1,070 theaters and averaged $5,952, making it only similar to Bringing's opening in unadjusted gross alone.

Fledgling studio Destination turned out to be the only one to get sucked dry by Bats. The B-movie grossed $4.7 million from 2,540 theaters. Sure the picture cost $12 million to make, but an aggressive ad campaign was mounted for it on par with potential blockbusters. I've seen more ads for this thing than any other picture in months. Maybe that means that, god forbid, I was considered among the target audience for this thing. (Note to self: Lay off the WB network). It should finish its run with around $10 million, leaving behind a puddle of red ink.

Three to Tango stumbled as expected, grossing just $4.4 million from 2,234 theaters. The three stars can be seen in new episodes of their respective TV shows for free, so why would people pay to see them in a movie? Also, the ad campaign seemed like it was hiding how bad the movie was by not showing any jokes or even giving a clear sense of what it was about.

Crazy in Alabama grossed just $1 million from 1,214 theaters. It marks the latest bomb for Sony, who has been having a terrible year.

Double Jeopardy continued its baffling run, dropping just 25% to $7.6 million. Fight Club tumbled 43% to $6.3 million, despite the buzz and a strong showing during the week.

MGM finally dumped Molly starring Elizabeth Shue. The financially troubled studio took a write-off on it and wanted to release straight-to-video, but contract obligations forced them to give it some kind of theatrical release. So they put it at only 12 theaters and it bombed as it was destined to do, grossing just $9,683 for an $807 average.

Overall box office was down about 5% from last weekend, but was up about 6% from the comparable weekend last year, when Pleasantville topped the charts with just $8.9 million.