A hugely successful New York debut for James Marsh's MAN ON WIRE - the best opening weekend for an doc since Michael Moore's SICKO - led a triumphant weekend for nonfiction at the box office. But, shhhhh!! Don't tell anyone, it's gonna ruin the doc doldrums meme.
In addition to MAN ON WIRE, which took in more than $24,000 on each of its two NYC screens and garnered unanimously rapturous reviews (and is, make no mistake, the Oscar and Cinema Eye frontrunner), there was a strong launch for Nanette Burstein's AMERICAN TEEN, which worried watchers with a just OK Friday opening day but built going into the weekend. Scoring more than $9K on each of its 5 screens, TEEN looks to be in a strong position for its own expansion next weekend.
Also doing well this weekend was Margaret Brown's excellent THE ORDER OF MYTHS on a single screen at NYC's IFC Center. Powered by a glowing review by the Times' Manohla Dargis, MYTHS took in just over $7K for the weekend.
With 3 high profile Sundance docs all succeeding at the box office this weekend, it was perhaps inevitable that a fourth - the Neil Young directed CSNY DEJA VU, would stumble. The concert and political doc was released on 24 screens but managed just over $1K per.
In addition to the big premieres, there was good news for yet another Sundance title. Yung Chang's UP THE YANGTZE became the 5th nonfiction title of 2008 to surpass $1 million, with this weekend marking the moment that the film's take from its American release via Zeitgeist surpassed the impressive total from its initial Canadian launch via Kino. Another Sundance film, Alex Gibney's GONZO, will pass $1M before this weekend is over.
For comparison, the year with the most docs over $1M is 2004 with 11. 2005 had 8 films reach that mark while 2003 and 2006 each had 7.
This weekend, WIRE stays in NYC before a big expansion on August 8. ORDER OF MYTHS comes home to Mobile, Alabama this weekend. I'd love to tell you about AMERICAN TEEN's release strategy but the film's website is strangely suck-tastic for something that has otherwise been pretty tech-savvy. It fails to list upcoming theater dates and it's "ABOUT" section says "Coming Soon".
Here's the box office top 15 of 2008 through this weekend:
1. U23D (National Geographic) $ 8,997,731
2. EXPELLED: NO INTELLIGENCE ALLOWED (Rocky) $ 7,614,754
3. SHINE A LIGHT (Paramount Vantage) $ 5,355,376
4. YOUNG@HEART (Fox Searchlight) $ 3,865,746
5. UP THE YANGTZE (Zeitgeist/Kino) ~ $ 1,021,000
6. GONZO (Magnolia) $ 837,974
7. VINCE VAUGHN'S WILD WEST... (Picturehouse) $ 603,894
8. ENCOUNTERS AT THE END OF THE WORLD (THINK) $ 578,334
9. WHERE IN THE WORLD IS OSAMA... (Weinstein) $ 384,955
10. BIGGER, STRONGER, FASTER* (Magnolia) $ 294,404
11. THE SINGING REVOLUTION (Abramorama) $ 293,333
12. TAXI TO THE DARK SIDE (THINKFilm) $ 274,661
13. PLANET B-BOY (Elephant Eye) $ 273,870
14. SURFWISE (Magnolia) $ 263,573
15. STEEP (SPC) $ 260,586
i wonder though if MAN ON WIRE's Oscar frontrunner status will survive a "swell" of support for something like TROUBLE THE WATER (which is less cinematic and uses a lot of home video footage, so it may not be shorltisted because of "certian procedures" within the branch - a la GRIZZLY MAN) but is very powerful, and was directed by two Michael Moore producers, and described by Manhola Dargis as "one of the best American documentary in recent memory." It opens on August 22 to qualify, and may expand if it does well. And it will certianly be interesting to see if it can overcome it's lack of cinematic appeal to survive in the theartical marketplace. HBO would have qualified it anyway, so maybe a TV deal would have better served this film in terms of reaching a wider audience and waking up people to the reality of post-Katrina New Orleans. Altohugh, by that measure, I'm not sure what Spike Lee's two-parter `accomplished. If anyone can do it, it's Zeitgeist.
Posted by: bryan | July 29, 2008 at 04:01 PM