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The Monday Brief: THIS IS IT and MRS. GOLDBERG Make 2009 Biggest Doc Year Ever

Greetings from London...where we await tomorrow night's Grierson Awards, Wednesday's kickoff of Sheffield Doc/Fest 2009 and Thursday's announcement of this year's Cinema Eye Honors Nominations...

The big doc news worldwide this weekend has been the massive success of MICHAEL JACKSON'S THIS IS IT.  The behind the scenes look at what was to be Jackson's big comeback tour launched last Wednesday with nearly $7.5M in ticket sales - the seventh best one day take for a nonfiction feature all time (only FAHRENHEIT 9/11 and both JACKASS films had higher grosses).  Friday, the studio estimates that the film made $7.85M, which would be the sixth best day ever.

Further, THIS IS IT became the fourth nonfiction to lead the theatrical box office for the weekend.  Estimates say the film took in more than $21M this weekend (which brings its total cume to $32.5M.  International figures already put the film over $100M in its initial bow.

Strangely, bizarrely, breathtakingly, there has been a campaign by some to declare the film's box office take a huge disappointment.  Nikke Finke seemed to get there first, quoting unnamed studio rivals declaring that Sony had overestimated the film's potential.  (Sony had reportedly paid $50M for the rights.)

David Poland knocks down that nonsense - and hard:

"Anyone still pushing the idea of THIS IS IT as a disappointment should be publicly ridiculed. Aggressively...

And let's not pretend it's innocent. "Projections by the studio were not met" is reporting a fact. "Disappointment" is claiming an emotion that reflects the intent to slap back at the feeling of having been set up for more. Plus, reporting what other studios are saying as though they are impartial observers is another remarkable break in trust with readers."

Look for THIS IS IT to become the highest grossing nonfiction title of the year sometime Tuesday.

Elsewhere in the theatrical box office (and decidedly a more quiet success), Aviva Kempner's YOO-HOO, MRS. GOLDBERG passed the $1M theatrical box office mark.  She previously scored at the box office with her 1999 documentary THE LIFE AND TIMES OF HANK GREENBERG.

With that, GOLDBERG becomes the 12th nonfiction feature in 2009 to make more than $1M - and that sets a new record for nonfiction features.  Previously, the breakthrough year of 2004 led with 11 films passing the $1M threshold.  

(The others, in case you're keeping score at home, are EARTH, THIS IS IT, JONAS BROTHERS, CAPITALISM, FOOD, INC., SEPTEMBER ISSUE, GOOD HAIR, WALTZ WITH BASHIR, VALENTINO, EVERY LITTLE STEP and IT MIGHT GET LOUD.)

Remember all that talk of the doc doldrums just - wow, was that all of a year and a half ago?

The Monday Brief: Indie Film in Hell - The Bloodbath, CineVegas & Polanski, But Signs of Hope With Ondi Timoner's Innovations, CAPITALISM, SEPTEMBER & IT MIGHT GET LOUD

Is the entire indie film world going to hell?  That's been the question vibrating through our community for the past several weeks, particularly after a Toronto International Film Festival that was light on sales and a summary paper issued by Anne Thompson, in which she labeled this year's TIFF an "indie bloodbath":

"The old independent market is over. A new one will take its place. But we are smack in the middle between the end of one paradigm and the start of another, and it’s a scary place indeed...

If nobody knew anything before, they know even less now. The one sure thing is that moviemakers will now PAY to get their films released. The few remaining distributors can sit back and wait for movies to drop in their laps, often with P & A funds attached. All hopes of a hot sale at a festivals were dashed this year."

And if you think filmmakers going to festivals have it bad, what about the festivals themselves?  This year has seen an unprecedented upheaval, as five of the top 10 festivals for documentaries saw a change in leadership (Sundance, Silverdocs, Los Angeles, Tribeca and Full Frame) and a number of film festivals found themselves making news - Toronto over its choice of Tel Aviv for its City to City Spotlight, Los Angeles in its battle with the BANANAS!* filmmakers and lawyers from Dole, SF Jewish Film over its screening of RACHEL, Tokyo due to its rejection-then-capitulation/acceptance of THE COVE, not to mention the coup at the Denver Film Society.  And what does it say about the New York Film Festival if most of NYC's indie film cognoscenti took the first flights out of town to be in Austin for Fantastic Fest, just as NYFF was opening?

Now we learn that CineVegas, one of the best regional festivals in the US, will not be back for its 2010 edition (although they state publicly that they will try to return sometime after that) and yesterday  the news that filmmaker Roman Polanski was arrested in Switzerland as he was en route to receive a lifetime achievement award from the Zurich Film Festival.

Add to all this what any filmmaker on the festival circuit (including this one) can tell you with certainty - for many festivals, the days of largesse have passed.  No travel, no accommodations, no screening fees.  Oh yeah, and if you want more than a couple tickets to your film, you're going to have to pay for them.

Let that sink in for a moment.

Tokyo Film Fest Will Screen THE COVE as Dolphin Hunts Return

Seeming to bow to international pressure (or, in their words, "interest"), the Tokyo Film Festival announced today that they will screen Louie Psihoyos' THE COVE at their festival next month.  Previously, THE COVE filmmakers had launched a PR offensive against the Tokyo Fest (see here and here), arguing that the festival's environmental theme (which was also in place in 2008) nearly demanded the film's inclusion.

From the Hollywood Reporter:

"The Tokyo International Film Festival's news conference Wednesday was dominated by the announcement that THE COVE, previously rejected by the fest, has been included in the lineup.

TIFF chairman Tatsumi "Tom" Yoda said Wednesday that the documentary about dolphin hunting in Japan would screen at the festival but denied that the decision was down to external pressure, saying it was because of "great interest in the film from around the world."

Yoda declined to explain in further detail why the film had now been included after its initial rejection, saying that the festival didn't do so for other films and would maintain the same policy for THE COVE."

The news guarantees that THE COVE, which has been a box office disappointment in the US for distributor Roadside Attractions, stays in the media eye through October, when Oscar voters will be making their first decisions.

The Monday Brief: More on THE COVE's Battle With Tokyo, Spike's Latest Doc Hits Big and Cinema Eye Moves to January

Good morning from Des Moines, where last night I scored the last chicken lip of the 2009 Iowa State Fair...

Disney released its latest nonfiction release of 2009, X GAMES 3D THE MOVIE, on 1,399 screens, the largest opening for a doc since Disney released EARTH in May.  This time, however, the results were not EARTH-shattering, as X GAMES managed just $572 per screen and a total gross of $800K.  Since the film was announced as a one-week only theatrical release, the ESPN Films-branded documentary may have difficulty making it to $1M by Friday.

UPDATE: X GAMES ended its one-week run with nearly $1.4 million, making it the 7th nonfiction title of 2009 to reach the million dollar mark and the third this year for Disney.

Fairing better was the release of Spike Lee's PASSING STRANGE: THE MOVIE, a filming of the same-name Tony-award winning Broadway musical written by Stew.  The film was recently announced as the kickoff to IFC's new Sundance Selects series, a Video-on-Demand service which debuts this Wednesday on Comcast, Cox and Cablevision.  It had its theatrical debut on a single screen at NYC's IFC Center and managed to gross more than $18K for the weekend.

In other box office news, IT MIGHT GET LOUD continued on 7 screens, cooling a bit in its second weekend to an average of $7,429.  Its cume is now $198K.  Meanwhile, THE COVE is continuing to defy expectations (although not in the ways that one would hope), slipping 40% from the previous week and now down to 29 theaters and total box office of $537K.

Last week, we wrote about THE COVE's producer Fisher Stevens sending a letter to Nikke Finke protesting THE COVE's exclusion from the Tokyo Film Festival.  We noted that drawing attention to a festival rejection was rarely a good PR move for filmmakers, thinking that Stevens' email was some rogue act.  But we'd missed what had previously been something of a concerted effort by THE COVE's filmmakers to draw attention to what they described as the Japanese government's efforts to stop the film from screening in that country.  It began as early as July, when THE COVE director Louis Psihoyos spoke to the IDA's Sara Vizcarrando:

"There was a major distributor who wanted to distribute this film in Japan, but his excuse not to do it was, "I didn't realize there was so much national pressure from the government not to have this film seen." He also said that he was worried the fishermen there might commit suicide if it was out because they'd lose so much face...

The Tokyo Film Festival called today. They said that, ironically, the theme of this year's fest is the environment. Not the top director but one of the directors of the fest said it would be hypocritical of us not to show that film."

The Monday Brief: IT Does GET LOUD in Theatres, A Tough Week for THE COVE and WOODSTOCK At 39

Good morning.  We're more than halfway through August and just under three weeks away from the World Premiere of Michael Moore's CAPITALISM: A LOVE STORY at La Biennale di Venezia...

But the big documentary news of the weekend is the stellar debut of the new film from another Oscar winner.  Davis Guggenheim's IT MIGHT GET LOUD, the story of the electric guitar as seen through Jimmy Page, The Edge and Jack White, broke out this weekend - and big.  Playing at just 7 theaters, the Sony Pictures Classics release made more than $100K, marking the best release for a documentary this year that was playing on more than 2 screens. 

IT MIGHT GET LOUD continues the sensational nonfiction streak for SPC this year, coming on the heels of WALTZ WITH BASHIR (just under $2.3M) EVERY LITTLE STEP ($1.6M and still going) and even TYSON ($886K).

It also marks the latest nonfiction feature from the 2008 Toronto International Film Festival to become a hit with moviegoers (following BASHIR, VALENTINO: THE LAST EMPEROR, EVERY LITTLE STEP and FOOD, INC.  Together, those five titles (including IT MIGHT GET LOUD) have taken in nearly $8.5M.  The highest grossing Sundance film this year is ANVIL! THE STORY OF ANVIL from the 2008 fest (although many haven't been released yet).

One 2009 Sundance title that entered theatres with lofty expectations - huge box office, Oscar nominations, changing maritime law - was THE COVE.  But this was not a good week for that film in terms of the things that worry filmmakers and distributors - box office and press. 

First, despite strong reviews and a new promotional push - including an appearance by director Louie Psihoyos on the Today Show - the film slipped to a per theater average of just $1,660 this weekend and a total cume of $424K.  It now looks like the film will have to struggle to make it to $1M at the box office Worse was a piece in the LA Times by John Horn that used THE COVE as the poster child for why environmental docs aren't working at the box office (we wondered why Horn never bothered to mention Disney's EARTH in his story).  It's never a good sign to have your distributor (in this case, Roadside Attractions' Howard Cohen) quoted as saying, "It's not what we would have hoped" and "the concept of the movie is much more off-putting than the experience of watching it".