Craig's MovieBlog

Oscar Tips and Tricks

Variety compiled a few bullets of Oscar trivia, which I'll just post below, because for some sick reason, I just can't get enough of this stuff:

With his eighth acting nom, for Venus, Peter O'Toole is a winner either way. If he wins, great; if not, he goes down in the record books as the actor with the most noms without a win (he was previously tied with Richard Burton).

With her 14th nom, Meryl Streep (The Devil Wears Prada) furthers her lead for most nominated actor ever. Runners-up are Jack Nicholson and Katharine Hepburn, with 12 apiece.

Kevin O'Connell, nommed for sound mixing in Apocalypto, scores his 19th nom. He furthers his status as the Academy's most nominated individual who, so far, hasn't won. Distant runners-up are composer Alex North and art director Roland Anderson, at 15 each.

Dreamgirls is the first live-action film to have three of its songs nominated. Two animated films can lay claim to the same record: The Lion King in 1994 and Beauty and the Beast in 1991.

I Need to Wake Up from An Inconvenient Truth is the first song from a docu to be nominated since More from Mondo Cane was up for the award in 1963.

Alan Arkin has gone 38 years since his last nom --1968's The Heart is a Lonely Hunter -- the same amount of time Jack Palance spent between Shane in 1953 and City Slickers in 1991. Henry Fonda is still the title holder at 41 years between acting noms.

With Little Children, Kate Winslet, 31, becomes the youngest actress to garner five noms. She has made 19 movies. Previous record holder was Olivia de Haviland, who secured her fifth at the age of 33. By that time -- 1950 -- she had made 33 films.

Big Box Office Roundup - Memorial Day Weekend 2006

Didn’t any of you stay home this weekend?  Even if you didn’t go to see X-Men: The Last Stand ($122.9 million), you certainly went to see The Da Vinci Code ($42.4 million) or Over the Hedge ($35.3 million).  According to BoxOfficeMojo.com, the top 12 movies this week grossed $187.6 million, the highest EVER for any weekend.  Clearly the big winner this weekend were studio executives and babysitters taking care of your kids while you went out.

Let’s start with the behemoth that is X-Men: The Last Stand.  By taking in $120.1 million for the four-day weekend and $103.1 million for the three-day weekend, it has garnered its fair share of records: The biggest Memorial Day weekend ever (Shrek 2 is now in 2nd with $95.6 million).

5th biggest four-day weekend ever:

	Title	Opening
1	Revenge of the Sith	$158,449,700
2	Spider-Man 2	$130,456,123
3	The Matrix Reloaded	$129,282,716
4	Spider-Man	$125,878,901
5	X-Men: The Last Stand	$120,125,000

4th biggest three-day opening weekend ever:

	Title	Weekend
1	Spider-Man	$114,844,116
2	Revenge of the Sith	$108,435,841
3	Shrek 2	$108,037,878
4	X-Men: The Last Stand	$103,125,000

4th biggest three-day opening ever (not just weekends):

	Title	Opening
1	Revenge of the Sith	$124,237,232
2	Spider-Man	$114,844,116
3	The Matrix Reloaded	$103,227,933
4	X-Men: The Last Stand	$103,125,000

2nd biggest single day and 2nd biggest opening day ever:

	Title	Daily Gross
1	Revenge of the Sith	$50,013,859
2	X-Men: The Last Stand	$45,500,000

Biggest Friday ever:

	Title	Friday Gross
1	X-Men: The Last Stand	$45,500,000
2	Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire	$40,118,363
3	Spider-Man	$39,406,872

10th biggest Saturday ever at $32.1 million.  Shrek 2 leads with $44.8 million.

8th biggest Sunday ever at $25.5 million.  Shrek 2 leads with $34.9 million.

6th biggest Monday ever at $17.0 million.  Spider-Man 2 leads with $27.7 million.

But besides X-Men, there was other news to report.  First of all, The Da Vinci Code did tremendously here in the States (another $42.4 million, bringing it to $144.9 million and 2nd for 2006) but it did even better overseas, losing very little business this week compared to its opening last week.  It’s about to break the $500 million mark for its worldwide total, and that’s just after being open for only 11 days.  Only 42 films have ever broken that mark in their entire run.

Secondly, Al Gore’s PowerPoint presentation on global warming which became a movie, An Inconvenient Truth, took in the highest average per screen total ever for a documentary, at $70,505 per screen in four theaters for a total of $365,787.  As a comparison, Fahrenheit 9/11 made $23.9 million opening weekend, on 868 screens, for an average of $27,558 per screen.

Finally, I want to get back to the big movies of the weekend for a moment.  Day by day, X-Men dropped and dropped, while Da Vinci and Over the Hedge held relatively steady.  While X-Men definitely won the weekend, and won each day of the weekend, check out this comparative chart that I threw together: