Box Office - 'Earth Stood Still' is Number One, But...

The hits keep on coming for Fox, and that's a bad thing. The studio, already reeling from a year full of major disappointments like Meet Dave, The X Files: I Want to Believe, City of Ember, Australia, Babylon A.D., Deception, and Mirrors, has one more ticking time bomb on its hands: The Day the Earth Stood Still.

The science fiction remake simply didn't make enough money in its debut to call itself a smash, and it might not recoup its $80 million budget in American ticket sales. A $31 million debut would normally be a good thing, but for a studio that is thanking its lucky stars that The Happening made a little bit of money this summer and can call What Happens in Vegas its crown jewel this year, Fox needed a lot more out of it.The Day the Earth Stood Still was easily the top movie in theaters, but it fell well below projections for its opening weekend, and doesn't resemble a movie that will be a strong contender for very long.Speaking of strong contenders, Four Christmases, Bolt, and Twilight spent their third weekend bunched together, and Bolt now appears very likely to break $100 million in a couple of weeks, which was not a sure thing when the film was released.The Top Five:
1 - The Day the Earth Stood Still ($31 million)
2 - Four Christmases ($13.3 million)
3 - Twilight ($8 million)
4 - Bolt ($7.5 million)
5 - Australia ($4.3 million)

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Viva la Revolución! Two Clips from 'Che'

I'm still really confused about Che, and that can't be a good omen for it finding a big audience. Steven Soderbergh's gargantuan biography of Che Guevara runs over four hours long, so it was going to be split into two films (Guerilla and The Argentine), but was reattached at Cannes, and is being halved again for international release."I took a cue from nature that when a cell gets too big it divides to survive and I felt that's what needed to be done," says the director. "Fortunately distributors who were enthusiastic about it wanted to re-do the deal for the two films."But what's the deal on the American release? I expected it to get some end-of-the-year adulation, particularly for Benicio Del Toro, but the critics and journalists have been quiet so far. It will come out in America next month, and apparently Soderbergh has refused to show it in two parts, meaning it will have an intermission.Couple that with its strange traveling road show strategy in New York and Los Angeles to qualify for the Oscars, the fact that like a lot of independent movies, it will have a very small initial run, throw in a dash of "Oh, by the way, it'll be on In Demand two weeks later," and stir in that the IFC website still says the film will be released in America in two parts...and you have one giant question mark.So, now that we've got that out of the way (sorta), enjoy two clips from Che, courtesy of Movie Web.

Trailer - Benicio Del Toro as 'Che'

Though it has kind of fallen off the radar as an awards contender, (I think) we still have what looks like one hell of a Best Actor consideration to watch closely, with Benicio Del Toro embodying the legendary revolutionary Che Guevara in Stephen Soderbergh's Che.I know the exact status of this might be confusing, because it was originally a two-film set with different names, and now Soderbergh has joined them into one movie spanning over four hours. And according to the IFC website, it will be released in January in two parts. So, I couldn't tell you what you're going to see. Sorry. There are opportunities to check it out soon, though, at the Che Roadshow in New York and Los Angeles beginning Friday, December 12th, and then IFC will offer it on demand beginning January 21st. Yep...it's certainly not the easiest movie to keep track of.And I hope that doesn't backfire, because, sweet Jebus, watch this trailer. It's maddeningly well done.

IFC Picks Up Steven Soderbergh's Epic 'Che'

Calling it "the film event of the year," IFC President Jonathan Sehring announced the acquisition of Steven Soderbergh's four-hour-long two-part bio-pic, Che, which stars Beinicio Del Toro as Che Guevara. The director has edited his films, which debuted at Cannes separately as The Argentine and Guerilla, and now it appears that Che will arrive in theaters in New York and Los Angeles for the requisite one week before the Academy Awards deadline. I have to admit, the reporting of this story by Variety is a bit confusing if you don't know a little bit going in. For example, they mention "companion films" and then talk about Che as one title. It ran at Toronto at its full length, and I have to believe that Che, the name for the whole project, and not Guerilla and The Argentine, are what we'll see in theaters. There's more proof of that plan in Sehring's comments: "By giving us the rise and fall of one of the great icons of history, Steven Soderbergh and Benicio Del Toro...have humanized him and given audiences around the world something that will be discussed for years to come." I think Lawrence of Arabia is the closest I've ever come to watching a four-hour film. Even then, it's only 3:40. And, well, it's Lawrence of Arabia. So this will probably require a good deal of audience concentration. Apparently, though, the four-hour version is much better than the two feature length cuts, or at least that's what the Toronto buzz is saying. Here's one other neat little item: If you're not in New York or Los Angeles and you want to see Che, IFC will release the film in theaters in January and, following a trend of recent Soderbergh indie flicks, it will be released on a day-and-date distribution platform, meaning you can watch it on in-demand video at home while it's still in theaters.

New Poster, Trailer for Soderbergh's Che Guevara Movie, 'The Argentine'

From the Argentinean website NeoCineTV by way of Cinema Blend comes this new poster for The Argentine, the Steven Soderbergh-directed biopic of Che Guevara starring Benicio Del Toro. I know it's kind of confusing, but there are actually two biopics about Che; the other one is called Guerilla, and Soderbergh directed that one too, and again, Del Toro plays Guevara. Here's where it gets harder to follow: Soderbergh may still join the two films into one four-hour epic simply called Che. I'm a broken record on movie lengths. Some, like The Right Stuff (which I'm dying to see again), works at three hours long for the exact reason it wouldn't work at two hours: The story dictates it. I think because Guevara had such a full life, and because it was, to a degree, compartmentalized, having two films instead of a monster-sized one makes sense to me. It's like making a John Lennon movie and putting all the Beatles stuff and the New York City stuff together. You'd be better off with two distinct movies. Anyway...here's the poster for the first of the two Che biopics, The Argentine. And wouldn't you know it? Now there's a trailer from the film, too, which we snagged at Ropes of Silicon. The Argentine will probably be released in the U.S. this fall; it opens in Spain next week and in the UK in January.