Weekend Box Office

It's a sad day when a Jennifer Lopez vehicle opens at number one. It's even sadder when you realize it has opened at number one with the best first weekend take since Sin City blustered through six weeks ago. Thankfully this travesty can be explained by the return of Jane Fonda to the screen. No doubt her die hard fans (who haven't seen her in a movie since Stanley and Iris in 1990) flocked to theaters thus bolstering the film's first week take. Too bad Jane had to take JLo to the top with her.

The new Will Ferrell movie Kicking and Screaming made an impressive showing as well, doing better in its first week than more interesting films like Sahara and Hitchhiker's Guide. There must be something about watcing looney men yelling at kids. Either that, or some people will watch anything with Will Ferrell no matter how silly it looks. Jet Li's Unleashed whimpered its way into a distant third, but it wasn't the big loser of the week. Mindhunters may have only had a medium sized release (about half as many theaters as Unleashed ) but it just barely made the top ten and only made one fifth of Unleashed's ticket sales.

Not in the top ten, but worth mentioning, was the debut of Layer Cake, directorial debut of Matthew Vaughn. For those who don't yet know he's the man into whose hands the X-Men film franchise has been so calously placed. Although only opening in ten theaters, it was number one in per theater sales this week. It may just be the novelty of the film or the fact that it had a very small release, but it drew attention and may even worm its way to the top ten as it widens release venues in the coming weeks.

Despite the return of Jane Fonda, this was another limp week at the box office. It's a trend that has been bearing its teeth all year. This week will see the release of the year's first almost-guaranteed block buster hit, the critically acclaimed Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith. Look for it to do far better than anything else so far in 2005. Still, how well it does will be an interesting indicator of whether or not the film industry is facing major challenges in getting people to spend their hard earned money in theaters.