Good points Brandon, though I would leave Sweeney Todd out of the mix, as it was rated R (therefore not really directed at the younger set) and it also barely cleared $50 million. (Don't get me wrong, Sweeney Todd is probably my personal favorite Depp/Burton collaboration, but the combination of a horror musical gorefest was admittedly a tough sell).
In general, we must remember that Johnny does not guarantee a huge box office, even if he does have a lot of young fans. His last film before this, The Rum Diary, did quite badly (Edited to add- egad, it was even worse than I thought- it only made a TOTAL of $13 million- less than half of what DS made domestically this weekend alone), but luckily, unlike DS, it had a small budget.
Sweeney Todd was definitely one of my favorites of Burton/Depp's as well!
As for The Rum Diary, when that film was released and even when it was being advertised before its release, I thought it looked quite bad and had no desire to see it whatsoever. Perhaps what I should have said is that, especially for the younger crowd, the roles where Depp plays a quirky, not-so-normal character tend to draw more of an audience than his regular, everyday characters do. It would be something very interesting to explore--why do the majority of people prefer Depp's quirky roles to his more normal ones? Is it because without these off kilter characters to prop him up his acting is simply boring? Or is it because audiences are becoming so accustomed to fantastical situations in films that the classic drama is steadily losing an audience? Or a combination of both?
I'll be 25 this June, so I'm right on the cusp of being both desirable and undesirable to advertisers. Perhaps I should prepare myself now to feel unwanted and undervalued in the grand scheme of Hollywood big wigs.
In any event, I'm intrigued by the various responses I've seen to this new DS movie. It seems as if there are only two options: you either love it, or you thought it was an overall bore, in terms of general consensus. I actually searched DS on Twitter last night and most of what popped up fit easily into one of these two categories. There were a lot of posts about how people were excited to go see it, then tons from people who seemingly were let down and wanted their time and money back.
I can't wait to see it again this week so I can really digest it and formulate my final opinion. And I kind of wish that I was removed from the fandom so I could experience the film on its own, as an unknowing movie goer to see how it plays out differently.