Depp/Burton DARK SHADOWS Is In Release!!

[Mysterious Benefactor]

Thursday's box office resulted in another $1,151,342, which moves Dark Shadows' domestic box office to $55,482,896,

Thanks for posting those numbers. And I also see that similar to how on Wednesday DS was one of the films to fall off with the smallest percentage, on Thursday it was one of the ones with the largest gain:

Thursday's Box Office

which is currently good enough to place it at #19 for the year to date

Excellent! We didn't even need to wait for Friday's box office for it to leap into the Top 20.

It's also interesting to note that one of the films it lept past was The Woman in Black.

Although I anticipate that Men In Black III will leapfrog Dark Shadows this weekend, I also suspect that there are 5 or so movies that could fall behind Dark Shadows this weekend.

Box Office Mojo is forecasting both Men In Black III and Chernobyl Diaries. But even if DS places 6th or 7th for the weekend, that wouldn't be anything to get upset about. 

While there has been quite a bit of concern expressed that this movie will be viewed as a bomb, I don't share those concerns.

Nor do I. I'm pretty sure some people will say it - but just like some of the other things that have already been said (like how it was on life support ), that won't make it true.

And I do expect the movie to do well in the aftermarket.

Definitely. 

14 days 15 hours 42 minutes 52 seconds since the Depp/Burton Dark Shadows has been in release(ET)!!

[usffan]

MB, you mentioned many pages ago that you were waiting to give your own detailed analysis of the movie until after you'd seen the movie a second time.  Now that you've done that, I for one would be very interested to hear your thoughts.

[Mysterious Benefactor]

And I definitely plan to post them. But I probably won't get any chance to do it before Sunday...

14 days 15 hours 50 minutes 40 seconds since the Depp/Burton Dark Shadows has been in release(ET)!!

[Brandon Collins]

I think there are definitely some things to question with Magtoria's backstory and how she came to Collinwood. Certainly, it doesn't really make sense for her to be making up a name on the train to Collinsport. And if she didn't give a name to someone at Collinwood, how would they know who to expect would be arriving?

It makes sense to me that perhaps she stole the things we see her show up with in Collinsport, after she escaped from Windcliffe, which would also explain why she was trying to hide from the cops when she saw them. I keep trying to think of a way to explain the gaffe with the name, but nothing comes up. I thought maybe it would be possible that she gave her original name to Willie or something, and then he simply forgot it. But this wouldn't make sense given how protective Liz is shown to be over the children in the movie. She would want to know the name of the person coming to watch over them. There really is just no good way to explain this oversight.

[michael c]

since it was not(that we're aware of)written into the script i suppose all any of us can do is randomly speculate...

but it doesn't really seem "in the character" of the girl we saw to engage in criminal activity like theft.

she struck me as the classic "virtuous" DS ingenue. but that's just my take on her.

[Mysterious Benefactor]

Perhaps an effort to convey that image could be the very reason why Burton decided to cut whatever she had to resort to in order to get to Collinwood. Well, that is if what she did was even spelled out in the script. There's also the possibility that all along her reaction to the police was meant to hint that there was more to it than met the eye, but instead of being fully explained in the script, if was meant for the audience to use their own imagination. Who knows? But if the latter was the case, I suppose it was a successful ploy because here we are trying to decipher what her reaction to the police meant and how really significant it was in relationship to her getting herself to Collinwood...

14 days 19 hours 17 minutes 26 seconds since the Depp/Burton Dark Shadows has been in release(ET)!!

[Gerard]

It obviously was a flub that Maggie Evans quickly came up with a fictional name while on the train to Collinsport, since it was equally obvious that she had applied for the job and had been hired before journeying north.  Well, so what?  Aren't flubs all part-and-parcel of DS?  Didn't they exist in every incarnation of it?  Without them, they wouldn't be DS.  Maybe Depp/Burton intended it and wanted to see if anyone caught on.  After all, Cameron, who wanted to make everything on Titanic to be historically perfect had smoke coming out of the fourth stack - he did that deliberately for Titanic buffs, since the fourth funnel was a dummy that served as storage for deck chairs.  And S.E. Hinton somehow got the publishers to retrain one "flub" in her reworked novel, Hawkes Harbor (the obvious original title must've been Collinsport), for us DS fans.  I'm surprised JP didn't go ballistic over that and started filing multiple lawsuits.  You know how finicky he is about anyone taking away one penny regarding DS from what he thinks he is the ultimate guardian of every cent that goes to, well, whom?  Keep those youtube videos shut down and banned, JP.  We all know that if they're on there without making one cent for anyone, somehow whomever you want to get a penny isn't getting it.  Good job.

Anyway, now that my rant is over (how much money did JP and his "clients" get from this film? - alright, alright, rant is over), in the movie, from how I took it, Maggie was pretty much on her own for quite some time after she escaped Windcliffe (or however one wants to spell it).  She just didn't climb down those bedsheets and within days was on a train.  She spent time living on her own, doing what she had to do to survive, for quite some time before she saw that ad.  I can picture her slashing hash at a diner while offering the best cup of coffee around and a free piece of pie and telling people they were "jerks" for whatever reason, and then consoling them by calling them "honey."  It was 1972 and a couple years before.  It was easier then to do that.  She lived in a bedroom in a boarding house, using the shared bathroom down the hall with women named Buffie Harrington (the only one who had a TV with rabbit ears), biding her time, wanting to find the answers to her dilema.  And then one day she busy a newspaper with an ad for a governess.  From there, the movie begins.

Gerard

[Uncle Roger]

The IMAX version has been replaced by Men in Black 3, in my local theatre. The regular version is still there.

[Midnite]

I thought maybe it would be possible that she gave her original name to Willie or something, and then he simply forgot it. But this wouldn't make sense given how protective Liz is shown to be over the children in the movie. She would want to know the name of the person coming to watch over them.

And Liz asks Vicki some questions that weren't on the application.

Aren't flubs all part-and-parcel of DS?  Didn't they exist in every incarnation of it?  Without them, they wouldn't be DS.  Maybe Depp/Burton intended it and wanted to see if anyone caught on.  After all, Cameron, who wanted to make everything on Titanic to be historically perfect had smoke coming out of the fourth stack - he did that deliberately for Titanic buffs, since the fourth funnel was a dummy that served as storage for deck chairs.  And S.E. Hinton somehow got the publishers to retrain one "flub" in her reworked novel, Hawkes Harbor (the obvious original title must've been Collinsport), for us DS fans.

Sooo, are you saying that the palm trees in the 1991 DS were intentionally left in to drive you to distraction?     

[Gerard]

No, Midnite!  Those palm trees were evil...e-v-i-l...EEEVVVIIILLL!!!

Gerard

[michael c]

a friend of mine wanted to see the movie so this week i went, yes, a third time.

on first viewing i found the "magtoria" compromise and the carolyn "reveal" to be extremely discombobulating.

the explosive, overstuffed "climax", as someone else pointed out, also felt like about a third of the movie's running time.

but in reality it was only about 10 minutes.

so my feelings about the film have softened considerably. it's just become part of our "vocabulary" if you will. a different variation on the tale. flawed to be sure, and what version of the story isn't, but quite enjoyable. i wasn't "mesmerized" by it the way i was the OS but i don't dislike it either. hopefully a "director's cut" dvd will help flesh some of it out.

i still don't really go for "magtoria" and i will forever despise turning carolyn into a werewolf in the last ten minutes of the film but otherwise it's fun.

[michael c]

They've already been replacing (with other movies) the billboards, and ads on buses and bus stops, in Chicago over the last several days. 

it's happened in new york as well...

for a few weeks "they" were looking down on us from everywhere. now they're gone. a little moment in time and now they'll begin to retreat from the public consciousness and become "ours" again soon.

and for whatever this means when i went to see it wednesday at 7:00pm there were only about 20 people in the theater.

[Mysterious Benefactor]

I was surprised when I went to see the film on Tuesday afternoon and there were about 40-50 people there. But as we've seen from the box office figures, Tuesdays seem to have the highest attendance during the week. And it would actually be interesting to know if the highest attendance for the film is still in the midwest and the south, as was reported for the first weekend, or if it's spread out to other areas of the country...

And speaking of box office figures, because of the holiday weekend we'll probably be getting estimates right through Monday, with the actuals not coming out until Tuesday...

15 days 10 hours 45 minutes 45 seconds since the Depp/Burton Dark Shadows has been in release(ET)!!

[Phil]

David Selby has posted some comments about the new movie on his blog:

http://www.davidselby.com/blog/2012/05/25/comments-on-tim-burton-and-johnny-depps-dark-shadows/

Seems to have been taken down. Anyone have it saved?

EDIT: Disregard - just found the twitter post where Mr. Selby said he took it down because he wanted to revise it.

[joe integlia]

most billboards and ads are gone in los angeles also.