That’s the dilemma facing Leo (Channing Tatum) after his wife Paige (Rachel McAdams) recovers from a serious brain trauma wiping out all memories of their marriage in “The Vow.”

The film, loosely based on a true story, tells the standard tale of a young couple who meet, fall in love, get married to live their happily ever after until one of them falls out of love. It’s just not in the way you expect.

When Paige wakes up from a medically induced coma following a car accident, she thinks she is currently engaged to ex-boyfriend Jeremy (Scott Speedman), still in law school, and is in close contact with her estranged parents (Sam Neill and Jessica Lange). Paige resumes her old life, the one she lived before meeting Leo and becoming a completely different person.

So artsy Leo hardly seems her type, and her parents seize the opportunity to re-enter her life again. Can Leo win back the heart of the love of his life?

What happens when your loved one loses the last five years of her memory and can’t remember you at all? Well, it probably wouldn’t go down exactly the way it did in this film, but director Michael Sucsy does a sweet job trying.

I know this is only “based on” true events, and whenever that pops up in the trailer, it means the scriptwriter has taken an idea from a true story and used plenty of creative license. I was very much in love with “The Vow” until it took an unexpected turn midway through. Paige becomes extremely whiny and annoying after starting out as likable, fun, and relatable! I just couldn’t sympathize with her anymore.

One minute she wants to be with Leo, then the next she’s fighting her feelings for ex-fiance. This story’s been said and done and frankly, we didn’t need all this mixed feeling nonsense in the middle. We should’ve seen more of Leo and Paige’s back story and struggles the couple face while trying to reconstruct her memories. It would’ve been much more of a realistic touch than how the film eventually plays out.

McAdams is a talented young actress, but don’t expect to see her charismatic character from “The Notebook” here. She does what she can with the part; I just didn’t agree with the scriptwriter’s wishy-washy tone.

As for Tatum, the handsome star certainly has impressed me this year kicking butt (literally) in Soderbergh’s “Haywire” and coming off strong with his film performance. If nothing else, it’s he who really carries the heartfelt tale all the way to the end.

“The Vow” isn’t this year’s best romantic drama or the Valentine’s Day film girls were hoping for, but Sucsy tells us an unusual story in a very pleasant and watchable way. If only certain subplots were left out altogether, the film could’ve been remarkable to watch versus just mediocre.

Allen’s romantic comedy, which beat out “Star Wars” for the Best Picture Oscar in 1977, remains an unabashed delight in its newly minted Blu-ray format. You’ll fall in love with Miss La-dee-dah herself, Diane Keaton, and marvel how Allen could smuggle in so many laughs without sacrificing the film’s bittersweet core.

It’s that rare comedy that hasn’t aged a minute, even if we still scratch our heads over why a stunner like Annie would fall so hard for a neurotic comedian.

What’s more remarkable about re-watching the film is seeing how Allen the artist handled the political divide then … and now.

In “Annie Hall,” Allen’s Alvy Singer is a liberal stand-up comic who is seen at one point performing for an Adlai Stevenson fundraiser. It’s clear from that sequence, and from other stream-of-conscious bits, that he’s a man of the Left. Yet Alvy never rubs us the wrong way no matter how he kevetches about his inability to be truthful to his girlfriends or his unabiding hate for the Left Coast.

Contrast that demeanor to two of Allen’s more recent films, “Whatever Works” and “Midnight in Paris.”

In “Whatever Works,” Allen paints people of faith as being troglodytes who finally see the light – by embracing their inner beatnik. The film “invites us to sneer at benighted Southerners, idiot Christians, stupid kids and their hard rock music – anything, in short, that wouldn’t pass muster among the Big Apple sophisticates of whom the director is a longtime laureate,” says Kurt Loder in his excellent new film anthology “The Good, the Bad and the Godawful: 21st Century Movie Reviews.”

“Midnight in Paris” is even more alienating to anyone who doesn’t embrace the Left. Rachel McAdams plays the villain of the piece, a soulless American trying to keep her beau (Owen Wilson) from pursuing his passions rather than easy paychecks. But she’s a doll compared to her parents, a Tea Party couple depicted as utter boors. The movement itself is dubbed “crypto-fascists” by Wilson’s character.

What a shame that an older, not-so-wiser Allen feels the need to add divisive elements into his new stories. Good thing we have films like “Annie Hall” on Blu-ray to chase away those negative vibes.

The result? “Valentine’s Day” lacked the sugary sweetness we demand from romantic fare.

For 2012’s most romantic season, the leads from “The Notebook” and “Dear John” are hoping to pry open our tear ducts. “The Vow,” hitting theaters Feb. 10, casts Rachel McAdams as a woman who loses her memory in a car accident and can’t remember her own husband (Channing Tatum).

The trailer hits the expected notes – the frustration, endless passion and possible salvation of a couple in distress. The stars as as purty as a picture, although Tatum is working so often these days (“The Vow” is the first of four movies he has in the can for 2012) he could be heading for overexposure alerts.

It’s shame we don’t see more in the trailer of actor Scott Speedman, the “Felicity” standout cast here as the “other man” potentially vying for the attentions of McAdams’ character. He’s been picking some sleepers of late, from the woefully underrated “Barney’s Version” to a nasty 2010 thriller “Good Neighbors.”

Hollywood’s rom-com track record has been abysmal in recent years, although its “rom-drams” like “Love and Other Drugs” fare far better. Let’s just hope “The Vow’s” resolution doesn’t involve a second bonk on the head that sets the character’s memory back to normal. That only works on ’60s sitcoms and shabby films like Liam Neeson’s “Unknown.”

So perhaps we should forgive her for being utterly unaware of the group’s radical roots and extremist behavior.

McAdams, currently in theaters courtesy of “Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows,” shared her views on OWS with Glamour magazine.

“I wanted to educate myself. People have said it’s unfocused, but I appreciate that there are so many different groups coming together peacefully, saying there are things that are broken in the system, and we need to put our heads together,” she told the magazine.

Let’s start her education here. That should give her plenty of reading material – and a new perspective on the “peaceful” movement.

[I]n finding artistic and commercial renewal across the pond, Mr. Allen often has flattered European vanities by ogling the sights of their storied capitals with his camera. Unfortunately, in “Midnight,” he also has pandered to European stereotypes of the Ugly American.

[...]

The cross-cultural comedy concerns a burned out Hollywood screenwriter named Gil (Owen Wilson) who hopes a trip to France will inspire him to finish his novel. Gil fantasizes about Paris in the 1920s, a time when artistic giants such as Ernest Hemingway, Cole Porter and F. Scott Fitzgerald roamed its streets.

One mysterious car ride later, Gil finds himself magically transported back to the Lost Generation golden age of his daydreams.

“Midnight in Paris” taps into a timeless American attraction to the City of Light as a cultural beacon, a place even ordinary artists can visit and emerge reborn. Throughout the film, Mr. Allen treats the city’s creative minds, native and transient alike, as intellectual titans.

Yet, in paying tribute to the artistic and historical glories of Paris, Mr. Allen gratuitously sneers at his own country. Mr. Wilson’s character is engaged to a shallow, materialistic American played by Rachel McAdams, a shrew whose parents are even more distasteful to Mr. Allen.

They belong to the tea party, for crying out loud.

Full article here.

“Morning Glory” follows Rachel McAdams as Becky Fuller, a driven, klutzy morning show producer with a life-long dream of working for “The Today Show.” Her break comes when she is hired, reluctantly, by the network IBS to host its low-rated morning show, “Daybreak.” 

—–

“Daybreak” is the epitome of bad morning television. With an aging beauty pageant contestant (Diane Keaton) and a fetish obsessed co-anchor (Ty Burrell) at the show’s helm, McAdams has her work cut out from her. After firing Burrell’s character, McAdams goes searching for a new male co-anchor. Through a contract loophole, she snags her childhood hero Mike Pomeroy (Harrison Ford), long-time mega hard news journalist and anchor, for co-host. But what starts as a dream come true turns into a nightmare as ratings plummet and Pomeroy refuses to cover soft news. 

As ratings fall, McAdams’ boss delivers an ultimatum: Improve the ratings or lose the show. With her job on the line, McAdams attempts to jump the shark every day for six weeks in order to turn things around. 

“Morning Glory” returns the romance to journalism – the romance of finding a good story or the right angle. And yeah, it’s soft journalism, but with Harrison Ford’s best Walter Cronkite facial expressions and Dan Rather vocal imitation, it’s good fun. 

It’s not necessarily clean fun. “Morning Glory” drops swearwords incessantly to easily earn its PG-13 rating. And a few socially liberal elements are added as McAdams’ Becky attempts to push the show’s limits – in one instance by having a cross-dresser on the show. They aren’t a big deal, and fit with her effort to make Daybreak the most outrageous in-your-face morning program, but they are, in my opinion, worth noting. Then there’s the fact that our notably conservative Pomeroy (he’s seen hunting, and brags that he once had lunch with Dick Cheney) is found drinking one night with Chris Matthews. It’s fine by me, but it does seem out of character. 

What’s refreshing is the relationship between McAdams and her love interest, played by Patrick Wilson. Wilson plays a real guy who responds like a good boyfriend (not a stereotypical one, or a flimsy film heartthrob) to McAdams’ all-work, all-the-time ethic. And the romance avoids being the film’s main focus. The featured relationship is McAdams’ near father-daughter relationship with Ford. 

And the film’s funny. One of the reasons is McAdams herself, a strong lead with an exuberant personality. She’s a bit over the top in a couple scenes, in strained attempts to keep her energy up, but for the most part her driven character is a likeable young hot professional that you can’t help but fall for. 

And Ford is awesome, as usual. He’s still got that wry Indiana Jones/Han Solo smile, which keeps him likeable even when he’s a huge jerk onscreen. A touch of bitterness makes Ford’s Pomeroy a solidly classic journalist who drinks too much, swears too much and is a piece of history himself. For their parts, co-anchor Keaton and weather guy Matt Malloy are both well-cast comic relief. 

“Morning Glory” boasts an easy pop sound track, good filming and a fun, well-written central story (thanks to screenwriter Aline Brosh McKenna of “27 Dresses” and “The Devil Wears Prada”). While it’s not perfect, it’s the best romantic comedy I’ve seen this year, by far less of a nightmare than “Leap Year” or “Letters to Juliet.”

Ritchie’s slovenly Holmes is a long way from Basil Rathbone’s, the actor who played the resident of 221 B Baker Street in 14 films over half as many years starting in 1939, and he’s even further from Doyle’s. The mannered, sophisticated detective is now a borderline recluse who’s utterly dysfunctional when not preoccupied with a case, a glib ladies man and ready action hero who knows how to use his fists.  As his physician-partner in crimesolving, Jude Law grabs his best role in years as Holmes’ closest friend and mother hen.

Set in London in the late 1800s, the game afoot does not involve Holmes most famous nemesis Professor Moriarty this time, but instead Lord Blackwood (Mark Strong), a presumably hanged ritual killer and user of the dark arts who might have risen from the dead with a master plan for world domination. Through an influential Gentleman’s Club of fellow occultists, Blackwood all but controls Scotland Yard which leaves only  Holmes, Watson and Irene Adler (Rachel McAdams) — a scheming American woman from Holmes’ past with dueling loyalties and a mind just as sharp as her romantic rival’s — to stop him.  

The glue that holds the narrative together is not a somewhat convoluted –though smart in places – story, or the tense, suspicious romance between Holmes and Irene (has anyone ever created romantic sparks with McAdams?), but rather the detective’s affectionate friendship with Watson. Contrary to the rumor, there’s no gay subtext at work here. The dynamic between the two adventurers is similar to Hope and Crosby‘s “Road” films not a mountain named Brokeback. Holmes knows he’d be lost and lonely without his old friend to guide him, and though he doesn’t know it, Watson would be terribly bored were he to go through with his plans to marry and stake out a life as a run-of-the mill physician.

That’s not to say the film doesn’t employ other charms. There are a couple of terrific actions sequences, one involving a shipyard and the other a slow-motion explosion, and the washed out cinematography does a lot to hide the CGI’d cityscapes and create the perfect wet and foggy atmosphere for such a dark story.  But the real plus is Ritchie’s success where it counts. Like Easter eggs for purists, bits and pieces of Doyle’s stories are seamlessly integrated into this affectionate piece of revisionism, and then there’s the genuine star chemistry between Downey Jr. and Law. Much can be forgiven if a film’s central relationship works, and as was the case with “Iron Man,” the blockbuster that made Downey Jr. the superstar comeback story of the decade, it’s hard to imagine how much lesser “Holmes” would be without him.

Fun, frivolous, and bearing no agenda other than pure holiday escapism, Guy Ritchie and Jude Law have officially earned a comeback, Downey Jr. has cemented his, and that promise of a sequel made just before the final fade sounds good to me.

UPDATE: Here are a couple of well-argued articles, one via Instapundit and the second from reader Nate Winchester, claiming the film is closer to Doyle than I gave it credit for. Instapundit’s is the more convincing; the idea being that Doyle gave Holmes certain character traits that “Guy Richie’s re-invention of the Sherlock Holmes film has, at it’s core, a great idea: let’s re-examine the way Doyle might have written about the exact same character in a more permissive, action-oriented era. All the elements are there[.]”

That’s an excellent way to put it. Or as one commenter put it, Ritchie “extrapolated” what would work best for a modern action-adventure. The link from Winchester is to an article written prior to the author seeing the film, but still worth a read.

Star-turned-producer Hugh Jackman has scored his second-biggest opening ever and, easily, his biggest as a solo star. Wolverine has mauled the competition with a massive $34.75M opening day (including $5M or so in Thursday midnight sales). That could translate to a 3-day of $86.8M, getting Hollywood’s most lucrative season off to a spectacular start.

The stars of WOLVERINE (from the left): Ryan Reynolds as Deadpool, Taylor Kitsch as Gambit, Hugh Jackman as Wolverine, Liev Schrieber as Sabretooth and Lynn Collins as Kayla Silverfox

The X-Men spin-off, which has been made for substantially less than the $210M budget ponied up for to produce 2006’s X-Men: The Last Stand, becomes the all-time fourth-best first-weekend-of-May opening, trailing only Spider-Man 3 ($151.1M), the original 2002 Spider-Man ($114.8M) and last May’s Iron Man ($98.6M). Wolverine has also posted one of the top seven opening days ever for a comic book adaptation.

ALL-TIME BEST OPENINGS DAYS FOR COMIC BOOK ADAPTATIONS
1. The Dark Knight – $67.1M
2. Spider-Man 3 – $59.8M
3. X-Men: The Last Stand – $45.1M
4. Spider-Man 2 – $40.4M
5. Spider-Man – $39.4M
6. Iron Man – $35.2M
7. X-Men Origins: Wolverine – $34.75M (estimated)
8. X2: X-Men United – $31.2M
9. 300 – $28.1M
10. Watchmen – $24.5M

And, as comic book movies go, Jackman’s solo effort has cut and sliced through the pack to become the all-time seventh-best 3-day start.

X-MEN ORIGINS: WOLVERINE will not match the opening weekend of last year's summer starter IRON MAN

ALL-TIME BEST OPENING WEEKENDS FOR A COMIC BOOK ADAPTATION
1. The Dark Knight – $158.4M
2. Spider-Man 3 – $151.1M
3. Spider-Man – $114.8M
4. X-Men: The Last Stand – $102.7M
5. Iron Man – $98.6M
6. Spider-Man 2 – $88.1M
7. X-Men Origins: Wolverine – $86.8M (projected)
8. X2: X-Men United – $85.5M
9. 300 – $70.8M
10. Hulk – $62.1M

How does Jackman hold his silverware during dinner?

Jackman himself is getting lots of positive feedback on his personal Twitter page, but there is some real negative feedback in the Twitterverse. Here are some actually Tweets from movie fans that have been posted in the last couple of hours.

if its wolverine dont waste your time

Wolverine sucks!

Wolverine: not too bad. Better than the horrible second X-Men movie. Coolest thing was preview for District-9.

I went and paid for 2 movie tix to see that damn Wolverine movie. I just wasted my money.

Wolverine was ok – too much smooshed into one movie and too many things attempted to be neatly wrapped up and squared away.

Saw Wolverine. It was weak.

What does Hugh Jackman being a hottie have 2 do w/ how crappy the movie is?

Oh my God Wolverine was just as bad as everyone was saying.

out to see Wolverine! Ill let you guys know how bad it is.

“don’t waste your money” unless you’re a huge fan. Like 2nd X-files bad.

So, it appears that fans are as tepid about this movie as film critics. X-Men Origins: Wolverine will likely be very front-loaded both for the weekend and the long haul. I’m guessing that the weekend could play out like this. Wolverine did $5M Thursday at midnight and has added another $29.75M Friday (for a $34.75M opening day). Then Saturday, the movie may drop 9% to $31.6M or so, followed by a Sunday dip of 36% to just over $20M.

Jackman is not just another action star; Here he is in his Tony-winning performance in Broadway's BOY FROM OZ

After speaking with a number of competing studios, the consensus is that Wolverine will have a multiple of less than two. (The multiple is the number by which you multiply the opening weekend to arrive at the ultimate domestic gross.) With a multiple in the 1.8-1.9 range, the summer’s first movie spectacle will finish at $156-$165M. That’s a good, but not great number. Meanwhile, Star Trek (Paramount) has a chance to be this year’s Iron Man, an early May release that plays deep into the summer at a high multiple in the 3.2-3.3 range.

Matthew McConaughey and Jennifer Garner are creating some sparks in GHOSTS OF GIRLFRIENDS PAST

The other wide release in the marketplace this weekend is the poorly-reviewed Ghosts of Girlfriends Past (Warner Bros). With Matthew McConaughey and Jennifer Garner as the romantic leads and an assist from Oscar winner Michael Douglas, Ghosts has performed decently, especially with Females 25 Plus. The Mark Waters-directed rom-com coaxed an estimated $6M in opening day sales and will likely reach about $16.5M for the weekend. That’s would be 12% stronger than last year’s first-weekend-of-May chick-flick counter programming, Made of Honor, which finished second to Iron Man with $14.7M.

Ali Larter (center) and Beyonce (right) come to blows over THE WIRE's Idris Elba in OBSESSED

Last weekend’s box office champ Obsessed (Sony) – the one where Beyonce “tromps a tramp” (played by Ali Larter from Heroes) – took a nosedive with just $4.2M or so on Friday. It seems headed for an estimated 3-day of $12.39M, down 57% from its opening, but the genre pic with a budget of only $20M will still have $47M in the bank by Monday. That’s a very profitable little movie.

Tween are pushing Zac Efron's 17 AGAIN past the $50M mark

The Warner Bros comedy 17 Again, starring tween dream Zac Efron, continues to perform well with about $2.22M to start the weekend and a possible $6.62M for the frame. Zac’s high-concept comedy will have topped $48.7M domestic in its first 17 days of release.

The new nature doc EARTH is really just the Cliff Notes for the extraordinary BBC miniseries PLANET EARTH

Disney’s Earth, a 90-minute version of the BBC’s 11-hour 2006 miniseries Planet Earth, will round out the top five for the first official weekend of summer. The nature doc grabbed $1.45M on its second Friday and is targeting $5.81M and a new 12-day cume of $23.47M by Monday.

The other wide release is the 3-D pic Battle For Terra (Lionsgate/Roadside Attractions). It is on just over 1,100 screens, but has managed only about $300,000 on opening day. I did see a commercial for Terra during American Idol this week, so there was some money spent, but it couldn’t have been much. Despite respectable reviews, this cg animated flick is destined for no more than $1M. That’s a full-on disaster.

EXCLUSIVE STEVE MASON EARLY FRIDAY ESTIMATES
1. NEW – X-Men Origins: Wolverine (Fox) – $34.75M, $8,478 PTA, $34.75M cume
2. NEW – Ghosts of Girlfriends Past (Warner Bros) – $6M, $1,890 PTA, $6M
3. Obsessed (Sony) – $4.2M, $1,671 PTA, $39M cume
4. 17 Again (Warner Bros) – $2.22M, $682 PTA, $44.36M cume
5. The Soloist (Dreamworks/Paramount) – $1.7M, $836 PTA, $14.2M cume
6. Earth (Disney) – $1.45M, $804 PTA, $19.11M cume
7. Monsters vs. Aliens (Dreamworks/Paramount) – $1.41M, $537 PTA, $178M cume
8. Fighting (Rogue) – $1.4M, $608 PTA, $14.73M cume
9. State of Play (Universal) – $1.28M, $527 PTA, $28.51M cume
10. Hannah Montana: The Movie (Disney) – $1.1M, $390 PTA, $67.88M cume
*NEW – Battle For Terra (Lionsgate/Roadside Attractions) – $300,000, $258 PTA, $300,000 cume

EXCLUSIVE STEVE MASON EARLY 3-DAY ESTIMATES
1. NEW – X-Men Origins: Wolverine (Fox) – $86.8M, $21,194 PTA, $86.8M cume
2. NEW – Ghosts of Girlfriends Past (Warner Bros) – $16.5M, $5,197 PTA, $16.5M
3. Obsessed (Sony) – $12.39M, $4,928 PTA, $47.19M cume
4. 17 Again (Warner Bros) – $6.62M, $2,034 PTA, $48.76M cume
5. Earth (Disney) – $5.81M, $3,221 PTA, $23.47M cume
6. The Soloist (Dreamworks/Paramount) – $5.7M, $2,804 PTA, $18.2M cume
7. Monsters vs. Aliens (Dreamworks/Paramount) – $5.65M, $2,152 PTA, $182.25M cume
8. State of Play (Universal) – $4.31M, $1,765 PTA, $31.54M cume
9. Hannah Montana: The Movie (Disney) – $3.96M, $1,405 PTA, $70.74M cume
10. Fighting (Rogue) – $3.76M, $1,630 PTA, $17.1M cume
*NEW – Battle For Terra (Lionsgate/Roadside Attractions) – $1M, $878 PTA, $1M cume

Steve Mason is on Facebook and now also on Twitter@LAMase.

Look at these numbers.

X-Men – estimated budget – $75M
$20.8M opening day – $54.5M opening weekend – $152.3M domestic – $296.3M global

X-2: X-Men United – estimated budget – $110M
$31.25M opening day – $85.5M opening weekend – $214.9M domestic – $407.7M global

X-Men: The Last Stand – estimated budget – $210M
$45.1M opening day – $102.7M opening weekend – $224.4M domestic – $459.3M global

It’s pretty clear that, with no cost-containment on budget (especially the big cast), the X-Men franchise had reached the point of diminishing returns. So, X-Men Origins: Wolverine (Fox), debuting Friday, is a sequel, but, technically, a spin-off, without costing as much as a true sequel would.

A very different Hugh Jackman won the Tony for Best Actor for his performance in Broadway's BOY FROM OZ

I’m guessing that Hugh Jackman is working for a great price, also serving as a producer with a healthy backend participation. The rest of the name cast is essentially limited to Liev Schrieber (The Manchurian Candidate, The Omen), Dominic Monaghan (The Lord of the Rings Trilogy, ABC’s Lost) and Ryan Reynolds (Blade: Trinity, The Amityville Horror), and there is no Bryan Singer (X-Men, X-2) or Brett Ratner (X-Men 3) to direct. Instead, Fox and Jackman settled on the much less expensive, but still Academy Award-winning director Gavin Hood (Tsotsi). Now with a scaled-back story and cast, the movie comes in at a much more studio-friendly price while, hopefully, still packing an X-Men-style box office punch.

Aussie director Gavin Hood accepting his Oscar for TSOTSI

Fox has smartly positioned Wolverine as the first movie into the summer fray, and that is important because this is the one May huge release that may not have long legs (I believe that J.J. Abrams’ Star Trek will squash it like a bug on the all-new Enterprise windshield next week). I am told that pre-release industry tracking is in the stratosphere for this X-Men spin-off – Un-Aided Awareness, Total Awareness, Definite Interest and First Choice are all through the roof. When the tracking data gets this heated, predictions are dicey at best, but I am calling for $92M domestic. That would be just a tick lower than last year’s first-weekend-of-May starter Iron Man, which was $98.6M.

Without claws: Hugh Jackman as host of the 2009 Academy Awards

For those of you who may be reading my column for the first time, that $92M figure is my “prediction.” That means that based on my experience, conversations with sources at competing studios and interpretation of pre-release industry tracking, I am making a well-educated guess as to how X-Men Origins: Wolverine will deliver in opening weekend US sales. (The road is littered with other well-educated guessers, and I have missed substantially on a few predictions in the past.)

When I start writing on Friday, it will be based on early ticket sales. That will make my numbers “projections” instead of “predictions.” My Early Friday and 3-Day “projections” are historically off by no more than 5%-8%.

For the record, I believe that Mr. Jackman and the folks at Fox will be quite happy with anything north of $80M, but they are definitely working to keep expectations lower. In the end, I think they’ll be in the $90M-$95M range for 3-days.

Over the long haul, WOLVERINE will be no match for last year's IRON MAN

Ultimately, Iron Man performed like a monster deep into the summer. It was followed by the box office misfire Speed Racer on the following Friday, giving the Jon Favreau-directed comic book adaptation basically 17 days alone in the marketplace. Wolverine doesn’t have that luxury with the aforementioned Star Trek, arriving next Thursday starting at 7pm.

Additionally, Iron Man was jet-powered by spectacular reviews (93% Fresh on Rotten Tomatoes)
and excellent word-of-mouth. It’ll be more of a mixed bag for X-Men Origins: Wolverine, standing at 41% Fresh on RT as of Wednesday night. The multiplier for Iron Man was 3.22 (the number by which you multiply the opening weekend figure by to arrive at the ultimate domestic gross). Wolverine is more likely to finish with a multiplier of 1.8-1.9. If the picture hits my opening weekend number, that multiplier will put the final US total at something in the $165M-$175M range.

In addition to my final weekend prediction, I also believe that Wolverine may scratch and claw its way to one of the top five or six opening days ever for a comic book movie. That could make it the 2nd-biggest opening day ever for a film from the X-Men franchise, trailing only the first day for X-Men 3.

ALL-TIME TOP 10 OPENING DAYS FOR COMIC BOOK ADAPTATIONS
1. The Dark Knight – $67.1M
2. Spider-Man 3 – $59.8M
3. X-Men: The Last Stand – $45.1M
4. Spider-Man 2 – $40.4M
5. Spider-Man – $39.4M
6. Iron Man – $35.2M
7. X-2: X-Men United – $31.25M
8. Watchmen – $24.5M
9. Hulk – $24.2M
10. Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer – $22M

There is always room for an inspired piece of counter-programming, and Warner Bros is apparently executing just that. The Matthew McConaughey-Jennifer Garner-Michael Douglas rom-com Ghosts of Girlfriends Past could reach a very solid $18M by appealing to Females 25 Plus.

The only other wide release is Battle For Terra (Lionsgate/Roadside Atttractions), a sci-fi 3-D release unluckily sandwiched between Monsters vs. Aliens (Dreamworks/Paramount) and Pixar’s Up (Disney) on the 3-D release schedule. Despite essentially decent early reviews (70% Fresh on Rotten Tomatoes), Terra will not be putting up much of a Battle. The 3-D screen count will be low, and there has been no real marketing money spent on getting this one launched. I’m predicting about $3.4M, which might be enough to “sneak it” into the top twelve for the frame.

FINAL PREDICTIONS FOR THE WEEKEND OF MAY 1-3
1. NEW – X-Men Origins: Wolverine (Fox) – $92M
2. NEW – Ghosts of Girlfriends Past (Warner Bros) – $18M
3. Obsessed (Sony) – $10.2M
4. 17 Again (Warner Bros) – $6.5M
5. Earth (Disney) – $5.6M
6. Monsters vs. Aliens (Dreamworks/Paramount) – $5.5M
7. The Soloist (Dreamworks/Paramount) – $5M
8. State of Play (Universal) – $4.3M
9. Hannah Montana The Movie (Disney) – $3.9M
10. Fighting (Rogue) – $3.8M
11. Fast & Furious (Universal) – $3.5M
12. NEW – Battle For Terra (Lionsgate) – $3.4M

Steve Mason is on Facebook and now also on Twitter@LAMase.