Oz The Great And Powerful

It only has 3 of the top international markets in release. And it doesn’t open in North American until May 24th. But Twentieth Century Fox’s Blue Sky Studios toon Epic launched with almost no fanfare overseas to $14.5M from 4,674 screens in 16 markets. Mexico ($3.5M from 1,416), Brazil ($2.5M from 616), and Germany ($2.3M from 957) were the leaders with 20 additional international markets opening next Memorial Weekend alongside the U.S. The storyline bears great resemblance to Fox’s juggernaut Avatar and little to Blue Sky’s previous blockbuster franchise Ice Age. “This is an excellent launch in a competitive window,” a Fox exec told me. Epic was #1 in 8 markets, and #2 in 5 markets,  because of what has been a long, long draught for family fare in the worldwide market. The last toon in theaters was DreamWorks Animation’s The Croods also distributed by Fox which is playing in 38 markets and whose international cume to date of $375.8M is the 19th highest grossing animated film of all time overseas. Worldwide cume is $552.2M.

If there is any movie this year at Cannes that is absolutely brimming with promise on paper, it's Guillaume Canet's "Blood Ties." With an extended cast featuring Clive Owen, Billy Crudup, Mila Kunis, Matthias Schoenaerts, Zoe Saldana, James Caan, Marion Cotillard, Noah Emmerich and Lili Taylor among others along with a script co-written by James Gray, one wonders how it could go wrong. And while "Blood Ties" isn't a disaster, it's certainly a mess, a sprawling crime saga that endeavours to evoke the great character driven movies of the 1970s, but never quite lives up to its epic scope. Playing out over two-and-a-half very long hours, there is enough plots, subplots and side-stories in the film to fill an entire season of a TV series. But here are the basics: Chris (Owen) is just out of the joint, trying to go straight and essentially do right by his cop brother Frank (Crudup), but he's got a messy past to deal with including making amends with Monica (Cotillard) a...