The Rock Rolls on at the Box Office
April 29 -- Thanks to an exceptionally weak crop of new releases, The Scorpion King had no difficulty recapturing the No. 1 spot at the box office for the second week in a row.
The weekend's new movies — Angelina Jolie's weepy comedy Life or Something Like It and the sci-fi flavored Friday the 13th sequel Jason X — failed to even best Ben Affleck's 3-week-old Changing Lanes, which again came in second.
Jolie has become the fourth Hollywood hottie in as many weeks to suffer a catastrophic flop, on the heels of Ashley Judd (whose High Crimes is mired in ninth), Cameron Diaz (the disastrously reviewed The Sweetest Thing, No. 10) and Sandra Bullock (whose Murder by Numbers continued to disappoint in fifth place). Only Jodie Foster (the star of Panic Room, which continues to close in on the $100 million mark) has been able to escape the jinx.
Next week is about one movie and one movie alone: Columbia's eagerly anticipated Spider-Man, which marks the official beginning of the summer blockbuster derby. Woody Allen's Hollywood Ending and the oft-delayed gang drama Deuces Wild are also opening, but look for them to get steamrolled by the superhero, who's expected to snare as much as $70 million in his web next weekend.
Andrew Johnston is a film critic and associate editor at US WEEKLY magazine.
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