Between the abysmal Mirror, Mirror and the upcoming Bella and Thor Battle Aileen Wuornos (you make know it as Snow White and the Huntsman) it seems remixing and revising the classic Snow White premise is the hot new trend in Hollywood—as long as it’s relatively cheap that is, as a post-John Carter Disney has announced they’ve halted development on their own Saoirse Ronan-starring Snow White revision.

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Studio chairman Rich Ross was let go today from Disney, after a tumultuous two and a half year run as the head of the studio.  He came into to replace Dick Cook, who ran it for eight years. Heads of studios tend to fall into two categories: those who hope be like the old school heads and stay in the position until they’re virtually dead, or fresh blood that often last for a brief spell. But what does this really mean for movies?

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Let’s give this opening weekend for The Hunger Games some context. It made $155 Million, which is the highest opening for a non-sequel ever, it had the biggest day of a non-sequel ever, and is the third highest opening weekend of all time. It’s three million and change away from The Dark Knight, which was one of the most hyped openings ever. And it’s hard to say if the picture will stop at or around $400 Million. Also, October Baby opened, and did less than two million. Check out the numbers…

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Though most of its competition was slightly older, 21 Jump Street outperformed expectations this weekend and opened to $35 Million. For those hoping for good news when it comes to John Carter, alas, that ship has sailed. It was a big weekend for Channing Tatum, but also the quiet before The Hunger Games storm. Check out the numbers…

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It’s the week of release, so it’s only fair that you’ve seen a lot of 21 Jump Street coverage here. Would you like to read my interviews with screenwriter Michael Bacall, stars Rob Riggle, and Brie Larson or the directors Chris Miller and Phil Lord? You can. Or not, up to you. But it’s the only new movie this week, and with John Carter‘s weak performance last weekend, it’s a got a clear shot to be the number one picture this weekend.

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Though it’s definitely the box office story of the week, John Carter flopping isn’t that big a deal – unless it leads to massive firings. This train was coming into the station slowly, and  from the first trailer and poster there were questions if the studio ever figured out how to sell the picture. The answer is that they didn’t. Alas. And so The Lorax takes the weekend again.

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For some people there is glee when a movie fails, but I’m reminded of something Justin Bartha said to me about Gigli. People work just as hard on movies that bomb as movies that succeed, and almost everyone is just doing their jobs. And no one ever sets out to make a bad movie. The makers of John Carter went in with good faith, and thought they were making the Star Wars for the next generation. Unfortunately, they’re going to need a miracle for the film to work. And it seems a little too late for that.

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It’s hard to parse Andrew Stanton‘s John Carter without acknowledging that the film has become a curiosity, as it’s a very expensive movie that never figured out how to sell itself. But that has nothing to do with the quality of the film itself, which suffers from a number of very familiar problems to the science fiction and blockbuster genres. Though the spectacle is often jaw-dropping in scale, Carter is incredibly clumsy in getting to those moments.

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Can Nicolas Cage keep the Ghost Rider going? When the first film hit, it opened to $45 Million around the same weekend in 2007. But the film was not all that well received. And then there’s last weekend’s big winner The Vow. The Valentine’s day is over, but the film is a monster hit. One wonders if they can find a way to make a sequel. And then there’s This Means War - which after The Vow‘s showing, looks like it came to the dance without a date. Interesting times.

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