Up is the widest release this weekend, in 3,766 theaters. It’s also the tenth feature put out by Pixar, and their name has basically become the gold standard in computer animation. And they’re really trying to make a point that their name is bigger than the subject of whatever movie they put forth. Cars was about a car that got arrested and had to repave a road, Ratatouille was about a rat that wanted to be a chef, and WALL-E was about a robot cleaning up the garbage left behind on an Earth abandoned by humans. Those aren’t your usual topics for big-budget animated movies aimed at kids. Up is no different, about an old man that ties thousands of balloons to his house so he can float away and find adventure. But it’s a Pixar movie and as usual, it’s getting great reviews. Up should be number one this weekend, the only competition coming from last week’s Night at the Museum II, which is competing for the same audience. I think it’ll still manage to pull in around $61,492,540.

The other new wide release this weekend is Drag Me to Hell, and it’s a pretty thin affair-  some chick pisses off an old women and gets cursed in the process. It’s the first step back into horror for director Sam Raimi since Army of Darkness. Raimi’s been growing fat and lazy on the Spider-Man teat this century, so it’s nice to see him finally doing something different. He’s got a rare talent to balance disgust and amusement, gasp and guffaw. Over the years he’s seemed to have lost some of that. If you watch The Evil Dead and Spider-Man 3 back-to-back, it’s almost painful to see how much more generic he’s become. In the former you can really feel the filmmaking process- in the latter, you feel the budget meetings. Ingenuity was replaced with scale and the movies are worse for it. Drag Me to Hell is being touted as Raimi’s return to his roots and, like Up, is getting rave reviews (which easily makes this the best reviewed weekend in a long time). I’d say this movie would do really well at the box office, but I’m not sure there’s enough money to go around this weekend. I’m going to say it’ll make around $23,381,808, but it wouldn’t surprise me if it got closer to $30 million.

Night at the Museum II should wind up in second place, with Terminator Salvation likely edging out Drag Me to Hell for third. Star Trek and Angels & Demons should both still be somewhere in eight-digit numbers. There’s a chance we could see close to $200 million spent this weekend.

Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian plays the role of the family movie. The difference between this movie and the original is that it takes place in SURPRISE! the Smithsonian. Other than giving the museum more advertising than it’s ever had during it’s entire existence, I suppose all it really means is that there will be different exhibits to rankle Ben Stiller’s character, which is probably all people really want out of the movie: Ben Stiller overacting.

The first Night at the Museum made $250 million domestically. It opened to $30 million, but the second weekend shot up to almost $37 million. It’s pretty rare to see the second weekend bigger than the first, most likely the result of some great word of mouth. I’m not sure if it’s really the case, but there doesn’t seem to me to be a whole lot of buzz around the movie. Could it be that this was a one-shot idea and putting the same characters in a different museum sounds ridiculously contrived? What’s next, Adventures in the Museum of Modern Art? I’ll say the Smithsonian edition of Night at the Museum takes in around $49,600,469 this weekend, solid, but not spectacular. I still find it hard to see how the guys behind Reno 911! wrote both these movies.

It’s been six years since the last Terminator movie, but that’s probably not enough time for most people to get suped about another sequel. T3 had the biggest opening weekend of the series, but T2 had the biggest overall box office. I read that as people were excited for a sequel but less than thrilled with what they got. Terminator Salvation is going to change things up by moving to the future and giving us that back-story. There will be some people who are extremely geeked out to see that, but Joe Matinee might not be wetting himself over it. After all, this is another big-budget scifi movie, which have been showing up in droves lately. Eventually audiences will tire of it. I’m not sure about the long-term outlook for the movie, but I’ll say it goes for about $59,946,935 from Friday to Sunday. Too much competition from movies in the same genre right now for it to go higher.

Lastly we’ve got Dance Flick, and it’s relying like hell on the Wayans name. And really, that name is the only chance this movie has. Spoof movies have gone from silly to nigh-insufferable. Who saw Disaster Movie? Superhero Movie? Did you even know there was a Superhero Movie? The genre had been going a similar route at the end of the 1990′s with stuff like Mafia! and Plump Fiction flinging poo at your eyes. Then Scary Movie dropped in 2000 and reinvigorated the whole thing. That’s what Paramount is hoping will happen with Dance Flick, but this time they’re resting those hopes on the backs of the progeny of the folks that made Scary Movie, familiar sounding names like Damien Wayans and Damon Wayans Jr. But you can tell this just isn’t the same thing by reading the credits. There are characters such as Tracy Transfat, Uglisha, Ms. Cameltoe, and the whole Brady Bunch. This sounds all too similar to the same crap we’ve been getting since, well Date Movie, anyway. It makes me yearn for the days of Hot Shots!, or even Hot Shots! Part Deux. I think the familiar names behind the movie might get it to $9,517,788 this weekend.

Sony’s big chance comes in the form of Angels & Demons, sequel to The Da Vinci Code. I hated that movie. Ugh. All of the “clues” were just weird inferences that went way over the top. Just ridiculous. And the thing had more endings than Return of the King. It ended and went on for another 20 minutes or half-hour or something. I’m not really sure since I was nearly unconscious from the ludicrosity. Personally, I think South Park had a much more accurate asessment of da Vinci’s clues.

I’m likely in the minority since The Da Vinci Code made $217 million. So it’s got that going for it. It also has the synergy of Tom Hanks and Ron Howard, which have thus far combined for nearly half a billion dollars at the box office. It’s a winning combination and should win this weekend with a haul somewhere around $64,112,192.

A&D probably has some competition from Star Trek, which seems to getting good word of mouth and generally pleasing audiences. Wolverine will actually be in the most theaters this weekend, but that thing is losing an audience faster than… well, pretty fast. The daily gross for Wolverine has been down almost 65% from the first to second weeks. If that trend continues, the movie will have a hard time getting above $10 million for the weekend. That’s a quick fall for a  movie that opened to $85 million.

Without knowing much about the movie, you can tell by the fact there’s no subtitle that this is a do-over rather than any kind of a sequel. They’re taking Captain Kirk and the gang all the way back to the Starfleet Academy and making you forget everything you know about Star Trek. Those old farts just weren’t relevant to today’s sensibilities. It needs more special effects, more monsters, more sex, more dramatic camera angles, more contrast, more things whizzing past the camera, etc. And it’s relying on these modern crutches to bring in the crowds: the cast, though occasionally recognizable, lacks big names and the franchise pretty much wore out it’s welcome at the box office.

It’s been a long (but not too long) seven years since the past Star Trek: Nemesis, the most expensive ($60 million) and worst performing ($43 million) Star Trek movie. Straight dollar-wise, the highest grossing movie was Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home in 1986 with $109 million.  But if you translate everything to today’s dollars, Star Trek: The Motion Picture hauled in $235 million. I think Star Trek (the new one) will do good out of the gate, but it might struggle to unseat The Motion Picture as the biggest success of the franchise. Ain’t nothing like the real thing. I think the new iteration could make $70,138,969 this weekend, but with more big movies in the coming weeks, the tail might not be that long. The movie is getting extremely positive reviews, so it does have that going for it.

If you manage to find a theater showing more than Star Trek and X-Men Origins: Wolverine, there’s a chance you could find Next Day Air playing. The question will be if you really want to spend your money on it. The cast features actors known for playing either the foil or the comic relief. And that’s about as much as I can say about the movie that stands out in any way. It’s got an outside shot of cracking $4 million, but I’m predicting $3,850,917.

For some reason The Soloist is adding 57 locations this weekend, for a total of 2,090. The movie will be unbelievably lucky to make $3 million, which would translate to about 16 people a showing. 17 Again will still be in 2,903 theaters and will be lucky to average over $1,300 per theater (15 people a showing) for the weekend. Similar stories can be told for Monsters vs Aliens, Hannah Montana, and Fighting. With two $50+ million movies this weekend (Star Trek, Wolverine), everyone else is fighting over scraps.

When the all but finished print of Wolverine was leaked at the beginning of the month, it set the stage for us to get a real test of how much piracy impacts ticket sales. Despite all the bitching and moaning by Hollywood and the FBI and X-Men fanboys, research is showing that interest in the movie is actually increasing after the calamitous leak. Isn’t there some old saying about there not being any such thing as bad press? For some reason, people have heard so much of all this Wolverine ballyhoo that it’s actually piqued their interest. I think it’ll pique interests to the tune of $88,816,837.

I’ve never really bought into the argument that each person that acquires a pirated copy of a movie equates to a lost sale. Most people will gladly take something for free they would otherwise forgo if money were involved. In the case of movies, there may be a few people who would skip a planned visit to the theater, but watching an eye candy spectacular isn’t the same thing on a laptop, or even most TVs, as it is seeing it in the theater. You go there for the experience, not just because it’s a way to see a movie. It won’t get a lot of press, but if Wolverine banks the same amount of cash the studio has always been hoping, it’ll certainly add a little validity to that thought.

As counter programming this weekend, we also get Ghosts of Girlfriends Past. A romantic comedy should haul in the ladies, and possibly their respective dudes or even just some dudes on their own, who aren’t really into the whole people with superpowers thing (to be more PC, should they be referred to as differently powered?). Matthew McConaughey always seems to do good in these craptastic romcoms and Ghosts will only really be competing with the week-old Obsessed, which in movie years is older than a dusty dinosaur fart. Ghosts could make around $19,948,630 this weekend.

And then there’s Battle for Terra. The question is, who is this Terra chick and why are folks battling over her? Well okay, the REAL question is if this movie can fare any better than Delgo. You might scoff and say no other movie could do that bad, but the parallels are there: both are independently produced computer animation scifi extravaganzas featuring a second-rate cast (Brian Cox notwithstanding) and won awards before their release. The difference might be in the distributor, as Lionsgate (Terra) puts out some decent movies, while Freestyle Releasing (Delgo) puts out a lot of crap. Terra will be lucky to make $2,801,632, but that still crushes Delgo.

Instead of popping this smartass upside the head like they deserve, you sit down and you think. Maybe it’s January 1991. Lionheart, that was about a dude that got caught up in the seedy world of street fighting. But Sleeping with the Enemy didn’t come out until February. Hmmm, and there’s no musical biopic around then either.

Hell, you think, maybe it’s October 1999. That’s when Fight Club was released. And weren’t Music of the Heart and Random Hearts released around then? Yeah, but I’m not sure Random Hearts really qualifies as an erotic thriller. And they weren’t all released on the same day anyway.

And then you have it- April 2009. Finally those three movie ideas that seem to always be circling each other are released on the same day. And then you realize what a glorious time it is: you can still see your favorite remakes before they’re remade.

I suppose it would be fair to say Obsessed is the most original film released today, even if it is basically Fatal Attraction. Stringer Bell plays the Michael Douglas role, the singer from Destiny’s Child plays Anne Archer, and the chick in the whipped cream bikini is Glenn Close. Well, not exactly Glenn Close, because no one does crazy like Glenn Close. Since this is the widest new release and probably the highest profile (and the fact that there isn’t a whole lot of competition at the moment), I’ll say this is the only movie this weekend with the potential to reach $20 million. My guess is it falls just short: $19,596,481.

Fighting stars someone that goes by the incredulously pretentious sounding moniker of Channing Tatum. That name sounds more like someone that would go to Yardale and have a 4.0 grade point average, not an action star. Aside from starring someone who’s name sounds more like that of a Harvard legacy, the movie seems about a decade too late to capitalize on the interest in underground fighting borne by Fight Club. But that sure didn’t stop anyone from making the movie. My brain says the movie stinks, but my heart says the movie really stinks. Even though I’m predicting $9,240,000, it wouldn’t surprise me if it was lower. It also wouldn’t surprise me if it opens to $100 million. Who knows any more.

The Soloist is basically garbage. I can tell you this with full and honest belief in that fact without knowing much about the movie and having read no reviews. How did I come to this realization? It’s a movie where the main focus is not on the plot, but the interaction of the two lead actors. Two actors that share a few awards between them. And that plot, it’s one man discovering and sharing the beauty that can be created by the most unlikely of people. And it’s a true story. Doesn’t that sound like something that should be geared toward winning an award of some kind. Doesn’t this sound like exactly the small type of movie that would clean up during award season? Yes, yes it totally does. Then why would it come out in April? Movies that come out this early in the year rarely earn any recognition from the major awards. Movies that sound like The Soloist come out in December to qualify for awards and be fresh in the minds of those making the nominations. When this kind of movie shows up in April, it’s just being dumped in a relative low point in the year where the fact that there’s little competition will be the only chance the movie has of attracting any audience. If it was anything near decent, this would be released just before the end of the year so Jamie Foxx and Robert Downey, Jr. would have a shot at an award. It’s being dumped in April because it’s garbage. I’m predicting $8,482,648, but I’m being awfully generous.

17 Again wouldn’t amount to nothing if folks of the female persuasion didn’t fall all over themselves to see Zac Efron. Seriously, the people-changing-ages-and-learning-a-valuable-life-lesson genre is as played out as any and putting Matthew Perry’s name on a movie means about pretty much near nothing. So this thing is going to rely on the guy from High School Musical. And most likely, it’ll do just fine. I’m going to float a guess of $26,270,805.

The second biggest release is titled State of Play. I assume State of Play is some sort of political/espionage term, but it makes for a weird title, don’t you think? I expect this to be a well made movie, but I don’t think it’s going to make a lot of money. Russell Crowe can’t pack them in like he used to and it’s hard to take Ben Affleck too seriously, despite accolades for his performance in Hollywoodland. Overall, it’s a solid cast and crew and I think that’s the only reason this movie will make any money at all. Solid can only take you so far. $13,459,253 sounds pretty close.

I think it’s fair to say Jason Statham is becoming overexposed. He’s averaging 2-3 movies a year for the length of his career, and he’s starred in most of those movies. He’s a likable enough actor, but seeing him running around punching and kicking and shooting and brooding, it gets old after a while. Crank may go down (at least until this sequel) as the most mindless, frantic movie ever made. But it worked. Every time the movie slowed down to let you catch your breath, you couldn’t wait until it kicked back ito superoverdrive. However, I think the overexposure thing is going to catch up with Statham this weekend. My guess is the audience will mostly be fans of Crank. It won’t surprise me if Crank: High Voltage only makes around $6,607,290 this weekend.

Hannah Montana the Movie is the biggest release this weekend, being crammed into 3,118 theaters. Last year, Hannah Montana/Miley Cyrus: Best of Both Worlds Concert Tour (which might win the contest for most descriptive title ever) set the record for the highest per theater average for a wide release in the history of the world, a totally asinine $45,561 per theater on the opening weekend. However this time around, the hype isn’t near as big and the movie isn’t advertised as a one week (wink-wink) engagement. I’m thinking the number this weekend will be a much more realistic $23,863,892. Even though that’s a much smaller number than the first Miley movie, don’t be fooled: Disney is still making a killing.

The second biggest release is Observe and Report. It’s the second movie about a mall cop this year. It’s the second movie about a mall cop this year. No matter how many times I say it, the idea just sounds plain stupid and the fact that it’s a reality is just ludicrous. This one has an R rating, so it’s not going to make Paul Blart money, but it is going to please the heck out of it’s target audience. $20,334,422 could be a little high, but it sounds good. It’s the second movie about a mall cop this year.

Bringing up the rear is Dragonball Evolution. I ain’t no Dragonball fan, but I’d say this movie missed the boat. It sounds a few years late to me. And what the hell is up with the name? Isn’t everything else in the franchise ‘Dragon Ball’, two words? Seems weird to change the spelling for the movie. Or maybe it’s just that I don’t know jack about anything Dragon Ball, since I ain’t no Dragonball fan. I’m sure there are a few Dragon Ball or Dragonball fans out there that’ll see this thing, maybe to the tune of $7,864,901. Maybe.

Fast & Furious is going back to it’s roots in the fourth installment. It reunites all the people who have gone on to bigger things since the first movie with those who couldn’t hack it without Vin Diesel headlining the movie. And they’ve gone and tightened up the title. All those repetitive definite articles in the title were just grammatically ugly and annoying. Dropping the The’s makes everything much better and just gets to the point. Finally, I can really understand what these movies are about. Now I see why Jane Austen didn’t go with The Pride and The Prejudice. She just got it right the first time, unlike the people who made The Fast and the Furious. They had to come back one more time to try and get things right. Not sure that they’ll succeed, but they’ll probably rake in around $40,297,220 this weekend.

When I say Adventureland fits every definition of an independent movie, what I really mean is that there are very few people involved in the movie that have ever been in a movie that’s played on more than 1,000 screens. Producer Ted Hope, despite having 58 producing credits to his name, has never made a movie that’s cracked 1,000 screens. And he’s done some good movies like The Ice Storm and In The Bedroom. Kelsey Ford gets second billing in Adventureland, her first movie. Jessie Eisenberg gets top billing with only two 1,000+ screen movies to his credit. And of course it’s only the third movie for director Greg Mottola. My spreadsheet for this movie is a study in division errors since there are so many blank cells. I’m going to say about $9,027,005 for this little movie.

Monsters vs. Aliens will be the recipient of all the love this weekend. The hype has been building for months, peaking with the flashback-inducing Super Bowl commercial. It probably would have helped if I had a pair of the 3D glasses to watch it, but spending a few minutes back in 1986 wasn’t so bad. You know how porn movies will take the title of a legitimate movie and make sound dirty, like Forrest Hump or Teenage Mutant Ninja Dildos? I think this movie is starting that trend in kid’s movies, obviously taking it’s title from Alien vs. Predator. But there’s a good chance Monsters vs. Aliens would have been just as popular without having to weez AVP’s juice. I think it’s probably going to make something in the neighborhood of $56,989,556.

The thing about The Haunting in Connecticut is that it’s about “The” haunting, not “A” haunting. Since there was apparently only one haunting to ever occur in Connecticut, kudos to the producers for getting the exclusive rights to the story. But the rumor is that there was never any haunting in Connecticut since this real story is really just a bunch of made up hooey. Oh well, like you expected a movie to show you the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth anyway. I’m going with $10,135,648 for this one.

Finally, this brings us to the last wide release of the weekend- 12 Rounds. It’s about Mayor Tommy Carcetti kidnapping John Cena‘s girlfriend and forcing him complete 12 carefully devised/extremely dangerous/sure to include explosions games in order to get her back. It’s kind of like the low-rent action version of Saw III. As of right now on Wikipedia, the plot section for the movie ends with the statement “The movie is 108 minutes long.” I’m sure whoever wrote that really meant “The movie is 108 minutes (over)long.” I’ll go ahead and say $6,980,793.