‘Menace’ Seizes the Day

After perhaps the biggest buildup in movie history, “Star Wars: Episode I The Phantom Menace” lived up to its early box-office expectations, setting a single-day record by taking in $28.5 million in its first 24 hours.

That easily beats the one-day record posted by “The Lost World: Jurassic Park” in 1997, which grossed $26.1 million--and that was on a Sunday before Memorial Day. “Phantom Menace” had a staggering per-screen average of $9,610 on Wednesday.

“It’s a shooting star. It’s taking us, we’re not taking it,” said Tom Sherak, a senior executive at 20th Century Fox, which is distributing “Phantom Menace” for Lucasfilm. Sherak called the first-day business “unheard of--that’s what’s wonderful about the movie business. Unheard of is what we live for.”

Gordon Radley, president of Lucasfilm, was equally rapturous. He said Thursday in a statement: “We’re all on cloud nine. Our bottom line is not yesterday’s number but that people are enjoying the movie and having such a great time and sharing in the excitement.”

George Lucas’ long-awaited “Star Wars” prequel was expected to end up with about $45 million in its first two days. As it heads into the weekend the sci-fi spectacular should eclipse the $72.1 million “Lost World” made on its first Friday, Saturday and Sunday. “Lost World” added another $18 million on Memorial Day, for a four-day total of $90.1 million, the current record. Exhibitors and film executives say “Phantom Menace” should sail right past that with well over $100 million in its first four days and between $130 million and $140 million in its first five days.

Either today or Saturday it could easily surpass its own opening day record total as its core audience of preteens gets out of school. (Not everyone played hooky or took off from work to see “Phantom Menace” on its opening day and some of those who did are likely to see the film a second time over the weekend.)

The “Phantom Menace” is poised to see all these records without the benefit of a blockbuster-sized marketing campaign. The TV campaign has been light and the spots that have been aired are low-key and aimed primarily at attracting the female audience, where the only potential resistance to Lucas’ magic is being perceived. But as Hollywood analysts note, why spend millions when virtually every media outlet in the country has spent the past several months spreading the word for free? Reviews for the film, meanwhile, have been mixed at best.

The stiff terms Fox demanded from theaters for “Phantom Menace” resulted in having to forgo any Loews Theaters in New York City (the city’s biggest chain) and a four-week rental deal at two of L.A.’s best houses--Mann’s Village in Westwood and Mann’s Chinese in Hollywood. After that “Phantom” will move into the Avco in Westwood and Hollywood’s Galaxy multiplex.

The film’s hold on the best screen in each multiplex around the country will be tested by its long-term appeal, say rival studio distributors, despite the commitments Fox has secured--especially when the other big summer movie titles start to crowd into theaters in mid-June and early July, such as the “Austin Powers” sequel (June 11), Disney’s animated “Tarzan” (June 18) and “The Wild Wild West” (June 30).

“We’ve made 6-, 8- and 12-week deals,” says Sherak. “It depends on the market. Now we’re just watching it every day. Remember, the summer doesn’t really start until July 3 [when all of the nation’s schools are out, though many schools in the South close in early June]. If everyone is right about this being a kid’s picture, wait until the kids get out of school.”

“Phantom Menace” took some business away from the other top movies playing in theaters Wednesday, which analysts say is logical as the market doesn’t benefit as much from spill-over business in the middle of the work (and school) week as on weekends. Still films such as “The Mummy” and “The Matrix” (both off 28%) and “Entrapment” (off 23%) declined only moderately from the previous day, indicating that these movies will hang on and business in general will expand over the weekend.

The only new national release for the weekend is DreamWorks’ “The Love Letter,” which debuts on about 700 screens (compared to almost 3,000 for “Phantom Menace”). “Love Letter” is meant to appeal to exactly the crowd that’s not likely to see “Phantom Menace,” especially on the packed opening weekend: older women.

The next peak for “Phantom Menace” will be the four-day Memorial Day weekend. That may provide an early indication of how high this “Star Wars” episode will fly. Everyone in Hollywood expects the film will gross about $350 million to $400 million domestically, but whether it can even come close to “Titanic’s” box-office mark of $600 million is in doubt. But as “Titanic” proved, the true test of how popular a film truly is comes with time; “Titanic” stayed atop the box-office charts for almost six months.