‘Lilo,’ ‘Minority Report’ Tussling Over Top Spot

The race for No. 1 ranking at the box office turned into a mud-slinging affair over the weekend as two studios claimed the top spot for their films--20th Century Fox for the Steven Spielberg sci-fi thriller “Minority Report” and Disney for the animated “Lilo & Stitch.”

“It’s nice to be No. 1, and we believe we’re No. 1,” said Chuck Viane, senior distribution executive at Disney about “Lilo.” Disney claimed the film made an estimated $35.8 million for the weekend on 3,191 screens.

“I don’t know what Disney is reporting, but we did $36.9 million [on 3,001 screens],” countered Fox distribution chief Bruce Snyder about “Minority Report.”

Although Fox is laying claim to the bragging rights as the top-grossing movie, competing studios all had “Lilo” running ahead. According to other studio estimates, the highest “Minority” grossed over the weekend was $34 million--with the low being just above $32 million. Conversely, “Lilo” was tracking somewhere between $34 million and $36 million, much closer to what Disney reported.

The Sunday box-office figures are based on studio estimates, and it’s not unusual for those figures to change when the final numbers are reported on Monday. But it’s rare for studios to directly dispute each other’s numbers, indicating how much pressure is on Fox and Disney for their high-profile films to perform well.

“Lilo” was No. 1 on Friday and “Minority Report” came in first on Saturday. But according to Snyder, “Minority Report” was estimating $12.3 million on Sunday, which would be higher than its opening-night gross of $11.9 million. Sunday grosses, particularly on an adult-skewing film, rarely outpace Friday.

The $36.9-million estimate by Fox was widely reported by the media and allowed the studio to claim that its highest-profile and most expensive film of the summer (more than $100 million)--which boasts such costly talents as Spielberg and star Tom Cruise--was not beaten out by a kids film that cost half as much.

Regardless of who was on top, box-office totals for the year have already surpassed $4 billion, running about 20% ahead of last year. The last weekend was about 12% ahead of last year when “The Fast and the Furious” debuted to $40 million. Totals for the top 12 movies were approximately $151 million, according to Exhibitor Relations.

For Disney, “Lilo” represents a return to traditional animation, with an edgier, more free-form style that seems to have pleased critics and audiences as well. Not since “Tarzan” has the studio enjoyed as strong a start in non-computer animation--and “Tarzan,” which took in $34.2 million its opening weekend in June 1999, cost more than twice as much as “Lilo.”

Disney’s biggest animation hits in recent years have all been in computer-generated form with films such as “Monsters, Inc.” the “Toy Story” movies and “A Bug’s Life,” all produced by Pixar, with whom Disney shared the bounty. “Lilo” is an in-house production and looks to generate the kind of revenue and profits that could boost the company’s flagging fortunes (Disney’s stock was pummeled by analyst downgrades over the last week).

“A lot of people who are advocates of 3-D [computer] animation have been naysayers of 2-D [traditional cel animation],” said Disney CEO Michael Eisner. “We’re working in 3-D, but that doesn’t mean 2-D doesn’t work. It’s all about creativity and storytelling. And we have reworked our economic model on animated films to tell great stories and at the same time enhance value for shareholders.”

In a season when hyperbolic opening-weekend grosses have become standard issue, even if the estimates on “Minority Report” hold up, they are modest by comparison to the $114-million opening “Spider-Man” and even the $54-million opening of “Scooby-Doo.” According to Snyder, the reason is that “Minority” played to a largely older audience (64% of whom were over 25), which doesn’t necessarily show up en masse on opening weekends the way teenagers do. “But these movies tend to play longer,” he said.