The experts were wrong again. Last weekend’s huge success of Paramount’s Paranormal Activity 3 lead everyone to believe that the film would have continued success on the weekend leading up to Halloween. Turns out, kids who love Shrek and folks that love adorable, animated kittens proved them all wrong.

That’s right, Universal’s Shrek spinoff, Puss in Boots, managed to blow Paranormal’s creepy handicam shots out of the water this weekend with a decent $34 million in the domestic box office. Don’t worry, horror fans, Activity stil stayed relevant in 2nd place as it pulled in $18.5 million, bringing its total gross up to $81 million so far.

Also opening this weekend, Justin Timberlake’s foray into the world of sci-fi with In Time made a whisper in the box office, only making $12 million, while the faux continuation of Johnny Depp’s performance in Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas (The Rum Diary) underwhelmed audiences and only pulled in $5 million for the weekend.

Next weekend, it’s the tale of two crowd-pleasers, as the Ben Stiller/Eddie Murphy caper flick Tower Heist hits theaters alongside A Very Harold & Kumar 3D Christmas, which both open up wide across the country. Are people already in the Christmas mindset or will Heist prove that the Ocean’s 11 formula works with lesser grade talent? We’ll find out in a week!

Quite a year for big openings in the box office 2011 has been. We’ve seen films like Dolphin Tale and Lion King 3D take over in even the biggest markets, and big films like Green Lantern fall flat on its face. Now we’re getting another surprise, as the third film in Paramount’s Paranormal Activity franchise broke records for October and Fall opening weekends, pulling in $54 million over the three days.

Not only is this the biggest weekend for the franchise, but at $80 million worldwide already, we expect 3 to be the highest grossing Paranormal Activity film, and possibly the highest grossing film of all time, with a production budget of $5 million.

Other openings this weekend, Summit’s Three Musketeers barely made any waves, pulling in just under $9 million in the domestic box office, and $73 million worldwide. Meanwhile, people overseas still seem to love Mr. Bean, as Johnny English Reborn pulled in $108.3 million worldwide, and only $3.8 million in the domestic box office.

Next weekend, you can expect Paranormal to do well again, as its Halloween weekend, but it may have some competition with Paramount’s Puss in Boots and Fox’s sci-fi epic In Time. We’ll have to see what happens next weekend!

Found footage movies have been getting worse and worse lately. They one thing they have in common is that they have all been set in the horror or sci-fi genre. But what happens when there’s a supernatural superhero spin on a classic tale using the found footage storytelling device?

That’s what Fox’s newest film Chronicle discovers. The film is definitely made for the the MTV demographic, but that doesn’t mean it won’t be enjoyed by the geeky generation as well. Here’s a synopsis.

Three high school students make an incredible discovery, leading to them developing uncanny powers beyond their understanding. As they learn to control their abilities, and use them to their advantage, their lives start to spin out of control, and their darker sides begin to take over.

The film comes from Josh Trank, the director behind the popular John Leguizamo miniseries Kill Point and is set to hit theaters on February 3rd. Take a look at the awesome trailer after the jump.

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It shouldn’t surprise anyone that Paramount is still looking to capitalize on the success of the first Paranormal Activity. That movie, made for a shoestring budget, went on to be one of the most successful horror films in history.

One of the main reasons for the original film’s success (in addition to the fack that it was scary good) was the inspired marketing by Paramount. It really helped get the word out and get people extremely interested in seeing the movie.

Well, the company is at it again and has a third film coming soon to a theater near you. Of course, they’ve got a new trailer for it out now and we’ve got it for you right here.

In it you’ll see the new film retains many of the elements of the first and tells the story of the young Katie and Kristi when they were kids back in 1988 and the first time Bloody Mary began haunting them. Look for Paranormal Activity 3 in theaters on October 21.

Check out the new trailer after the break. That is, if you dare.

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It all started as a little, micro-budget horror flick 3 years ago, that has now become a phenomenon (pun intended) and one highly anticipated trilogy. Oren Peli’s Paranormal Activity is just that, and the viral marketing campaign for the upcoming third installment is just beginning.

Over the weekend, several news outlets received a VHS tape and VCR in the mail that had some pretty scary stuff on it. Just enough to get you to pee yourself with both fear and anticipation for what the next film has to bring us.

Here’s what we can look forward to in terms of a story.

The third film takes place in 1988, when Katie and Kristi were kids. While trying to get video proof of Bloody Mary, Katie and Kristi are first confronted by the monstrous demon haunting them in the first and second movies along with their family.

Check out two of the static-filled videos after the jump, and catch Paranormal Activity 3 in theaters on October 21st.

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Since he struck gold back in 2004 with Saw, James Wan has taken the horror world by storm. Continuing in that trend, his next major film in the genre, Insidious, is finally making some buzz with it’s first trailer.

Starring Watchmen’s Patrick Wilson and Damages’ Rose Byrne, the film is an interesting take on a child’s possession. Here’s the full synopsis.

INSIDIOUS is the terrifying story of a family who shortly after moving discover that dark spirits have possessed their home and that their son has inexplicably fallen into a coma. Trying to escape the haunting and save their son, they move again only to realize that it was not their house that was haunted.

The first trailer finally hit for the film, which is set to release on April 1st, and needless to say, it’s pretty haunting inside of the 51 seconds we’re given. Check it out after the jump, and be sure to catch Insidious in theaters this April.

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Out with the old, in with the new. Many people were speculating that the Saw franchise would go head to head with the Paranormal Activity franchise every October, after they had a dueling horror theme this past Halloween. It looks like Activity may have won that battle, as there is already a plan for a third film to release next October, and Lionsgate has no plans on continuing the Saw franchise. From Variety.

Paramount has greenlit “Paranormal Activity 3″ for production with plans to release the pic on Oct. 21.

Insiders said the pic’s original helmer, Oren Peli, and producer Jason Blum will have some part in the creative process but their roles are yet to be determined.

The first two “Paranormal Activity” pics revolved around a family haunted by an evil spirit, with both films lensed in the found footage style.The films have grossed a total of more than $300 million at the worldwide box office.

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The first Paranormal Activity was a bit of a phenomenon. It managed to capture the attention of audiences and also be a pretty scary movie that you wouldn’t necessarily want to watch in a dark room alone. Naturally, when something is a success as the first film was, people want to try and capitalize on that success. Thus we have the inevitable Paranormal Activity 2.

The first trailer for the sequel has arrived and with it we get our first chance to see if the magic of the first film can be recaptured. After watching the trailer a few times I think I can safely say it probably can’t and won’t. Still, I give the filmmakers props for trying. I’m just concerned we might have another Blair Witch 2 situation on our hands. And really, nobody wants that.

Judge for yourself and check out the trailer after the jump. Paranormal Activity 2 hits theaters on October 22.

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We’re all pretty big fans of the horror genre here in The Flickcast. We’ve had many a heated debate about the popularity of Paranormal Activity and lack of popularity of Cloverfield. Basically, the new concept of “first-person horrors” has us intrigued, along with the rest of the country. In picking up on that trend, producer Eli Roth has released the first trailer for his newest film, The Last Exorcism.

The film follows in the trend of a Cloverfiled or Paranormal in the sense that it’s a documentary (mockumentary?) about uncovering some mysterious things that took place to a family in the Midwest. Things get even weirder when the documentarian comes to discover that the daughter of the family is actually possessed.

There are some neat horror devices that we can see in the trailer, some interesting first-person camera tricks, but it looks like it could be an entertaining film, to say the least. Between the poster and the first promotional image we got, the filmmaker seems to be smitten with the shot of actress Ashley Bell bent over backwards.

With this technique turning plenty of heads in Hollywood, it’s possible that we can see more and more genres adopting this style for use on a spec script (see something like District 9).

Check out the trailer after the jump (preferably with the lights on) and be sure to keep an eye out for The Last Exorcism when it hits theaters on August 27th.

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Last August, a small film called Paranormal Activity swept the nation, making nearly $200 Million to date, worldwide, and creeping out just about every teen who walked into the theater. On the other side, 2009 was the 6th consecutive year that Lionsgate and Twisted Pictures put out a film in the Saw franchise. To date, Saw VI has only made $60 Million worldwide.

Since 2005, a Saw film has always dominated the theaters on the weekend of or just before Halloween. Granted, October is infamous for being the worst financial time of year for films and it still holds strong. Now, it seems the sequel to Paranormal Activity will be coming out to directly compete with the next Saw film, and they plan to be victorious. From Variety:

Paramount is committed to meeting the Oct. 22 release date for “Paranormal Activity 2,” which pits the sequel directly against “Saw VII 3D.”

“Saw VII” has already tried to bloody “Paranormal 2″ once. Kevin Greutert was circling to direct “Paranormal 2″ when Lionsgate and Twisted Pictures exercised an option requiring Greutert to direct the seventh installment in the “Saw” franchise.

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It’s a grab bag of items on the radar this week. Wolverine and Sabretooth have dinner together, Bruno himself could be the next Man in Black, and in honor of The Flickcast crew attending SXSW some Predators love (of which they may get a taste).

Predators get dark and scary…finally!

Robert Rodriquez‘s Predator reboot, Predators, is starting to get some buzz.  While the first film of the series was a great sci-fi/action hybrid subsequent films have been less than stellar.  Predators star, Alice Braga talked a little about the new film and what we can expect:

“The new Predators are dark. They are really, really scary. So I think the fans are really going to be happy with it. I hope so. The director Nimród Antal, he’s a fan of the Predator films. So it’s like a fan directing this, [it was] like a kid on set, and having that energy was very special. I wish I could tell you more.”

Here’s hoping “dark” and “scary” means an R-rated film and not a watered down PG-13 movie.

Conan will square off against Avatar villain

As an update to our last ‘On The Radar’ article, it has now been confirmed that actor Stephen Lang will indeed play Conan’s villain, Khalar Singh.  Speaking with MTV, Lang stated:

“I have no idea how I’m going to do it,” Lang laughed. “First I’m going to find out how I’m going to sound. I’m going to get back on a Mongolian pony and ride like the wind. I’m going to flash my scimitar. I’m going to cut the nuts off Conan and his father.”

That last threat may seem really out there, but after seeing Lang’s bad ass side in Avatar I have no doubt he can make good on it.

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Welcome to the second part of my look at the duplicity that is the Hollywood we know and love (or love to hate in some cases).   Yesterday I delved into the mainstream films, such as Transformers, which get little to no recognition by the Academy.  These are movies that represent the very monetary foundation of which Hollywood is built.

Today I’m going to slide the other way and talk about the performance side of Hollywood.  Films with limited budgets, little to no marketing and have to fight tooth-and-nail in some instances for distribution as well as theater screens.  They are the darlings of Hollywood, praised for often dramatic portrayal of characters and deeply emotional stories.  Yet, even with all the attention they receive when nominated for an Oscar, only a select group of viewers end up seeing these films.

In contrast to their mainstream counterparts, performance films have always been the underdog.  It starts from the very point the script is completed all the way to getting onto the screen.  It’s the latter which ultimately proves the most critical because without theaters to show it, what good is a movie?

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