The Hunger Games Claims the Top Spot for DVD Sales and Rentals for the 2nd Week in a Row!

The Hollywood Reporter reported on Wednesday that The Hunger Games was the #1 DVD seller and rental for the second week in a row!

Nearly a dozen new home video releases appeared in the top 20 on the national sales charts the week ending Aug. 26, but none could break the hold of two high-profile theatricals already available on disc. 

Lionsgate’s The Hunger Games and Universal Studios’ Dr. Seuss’ The Lorax repeated at No. 1 and No. 2 on both the Nielsen VideoScan First Alert chart, which tracks overall disc sales, and Nielsen’s dedicated Blu-ray Disc sales chart. 

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The Hunger Games also hung on to the No. 1 spot on Home Media Magazine’s rental chart, with The Dictator bowing at No. 2.

We're loving the mention of Home Media Magazine, who interviewed both of your Welcome to District 12 admins in early August regarding The Hunger Games on DVD.

Source: THR

Lionsgate Splitting Marketing Groups; Tim Palen and Nancy Kirkpatrick to Stay | THR

Fear not, Hunger Games fans! When the Summit/Lionsgate merger was announced, we wondered who would be heading Lionsgate's marketing. Since The Hunger Games had a very successful and innovative marketing campaign, we were hoping they'd keep Tim Palen so that we can expect more awesome marketing for the future Hunger Games movies. Looks like they've reached a compromise!

Lionsgate marketing head Tim Palen and Summit marketing chief Nancy Kirkpatrick are both staying with the company, The Hollywood Reporter has learned. 

The Hunger Games studio has closed a new long-term deal with Palen, who will now run marketing for the Lionsgate-branded film slate. Kirkpatrick will head up marketing for Summit-branded films, including the final installment of the Twilight franchise, set for release in late November.

There had been widespread speculation in Hollywood that one of the marketing execs would depart Lionsgate in the wake of the company's merger with Summit this year. As part of that deal, Summit'sRob Friedman and Patrick Wachsberger took control of the film studio, potentially giving Summit's Kirkpatrick the inside track. But Palen is considered a talented marketing executive, responsible for the campaign for Lionsgate's current blockbuster Hunger Games. The studio now has worked out a compromise that seems to have satisfied both executives in the short term while planting the seeds of a long-term plan. 

Combining the two studios has resulted in a large number of films on the upcoming release slate, so splitting the duties and allowing each executive to run his and her own slate makes sense. However, once the merged Lionsgate trims its film slate to about 14 films a year, as it has said it plans to do, two marketing heads probably won't make sense. 

At that point, locking Palen into a long-term deal probably gives him the pole position to remain with the company.

UPDATE: Lionsgate is confirming the news with a press release announcing Palin's new long-term deal. 

"Tim is a gifted marketing executive who has been a driving force in the success of our motion picture business over the years, and he elevated his game to a new level with a groundbreaking marketing campaign for The Hunger Games," said Lionsgate CEO Jon Feltheimer and vice chairman Michael Burns in a statement. "His marketing campaigns integrate digital and traditional resources in innovative and cost-effective ways that reflect Lionsgate's entrepreneurial culture at its best." 

"One of the great benefits of Summit’s recent merger with Lionsgate is the opportunity to be in business with a marketing executive as talented as Tim,” said Friedman and Wachsberger said in a statement. “As we roll out a combined slate capable of generating more than a billion dollars at the North American box office, we are fortunate to have two extremely talented marketing executives to guide both the Lionsgate and Summit brands going forward.”

We're glad that Tim Palen's work on The Hunger Games hasn't gone unnoticed. We love the marketing done for The Hunger Games and we can't wait to see what's in store for Catching Fire and Mockingjay!

Source: The Hollywood Reporter

Sources Say...It's Francis Lawrence!

Could it be? THR is reporting that Lawrence got the offer today, and if he accepts will direct "Catching Fire".  But of course, nothing is official!

Sources say Lawrence will receive an official offer Thursday afternoon. If he accepts and a deal can be worked out, he will replace Gary Ross, who directed the hugely successful first installment of the franchise.
The hunt has been fast and furious, with the field narrowing down to Lawrence, director of I Am Legend and Water for Elephants, and Bennett Miller, who helmed the Oscar-nominated Brad Pitt baseball movie Moneyball. Both directors met with the studio Thursday, according to sources, and Lionsgate executives have made their pick.

Read the full THR article


If this is true, we're very excited to see what Francis Lawrence will do with Catching Fire, and we are even more glad that he has experience when it comes to big special effects and big budgets.

Conflict With Fox May Have Cost Us Gary Ross

The Hollywood Reporter is reporting that scheduling conflicts with Fox regarding X-Men is what caused Gary Ross' decision not to return for Catching Fire.

When writer-director Gary Ross announced his decision to drop out of the next installment in The Hunger Games saga, he stated his reasons succinctly:  

"As a writer and a director, I simply don't have the time I need to write and prep the movie I would have wanted to make because of the fixed and tight production schedule," he said Tuesday. 

Ross did not allude to Fox, which had imposed that schedule by putting a January start date on its X-Men: First Class sequel with an ensemble role for star Hunger Games Jennifer Lawrence. And Ross did not express his misgivings about the particular challenges he perceives in framing and executing a film version of Catching Fire, the second book in Suzanne Collins' young-adult series.

Fox's January date led the bond company on Catching Fire to insist that Lionsgate commit to finish filming by Dec. 20, backing the studio into a production schedule with an August start date that Ross felt he could not accommodate. (Fox's deal with Lawrence predates her contract for Hunger Games, putting X-Men in a priority position.) 

According to knowledgeable sources, Lionsgate Motion Picture Group co-chair Rob Friedman pressed Fox to set a later start date for the X-Men movie, even offering allurements including a chance to handle some of the overseas distribution on Catching Fire. 

Fox was willing to move back its start date a few weeks and is still in conversations with Lionsgate on that issue. But the additional time would not have been enough to allay Ross's concerns. And Fox might have been inclined to cooperate only up to a point: When X-Men: First Class was released in June, the studio very much wanted Lawrence to attend the premiere. But the actress was starting The Hunger Games then and Lionsgate did not make her available, apparently causing severe friction with Fox. Friedman, who was not at Lionsgate then and has a good relationship with Fox's Tom Rothman, has been negotiating to win a little more time. Lionsgate is now said to be confident that it can complete shooting in the time allotted.

Some sources are skeptical that Fox actually will start filming the X-Men movie -- which still lacks a finished script -- in January. Its deal with Lawrence allows the studio to start within six months, so filming could begin as late as June. But given the possibility of an earlier start, the bond company on Catching Fire required a commitment that the film would be finished shooting in December. 

Ross, who has earned screenplay Oscar nominations for Big, Dave and Seabiscuit, felt that he had to focus on the script for at least two months, leaving him only six to eight weeks to prepare for shooting. Sources also say he feels the second novel is the most challenging in the trilogy to make into a compelling film. Collins, who shares writing credit on The Hunger Games with Ross and Billy Ray, is said to want a screen version that is very faithful to her book. 

Although the key actors are locked into Catching Fire, Lionsgate didn’t kick off a negotiation with Ross for the sequel until about three weeks before Hunger Games opened March 23.

It is unclear who might replace Ross and make the sequel in the time allotted, though no doubt many directors will be interested. And Friedman has shown in the past that he is willing to make changes. When he ran Summit Entertainment, the company memorably did not invite Catherine Hardwicke back to direct the second Twilight movie, New Moon.

Fox and Lionsgate declined to comment for this report.

Even though there haven't been official statements made about this from any of the parties, this sounds very plausible, especially coming from THR. All I'm saying is that I will be pissed if X-Men starts filming much later than January.

Source

What's That? The Hunger Games Broke Another Record?

That's right! Check it out:

Lionsgate's film adaptation of Suzanne Collins' best-selling young-adult novel grossed $10.8 million on Monday -- the best showing ever for a Monday outside of holidays, the Christmas stretch and summer.
Hunger Games has amassed $163.4 million in only four days of play at the domestic box office, suggesting the film could easily gross $350 million or more in North America.
The pic, opening to $152.5 million during the weekend, shattered a number of records in scoring the third-highest debut of all time behind Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2 ($169.2 million) and The Dark Knight ($158.4 million), as well as the top opening outside of summer and the top opening for a nonsequel.

Source: THR