Weekend Receipts: Fockers Narrowly Tops True Grit Again

Once again, a family of Fockers has pushed boozy lawman Rooster Cogburn to second place, as alleged “comedy” Little Fockers took the box office crown this weekend. Meanwhile, Jeff Bridges repped silver and bronze with True Grit and Tron: Legacy respectively. And no one go looking for Jack Black — his nearly universally-reviled Gulliver’s Travels plummeted to eighth place. Your weekend receipts are here.

1. Little Fockers
Gross: $26,300,000 ($103,191,000)
Screens: 3,554 (PSA: $7,400)
Weeks: 2 (change: -14.7%)

Honestly, folks, just pop Meet the Fockers into the DVD player and throw in a couple hackneyed boner jokes, and you’ll have the Little Fockers experience at a fraction of the price. Cranking out an unnecessary sequel like this is such a blatant moneygrab, I’m surprised they didn’t just say it was in 3D just so they could charge an extra 5 bucks per ticket

2. True Grit
Gross: $24,500,000 ($86,765,000)
Screens: 3,083 (PSA: $7,947)
Weeks: 2 (change: -1.4%)

Thank god for True Grit, the compromise movie of households worldwide this holiday season that was a great movie in its own right. Hailee Stansfeld gives one of the best child performances ever and Jeff Bridges makes a welcome return to the artfully-constructed dialogue of the Coen Brothers. Which just about makes up for…

3. Tron:Legacy
Gross: $18,306,000 ($130,854,000)
Screens: 3,365 (PSA: $5,440)
Weeks: 3 (change: -4.4%)

It’s tough to consider a movie that’s made $130 million a bomb, but I’m sure Disney was expecting much, much higher grosses from this movie (The Karate Kid will probably make more!). Nota bene to the filmmakers, the audience was expecting cool lightcycle races and gladiator fights, not the dullest pieces of expository windbaggery this side of Keanu’s confab with The Architect.

4. Yogi Bear
Gross: $13,000,000 ($66,130,000)
Screens: 3,515 (PSA: $3,698)
Weeks: 3 (change: +65.9%)

Now that this is halfway profitable, I hope that a Snagglepuss live action movie is on its way. I’d love a knowing satire in the vein of Josie and the Pussycats wherein an obviously gay Snagglepuss is forced into a bearding relationship to jump-start his flagging career. I bet Rachel Bilson is available.

5. The Chronicles of Narnia: The Voyage of the Dawn Treader
Gross: $10,500,000 ($87,141,000)
Screens: 2,948 (PSA: $3,562)
Weeks: 4 (change: +10.8%)

Appropriately enough, this movie just won’t die.

[Numbers via Box Office Mojo]

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Natalie Portman Calmly Explains Why She Doesn't Do Nude Scenes Again

· Black Swan cygnet Natalie Portman has another well-spoken reason for why she doesn’t do nude scenes. She even threw in the impressive word “expropriate” to make you feel bad for asking. [MCN via ONTD]

· Anne Hathaway says she cried daily while shooting Love and Other Drugs. She must’ve known she would soon star in a highly derivative photo shoot. [ONTD]

· Lost’s Carlton Cuse is returning to ABC for a Civil War-set drama. That’ll make sense right next to The Middle. [TV Guide]

· Huge may have been canceled, but Raven Symoné’s new series Great State of Georgia may pick up where its curves-conscious message left off. [Jezebel]

· Finally, ‘tis the midseason for Christian Slater’s comeback. Fa-la-la-la. [Deadline]

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Roll With The Cycles, Grab Some Cisco While It’s Cheap Again

Darwin's ideas work in stocks, too

“If I’d known I was going to live this long, I would have taken better care of myself.” – Eubie Blake, American composer (1887–1983)

You cannot underestimate the power of cycles.? They reoccur in nature, business, and financial markets with great regularity.? When we ignore them, cycles seem obvious in hindsight.? Foresight is where you’ll make your money.

Time frames may be different based on secular trends, weather phenomenon, innovations in health care, and government intervention, but generally, what goes around, comes around.? For example, economic booms and busts occurred, on average, every 14 years for 2,000 years.?Beginning in the late 20th?century, they began cycling every seven years as a direct result of government efforts to stimulate economic activity during recessionary downturns.? While they occur more frequently, they’re cycles nonetheless.

Tall Parents Have Shorter Children, On Average
Charles Darwin and his cousin, Francis Galton, were the first to note that tall parents have shorter children, on average, and vice versa.? With Karl Pearson, they studied over one thousand father and son pairs.? Galton termed this phenomenon in nature “regression to mediocrity.”? Since then, the method of studying how one variable leads to another variable has been called “regression analysis.”

Financial market observers see it all the time.? Excessively high prices eventually lead to excessively low prices.? The key to succeeding as an investor is knowing where the excesses are when they’re happening and exploiting them.

Special Offer: Make the most of explosive moves in gold and silver but don’t get left holding the bag when it’s time to run.? Click here for instant access to market timing analysis and specific gold, silver and hard asset model portfolios in Curtis Hesler’s?Professional Timing Service.

“Joining The Dow Can Be The Kiss Of Death”
In September, Jeff Reeves of InvestorPlace.com conducted research showing that by the time companies have grown to become the recognized leaders in their industries, share prices are inflated.? For example, turning the clock back to March 1999 when the Dow Jones Averages closed above 10,000 for the first time, then crested to 11,000 a few months later, four of the biggest names of the day joined the Dow 30. Here’s how they fared: AT&T (then SBC Communications), down 38%; Intel, down 50%;?Microsoft, down 47%;?Home Depot, ?down 38%.

During subsequent reformulations of the Dow Jones Industrial Average, laggards were replaced with other leaders of the time.? They included Pfizer, Verizon, Bank of America, Cisco, and AIG.? As a group, these stocks have been shellacked since they joined the Dow 30, but along the way they have continued to make a lot of money for anyone who purchased shares when stock prices were excessively low.? Many have tripled off of lows in 2003 and 2009.

The point is this: You cannot fight the power and magnitude of cycles.? They can make or break an investor.? Here’s one stock that appears far too low right now:

Fallen Angels Focus Stock: Cisco Systems? (CSCO, 20.15)

Cisco is the dominant player in the global networking industry.? Shares plummeted more than 16% on ?Thursday following a less than stellar outlook presented by company management.? While management cited near term challenges, we believe the selling has provided an attractive entry point for longer-term investors.

The company has a solid balance sheet, operating profit margins of more than 20% and net margins in the high teens.? Our fair value estimate (based on discounted cash flow analysis) is $30 per share; providing investors with 50% potential upside from current levels.

Gabriel Wisdom and clients of American Money Management LLC, including mutual funds managed by AMM may buy or sell securities mentioned without prior notice.

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Roll With The Cycles, Grab Some Cisco While It’s Cheap Again

Darwin's ideas work in stocks, too

“If I’d known I was going to live this long, I would have taken better care of myself.” – Eubie Blake, American composer (1887–1983)

You cannot underestimate the power of cycles.? They reoccur in nature, business, and financial markets with great regularity.? When we ignore them, cycles seem obvious in hindsight.? Foresight is where you’ll make your money.

Time frames may be different based on secular trends, weather phenomenon, innovations in health care, and government intervention, but generally, what goes around, comes around.? For example, economic booms and busts occurred, on average, every 14 years for 2,000 years.?Beginning in the late 20th?century, they began cycling every seven years as a direct result of government efforts to stimulate economic activity during recessionary downturns.? While they occur more frequently, they’re cycles nonetheless.

Tall Parents Have Shorter Children, On Average
Charles Darwin and his cousin, Francis Galton, were the first to note that tall parents have shorter children, on average, and vice versa.? With Karl Pearson, they studied over one thousand father and son pairs.? Galton termed this phenomenon in nature “regression to mediocrity.”? Since then, the method of studying how one variable leads to another variable has been called “regression analysis.”

Financial market observers see it all the time.? Excessively high prices eventually lead to excessively low prices.? The key to succeeding as an investor is knowing where the excesses are when they’re happening and exploiting them.

Special Offer: Make the most of explosive moves in gold and silver but don’t get left holding the bag when it’s time to run.? Click here for instant access to market timing analysis and specific gold, silver and hard asset model portfolios in Curtis Hesler’s?Professional Timing Service.

“Joining The Dow Can Be The Kiss Of Death”
In September, Jeff Reeves of InvestorPlace.com conducted research showing that by the time companies have grown to become the recognized leaders in their industries, share prices are inflated.? For example, turning the clock back to March 1999 when the Dow Jones Averages closed above 10,000 for the first time, then crested to 11,000 a few months later, four of the biggest names of the day joined the Dow 30. Here’s how they fared: AT&T (then SBC Communications), down 38%; Intel, down 50%;?Microsoft, down 47%;?Home Depot, ?down 38%.

During subsequent reformulations of the Dow Jones Industrial Average, laggards were replaced with other leaders of the time.? They included Pfizer, Verizon, Bank of America, Cisco, and AIG.? As a group, these stocks have been shellacked since they joined the Dow 30, but along the way they have continued to make a lot of money for anyone who purchased shares when stock prices were excessively low.? Many have tripled off of lows in 2003 and 2009.

The point is this: You cannot fight the power and magnitude of cycles.? They can make or break an investor.? Here’s one stock that appears far too low right now:

Fallen Angels Focus Stock: Cisco Systems? (CSCO, 20.15)

Cisco is the dominant player in the global networking industry.? Shares plummeted more than 16% on ?Thursday following a less than stellar outlook presented by company management.? While management cited near term challenges, we believe the selling has provided an attractive entry point for longer-term investors.

The company has a solid balance sheet, operating profit margins of more than 20% and net margins in the high teens.? Our fair value estimate (based on discounted cash flow analysis) is $30 per share; providing investors with 50% potential upside from current levels.

Gabriel Wisdom and clients of American Money Management LLC, including mutual funds managed by AMM may buy or sell securities mentioned without prior notice.

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Aliens attack LA again in Battle: Los Angeles Trailer

Screenwriters have finally stumbled upon the perfect revenge-fantasy-outlet for their Los Angeles angst. Just as aliens head to theaters today to devour the city in Skyline, here comes the teaser for Battle: Los Angeles, in which a presumably different group of aliens turn LA into a total war zone. These scenarios are probably comforting to imagine after the second hour stuck in traffic, waiting for some flaky producer to call back. Anyway, this is a great trailer - Something like Black Hawk Down in Los Angeles…with aliens.

For a teaser, this preview seems to reveal quite a bit of the film, though the aliens remain obscured. At the same time, it’s so stylized and self-contained (the images and music are married perfectly here), that it’s hard to tell whether this is a great trailer for a great film or simply a great trailer. The one moment where an alien begins to materialize out of thin air kind of kills the mood. On the other hand, it’s hard to ignore the visceral impact of how convincingly director Jonathan Liebesman turns the west coast into a frantic battleground.

Aaron Eckhart and Michelle Rodriguez are in this somewhere, but with all of the explosions and army fatigues, I had to watch the trailer twice to pick them out.

Verdict: I’m going to wait and see what Kim Kardashian thinks.

If the trailer gets pulled, head over to Apple.

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