"Heartbreak Kid" ready to come out and play

By Carl DiOrio

LOS ANGELES (Hollywood Reporter) - The Farrelly Brothers' remake of "The Heartbreak Kid" is unlikely to break any records at the weekend box office in North America, even with Ben Stiller heading the cast of the honeymoon-from-hell comedy.

Stiller and the Farrellys have been comedy royalty since their 1998 collaboration on "There's Something About Mary." But the only way for "Kid" to join that genre classic in laugher lore will be for the film to open solidly and build from there. Prerelease tracking shows "Kid" limited to a three-day gross somewhere just north of $20 million.

Of course, "Mary" did just that -- albeit when ticket prices were lower -- and Stiller and the Farrellys often outperform tracking. So the inaugural frame could surpass ho-hum projections just a bit.

Happily for executives at DreamWorks/Paramount, Stiller's global appeal -- demonstrated most recently by the robust worldwide box office for "Night at the Museum" -- should help "Kid" outperform the typical comedy in an international rollout that also begins this weekend in a handful of territories.

The other major wide domestic release is Fox's "The Seeker: The Dark Is Rising." Adapted from a popular children's book series, "Seeker" looks to land somewhere in the double-digit millions. The film will compete with last week's No. 1, "The Game Plan," for the youth and family coin.

Elsewhere this weekend, Sony's musical drama "Feel the Noise" targets teen females and looks likely limited to the single-digit millions.

Sony Pictures Classics will expand its female drama "The Jane Austen Book Club" nationally after a couple weeks in limited release, looking to capture interest beyond major markets in a film still seeking its audience.

Reuters/Hollywood Reporter