Daily News Channel
It wasn’t quite the Preakness, leaving the pundits baffled by a filly winning for the first time in almost a century, but the box office race was closer than expected. The raw estimates for the weekend: Angels & Demons $48 million, Star Trek $43 million.
The Cannes Film Festival entrusted its opening to a Pixar film, and the animation studio did not disappoint. Pixar, which has produced such gems as “Toy Story,” “The Incredibles” and “WALL-E,” introduced its latest feature, “Up,” on Wednesday night at the French movie celebration.
The members of the Motion Picture Academy are still filling out their ballots, but right now the Anglo-Indian melodrama Slumdog Millionaire is the strong favorite to win the Oscars for Best Picture, Directing and Adapted Screenplay. It has already snagged top prizes from the producers’, directors’, writers’ and actors’ guilds. It’s also earned nearly $80 million at the domestic box office–far more than the combined take of three of its Best Picture rivals, The Reader, Frost/Nixon and Milk.