I was just checking Rotton Tomatoes to try and check up on some of the box office predictions that we've been talking about this summer. I realize that the big July films are still to come (Harry Potter, Transformers, etc.), but I was interested because Die Hard opened today and while I was really intrigued by the teasers, I was getting very, very wary because there were so few few-release reviews.

That's usually a bad sign -- keep the movie hidden from critics and heavily advertize the opening.

So you can imagine my surprise when the mass of reviews for Die Hard came out today -- and were amazingly positive. It was reviewed MUCH better than any of the previous summer action blockbusters -- Spidey, Pirates, Fantastic 4 and even Shrek 3 (I realize that's not an action movie). More significantly, it's getting a significantly higher user rating (92 percent positive) than any of the earlier blockbusters.

I realize it's still very early and I've always maintained that mindless summer movies are relatively immune to critics. I believe the key to estimating success or failure is the second week's gross -- how does it do in word of mouth?

I was also interested in the breakdown of the early summer biggies. What's successful these days for a "blockbuster? ... $100 million? $200 million? $300 million?

I ask because this is what I see so far:

Spider-Man 3 $332 million in 8 weeks (still got $1.2 million last week ... will top out at $350 million)
Shrek 3 $307 million (could reach $350 million)
Pirates 3 $287 million in 5 weeks (still got $2.6 million last week ... will top $300 million, but $350 is a stretch))
Fantastic Four $97 million in two weeks (dropped from 77 to 20 ... my guess is that it flatlines just under $200 million)

Evan Almighty debuted at No. 1 ... but only at $31 million, still well ahead of the well-reviewed No. 2 1408 ($20.6 million). I think A Mighty Heart is going to blow up big time -- a $3.8 million opening.

Looking over some lesser anticipated films, I see that Knocked Up has brought in $109 million in four weeks (and earned $11 million last week, so it's still going strong). Wild Hogs, which got little buzz, made $166 million -- much better than the heavily hyped Blades of Glory ($117 million). Meet the Robinsons, a Disney kid flick, made $96 million. All of those (except Knocked Up) are basically finished.

Still, did I once read that anywhere near $100 million is a big success for most comedies? It might be disappointing for a big-budget action film, but for the movies above that's pretty good. Can Evan Almighty catch any of them?

My big question comes back to Die Hard. When we were talking about predictions for the most successful movie of the summer, it got surprisingly little support.

We won't really know for another couple of weeks, but could we have missed this one??