STUDIO SPOTLIGHT Indie distributor Miramax earned nearly half of its annual gross from the two Scream pictures directed by Wes Craven. Other important contributors for the year were Cop Land and the Oscar champ The English Patient which was released in 1996. With about $420M in ticket sales in 1997, Miramax is starting to look like one of the big studios it trys not to be like.

The year started with long lucrative runs by the 1996 holdovers Scream ($103M), Sling Blade ($24.5M), and The English Patient ($78.7M). April brought the Kevin Smith-directed Chasing Amy ($12M) which is popping up on most critics' top ten films of the year lists. Another standout was Japanese import Shall We Dance? ($9.5M) which is now the highest-grossing Japanese-language film to play in the United States. Late summer entries included the Sylvester Stallone "serious" drama Cop Land ($44.9M), which set a new Miramax opening weekend record, and the Mira Sorvino sci-fi thriller Mimic ($25.5M).

December brought a trio of films that could not be more different. Good Will Hunting has succeeded in limited release, grabbed numerous award nominations, and is expanding nationwide. Scream 2 set a new December opening weekend record with $32.9M (although Miramax slipped and reported it as $39M before correcting it almost a week later). And Quentin Tarantino's Jackie Brown is holding its own too. Some other 1997 titles included Kolya ($5.8M), Operation Condor ($10.4M), Mrs. Brown ($8.5M), and She's So Lovely ($7.2M).