I’m not going to blame any of you, my sweet few readers who have been nothing but nice to me, but I can’t - for the life of me - figure out why this sentence exists in the Variety reports about this weekend’s releases: Judging by the strength of the tracking, “Fast and Furious” has a shot at securing the biggest opening of all time for April.

I understand the pure numbers that has Fast & Furious opening in 3,462 theaters as opposed to Adventureland’s 1,862. I also know that the previous Fast & Furious films have performed admirably ($40.1 million, $50.3 million and $24 million respectively) and that Adventureland is being touted as a Superbad-like coming of age story, which it isn’t.

Guys, I’m convinced this weekend is up to you. If Fast & Furious made the right choice by moving their 4th film back into April instead of opening in a crowded June like they usually do, then they are just going to bring in us stupid guys who want to see cool cars and girls in hot pants. Now, Fast & Furious undoubtedly has both of these things. If that’s what you want in your film, then you can go see it with a clean conscience (after THIS rant, I need to give everyone a “dumb summer movie” out). However, the plot is crappy and the acting is wooden.

As opposed to Adventureland, which I had enough to say about to fill out a whole damn REVIEW . A whole review is saying something, considering I’ve only reviewed Brothers Bloom and The Dark Knight for this site. I know Brothers Bloom hasn’t even come out yet, but when it does, I think you’ll see the kind of movie that motivates me to write a longer piece about it, and it’s usually when the film has something bigger to tell us as a full work.

As opposed to Fast & Furious, which took me all of 100 words.

But still, Universal thinks Furious might open big…

From Variety:

Universal’s “Fast and Furious” hopes to tear up the box office when it opens today, marking the fourth outing for the action franchise and reteaming Vin Diesel and Paul Walker for the first time since the original pic.
Weekend’s other wide opener is Miramax’s coming-of-age dramedy “Adventureland,” from director Greg Mottola (”Superbad”). Film opens in 1,862 runs.

The fourth “Fast” goes out in 3,462 theaters domestically. Pic is making an aggressive push internationally, opening day-and-date in 3,015 runs in more than two dozen markets, including France, Mexico, South Korea and Spain.

U is looking for the pic to restore the shine to the franchise. Michelle Rodriguez and Jordana Brewster, who starred alongside Diesel and Walker in the first film, also return.

The last pic in the franchise, 2006’s “The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift,” opened to $24 million, less than half the $50.3 million opening of “2 Fast and 2 Furious” in 2003. Original “The Fast and the Furious” debuted to $40.1 million in 2001.

Combined, the first three titles in the franchise grossed $334.2 million domestically and $267.9 million internationally for a worldwide tally of $602.1 million.

All three previous films debuted in June. U had initially planned on opening the fourth in June as well, but moved the picture to April to take advantage of a less-crowded playing field. So far, 2009 has been unusual in that a number of pics have done boffo business; the first few months of the year are traditionally a quiet time at the box office.

Judging by the strength of the tracking, “Fast and Furious” has a shot at securing the biggest opening of all time for April. Current record holder is “Anger Management,” which debuted to $42.2 million in 2003. “Scary Movie 4″ bowed to $40.2 million in 2006.