“Winter’s Tale” isn’t the only disaster this box office weekend. Sony released the $100 million-plus “Pompeii” to a world with no fans. Total box office take: $10 million. Peter Schlessel was executive producer. Now he’s running Focus Features at Universal, which has had the embarrassment of releasing Zac Efron in “That Awkward Moment.”

Anyway, “Pompeii” was director by schlockmeister Paul W.S. Anderson, who is not the director of “The Master” or “There Will Be Blood.” That’s Paul Thomas Anderson. Maybe “Pompeii” will be a hit in non English speaking countries. But probably not, as it has no stars…

Meantime, Roadkill– er, Roadside Attractions, the company that killed J.C. Chandor’s “All is Lost” with Robert Redford, dumped a film this weekend. For two years it was known as “Therese Raquin,” based om the famous novel by Emile Zola. Elizabeth Olsen and Oscar Isaac star in it, and Rotten Tomatoes has it at 49%. Not great, but not awful.

When RAtt., as it’s known on the boxofficemojo chart so appropriately, decided to dump it, they also changed its name. “In Secret” is the new name. and it made $272K over the weekend in 266 theatres. “In Secret,” released in secret, will now head to airplanes and video services. RAtt’s next two releases are even worse– “Blood Ties” and “Joe.” The latter is not a remake of the Peter Boyle-Susan Sarandon movie of the early 1970s. The former is unwatchable.

The sad story of “Winter’s Tale” gets worse this weekend. Last night (Saturday) Akiva Goldsman’s Village Roadshow-financed feature did a meager $670K at the US box office. With a $1.5 million total this weekend, “Winter’s Tale” will just about cross the $10 million line by Sunday night. The official budget is listed at $60 million, but that isn’t likely. Since we already know what the producers spent just in New York (thanks to that press release we talked about last week), the number has to be more between $100 mil-$125 million minimum.

Sometimes foreign box office will outweigh the domestic and save the day. But “Winter’s Tale” is not attracting crowds in places where often plot doesn’t matter. It turns out that people in foreign countries can’t follow it either, or just aren’t interested. So far “Winter’s Tale” has been a hit only in Italy, where it’s made over a million bucks. Why Italy? Who knows?

Meantime “The LEGO Movie” continues at number 1, also from Warner Bros. And “Monuments Men” is doing better than expected for Sony, even if it’s not the massive hit it might have been.

We are a week away from the Oscars. And the envelope goes to…the movies from 2012, not 2013. Even though we’ve said many times that 2013 was the strongest in decades for artistic releases, it wasn’t so good Oscar wise for the bottom line.

According to boxofficemojo.com, the 9 movies nominated for Best Picture 2013 made a total of over $225 million less than the ones from the previous year.

One movie that should have been a hit and wasn’t, Ron Howard’s “Rush,” took in just $26 million. I still don’t know why– it was all set for greatness. Now the company that made it, Exclusive Media, is laying off employees and has kicked out its principle directors.

Warner Bros. made a couple of announcements on Friday that I’m just catching up to. “Veronica Mars: The Movie” is still pretty a TV show after all. The studio has wisely decided to release the big screen version of the popular series on video on demand the same day it goes out to just 270 theaters. VOD is on your TV. The small theatrical release is to avoid a financial calamity. This doesn’t mean “Veronica Mars” isn’t good. It could be a lot of fun. But the studio isn’t going to spend $20 million to find out. If you’re one of those people who loved the show so much you helped out via Kickstarter, the big day is March 14th…

WB also has put “The Man from UNCLE” on for January 16, 2015. I’m sorry, this means a couple of things. They don’t want to hurt Henry Cavill, their Superman from the forthcoming “Superman vs. Batman.” It also means “The Man from UNCLE” isn’t a tentpole movie. Otherwise we’d have seen it this fall, for Thanksgiving or Christmas, or waited til early May 2015 for a blockbuster release. From the casting etc it doesn’t sound like anyone really knew what “The Man from UNCLE” was other than the title of a spy movie. Cavill as Napoleon Solo? Armie Hammer as Ilya Kuryakin? I do like the idea of Hugh Grant as Mr. Waverly, the Mr. Magoo of agency chiefs.

Each of these decisions sounds wise actually. A third decision, to put Will Smith’s “Focus” in mid -February 2015, is also prudent. Smith’s big blockbuster audience has eroded thanks to lots of bad choices. He’s not Mr. July 4th anymore. “Focus” is not “Independence Day 2,” which Smith won’t do. So “Focus” could be sharper in a month when no one has any expectations.

It’s bad news for all of us in the media though. If studios start getting smart about spending money to promote iffy products, what will we have to write about? Just kidding!

I wrote back in January that awards malaise was setting in after we went through about a half dozen awards shows and still hadn’t given out an Oscar.

I did say many of the movies would be finito at the box office by the time the Academy Awards were handed out on March 2nd. I’m flattered to say that a couple of writers have picked up that theme.

A big problem this season: either actors who didn’t want to participate or couldn’t in the campaigns, and some people who were just invisible.

Dame Judi Dench, for example, was AWOL for all of the “Philomena” promotion. Her stand in was the real Philomena Lee. At first the reason given was that Judi wasn’t well– sight trouble, knee trouble. Then she went to India to film teh sequel to “Best Exotic Marigold Hotel.” If she makes to the Oscars, it will be lovely. But why would she, when Cate Blanchett is all about coronated?

Michael Fassbender did nothing I know of for “12 Years a Slave.” Still he was nominated for Best Supporting Actor.

Joaquin Phoenix, ditto for Spike Jonze’s “Her.”

Even though “American Hustle” had lots of promotion, we saw Christian Bale once and never again.

And of course Woody Allen never said ‘boo’ about “Blue Jasmine.”

I’m still not sure who directed “Dallas Buyers Club.” Matthew McConaughey? No one’s ever mentioned the director’s name. While “Nebraska,” “Inside Llewyn Davis,” “12 Years,” and “American Hustle” all had lunches, dinners, and screenings, “Dallas” only had private events. One day all of the press was at a Bruce Dern lunch while “Dallas” was entertaining itself.

For a long time, the big story was going to be Robert Redford. His performance in “All is Lost” was expected to be the big win, a cap off of an amazing career. Then Roadkill–sorry, Roadside–Attractions simply caved in. They did nothing, and offended the press who did like the movie. J. C. Chandor’s brilliant film would have been hailed a masterpiece if anyone else had released it. What a shame.

All of this contributed to the extended malaise brought on by the March 2nd date of the Oscars. That date was because of the Olympics taking up all of February. But if they’d given the Oscars on January 26th, the whole process could have been a lot less frustrating. As it is, Neil Meron and Craig Zadan are planning a good show for March 2nd. And everyone will be happy to see this season end.