FLASHIERDANCE

1. The Final Destination 3D/WB Wknd/$ 28.3 Total/$ 28.3

2. Inglorious Basterds/Weinstein Wknd/$ 20.0 Total/$ 73.8

3. Halloween 2/Weinstein Wknd/$ 17.4 Total/$ 17.4

4. District 9/TriStar Wknd/$ 10.7 Total/$ 90.8

5. G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra/Paramount Wknd/$ 8.0 Total/$ 132.4

6. Julie & Julia/Sony Wknd/$ 7.4 Total/$ 71.0

7. The Time Traveler’s Wife/Paramount Wknd/$ 6.7 Total/$ 48.2

8. Shorts/Warner Brothers Wknd/$ 4.9 Total/$ 13.6

9. Taking Woodstock/Focus Wknd/$ 3.7 Total/$ 3.8

10. G-Force/Disney Wknd/$ 2.8 Total/$ 111.8

INGMAR BERGMAN’S THE FINAL DESTINATION 3D

The Final Destination 3D opens at number one and no matter what I can only see this as the X-Files episode it was meant to be. The original was written and directed by two X-Files vets, James Wong and Glenn Morgan and tell me you can’t just see Mulder dragging Scully to a small town where a bunch of kids are dying mysteriously and it turns out they all escaped a disaster that should have killed them and Mulder is insisting it’s Death collecting what its due. And that’s still more interesting than watching a bunch of kids die, I don’t care how imaginative you are about it. It all boils down to someone screaming while dying horribly and while still better than the “torture porn” movement, still not something I’m interested in seeing. It only works for me if the people are working to fight it and not simply being slaughtered one by one. More interesting is to see Death modify its attempt to counteract a survival attempt like a chess match. You escape getting caught in the seaweed and drowning, but didn’t see that Death had set up a speedboat just as reached the surface. And if you see the speedboat, you probably didn’t see the shark. Bergman understood you have to play chess with Death.

BASICALLY YOU CAN PUT –PLOISTATION BEHIND ANYTHING YOU LIKE

Speaking of “torture porn” Inglorious Basterds is down to number two and director Eli Roth, who brought us Hostel, is also in this and that’s another reason I don’t want to see it. I hate his films and I hate him, but the reasons I do are clearly the same as to why Tarantino likes him: he makes exploitation films and freely admits it. He flat out tells you that Hostel was exploiting the current animosity between Europe and the United States. He’s exploiting the situation for his film. This is no doubt how he wound up with a role in both Death Trap and this, because Tarantino is all about the exploitation genre and this is actually part of the Nazi-ploistation film genre of the 70’s when the original came out, alongside films like Ilsa She Wolf of the SS.

THIS MY JUDGMENT BASED ON SEEING ABSOLUTELY NOTHING

Halloween 2 is down to number three and are you kidding me? First Rob Zombie admittedly made a big stink about how he’d never do the sequel, but changed his mind when he says he realized he’d have more freedom because he felt “obligated” to do certain things in the first one out of respect to John Carpenter. Bullshit. What he saw were the checks that came rolling in. He’s just a big a hack as anyone in Hollywood. Whatever “street cred” he had from his rock background and earlier features has been completely eroded by this.

ACTUAL FACT: CASTLE WOLFENSTEIN IS BEING MADE INTO A MOVIE

District 9 is down to number four and if the guns used here seem familiar it’s because the director and Peter Jackson were supposed to do a Halo movie and the success of this brings them one step closer.

ON THE OTHER HAND, HE’S GETTING PAID NOT TO SUCK ONSCREEN

G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra is down to number five and also in this is Shaun Wayans in the “Wisecracking Black Sidekick” role and to show you either a) how Hollywood is fucked up or b) how good his agent is, he’s still getting paid for not playing Robin in Tim Burton’s Batman sequel. No, I’m not kidding. Can you imagine getting paid almost 20 years later for a job you didn’t do? Damn, I’m so in the wrong line of work. I’m a wiseass black guy who didn’t do shit 20 years ago. Somebody pay me!

ETC

Julie and Julia is down to number six, followed by The Time Traveler’s Wife at number seven and Shorts at number eight and here picking up a quick family film check are Jon Cryer, James Spader and William H. Macy. So is Leslie Mann, but honestly, without being Mrs. Judd Apatow, this is where she’d be anyway.

ALSO THERE ARE LESS OF THEM AROUND

Taking Woodstock finally enters the top ten at number nine and nothing prompts an eyeroll like the never-ending self-mythologizing of the baby boomers. It’s not as bad as it was in the 80’s because…well, they’re all entering Social Security/retirement age and don’t have a stranglehold on the economy they way they once did. They’re just too old now to do it. Once upon a time this would have been a MAJOR MOTION PICTURE rather than just an indie flick. I guess Viagra and regularity concerns are taking up more of their time these days.

THE END

Finally, G-Force is down to number ten.

STEP UP TO FLASH THAT LAST DANCE IN CENTER STAGE

I’m a bit of a sucker for a dance movie so long as it’s not a street dance movie. No You Got Serveds or Step It Ups for me. Give me some Center Stage if you want my time. That said, I was intrigued by the trailers for the clearly naked Flashdance remake called Make It Happen. Lousy title, clearly inspired by Step It Up, it’s the story of a small town girl who comes to the big city to attend dance school, only to wind up a bookkeeper in a, yes, burlesque club (because young girls who need money don’t seem to strip) thanks to the help of a Friendly Negro and when a dancer is out, yes, she steps up to become a star, much to the chagrin of the Bitchy Diva Star! But her dreams of the Chicago School of Dance will not be denied and she returns to the school that said she wasn’t sensual or sexy enough, utilizing her new stripper---I mean, burlesque experience and…well, I don’t want to spoil it for you. But what makes this a fun bad movie is that whenever she does street dancing, she puts a hoodie on. Hmmm, that couldn’t be so the dance double can come in could in. It’s hysterical because it’s so blatant and shameless! And as if that weren’t enough, she dances in the dark! Even at home by herself, she doesn’t turn on the lights! Now, how is it that every single female lead in D.O.A., a martial arts movie, has a background in dance but they couldn’t find an appropriate dancer for a movie about dance!?! Not that Mary Elizabeth Winstead (best known to you as Bruce Willis’ daughter in Live Free or Die Hard and apparently a distant cousin to Eva Gardner) doesn’t have a background in dance, but apparently it’s so purely ballet she couldn’t learn anything else. And apparently rhythm wasn’t on the menu at Joffrey in Chicago either.

ARE YOU ALIVE? SEMI FAMOUS? THEN DEATH IS LOOKING FOR YOU.

Death ends its merciless “Summer of Death” showing no one is safe, be it a statesman from a revered political family or a DJ with a drug problem. Clearly, the big fish this week was Senator Edward Kennedy, but again is it really that much of a shock when a 70-something man with brain cancer dies? I think not. 83-year-old Dommick Dunne, who would have been the first person to counteract looking back at Kennedy’s life through rose-colored glasses dies almost at the same time. Coincidence…or conspiracy? Also, 86-year-old Don Hewitt, who created 60 Minutes passed away. This man seriously made a mark on his world. No need to mourn here. 94-year-old Les Paul, the man without whom all modern music would not be possible, was needed to complete the greatest band in the afterlife. Continuing on with music, Ellie Greenwich died. She was one of the great Brill Building writers and the songstress behind some of the greatest girl group songs of the 60’s like “Be My Baby” and “Leader of the Pack” not to mention “Da Doo Ron Ron” (I’m a blasphemer and prefer the Shaun Cassidy version) and “Doo Wah Diddy” made the most famous, ironically, not by its chart success in the 60’s, but by Bill Murray singing it in Stripes. She also discovered Neil Diamond. Now that’s some shit. And from the sublime to the slightly ridiculous though sad, DJ AM, aka, Adam Goldstein, best known for dating Mandy Moore and Nicole Richie than his music skills (and openly admitted he couldn’t command the same money without dating someone famous), who survived that horrible plane crash a year ago and apparently learned nothing, because he overdosed on drugs and nobody knew he was dead for days. In fact, he’d done a reality show about getting over drugs. Guess that’s not going to run unless it’s a cautionary tale. That was supposed to be on MTV and between them and VH1 that’s three shows down, as that one murdering asshole took out Megan Wants A Millionaire and the next I Love Money. Their vetting process is going to be seriously looked now. “Okay, we’re going to need you not to either die or kill someone. Can you manage that?”