QUICK DRAW MCGRAW

1. Alice in Wonderland/Touchstone Wknd/$ 34.5 Total/$ 265.8

2. Diary of a Wimpy Kid/Fox Wknd/$ 21.8 Total/$ 21.8

3. The Bounty Hunter/Sony Wknd/$ 21.0 Total/$ 20.0

4. Repo Men/Universal Wknd/$ 6.2 Total/$ 6.2

5. She’s Out of My League/Paramount Wknd/$ 6.0 Total/$ 20.0

6. Green Zone/Universal Wknd/$ 6.9 Total/$ 24.7

7. Shutter Island/Paramount Wknd/$ 4.8 Total/$ 115.8

9. Our Family Wedding/Fox Searchlight Wknd/$ 3.8 Total/$ 13.7

8. Avatar/Fox Wknd/$ 4.0 Total/$ 736.9

10. Remember Me Wknd/$ 3.3 Total/$ 13.9

MORE LIKE BORN EVERY OTHER SECOND

Alice in Wonderland holds at number one and somewhere P.T. Barnum is smiling at all the suckers coughing up this money to see this in 3D. Do you feel immersed in the film? Do you remember the Cheshire Cat sitting in your lap? No. Then what’s the point of 3D if none of these things occur? People should be ducking under the seats because they think shit is flying at them, not sitting passively. Otherwise, what is the point beyond increased ticket prices that people are far-too-willing to pay because they think they’re getting something extra? I think I just answered my own question.

DIARY OF A GEEK IS MINE AND MINE ALONE

Diary of a Wimpy Kid opens at number two and being old and having no kids, I’ve never heard of this before. Clearly, millions of kids know differently. This is based on a successful book, one that seems like the type of thing that would appeal to me at that age. The movie, however, does not and while going to see animation can be somewhat forgiven, to be a middle aged man with no kids in to see something like this is a quick trip to the FBI watch list.

DEBBIE REYNOLDS DIDN’T NEED IT

The Bounty Hunter opens at number three and Jennifer Anniston should pay her ex-husband alimony. Seriously, without Brad and Angelina exactly what does Jennifer Anniston have to support a film career? She’s not bringing the charm like Sarah Jessica Parker, she’s not bringing the seriously pretty like the aforementioned Angelina and god knows she’s not bringing the acting like Kate Winslet, so what exactly is her appeal based upon? Being “The Wronged Woman” of a super-star couple that’s what. She had her shot at leading lady status when Friends was hot and they all bombed and they looked a lot better than this stuff here. When one of your so-called jokes in the commercial is Gerard Butler tackling Jennifer Anniston you’re in serious trouble. The only role Jennifer Anniston should have in a film is the buddy of the real star. She should be Sarah Jessica Parker’s bitchy/slutty sister, but she’s got no business in the leading role and clearly no taste for scripts if these are the choices she continues to make. She’s right up there with Kate Husdon and Jennifer Garner as “most likely to be in one of the worst romantic comedies you’ve ever seen.”

OPERATION THE MOVIE!

Repo Men opens number four and you know how they always say that homoeroticism is always at the heart of every action movie? Well, movies like this are why they say that. Set in a dystopian future where pretty much your health care provider or loan office can repossess your artificial organs (and leaving you to die in the process) should you not make payments, Jude Law and Forrest Whittaker are two sociopathic repo men who feel no remorse at cutting someone up and leaving them to die on their living room floor, or even taking time out from a barbeque to doing a procedure in a cab, which Forrest Whittaker does, thus causing Jude Law’s wife to leave him. Whittaker is overjoyed with his new roommate, but Law isn’t and plans on moving up to sales until an accident costs him his heart and suddenly he can’t do his job thanks to the empathy he now feels. This, of course ultimately sends him on the run for his overdue payments with Whittaker in reluctant pursuit. Now, this wants to be a dark social satire pretending to be an action movie like Robocop (and it more than matches it in gory bloodletting), but it’s just a B-movie science fiction action movie with delusions of grandeur. That it’s utterly legal to kill people for not paying their debts should have been at the heart of this movie, but it’s not. We should have seen more the incredibly insane society that allows this to happen but we don’t. That there’s also no mention of the otherwise good organs that go to waste when the borrower dies is your first clue. There should have been another competitive business that gathers those. Now, there are two developments at the beginning of the movie, which pretty much give away what’s to occur, and they both play on the love story between Forrest Whittaker and Jude Law. The first is pretty obvious: Forrest Whittaker causes the accident that results in Jude Law’s artificial heart. I don’t think I’m giving anything away as it’s revealed halfway in and we see him doing it! So, basically Forrest Whittaker completely destroys Jude Law’s life to keep Jude from leaving him! The other development is one line that pretty obviously gives away the film’s ending. It’s like the Hitchcock rule: “Don’t show a gun unless that gun is going off.” Well, they show a gun and it predictably goes off at the end of the movie in one of the gayest moments ever short of Forrest Whittaker and Jude Law in a tent.

YES, THIS HAS BEEN A THEME FOR AWHILE

She’s out of my League is down to number five and starring in this is Jay Baruchel and your probably remember him as one of the creepy roommates in Knocked Up. He was also the star of the TV show Undeclared, also a Judd Apatow creation which is probably why the first episode was how a hot chick deflowers him the first night of college.

THIS IS WHAT “THE MAN” LOOKS LIKE

Green Zone is down to number six and Greg Kinnear is making a career out of playing the WASPy weasel. In a perfect world he, James Spader and William Hurt would all play related characters, one in government, one in a corporation and one in the military, basically summing up most of their roles for the last twenty years.

THE TWO OF YOU WHO HAVEN’T SEEN AVATAR MIGHT WANT TO SKIP THIS PART

Shutter Island is down to number seven, followed by Avatar at number eight and if you haven’t seen it by now, tough. I’m going to give away something away by saying maybe one day James Cameron will make a movie where his ass-kicking Latina military officer lives. First the amazing Vasquez (who was actually played by a Jew) bites it in Aliens and Michele Rodriquez won’t be in any Avatar sequel that comes along. Too bad because, she always looks good in tank top with a gun.

NO JOKES ABOUT BRUCE WILLIS’ DAUGHTER PLEASE

Our Family Wedding is down to number nine giving Forrest Whittaker two mediocre films in the top ten, while Remember Me closes out the top ten at number ten and doesn’t it make perfect sense that Pierce Brosnan is the onscreen father of Robert Pattinson? Pretty people usually make more pretty people, not this Harrison Ford and Shia Lebouf bullshit. Know who played Justin Timberlake’s dad in a straight to DVD baseball movie last year? Jeff Bridges. Know who’s gonna play Serena’s dad on Gossip Girl? William Baldwin. Know who’s played Meg Ryan’s mother twice? Candice Bergen. Now that’s casting.

BUT I’LL NEVER SEE GONE WITH THE WIND! EVER!

Well, thanks to an intervention from Movie Buddy ’98 (yes, we’ve known each other that long) I finally saw Crazy Heart and it was good without being excessive Oscar bait. We’ve seen the story of the broken down “your job of choice here” who, in the twilight of their career/life meets a younger person who affects them for the better. Like say, Up In The Air, the “narcissist who discovers themselves” is never, ever new, just a matter of how well it’s done and this is done pretty well without them going over-the-top with it. Though an alcoholic, Bridges is a functioning one and while he may not perform a gig perfectly, he doesn’t miss them because he’s passed out drunk in an alcoholic stupor or get someone hurt the way a less clumsy film would have done for the sake of drama, which is one of the fears that kept me from seeing it over the past four months. But it’s gonna take more than one person to make me see Precious.

SLOW HAND

Somewhere down the line, Timothy Olyphant joined my mancrush list so I was supremely happy to see he’d not only be on TV again , but on a show I’d actually like to watch. Sorry, Deadwood fans, but it just wasn’t to my tastes. I left when Wild Bill died. Also, shows about US Marshals tend to be good, from the incredibly underrated The Marshall with Jeff Fahey, to currently, In Plain Sight. Like those two, Justified continues the tradition of modern TV marshals being smart with a dry wit. This time around Olyphant is a marshal from Kentucky who is sent back there after he kills a man in Miami that he literally told to “get out of town” like a marshal of yesteryear. Back in Kentucky he’s pitted against and old acquaintance who is now a Neo-Nazi criminal, but despite appearances it not dumb. More than anyone he knows why the marshal tends to shoot people. Again, no one is stupid and that goes a long way with me. Too often everyone around our hero is made to look dumb or incompetent so he can look better, not apparently realizing if everyone is smart and competent he looks just that much better when he succeeds. My only problem here is the use of “down home” southern accents and speech patterns, especially on the potential love interest. The actress isn’t up to the task making her scenes painful to watch, like a Minnesota high school production of Cat on a Hot Tin Roof. But it’s only first episode and I enjoyed it enough to hope it will only get better as most shows do from their pilots.

YOU ARE WHAT YOU EAT…YOU FAT PIECE OF SPRITE SOAKED PIZZA

I didn’t mean to watch Jamie Oliver’s Food Revolution but it seemed to be destiny as I was eating a frozen pizza (on which I had placed extra cheese) while drinking soda. Yes, we are a nation of fat, fat bastards and it’s our own fault. I could have gotten a freshly made pizza from the Amish Market, but this was on-sale. This is why the soda tax makes sense to me. No sale, no soda in my house. Except the shit I get from work. Though sometimes I swear, I’d have Sprite running from the faucets if I could. Wait. Where was I? Oh, yeah…Yes, the key is taking the time to make the things you like. Pizza and hamburgers aren’t bad, per se, but a freshly made one is infinitely better than one you get out of your frozen food section or from McDonald’s. And if you could make your own crust and bread… But there’s the rub. Who the hell has time!?! There’s a lot of internet to be surfed. Not to mention, no one likes being told they’re totally wrong in how they live their lives, which is what he was essentially doing. Doesn’t matter that he’s right and Fat-Ass, USA was wrong. He’s got an English accent and they need to change. Of course they were going to fight him even though those sad bastards were feeding kids pizza and chocolate milk for breakfast. What. The Fuck. On what planet is that right!?! It also means more work, because to feed the kids better, more of the food would have to be freshly made. Easy to say, but you’re not on the kitchen staff who, used to warming up chicken patties for 450 kids, now has to prepare chicken fresh for 450 kids. And you’re in your 60’s. It shouldn’t be getting harder, but easier. I mean, 99% of the reason I don’t cook more is because I don’t have a dishwasher and cooking means cleaning. Whereas frozen shit means eating it on the container it came in. No mess, no fuss. And honestly, isn’t Sprite amazing? But I need to do something, as despite the semi-regular working out, I’m still threatening to get “the belly line.” You know, that line under your gut right before your crotch completing the circle of your jelly belly? It’s coming. Know why? ‘Cause Sprite is amazing. Especially after nachos.

NICK AT NITE AWARDS TAKE ANOTHER HIT

Peter Graves and Fess Parker in one week? Clearly Death wants all her favorite old TV stars. And I’m still pissed they dicked over Peter Graves’ Mission Impossible character in the movie with Tom Cruise. Show some fucking respect.