LOVE IS THE DRUG AND I NEED TO SCORE

1. Harry Potter & The Deathly Hallows Wknd/$ 50.3 Total/$220.4

2. Tangled/Disney Wknd/$ 49.1 Total/$ 69.0

3. Megamind/Paramount Wknd/$ 12.9 Total/$130.5

4. Burlesque/ScreenGems Wknd/$ 11.8 Total/$ 17.2

5. Unstoppable/Fox Wknd/$ 11.8 Total/$ 60.7

6. Love & Other Drugs/Fox Wknd/$ 9.9 Total/$ 14.0

7. Faster/CBS Wknd?$ 8.7 Total/$ 8.7

8. Due Date/Warners Wknd/$ 7.3 Total/$ 85.0

9. The Next Three Days/Lions Gate Wknd/$ 4.8 Total/$ 14.6

10. Morning Glory/Paramount Wknd/$ 4.0 Total/$ 26.5

GET HAIRY

Harry Potter holds at number one, with Tangled opening at number two and I actually didn’t mind this so much which is saying a lot given they utterly hid the fact IT’S A MUSICAL! I’m not a fan of musicals to begin with and seriously cannot stand animated musicals. One of the reasons Pixar is so great is that they’ve never made that part of their formula. But Pixar had some input on this and it shows despite being as typical as it gets. You know, beautiful princess, evil stepmother---okay, not so much a step-mother as woman-who-stole-her-at-birth, but Rapunzel thinks she’s her mother and she’s evil, not just in the obvious ways, but in a non-stop display of passive aggressiveness (put-downs followed by “I love you”) that would seem cruel even to the stepmother of Snow White. But at the same time, it’s their refusal to try and be too modern and hip that makes this superior to something like Megamind. It’s got the perfect mixture of modern sensibilities and old-fashioned hokum. Sometimes you just want a movie about a princess who lives happily ever after to be just that. Enough winking at the audience over how silly these old fairy tales are. They’ve survived for a reason. The whole satire thing only worked once with Shrek anyway (unfortunately there were four movies).

TERABYTES AIN’T FREE!

Megamind is down to number three and believe it or not, this just made budget domestically and only has made $30M overseas. Not quite the success it seems to be. People can’t seem to understand all the computers that make this stuff cost money.

THE GAYEST NIGHT OF MY LIFE DENIED!

Burlesque opens at number four and this looks like an amazingly bad fun movie on the level of a new Showgirls (though with people possessing talent somewhere). I had plans to go see it drunk in Chelsea, which would have been perfect. Unfortunately the person I planned it with bailed but made me promise not to see it without her. Sigh. This is why I retired the whole “Movie Buddy” concept.

LOVE IS THE DRUG AND I NEED TO SCORE

Unstoppable is down to number five, followed by Love & Other Drugs opening at number six and this is best known as “The Movie Where Jake Gyllenhaal and Anne Hathaway Get Naked” neither of which is the whole truth, because no one would have been interested in a movie about “Drug Salesman & A Young Woman with Parkinson’s.” This is probably why they double wrapped it in a satire about the pharmaceutical industry and a romantic comedy drama. Unfortunately they simply do not mix. At least not in the way this would like to mix them. The best you can say about it is that they don’t spring it on you inside the film. We know Anne Hathaway has Parkinson’s even before we see her face, which is different from most “Beautiful Girl With Incurable Disease That Doesn’t Affect Her Looks” movies, which only bring it up in the second act as something that either happens to her of “The Secret She’s Been Hiding From Him.” Like Gyllenhaal, we know going in this will not end well. The question is, are we going to stick with it? Well, we in the audience don’t have choice and I was counting the minutes once we got to the point where Gyllenhaal decided he was suddenly going to find a cure for her. And never, not once do we touch on the irony of a pharma rep looking for an actual cure since that’s not how the business works. We’re so detached from the initial set up we don’t even see him easily getting her the medication she needs that his company makes that he mentioned the first time he meets her! Instead we are subjected to the type of scene the actors get wet over and the audience dread where we see the disease’s full effect on her. And by full, I mean she’s still beautiful but shakes a little more than usual and cries. Then in more acting masturbatory fantasy, she gets drunk and cries a little more, but never with a hair out of place. Yeah, it seriously lacks the courage of its convictions.

NOT ANOTHER SEQUEL TO THE FAST & THE FURIOUS

Faster opens at number seven and this is a lean, mean 70’s style action movie. Or at least it should have been, but gets unfortunately derailed by some need to show the personal lives of the people involved. The Rock---oh, I’m sorry---Dwayne Johnson gives action another shot (after failing miserably and retreating with his tail between his legs to family films) as a man out for revenge on the men who murdered his brother. On his tail are Billy Bob Thornton as a cop and some English guy as a hitman. This collision of three should be car chases and gunfights and we do get them, but what we get far too much of are scenes with Billy Bob’s home life (estranged wife, fat kid) and crazy hitman dealing with---hang on, this is a long one---his complexes of being a kid with polio who has remade himself into millionaire GQ model with a gun. You could drop his character without a single change into a comedy, starting with him talking to his therapist about not taking his meds as he leaves his car to go try and kill someone to the movie stopping to show him celebrate his marriage with him and his new wife shooting bottles in their tux and wedding gown! I get that it wants to be something more than just blood, burnouts and bullets, but you didn’t get money to make an introspective drama, much less a laughable introspective drama (did I mention the bride and groom shooting in the desert?). You got money to make an action movie. Do that first. You realize how off the reservation they’ve gotten when they use the classic action movie setting of a scene in a strip club and not show one. single. boob. I feel sorry for the teenage boys who see action movies today, because when I was a kid this was solid lock, even with a PG-13. How else are Playmates and porn stars supposed to get movie credits?

BECAUSE BEING CRAZY ACTUALLY HELPS YOU IN HOLLYWOOD

Due Date is down to number eight and also in this is Juliette Lewis. Remember her? Brad Pitt’s second girlfriend who was a bigger star than he was (Robin Givens was the first)? After blowing up huge in Cape Fear her role in Husbands & Wives made her white-hot (thanks in no small part to Woody’s own scandal). Then came the one-two punch of Strange Days---which made the huge mistake of casting her as some kind of sex symbol Ralph Finnes would be obsessed with when he’s got Angela Bassett by his side---and Natural Born Killers which pretty much speaks for itself. It was the latter which truly did her in, I feel. She just played white trash one too many times and way too vividly for anyone to ever give her another chance at anything else. It’s not simply her being at bat-shit crazy scientologist who thinks they have musical talent because that’s like a dozen people with better careers. Clearly not an obstacle. But I’m sure the ascension of Hilary Swank as the “Talented Girl Who Isn’t Pretty” didn’t help either. Oh, shut up. You know it’s true.

SUCCEED OR BE DOOMED TO KISS SETH ROGEN FOR ALL ETERNITY

The Next Three Days is down to number nine and also in this is Elizabeth Banks and clearly she’s made the leap to the A-list, working as a female lead to Ryan Reynolds, Russell Crowe, Josh Brolin and even Eddie Murphy but if she doesn’t choose her roles better than this, The Uninvited and Zack & Miri Make A Porno, it won’t be long before she’ll be back supporting Steve Carell. Too bad she didn’t get more notice for her smaller dramatic work like Heights where she was part of an ensemble cast, playing Glenn Close’s daughter (perfect casting when you think about it) and James Marsden’s fiancée who justifies why you should always be suspicious of men who are too pretty.

HE’LL PLAY THE JUDD HIRSCH ROLE IN THE INDEPENDENCE DAY REMAKE

Morning Glory is down to number ten and also in this is Jeff Goldblum who was the master of playing the nerdy leading man when Michael Cera, Justin Long and the cast of The Social Network were mere gleams in their father’s eyes. Maybe now that we’ve seen the long-awaited dream of a Tron sequel we can finally get that Buckaroo Banzai sequel too. And how long is it before he’s playing the father to Jesse Eisenberg anyway? He’s already started playing the “Older Cynic” role as he does here. Like Dustin Hoffman, he can start playing the father to young Jewish actors.

SURELY YOU MUST BE JOKING

Death clearly needed a laugh as it took Leslie Nielsen this week, he of the great Zucker, Abrams, Zucker movies of Airplane and The Naked Gun, which was the big screen adaptation of the Police Files series, so the next time you bitch about your favorite show being cancelled remember that 25 years ago America was too stupid to support getting The Naked Gun every week.

FOOD GLORIOUS FOOD

So, this was the year I decided to make my own Thanksgiving dinner. I get tired of playing the orphan having to haul my ass out to someone else’s home (usually outside of Manhattan) and then come back when I’m both drunk and suffering from “The Itis.” This time I’d just be able to stay home, be drunk and fall asleep. Needless to say, I called mom and asked for recipes and bless her heart she delivered, but declined to include little details like portions. She’d say “Sour cream, cheese and eggs” but would say how much of each, so for all I know I’m making a quiche of some sort. And we don’t eat quiche. I’m taking that as a voice of confidence, but the simple fact is, she’s being doing it so long, she really doesn’t know cups or teaspoons. She just “knows” how much to put in and somehow thinks I “know” through osmosis. For example: to make stuffing she told me I’d need celery and bell pepper, but not how much of either, so I just guessed and think it came out okay for the most part. Oh, shut up. I just got lucky. She still should have told me something. I started the night before with anything I’d need the oven for and wound up cooking until 4:00 am. Then I got up the next morning and started with the ham I’d bought, then the macaroni & cheese and then the turkey, while making the greens, yams and black-eye peas on the stove. Don’t ask me why I bought a bird and a pig when I didn’t plan on any guests. It just didn’t seem right without both. In total I made stuffing (from a mix, but punched up with celery & bell pepper), black eyed peas (from a can, but punched up with onions and smoked hamhock), yams (from a can), corn bread (made with leftover bacon grease), collard greens (from scratch because frozen and canned looked sketchy), macaroni & cheese (using a mix but punched up with sour cream, a pound of cheese and then baked), garlic mashed potatoes (from scratch, bitches) and of course a turkey and thank god for the internet or I wouldn’t know about making a mixture of butter and herbs and putting it both under the skin and on top. Mom only told me under and didn’t say anything about using herbs. Oh, and then there was the pie from The Little Pie Company. Because I was too lazy to walk the two blocks from work to pick one up earlier or at least order it, I had to pay their ankle-grabbling “last minute” prices which means you can only buy the large, which cost as much as the turkey and ham combined. I wish I could say it wasn’t worth it, but Sour Cream Apple Walnut with that apple crisp topping is heaven on earth. As it turns out I did have a guest, who was thankfully from Florida so the pork in the vegetables was no mystery to her (nor “The Itis”) and she even put hot sauce on the greens. Still, that left me with a ton of food leftover. I’ll definitely finish the greens, black-eye peas, macaroni & cheese, stuffing and pie, but I made three friggin’ pounds of garlic mashed potatoes and a full bird, not to mention that damn ham. It’s freezer time so I can eat some of this meal again in 2011. Hell, I may just have it around to thaw out for next Thanksgiving.

HOW ABOUT A “HIPPEST TRIP” AWARD?

One of the best nights I spent with my family was oddly around a funeral when all my cousins were gathered in a hotel room ripping apart the Soul Train Awards. That’s when I realized I was far from either the funniest or most ruthless member of my family. Since then, I tend to watch it occasionally. Last night was one such occasion…R.Kelly opens it? Jesus, have we no shame? And apparently he hasn’t missed many meals when out of the spotlight. I’m proud to say I know almost none of these songs. I’ve always hated this reedy-voiced muthafucka…Terrence Howard must also be eating well on the set of L&O: Los Angeles…I was already feeling old. I didn’t need to see Keisha-Knight Pullam aka, “Rudy” from The Cosby Show and Raven Symone as gorgeous young women…“Nothin’ On You” was the song of the summer for me, so I’m glad it won something. Funny how the black guy couldn’t make the Soul Train Awards, but whatever-the-hell-he-is Bruno Mars could…these so-called comedy routines with Terrence Howard and Taraji P. Henderson need to stop…on one hand I’m glad Nee-Yo is doing straight-up R&B. On the other hand he’s as boring as hell. I can’t believe anyone has sex to anything he does. But his dancers are killin’…a salute to Anita Baker. Okay, I love her, but she pretty much disappeared after 1990 didn’t she? And where the hell have you been Dionne Farris? The best part of this is watching Anita Baker’s reactions. That she is so touched is touching. But why does El Debarge sing “Sweet Love” her first and biggest hit? But she loves it and gets up to dance with that still pretty muthafucka…and we come back from commerical to Eric Benet hitting the high notes better than anyone we’ve seen before so far…Kim Fields is yet another example of black seriously not cracking. She’s gotta be 50 and looks 30…Eryka Badu is just too fucking pretentious for me. It’s like “What if Sting were a black woman?”…Doug E. Fresh comes out to show people how to do “The Doug E.” as we play the game “laugh at the old white guy trying to dance” the old white guy being Wolf Blitzer for some odd reason…Wolf also accepts the award Eminem wins, which may be the funniest thing you see all night…Cee-Lo comes out doing a whole Issac Hayes level of ridiculousness dressed like Ming the Merciless…SWV reunited on stage…Janelle Monae wins some odd award…I really don’t really care for Bruno Mars, but “Grenade” is tight…a tribute to Ronald Isley and say what you want about Eric Benet, he is a pretty muthatfucka and when sings “Footsteps in The Dark” every woman is up on her feet. Jeffrey Osborne, Pebo Bryson and Freddy Jackson come out to their rendition of The Isley Brothers’ rendition of England Dan & John Ford Coley’s “Summer Breeze” and all the weight everyone else has gained, Freddy Jackson lost. Then Ronald sings “Between Sheets” showing he’s still got it, but then they do that “Mr. Bigg” shit with R. Kelly and not even Cee Lo doing “Shout” can wipe away the stain.