1. Megamind/Paramount Wknd/$ 30.1 Total/$ 89.8
2. Unstoppable/Fox Wknd/$ 23.5 Total/$ 23.5
3. Due Date/Warners Wknd/$ 15.5 Total/$ 59.0
4. Skyline/Universal Wknd/$ 11.7 Total/$ 11.7
5. Morning Glory/Paramount Wknd/$ 9.6 Total/$ 9.6
6. For Colored Girls/Lions Gate Wknd/$ 6.8 Total/$ 30.9
7. Red/Summit Wknd/$ 5.1 Total/$ 79.8
8. Paranormal Activity 2/Parmount Wknd/$ 3.1 Total/$ 82.0
9. Saw 3D/LionsGate Wknd/$ 2.8 Total/$ 43.5
10. Jackass 3D/Parmount Wknd/$ 2.3 Total/$114.7
SORRY, BUT YOU CAN’T HEAR “PRETTY BOY” IN A VOICE
Megamind holds the number one slot and again, the difference between Pixar and films like this is that the characters come first and the actors come second. The Incredibles is ten times the film this is, but not because Craig Nelson and Jason Lee are ten times the actors Will Ferrell and Brad Pitt are (Holly Hunter, however, is ten times the actor anyone in this film is), but because they hired him solely to fit the role, because no one, not even Craig T. Nelson is going to see a film because Craig T. Nelson is in it, so he had to fit the role. People, however, do follow Will Ferrell, Brad Pitt and Tina Fey, so the role will be changed to fit them. This is not to say Brad Pitt isn’t a good comedic actor. He is. He has excellent timing, but you wouldn’t know that from the small role he winds up having here and you wouldn’t know how small the role is by his presence in the promotion. Might as well have saved the money and gotten John Hamm for it.
RUNAWAY TRAIN NEVER COMING BACK
Unstoppable opens at number two and if you can get one older established star and pair him with one upcoming star and they have actual chemistry, then you should have a license to print money. The key to The Rock wasn’t its by-the-numbers plot, but the chemistry between Sean Connery and Nicholas Cage. It’s why it’s still fun to watch at 2:00 am on TBS. Well, Denzel Washington is hitting the Sean Connery phase of his career where he needs some younger buster to help him out and in this case it’s the Man-Who-Would-Be-Kirk, Chris Pine and fortunately they do have chemistry, but it’s sad that it’s not in a better movie. Sorry, but runaway trains are joke to me. It’s a freaking train. You know exactly where it is and where it’s going and stopping one is so blatantly obvious you have to spend the first 85 minutes of this movie dutifully sucking on stupid juice to accept that it doesn’t occur to anyone to do just that until minute number 86. But it’s Tony Scott at the helm, so checking your brain at the door becomes a requirement. The script is as simplistic as it gets. Chris Pine is the rookie going into the family business while Denzel is the old hand being pushed out the door. They’re paired together for the first time on a day where everything that can go wrong does go wrong. There’s a hint Pine’s character didn’t want to go into the family business but wanted something else with his life, but we don’t have time for that. What we do have time for is his estrangement from his wife, setting us up for her watching him be a hero on TV, thus reconciling. How this will magically erase the problems that caused the rift is not explained. Perhaps the cheapest technique is that all of this is being covered by the news, so aside from the audience cheering for them we have other characters in the cheering for them as the media explains what heroes they are and when you should cheer, because the movie assumes you wouldn’t have known this otherwise.
SORRY, BUT “RAY II” IS PRETTY MUCH IMPOSSIBLE
Due Date is down to number three and if I didn’t dislike Jamie Foxx so much I’d feel sorry for him. Oscar Winner for Best Actor a few years ago when all Robert Downey Jr. could do was get fucking arrested and now, third lead behind Zack fucking Galifianakis. In a comedy no less, which is supposed to be what he’s good at. Like I said, if I didn’t dislike him so much I’d feel sorry for him, but since I do…HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!
WHERE’S WILL SMITH WHEN YOU NEED HIM?
Skyline opens at number four and normally this would have been the first on my things to do this weekend. Big, dumb alien invasion movie. I’m there. But something happened on the way to heaven and I had to weigh out the three movies I wanted to see this weekend vs…working out. Sigh. Yeah. I know. The 14-year-old inside me screamed with frustration, but he can still look down and see his feet after eating a bag of doughnuts. Me, not so much and I don’t even get the doughnuts. Besides, the cast is nothing C-listers and some of the worst. Erick Balfour? Are you kidding me? This dude is synonymous with crap. He peaked as the druggie boyfriend from the first season of Six Feet Under. And Brittney Daniels? Again, peaked as one of the Sweet Valley High twins, now specializing as “The White Girl” in otherwise Black productions (she’s boning Keenan Ivory Wayans). And Donald Faison, we love you Turk/Murray from Scrubs/Clueless, but saving the world from alien invaders? I buy you as much as I’d buy Zach Braff. Then there’s the little matter that part of the crew was working on the bigger, better “aliens invade LA” movie, Battleground L.A. and the trailer for that is nothing short of awesome. Clearly you don’t feel the need to hedge your bets like that if you think you’ve got the winning horse.
HAN SOLO VS. ANNIE HALL WHILE REGINA GEORGE SIGHS HEAVILY
Morning Glory opens at number five and this so much wasted potential it’s not even funny. Aside from the all-star cast of Diane Keaton, Harrison Ford and my beloved Rachel McAdams, the idea of a young producer being given the lowest rated morning show on network TV who forces an acclaimed newsman onto it where he fights with the perky longtime host (whom he once slept with) should have been easy, comedic gold. This is more like bronze. And it fails for the same reason the character succeeds at her job: going shallow. She doesn’t improve the show’s ratings by bringing a unique mixture of quality and fun, but just cheap stunts. This doesn’t throw the slightest bit of shading to its characters. Rachel McAdams had a father who utterly believed in her and a mother who makes it clear she does not. Then she gets a type of surrogate parentage in Diane Keaton and Harrison Ford…and they do nothing with it. Even though Harrison Ford actually brings up her daddy issues! Harrison Ford’s character is there because he lost his prime news desk. Why? We never find out. There’s a romance with Patrick Wilson, but it’s so shallow he might as well be called “Love Interest” he’s so ill defined as a person. And once again, any show that deals with conventional media that shows so little respect for the internet is clearly clueless. There’s a one-line mention of YouTube and that’s it. Bright spot: multiple shots of Rachel McAdams’s exceptional-for-a-white-girl ass in panties. Don’t know what they fed her in Canada, but it works. I guess that’s why they call it “back” bacon.
ONE STEP FORWARD, TWO STEPS BACK
For Colored Girls is down to number six and for better or worse this will turn a profit. For better, because when was the last time a movie starring half a dozen black women made money (hell, when was the last time you saw a movie starring half-a-dozen black women)? Worse, because, well, it’s Tyler Perry.
ETC
RED is down to number seven, followed by Paranormal Activity 2 at number eight and Saw 3D at number nine.
YOU ONLY WISH THIS WAS THE END
Finally Jackass 3D closes out the top ten and yes, there’s going to be another one.
CLOTHES MAKE THE MAN…BROKE
I need a boot intervention as just a few weeks after buying my last pair, I bought another. But they’re beautiful! They’re gray suede Converse boots. Yeah, I know, but they’re actually awesome. I didn’t mean to buy them, I swear. I was actually looking for winter sneakers (aka, leather sneakers, as opposed to summertime canvas) which were on-sale at Macys and I had coupon which means I was going to make a killing. But of course when you’re average fucking sized like I am, everything your size (in the color you want) is the first thing to go in a sale. So, I’m about to leave when I look to see if these boots are on-sale and voila! They are. Only $10 off, but then I add my coupon to it and it’s $20, which then puts them only $10 above what I was willing to spend on winter sneakers anyway. Of course when you make one significant purchase little ones seem acceptable so, I continued on my quest undo my parents’ obsession with buying me everything in a large no matter how many times I tell them “medium.” I’m convinced because your parents spent a lifetime constantly having to buy you larger and larger clothing, they’re convinced you won’t stop. Of course it’s not all them. I too was guilty of buying clothes a size too large because I was looking at the comfort level and not at the fact it made me look sloppy. But just remember: when shopping from places like H&M and Uniqlo, you have to go a size larger, because we’re a bunch of fat fucks compared to Europe and Asia. I learned that the hard way with my underwear. Also replacing a lot of that…
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