PRETTY AS A PICTURE

1. The Roommate/SGems Wknd/$ 15.6 Total/$ 15.6

2. Sanctum/Universal Wknd/$ 9.2 Total/$ 9.2

3. No Strings Attached/Paramount Wknd/$ 8.4 Total/$ 51.8

4. The King’s Speech/Weinstein Wknd/$ 8.3 Total/$ 84.1

5. The Green Hornet/Sony Wknd/$ 6.1 Total/$ 87.2

6. The Rite/Warners Wknd/$ 5.6 Total/$ 23.7

7. The Mechanic/CBS Wknd/$ 5.4 Total/$ 20.1

8.True Grit/Paramount Wknd/$ 4.8 Total/$148.4

9. The Dilemma/Universal Wknd/$ 3.4 Total/$ 45.7

10. Black Swan/FoxS Wknd/$ 3.4 Total/$ 95.9

SINGLE WHITE COED

The Roommate opens at number one and when I was a boy it was called Single White Female and because you hired actual actors instead of pretty starlets they didn’t have to look exactly alike to begin with. If you do that then where’s the transformation to indicate the descent into psychosis? In the meantime, somewhere Blake Lively is pissed off that she wasn’t the first Gossip Girl cast member to have a #1 as the star.

SPELUNKING SHOULD BE A TERM OF ONLY THE NASTIEST SEX

Sanctum opens at number two and really, without underground monsters to fight, who the hell wants to see a movie about spelunking? With no stars no less!?!

SHE SAID THE SAME ABOUT JOEL SILVER SO YOU KNOW SHE’S RIGHT

No Strings Attached is down to number two and also in this as Ashton Kutcher’s dad is Kevin Kline, which I think is a nice casting move. You get a clear reason where the character’s height and good looks come from. Kline is clearly repaying director Ivan Reitman for Dave, one of the few good movies Reitman has made without Harold Ramis or Bill Murray. His rep is build on movies like Meatballs, Stripes and Ghostbusters, but without them you get Kindergarten Cop, Twins, Junior, Father’s Day, Six Days Seven Nights, My Super Ex-Girlfriend, etc. Big stars with little laughs. In her book, “You’ll Never Eat Lunch In This Town Again” the late Julia Phillips called him “another businessman pretending to be an artist” and she was right.

MOVIES FOR THE LOWEST COMMON DENOMINATOR

The King’s Speech is down to number four, followed by The Green Hornet at number five and also in this is Christopher Waltz who won an Oscar just last year for Inglorious Basterds. But like Cameron Diaz’s presence, you wouldn’t know it from the advertising. They’re aiming for the odd audience that is interested in neither tall blondes nor talented actors. Strangely, that makes sense for a Seth Rogen movie. They know they aren’t getting laid and don’t want to think.

THE MAN WAS HAWKEYE PIERCE FOR GOD’S SAKE!

The Rite is down to number six, followed by The Mechanic at number seven and Donald Sutherland’s career long ago became supporting the younger leading man actually carrying the movie as far back as Ordinary People with Timothy Hutton on through A Time To Kill with Matthew McConughey, but showing up just to die to propel the movie is just sad. For half a second I expected Mark Walberg to show up in a mini cooper.

DO YOU EVEN KNOW THE LYRICS TO U.N.I.T.Y? DIDN’T THINK SO.

True Grit is down to number eight, followed by The Dilemma at number nine and also in this is Queen Latifah and exactly what is her continued stardom based on? Outside of Chicago she has no real movie hits, her rap career was a loooong time ago and she never enjoyed the success of say, LL Cool J. Living Single? Was it that successful, because I never watched it after the first episode? Somewhere along the line she became famous simply because she was famous.

THE “IN THE BLACK” SWAN

Finally, Black Swan closes out the top ten at number ten and can you believe this thing is about to hit $100M? I didn’t care for it, but it’s returns like these which keep indie film alive $95M for a $13M film means everyone gets cheese on their Whopper and another few works get the green light in hopes of the same high reward for low risk.

GIRLS ON FILM! AND BRIDGES! AND TATTOOED FREAKS!

So, we always talk about the artistic opportunities constantly available in NYC but the truth is we rarely indulge in them. They’ve always been there and will always be here, so we take for granted being able to see it at our leisure. This is how I missed the Gustav Klimt exhibit at the Jewish Museum a few years back. I kept telling myself I’d go see it and then…it was gone. This weekend, however, I continued to make good on one of the two New Year’s Resolutions I made get out more to see some kind of art in the city (the other was get more sleep and I think we all know that was a big failure). I went to see Amel Larrieux at the Blue Note two weeks back and this weekend went to see an exhibit of the photography of Mark Seliger at a gallery on 23^rd street for his book “Listen.” You know his work best from Rolling Stone or GQ or Vanity Fair and he even did a whole book on Lenny Kravitz (he did the shot of Kravitz in the red paint)…which is odd. The recent Glee cover of Rolling Stone? Him. Kim Kardashian on the cover of “W” in silver paint? Him. Katie Holmes trying to look like Jackie Kennedy on the cover of New York Magazine? Him. That “nip/tuck” poster with the girl with sutures up her back that you didn’t know was based on a real person? Him. Brittney Spears for Candie’s ads? Um, yeah. Him too. Gotta pay the bills. Any multi-star Vanity Fair photoshoot? If it wasn’t Annie Lebowitz, it was him. And while we all take pictures of the Brooklyn Bridge or skyline of NYC, it’s the artistry of photography, which makes his photos of the same better, unique, allowing you to see things you never saw before. Of course my favorite shot was of the naked woman with her legs spread, but that’s neither here nor there. There’s still a gorgeous shot of abandoned bridge supports in New Jersey totally validating all I’ve said. All the photography is in glorious black & white lending credence to what Goddard or Truffaut said about color “being” a distraction. And you know how in the movies when our artist hero is an art gallery and two gorgeous, dark and “artsy-looking” women walk in? I can never say that’s just Hollywood fantasy again, because that’s exactly what happened. See, this is why “Californication” exists. Some dude’s fantasy about what would happen if he had a classic “hip” novel and looked like David Duchovny and was in an art gallery and two hot artsy babes walked in. Me, I have no novel, don’t look like Duchovny and was wearing a Superman shirt, so I just left and went down to Chelsea Market to have hot chocolate. ‘Cause that’s how I roll bitchez!

FASTER PUSSYCAT, DIE, DIE

Tura Santana, star of Russ Meyer films like the classic, Faster Pussycat, Kill Kill died yesterday and up until I read her obit I had no idea she was Asian going against that demure bullshit stereotype all along. Represent, sista!

SUPER WHATEVER

So another Super Bowl has come and gone and while I kinda wanted the Steelers to win because my mom has always been a Steelers fan and I like the hold Brett Farve held over Green Bay, I like the fact that serial sex offender Rothlesberger didn’t win. Also, when you turn the ball over three times, get bad calls that go your way and the Packers lose one of their strongest defensive players and you still can’t score, you don’t deserve to win. I pretty much ignored the awful-as-usual halftime show to rewatch the Captain America commercial over and over again and it’s still miscast. Best commercial of the night? Sorry, but it’s Eminem standing up for Detroit showing you can shill for an evil corporation and still maintain your dignity. Not that Danica Patrick would know anything about that with those damn Go Daddy spots. And yes, we all love the kid Darth Vader Volkswagen commercial.