HBO: The "B" Stands For Bening

JA from MNPP here - while it's still quite a ways off from being a thing sitting in front of our eyeballs, if indeed it ever does, I figure this is the sort of news that the TFE readership wouldn't want to miss: Annette Bening might be headlining a series for HBO. Deadline's reporting that The Bening, as she's known round these parts, is looking at a series called The Third Coast, about "a larger than life casting director in New Mexico," that would be directed by Jay Roach and was written by Paul Rudnick.

Roach got his start with the Austin Powers movies before moving on to the Fockers series and then more recently making that memorable back-to-back pair of political powerhouses for HBO, Recount and Game Change. Meanwhile Paul Rudnick wrote Addams Family Values, and that is everything. (Seriously though, Rudnick's "Libby Gelman-Waxner" character for Premiere Magazine back in the Nineties was formative for this writer.)

If we're not already past the tipping point in mourning the flight of serious actors to the smaller screen I think we ought to be - an opportunity to check in with The Bening on a weekly basis, doing her thing, doesn't sound too shabby to these ears.

What Did You See This Weekend: Wolvie or Jasmine?

Amir here, bringing you this weekend’s box office report. Hit by superhero fatigue (more specifically ‘X-Men fatigue’ or even more specifically ‘Hugh Jackman as Wolverine’ fatigue) and feeling generally uninterested in most of the weekend’s leftover offerings, I spent the past couple of days at home catching up with some classics. The rest of North America felt differently, rushing to see Jackman’s sixth outing as the adamantium-clawed hero to help it to a total gross of 55 million dollars. Box office analysts suggest this number is well below the expectations but considering that with the international gross, The Wolverine has already surpassed its entire production budget in three days, it is well beyond the limits of my understanding how that is not considered a success.

BOX OFFICE

01 THE WOLVERINE $55 *NEW* 
02 THE CONJURING $22.1 (cum. $83.8)
03 DESPICABLE ME 2 $16 (cum. $306.4) 
04 TURBO $13.3 (cum. $55.7)
05 GROWN UPS 2 $11.5 ($101.6)
06 RED 2 $9.4 (cum. $35)
07 PACIFIC RIM $7.5 (cum. $84) 
08 THE HEAT $6.8 (cum. $141.2) Review
09 R.I.P.D. $5.8 (cum. $24.3)
10 FRUITVALE STATION $4.6 (cum. $6.3) Review
11 THE WAY WAY BACK $3.3 (cum. $8.9)
12 WORLD WAR Z $2.7 (cum. $192.6) Review

The weekend’s other wide release is the virginity comedy called The To-Do List. Not helped by the generally negative critical response, Aubrey Plaza and co. sold less than two million dollars worth of tickets and debuted outside the top ten, surely a failure by all measures. On the other hand, The Conjuring continued its strong run and proved once again that horror films are the most consistently profitable genre in today’s cinema. Meanwhile, Fruitvale Station added more than 1000 screens and The Way, Way Back nearly 600, and they were both rewarded with strong returns, allowing them to finish at 10th and 11th respectively.

The real story of the weekend, however, was in the tiny release of Blue Jasmine. Those of us not lucky enough to live in NY and LA will have to wait at least a week to see it, but Woody Allen’s latest opened to an astonishing 102k/screen average on six screens, surpassing the screen average of the widely successful Midnight in Paris. It’s probably a bit much to expect a similar final tally for Jasmine, but the signs are all good so far.

What did you see this weekend? (If you are as uninspired by the top ten as I am, may I suggest the acclaimed documentary The Act of Killing or Computer Chess? See them if they’re open near you!)

Orange Is The New (Fabulous) Black

Move aside, House of Cards. There's a new reigning champ in the Netflix world. Jenji Kohan's follow up to Weeds called Orange is the New Black has earned the designation of being the strongest television debut of the year. The series about an upper class woman Piper Chapman (Taylor Schilling) whose life is derailed by a prison sentence for a drug mule crime committed in her wilder (lesbian) youth. It features strong, multi-layered female characters, a solid dramatization of the source material and one of the best ensembles from any medium in 2013.

Nathaniel will touch on the series more soon but here are some things I, Beau, enjoyed about it as well as some 'room for improvement' items from its first season. [more...]

Click to read more ...

Woody Allen - The Last 12 Years

Podcast mate and friend Joe Reid polled several critics (including myself) for an article at Tribeca Film detailing Woody Allen's recent output as the critical hit Blue Jasmine hits theaters. I won't be able to see the new entry in his filmography until Sunday since I'm in Chicago for the weekend and limited release films only believe in Los Angeles and New York for their coming out balls. But since I took the time to write Joe notes on each film for this collective list, I thought I'd share them. I regret to inform that in doing this I have just been reminded that my proud familiar refrain "I've never missed a Woody Allen movie in the theater since I saw my first one in 1984!" is not technically true anymore. This article forced me to recall that I did not see and still have not seen Cassandra's Dream (2007) ... though I can't honestly remember why. Have you? 

Here's my ranking from worst to best of Mr Allen's recent work if you'd like to compare it to the consensus list at Tribeca. I've also included their Rotten Tomatoes percentage and box office gross just for survey perspective. 

Click to read more ...

Weekend Relaxation with Gregory and Ava

Glenn here and it's Friday afternoon! Time for some weekend rest and relaxation, wouldn't you say? It sure would be nice to travel back in time and put my feet up with Gregory Peck and Ava Gardner on the Australian set of On the Beach. How about you?