Box Office: Cowboys, Smurfs, Soldiers, Aliens, Beginners
Monday, August 1, 2011 at 9:28AM Confession: I loved The Smurfs when I was young though I knew that they drew scorn from many corners. I would sing "la la laLALALA la la la la la" loudly whenever I wanted to annoy my older brother. That said, the movie looked a-tro-cious so I felt roughly zero in the way of nostalgic pull. I don't know how you cast talents as comedically strong as Hank Azaria and Neil Patrick Harris and then rely on fart jokes but apparently they did since "Who smurfed?" is supposed to be a joke therein. I was discussing this on Twitter last night with strangers lamenting that their kids liked it and Miyazaki would have to wait. I just returned from a vacation week with close friends and their children (including my goddaughter) and I'm happy to report that Miyazaki is well loved by the tween / early teen set. So there's hope for all disheartened parents of toddlers out there! Some of your children will grow out of their bad taste. Some of them won't and will grow up to rush to movies like Zookeeper wtih Kevin James on opening weekend. It's not the end of the world. It only feels like it to the devoted cinephile.
Weekend Showdown. Cowboys vs. Tiny Blue Aliens
box office top ten
01 COWBOYS AND ALIENS new $36.4
02 THE SMURFS new $35.6
03 CAPTAIN AMERICA: THE FIRST AVENGER [review] $25.5 (cumulative $117.4)
04 HARRY POTTER AND THE DEATHLY HALLOWS PART TWO [review] $21.9 (cum $318.5)
05 CRAZY STUPID LOVE [your take] new $19.1
06 FRIENDS WITH BENEFITS $9.2 (cum $38.1)
07 HORRIBLE BOSSES $7.1 (cum $96.2)
08 TRANSFORMERS: DARK OF THE MOON $6 (cum $338)
09 ZOOKEEPER $4.3 (cum $68.8)
10 CARS 2 $2.3 (cum $182.1)
Items of Note: HP 7.2 passed the difficult $300 million barrier domestically and the even rarer billion mark globally placing it at the #2 position for 2011 just behind #1s Transformers 3 (domestic) and Pirates of the Caribbean 4 (global). Given that "It All Ends!" has only been in release for two weeks, it'll easy defeat both of those films any day now. In ten days Captain America has earned about $116 here in its home country which means its already falling behind Thor despite a similar opening weekend draw. Thor was an even bigger hit across the Atlantic which doesn't seem likely for Cappy due to his homeland hero specificity. Cars 2 is running out of fuel, and may become the first Pixar release since A Bug's Life to fall short of $200 million domestically. Ah well, they'll always have their merchandising bonanza. Wasn't that the whole point of the sorry film to begin with?
other films we thought we'd check in on...
18 SARAH'S KEY $.3 (cum. $.5)
20 THE TREE OF LIFE [overheard / thoughts] $.3 (cum. $11.6)
25 BEGINNERS [review] $.2 (cum. $5)
39 THE DEVIL'S DOUBLE new $.09
53 THE FUTURE new $.02
Sarah's Key a Holocaust drama starring TFE favorite Kristin Scott Thomas has been surprisingly robust with ticket sales thus far at only 33 theaters. Should we have been considering this one long ago?
I included The Devil's Double and The Future because I missed critics screenings but I'm totally curious about both (would love to hear your thoughts if you've seen them). Plus, we hadn't checked in on the lower ranks of the charts in some time. Terrence Malick's The Tree of Life, keeps puttering along in arthouses (widest release peaked at 237 theaters) and it might even eventually gross as much as the first two days of Zookeeper (!) which, as one friend soberly notes, '...is why we can't have nice things.'
'Sarah's Key' and 'Beginners' are arthouse hits
Beginners has been a small and sturdy arthouse attraction itself, roughly akin to Winter's Bone at this point in its life (2 months) in terms of both gross and theater count. But can a 5 million grosser summon up enough energy to grow legs and stride through the often brutal precursor awards season without, one presumes, a lead performance and director with similar awards hopeful traction? Do you think Christopher Plummer has a good shot still or did the film need to catch on with more fervor for what might be a lone supporting bid?
Reader Comments (12)
I did see Sarah's Key on the weekend, and it's not bad at all. Some of the ancilliary plot details were not particularly needed (e.g. KST's marital problems), but her research into the 1942 raids on the Parisian Jewish community, and particularly the scenes set in 1942, were quite good. I don't see it as being award material on this side of the Atlantic, though...maybe at the Césars.
I'm also interested in both The Future and The Devil's Double. I've seen the trailers for both in fairly heavy rotation, and it's the trailer which has sold me on TDD. For The Future, though, the trailer has sort of turned me off of it. However, I can tell there's a lot more there than we see in the trailer, so that makes me want to actually see it. (Besides, I want to compare Paw Paw the cat with Arthur in Beginners.)
The best superhero movie for me is X Men, but that was easy, it's the only one I've seen. I really doubt any other one in that list can beat that McCavoy/Fassbender duo. I must say that all these superhero movies and the talk about superheroes fatigue has made me realized I liked Batman more than I thought. That said, I think it must be close to a cinematic crime hiring Hardy, probably the most lusciuous male lips in a while and make him wear that thing hiding them (http://justjared.buzznet.com/2011/07/30/tom-hardy-on-set-as-bane-for-the-dark-knight-rises/?ref=topposts). Could that be considered playing against type? :)
I think the picture you posted, Craig from the back, which is probably the movie's best asset beats Katie Perry dressed as smurfette (at the premiere) any time. And I'm not alone, I saw Harrison Ford commenting that outfit (Craig's) in an interview with one of the Jimmys. Btw, it's a pity his sense of humour in interviews has never translated into a (really) good comedic role.
If I could SHOUT a vote, it would be choice #5....
I sort of vaguely get how someone could dislike miranda July, but not really.
I adore her. And The Future was gorgeous, self-deprecating, progressively weirdly poetic fun.
The Smurfs movie looks absolutely horrible. I wasn't a die hard Smurfs watcher when I was a kid but I did have some fond memories of the series; this film destroys them.
I can't help but feel that Sarah's Key is not really worth checking out... It's a Holocaust drama based on a popular acclaimed (I think) novel starring a previous Oscar nominee and noted Serious Actress (TM) being distributed by The Weinstein Company. And yet, it's not being released in the height of Oscar Season. The Weinsteins aren't stupid, so I think that if they thought it was really that good, they would have released it later in the year than this.
And as for those damned superhero movies, Captain America was the "best" as a movie, but the one I enjoyed the most (God help me) was Green Lantern. This may or may not have been due to the hotness that is Ryan Reynolds and the fact that he was either wearing a tank top or nothing at all for very nearly the entire movie. And the fact that I prefer my superhero movies more comic book-y and not actually "good" for reasons I can't accurately describe.
"Sarah's Key" was out in Australia last year and did nicely enough for a WWII drama, but yeesh - that ending! Abominable. Don't expect any awards play.
As for best superhero movie? THOR! THOR! THOR! Although, I do suspect that "Captain America" will play better on repeat DVD viewings simply because so much of the "Thor" enjoyment came from those wacky sets and costumes plastered upon the big screen and lacquered in gold.
"The Future"? I saw that tonight at a local film festival and... okay, it's not that great. I found the opening half quite frustrating, although the second half works better due to it actually being about something. However, it caused that really unfortunate feeling of making me want to go back and watch "Me & You & Everyone We Know" to find out if it's really as good as I thought it was back in 2005 or if I was just imagining things? I tend to think that some of the apathy towards "The Future" is more a result of American indie quirk overload. And yet, I loved "Tiny Furniture" when I saw it last week so... who knows, yeah?
LOVE the Photoshopping, Nathaniel.
I'm just happy that I enjoyed all of the superhero films I saw this summer. I think I would've been more fatigues if I didn't. Now I had high expectations for X-Men and while it didn't meet them, the chemistry of McAvoy/Fassbender made up for that. Thor and Captain America I had NO expectations and was pleasantly surprised how wonderful they were. I chose to skip Green Lantern. I guess I'm a Marvel dude.
I knew a Smurfs movie existed but had no idea it was opening this weekend. This has happened a couple times this year now - movies I was barely aware of opening to #1. I think the last one was Hop. I'm not the target audience, obviously, but it always weirds me out when a movie I didn't even know was opening not only opens, but does so at #1.
I didn't see anything this weekend - which means I gotta do Bridemaids and Beginners this week or else risk the indignity of being forced to wait until dvd (NOOOOOO!).
" I could SHOUT a vote, it would be choice #5...."
Ditto, Robert; thanks for saying it! (Somebody has to.)
Roark -- i'm sure bridesmaids is much better when you see it with a crowd -- as all good comedies are -- so do an evening show.
I LOVED July's first movie, "You and Me and Everyone we Know". i LOVED her book with a similar prounoun heavy title. I was really looking forward to "The Future" at teh SFIFF.
but it blowed. honestly. i'm sorry to have to report it. She was so sweet and vunerable afterward, but honestly, the movie was crap. The hokey narrating cat? My nomination for the worse movie ?element ?plot device of the year. by far.