Box Office: Cop Ladies vs. Cuddly Monsters vs. Zombie Swarms
Sunday, June 30, 2013 at 1:11PM This week's box office battle found swarms of zombies, feisty lady cops, cuddly collegiate monsters, paramilitary armies and indestructible men in Kryptonian bodysuits loudly fighting for the souls of the US moviegoer, while sacrificing their ear drums to the angry cinema gods. As incredible as it sounds, Brad Pitt's Zombie Apocalypse might be the quietest movie in the top five this week. They build the silence into the story and we thank them. Give them a Best Sound Mixing nomination as mark of gratitude, plz.
Yes, I made this title with The Heat's official 'cat font'. Don't judge.
01 MONSTERS UNIVERSITY $46.1 (cum. $171) Review
02 THE HEAT $40 *NEW* GIVEAWAY CONTEST
03 WORLD WAR Z $29.8 (cum. $123.7) Review
04 WHITE HOUSE DOWN $25.7 *NEW*
05 MAN OF STEEL $20.8 (cum. $248.6) Superheroes and National Security
04 THIS IS THE END $8.7 (cum. $74.6)
07 NOW YOU SEE ME $5.5 (cum. $104.6)
08 FAST AND FURIOUS 6 $2.4 (cum. $233.3)
09 STAR TREK INTO DARKNESS $2 (cum. $220.5) The Dumbing Down of Star Trek
10 THE INTERNSHIP $1.4 (cum. $41.7)
11 IRON MAN 3 $1.4 (cum. $405.4) Reviewed
12 THE PURGE $1.2 (cum. $62.7)
13 THE BLING RING $.8 (cum. $4.3)
14 EPIC $.8 (cum. $103)
15 BEFORE MIDNIGHT $.6 (cum. $5.7) 5 Reasons Why...
In wide release: The Heat's $40 million bow makes it the biggest opening ever for Melissa McCarthy and, more impressively, Sandra Bullock who has had a lot of sturdy opening weekends over the past two decades. (ENTER OUR GIVEAWAY CONTEST) Incredibly Iron Man 3 is still hovering near the top ten, and is now the 5th highest grossing movie of this young decade (with The Hunger Games as its next target... just 3 million away).
In limited release: Joss Whedon's quickie Much About About Nothing adaptation crossed the $2 million mark at the box office; The hot arthouse debut was Pedro Almodóvar's I'm So Excited! (ENTER OUR GIVEAWAY CONTEST) which won $100,000 on just five screens. Unfortunately without the starpower of Penélope or Antonio and with lesser reviews than Pedro tends to wins, it's unlikely that this one will do as well as usual for him; And finally Before Midnight is losing theaters rapidly now and when adjusted for ticket price inflation will be the lowest grosser in the series. I was hoping for some sort of crossover miracle but the fanbase hasn't grown or its target audiences is too lazy not to wait for DVD. (le sigh)
WHAT DID YOU SEE THIS WEEKEND?
Reader Comments (18)
It is absolutely KILLING me that Before Midnight has done so poorly. Delpy, Hawke and Linklater have been working their asses off on the press circuit, yet to no avail. What is wrong with people? I thought the Midnight In Paris-esque poster would bring in some couples who wanted a summer romantic film for a change. And it had a 95 on Metacritic! WTF. I give up. Sadly, this probably means no Best Actress nomination for Delpy. Which is a shame. Such a strong female character.
Caught a double feature of "The Heat" and "White House Down". I laughed more at the latter, and not accidentally either. I think Roland Emmerich was trying harder than ever to make a compact summer popcorn flick, and I had a blast with it. Anybody who walked into it expecting something more had expectations I don't understand in the slightest. I'd wager it's the only summer actioner I'd revisit in theaters.
As for "The Heat", I felt so much of the humor was overcooked, a major issue with broad comedies nowadays. They don't know when to let jokes lie down, and end up beating them to a pulp. It also just didn't have emotional investment in the characters that made "Bridesmaids" such a delight. Everyone's for Melissa McCarthy, but I felt Sandra Bullock was the film's stronger asset. Neither was fulfilled.
Jordan: Why not, exactly? I get the complaints of "unlikeable", but this is a series and after eighteen years of building on it (and 22 on Linklater's career as a whole, through ups (Slacker, Dazed and Confused, this series and even School of Rock), it (and he) have got to have larger Oscar crossover sometime. Maybe Boyhood, if it's not two-three hundred minutes long, even after pruning.
Bullock still paking them in at 48 is no mean feat,i can see her doing a Meryl well into her 60's.
I saw "Star Trek; Into Darkness" and enjoyed it . Zachary Quinto is perfect as Spock but I do wish they had taken the Kirk and Spock bromance a step further.
I watched White House Down and The Heat back to back. Sure, both are no Oscar contenders, but at least they know their purpose of existence, which is to stimulate the senses either with endless action and explosion, or endless silly slapstick jokes. For that, I pronounce them two good popcorn movies, two guilty pleasures. Definitely better than their clones / evil twins: Olympus Has Fallen & Miss Congeniality 2.
Speaking of The Heat, I visited their IMDb page and looked through the cast list. There is an entry (I guess it must have been intentionally) named Jessica Chaffin's Boobs playing Gina's Boobs. If this is indeed not accidental, I salute the team for trying to be as funny as they can even in this tiny little detail that most probably ended up unnoticed (seriously, how many persons out there will go through the full cast list on IMDb?).
I saw The Bling Ring for the second time. Have you seen it, Nathaniel? How about my fellow readers? I'd love to hear people's opinions on it.
Tyler - I saw it Last Saturday. It's a shallow exploration of shallow people, which is in sync with the material but didn't leave a lasting impression on me. Enjoyable film but nothing I need to revisit anytime soon.
Anyway, I skipped the movies this week - WHD & TH just looked blah - and will probably do so again until Pacific Rim.
I saw The Ring, Alfred Hitchcock's first (earliest surviving?) silent film at BAM, beautifully accompanied by a 5 piece band in the gorgeous BAM Harvey Theater. A mind-warp, with amazing dance and fight sequences and gorgeously restored. BAM, may you do your magic forever...!
I saw BEFORE MIDNIGHT today! So I did my part. :D
Sandra Bullock may have had one movie I have liked for the last 20 years in the business but I feel like she is one of those people whose career can only benefit from an Oscar win. This may be due to the fact I saw a pre-Oscar Rachel Weisz in one of the Mummy movies and marveled at how far she has come from leading lady in a C-grade blockbuster franchise to respected thespian. Needless to say I am very bullish about Sandra in Gravity.
As for the movies, I watched Auntie Mame with my grandmother like it was my duty. And I've been dealing with my Mad Men fix by re-watching the first 5 seasons on Netflix. 'You can't just go cold like that!'
And I don't know why, but I have been catching cable showings of Con-Air that have been airing constantly.
I wasn't aware of the cat font and am very thankfull that I do now
Maybe people feel unable to go see 'Before Midnight' without having seen the other two films first? After all, these aren't just sequels in name only, but a carefully developed portrait of a relationship over twenty years. Their audience might be inevitably self-limiting.
That said, I saw 'Before Sunset' before 'Before Sunrise', and it worked perfectly for me as a standalone - I suspect 'Before Midnight' would also stand on its own two feet, so give it a chance people! You won't see anything better this year!
Jeremy - Oooh, so jealous. I haven't been able to make it to any of the Hitchcok silent films at BAM so far. Hoping to make it out this week. Sounds incredible!
Re: Before Midnight: anecdotally I think this may also be an example of the frugal Sony Pictures Classic underplay. I had family visiting last weekend, and they were asking me for movie recommendations. These are educated city dwellers who go movies a couple times a month and ought to be right in Midnight's wheelhouse - none of them had heard of the movie. Not even a glimmer of recognition. So that might be one of the reasons it's not breaking out more.
As for me, I did not go out to the movies this weekend. I'm probably seeing World War Z or The Heat tonight, and I saw Monsters University last week, as well as Much Ado About Nothing for a second time. Both very charming and enjoyable, but limited in key ways.
I rented "The Call" from Red Box and was completely distracted by the busted wig that Halle Berry inexplicably had to endure at the hands of the hair and makeup department, which obviously hated her.
According to Halle, the wig in The Call was her idea:
If you like your Halle Berry all pampered and glamorous, well, her new film The Call may not be for you. Just look at how the Internet reacted to the unflattering 'do donned by the Oscar winner in the previews.
And Ms. Berry has heard your concerns. Kinda: "I know! I don't even know what they're saying, what are they saying?" Halle asked us at the premiere of the thriller. "I look like I have a poodle on my head or what?!"
You said it, not us! So how did this curly wig come to be? "That was all my say," she continued. "I always have to get rid of this hair. This hair is so synonymous with me and I think that you have to create a character that takes the audience away from who you really are." She went on to describe the onscreen style as "pedestrian" and "kind of average."
And fear not, when we asked if this would ever be a look she'd rock in real life, she laughed and simply responded, "No."
Thank you, Claire.The film is absurb enough by itself, but the hair added a dimension with which I was not prepared to deal.
Well...I saw "Before Midnight" and adored it, even though I haven't seen the two earlier ones. What amazing dialogue!!
I also saw Michel Gondry's latest film, "L'écume du jour" which is out here in Montréal and which should eventually make it to the States, I presume. I liked it from the beginning, with its inventiveness and colourfullness, but it got a bit dark in the second half. The reviewers here weren't crazy about it...it's based on a cult novel by the French writer Boris Vian, and they seemed to think it didn't live up to the book...but I've never read the book and thought the movie was pretty good.
Finally, I saw "Frances Ha"...and about halfway through, I asked myself "Why am I supposed to care anything about these people?" I wasn't crazy about it...although perhsps that's because I've never been terribly impressed by Greta Gerwig.