The Two Leonardo DiCaprios (and Weekend Box Office)
Sunday, January 10, 2016 at 4:49PM Leonardo DiCaprio is, as an actor, inarguably most attracted to roles where he is mentally or physically suffering often while mourning a dead wife (His infamous "Dead Wives' Club," already quite extensive, got another member this weekend with the spectral presence of his Native American love, never named, in The Revenant). But Leo DiCaprio, the celebrity and movie star, is more tied in the real world to the wildly wealthy playboys that occasionally dot the dramatic resume (Celebrity, The Great Gatsby, Wolf of Wall Street). This is not just because he commands an astronomical fee for acting and has been known to enjoy the fruits of his labor, but because his films in turn attract even deeper pools of money. In other words: he's worth what they pay him. Enter The Revenant, a brutal, arduous, and arguably very quiet drama with brief but intense flashes of excitement, making a mint in its first weekend. It's something virtually no other star could pull off. DiCaprio is just about the only movie star that can convince moviegoers en masse to show up for straight dramas these days -- superheroic powers, franchise branding, or stylized action not required.
I have had issues with DiCaprio over the years you're aware. Why? Well his career can, roughly, be cleaved in half. First came the Versatile Gifted Prodigy years (Spring 1993's This Boy's Life through Christmas 2002 with Catch Me If You Can). And then the anguished, increasingly familiar, all caps OSCAR SEEKER of current renown (Christmas 2002 Gangs of New York through The Revenant). He's good in The Revenant, no mistake, but other than suffering the role asks almost nothing of him.
I want to be surprised and emotionally invested again and am exhausted by the reduction of his screen magnetism. I prefer Original DiCaprio but I freely admit it's a minority opinion, an endangered species opinion even. Inarguably the world at large prefers DiCaprio 2.0 ... I'll just be over here waiting for his third act. Hope it's unexpected, whatever it is.
BOX OFFICE WIDE
Estimates January 8th-10th
01 Star Wars: The Force Awakens $41.6 (cum. $812) Review & Podcast & BB-8
02 The Revenant $38 *new* The Costumes, The Production Design
03 Daddy's Home $15 (cum. $116.3)
04 The Forest $13 *new*
05 Sisters $7.1 (cum $74.8) Review
06 The Hateful Eight $6.3 (cum. $41.4) Hated It & Podcast
07 The Big Short $6.3 (cum. $42.8) Reviewish Review & SAG Ensemble
08 Alvin and the Chi--Oh God Make This Stop $5.5 (cum. $75.6)
09 Joy $8 (cum. $46.5) Reviewish & Serious Hair
09 Concussion $6.8 (cum. $30.9) Review
10 Point Break $4.6 (cum. $26.7)
BOX OFFICE LIMITED
excluding previously wide
01 Carol $1.4 (cum. $6.9) 525 screens Greatest Pick-Up Line, Production Design, Editing Best Actresses, Adapting Patricia Highsmith, FYC Sarah Paulson
02 The Danish Girl $.8 (cum. $7.5) 417 screens Podcast, Screenplay, & Eddie Interview
03 Wazir $.6 *new* 111 screens
04 Anomalisa $.2 (cum $.4) 17 screens Podcast & Review & Festival Capsule
05 Youth $.1 (cum. $2.0) 95 screens Reviewish, Campaign, & Podcast
Carol added hundreds more screen this weekend and though its box office is solid and growing, the per screen average (just under $3000 so...non-sensational) suggests they were right to nurture it so carefully. The Hateful Eight which had a strong opening wide weekend suffered brutally in its second weekend at the hands of the new violent fur-slathered manly man movie in town. But an honest tormented question from out of my cinephile soul: Who in their right mind wouldn't want to see Cate Blanchett costumed to the nines as a lesbian society wife?
How is Cate Blanchett at her mannered sexiest and making all kinds of lascivious eyes at a young blank-slate shopgirl NOT as big a draw as Leonardo DiCaprio grieving whilst foaming at the mouth (again) or another Tarantino shoot-em-up? And yet it isn't! And this is why we can only very rarely have nice things (aka Todd Haynes's femme-centric melodramas) and need to cherish them when they come along.
Reader Comments (31)
I saw "Star Wars: The Force Awakens" which I liked even thought I question some of the scripts choices ( and why does Lord Valdermort show up as villain) The movie is the sequel Star Wars fan wanted. Lucas should have made this before going back to Darth Vader origins- ( of course now I'm intrigued by the origin story of Kylo Ren...) and "Spotlight" a smart tough picture (which feels like something the Warner Bros would have produced with John Garfield as the crusading reporter) Great cast, script and probably will get a lot Oscar recognition. The Academy loves this type of heroic journalism.
Cate Blanchett has proven she CAN be a big box office draw when the movie is a little more accessible -- ie, Blue Jasmine. Plus, The Revenant has more than just Leo going for it -- Alejandro Inarritu, fresh off an Oscar win; dramatic trailers / marketing; etc. As good as Carol is, a lesbian melodrama by a lesser-known auteur (among the general public) isn't going to sell as well.
I am sad that the American movie going populous is forgoing Carol for Leo and Quentin. However, I would like to take this opportunity to address Academy Awards voters (even though ballots have closed) - if you are looking for suffering, forget about Leo sleeping in an animal carcass, It's all about Cate and Rooney battling bed bugs! They truly suffered for their art and our pleasure. Please consider: https://youtu.be/5msaerWNNEg?t=7m29s
I saw Anomalisa. I admired what it set out to do, but the film is very awkward and incredibly boring. Cold.
I don't know. Maybe expanding Carol over the holidays would've been a much better approach. Brooklyn made tons of money in those 2 weekends - and I compare with Brooklyn because it's the only other women-centric love story . Carol will only go downhill from here as it won't get the awards that Weinstein hoped for. I so wanted for Carol to do well at the box-office - money it's the only incentive "these" people have when making movies.
I hope I'm wrong and Carol will get ton of awards. But it doesn't look likely :-(
Carol may not win a lot of GG's and/or Oscars or make a ton of money, but I predict it will have a longer shelf-life than many of these other contenders. Great art sometimes isn't fully recognized during its beginning period.
Can we talk about how Sisters is the little engine that could? I saw it this weekend and it was just the definition of a good time at the movies, not too challenging, made me laugh a lot and left feeling like I'd had a good time. Sometimes, amongst all this awards season madness - that's all you want.
Gotta say, I hate Innaritu + suffering, but I have a shit-tonne respect for DiCaprio's pull. That he eschews Marvel-esque tentpoles and almost works exclusively with auteurs that pull gangbusters numbers... I know I'm supposed to hate the bait, but whatever.
Plus he was the best nominee in 2004 and 2013 anyway.
Unfortunately, add about $100 million to the cumulative as listed for "Daddy's Home."
Just how things roll at the movies.
Leo is true BO movie star I mean one who can cross genres and lead a film to great numbersbut I wish he'd win for something else in future,IMO he should have won already,he is getting the kind of Oscar Pacino got.
I feel like "The Revenant" should have been renamed "The Slog" or "He who Struggles".
As much as I like Leo DiCaprio I got tired of his "struggling ickle face" for the ENTIRE film.
Liam Neeson in "The Grey" did a performance that was better and it didn't take half a day to watch. But even so, I'm all for giving Leo this Oscar because maybe then he would move on to this third act that Nathaniel speaks of.
That's a typo Point Break earning $274mil right? Surely you mean $27.4 mil, or that $274 is for that little film which confused us and tried to have us believe the 40-year-old single mother who invented miracle mop is a 18-year-old teenager?
I watched The Big Short, but just didn't like it. You had Academy Award nominee Steve Carell, Academy Award nominee Christian Bale, Academy Award nominee Ryan Gosling, Academy Award nominee Brad Pitt do all the works while let Academy Award winner Marissa Tomei and Academy Award winner Melissa Leo go to waste? That's bad. Oh, and I feel the movie is too self-conscious and all the jokes felt calculated. Please don't win the GG over The Martian.
Nathaniel: I agree with everything you say regarding Leo. I absolutely love him in his first act, but act 2 has frustrated me time and time again: he seems to be trying far too hard each time (with the exception of The Wolf of Wall Street, and possibly The Great Gatsby, the one film of his from act 2 that I haven't yet seen). It's odd to think that relaxing would actually be more of a test for him, but I think it would be. All that said, I agree also that his box office clout is remarkable and to be encouraged. And rather than mourning a dead wife, can someone give him a living screen partner to romance?
I'm finally seeing Carol tomorrow evening. I appreciate that Blanchett is the bigger draw, but I can't wait to see Rooney Mara.
The cum. on Joy is $46.5m, on a budget of $60m.
Nathanael, if you had a time machine and almighty powers, what filmography would you give DiCaprio?
I've been coming here since 2008, and you were as critical of his choices then as you are now. So, after The Departed, which path do you wish he would have taken?
I love Leo but I fully agree with this opinion. It's kind of a 50/50 toss up for me when it comes to his 2000's output. I thought he was fantastic in roles where he got to loosen up a bit. He's also bewitchingly good as a villain and was a weirdly perfect fit for the Calvin Candie character in Django Unchained (he and Samuel pretty much saved the second half of the movie...until Calvin dies). I'm not really looking forward to Alejandro returning to heavy-handed, lagging direction as he appears to be (how the hell did the same person direct Babel AND Birdman?!), or Leo showing us how much agony he's in. Leo, that's a pony you've tamed to submission in The Departed and RR. Play another coke addict, maybe?
hey everyone sorry about the typos... i shouldn't be doing two things at once but you know... golden globes day.
all numbers fixed on chart.
I get what you are saying but there are SO many more male stars making wierd career choices out there than Leo. He's not phoning it in, he's still periodically popping out gems (wolf of Wall Street) and has not been shying away from comedic bent performances (wolf & Django). Compared to other big stars out there (Depp, Clooney, Pitt, Downey Jr. to name a few, etc) he's a saint!
"The Revenant, a brutal, arduous, and arguably very quiet drama with brief but intense flashes of excitement, making a mint in its first weekend. It's something virtually no other star could pull off. DiCaprio is just about the only movie star that can convince moviegoers en masse to show up for straight dramas these days -- superheroic powers, franchise branding, or stylized action not required."
Dude, you should totally be the Oscar campaigner for DiCaprio. This is not only terrific analysis/observation on the value of REAL star power, but also if it was put this way in his campaign, it's hard to imagine DiCaprio not getting the kind of industry pat-on-the-back that they gave to Tom Hanks, Russell Crowe, Julia Roberts and Sandra Bullock.
It's unfortunate that Leo is going to win his Oscar for this, a lesser performance, but hopefully it will empower him to pursue different projects. The film is beautiful but the suffering is almost ludicrous...and the tropes of the dead wife and the nobility of the Native American people are just so tired...
I looked at DiCaprio's filmography just now and I have to say a lot of those movies I didn't care for at all (Inception, Shutter Island), but at least they are to a one made by actual directors attempting to craft genuinely artistic work. DiCaprio has yet to make a by-the-numbers superhero flick or committed himself to a hacky franchise and for that I give him major respect. His filmography is way, way better than the vast majority of his peers - think of all the junk most of them do.
Talking to lots of LA people this weekend and they all had the same reaction to my love for "Carol". To a one they said something like..."that movie is so boring. Takes forever to get going." Shivers of horror.
Saw The Force Awakens for the fourth time this afternoon. This'll probably be the last time, though, because I need to catch up on some Oscar-Bait films. The Revenant is the main one and I'd like to see Macbeth before it leaves theaters. I'm iffy on whether I'll see Joy, The Danish Girl and The Hateful Eight at this point, however.
The only Leo performance I really really loved in the 2000's was Revolutionary Road. He's fine in The Revenant. In fact, it's a down year for lead actors so I'm fine with him winning for it, even on merit.
I can't imagine any circumstances that would make me see The Revenant apart from some kind of hostage situation.
Juz give Leo his o/due Oscar & all o us & the studios, critics, fans and haters, etc can collectively heaves a sign o relief!! lol
If he doesn't win. Imagine all the sympathy and anguish its gonna generate
If Leo doesn't win this time, the Susan Lucci comparisons will rev into overdrive. But he will win.
I saw Carol, The Revenant, The Hateful Eight and Janis: Little Girl Blue this weekend, The Janis documentary is excellent, one of the best documentaries of the year and the obvious perfect (maybe too perfect) companion piece to Amy. As for The Revenant, meh. It's a half hour too long, the script would be even worse if there was more dialogue and I've always thought that it was ludicrous that Leonardo was "owed" an Oscar, now I can point and laugh at the dullards who buy into that tripe
As for the other two, my reactions are so extreme, I may need to think about them for awhile to see what I really think
I had high hopes for Carol, and was afraid of being disappointed. Well, if anything I think Carol is even better than I imagined! Can it really be THAT good? Perfect in every way, it's the first movie I'd consider giving a personal A+ since The Act of Killing.
And then there's The Hateful Eight. Let's divide it down to first 2 hours and 45 minutes - A-. Last 3 minutes - F. Overall D+ maybe? I enjoyed the in yo face/over the top/black explosion at the ketchup factory humor of first 2 1/2 hours plus. But the ending is one of the most putrid, offensive, misogynistic, unforgivable messes ever. The fate reserved for Jennifer Jason Leigh was unbelievably ugly made so much worse by the fact that it was happening to a woman and that made it funnier or something. A true abomination
RIP David Bowie
I watched episode 5-10 of Transparent season 2. A very rewarding experience viewed all at once. If I'd watched it one episode at a time, I might have bailed around episode 7 because I was so angry at so many of the characters. But Soloway and co. have a wonderful way of digging past the horrible choices and narcissism and letting you see the wounded, vulnerable person behind those bad choices (well, everyone except Ally, who I still can't stand). It's the very definition of humanistic storytelling, and I ended up really liking where this season went.
I'm kind of burnt out from hating Leo during his Horrible Accent period of circa 06-11. Started to forgive him/like him again when he revived his charming best for Great Gatsby, Django, and Wolf of Wall Street, so I'll give him a pass for The Revenant.
Sorry, it's Nathaniel, of course, not Nathanael.