Review: Sausage Party

Tim here. You can't deny that Sausage Party does what it promises. It's a not-quite-parody and not-quite-satire of the Pixar-style premise of a secret world where inanimate objects have an elaborate culture unseen by humans. In this case, it's the life of a supermarket with Seth Rogen as the voice of a heroic hot dog and Kristen Wiig as the hot dog bun he loves. To this, add in a bunch of curse words and outlandishly filthy sex talk, and you've got a solid 70% of the movie.  It's not mine to say whether this is good or bad: there's no point in telling people that what they're laughing at isn't funny, and Sausage Party's audience undoubtedly knows itself.

That audience would be anybody who has loved writers Rogen & Evan Goldberg's previous forays into sex-obsessed philosophy hiding in a thick cloud of pot smoke: Superbad, The Interview, or especially This Is the End, the duo's film that Sausage Party most closely resembles. The 30% that's not cartoon characters saying raunchy things is an extension of that film's agnostic theological commentary, and not even a necessarily bad one. [More...]

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Box Office: 'Sausage Party' Is An Animated Adult Smash

This weekend while Suicide Squad suffered one of the biggest superhero second weekend dropoffs ever and Pete's Dragon had one of the mildest starts for a Disney remake, Sausage Party was breaking box office ground for adult animation. The high concept comedy had the biggest opening ever for animated film meant for grown-ups, passing 2007's violent Beowulf (apologies for reminding you of its existence).

While Party is unlikely to repeat the animation for grownups Oscar nomination breakthrough that Anomalisa achieved last year, this strong box office opening shows that medium doesn't need to appeal to the kiddies to be commercially viable. The most popular toons often become so partly because they are equally embraced by adults - we love animation just as much, so the rarity of one aimed squarely at us remains perplexing. Sausage Party is on track to surpass South Park - Bigger, Longer, and Uncut's business, so maybe we'll at least get more bawdy animated comedies if not the type of character dramas that Anomalisa was trying to deliver.

TOP TEN

01 Suicide Squad $43.7M (cum $222.9M) Review
02 Sausage Party $33.6M NEW
03 Pete's Dragon $21.5M NEW Review
04 Jason Bourne $13.6M (cum $126.8M) Review
05 Bad Moms $11.4M (cum $71.4M)
06 The Secret Lives of Pets $8.8M (cum $335.9M)
07 Star Trek Beyond $6.8M (cum $139.7M) Review
08 Florence Foster Jenkins $6.6M NEW Review
09 Nine Lives $3.5M (cum $13.5M)
10 Lights Out $3.2M (cum $61.1M)

Limited releases were mostly quiet this weekend, with the biggest winner being the well-reviewed Texas crime drama Hell or High Water. Led by Jeff Bridges, Chris Pine, and Ben Foster, the film grossed $592,000 at 32 theatres for the weekend's per screen average of almost $19K.

What did you see this weekend??

Silverstone and Suvari

Kieran, here. It was recently announced that Alicia Silverstone and Mena Suvari will headline TV Land’s new comedy pilot “American Women”. The project, produced by John Wells (“Shameless”) is set in the 1970s against the tumultuous and backdrop of the sexual revolution.  Silverstone and Suvari will play best friends navigating marriage, divorce and motherhood.

Alicia Silverstone and Mena Suvari’s careers have sort of mirrored each other’s, which makes the almost the perfect pair of actresses to headline a vehicle. Both came out of the 90s, with charismatic turns in a high profile role that put them on the map (Clueless and American Beauty, respectively). Sadly, neither actress was able to find a film to match the attention and success of their star-making vehicles, though both have continued to work since their breakthroughs (Suvari more so). 

Suvari, billed as the true lead of “American Women” especially could do a lot to change the perception of her and truly give her a front-and-center showcase for her talents. Though mileage varies for everyone where all things American Beauty are concerned (who’s MVP? how poorly or not does the film age?) Suvari absolutely nailed her BAFTA-nominated role (seriously. Look it up) as the flinty, deeply insecure suburban teenager, Angela.

And what of TV Land? It’s true that the network hardly conjures thoughts of quality and prestige television.  However, the same could have been said just two short years ago about Lifetime before “UnReal”. Word is TV Land has been looking for a project for some time that will change the face of their network in a similar fashion. In this early stage where we know very little, “American Women” seems promising enough. Plus, it’d be great to see these two actresses get an interesting second act to their careers.

Are you excited for “American Women”?

Watch Out, Titanic.... Here Comes Passengers

Or so says its director. Speaking to Entertainment Weekly, Morten Tyldum (The Imitation Game) tried to build up hype for his December release starring Jennifer Lawrence and Chris Pratt:

Every generation has its love story. I feel like this is it. 

There are certainly similarities with Titanic. Passengers is about two, well passengers, aboard a spaceship who accidentally wake up from an iduced time suspension, 90 years into a 120 year trip. Everyone else on board is still asleep when they discover that the ship is in danger. They try to save themselves and everyone else while falling in love. Sound familiar?

Lawrence and Pratt are arguably the two biggest movie stars in their age groups, so a commercial hit is expected. But will they capture the zeitgeist like Kate and Leo? Tyldum certainly hopes so. We will find out on December 21.

Does Passengers give you blockbuster vibes? What is your definitive love story? 

Half Century Halle (and other anniversaries)

On this day in history as it relates to showbiz...

1040 King Duncan is killed in battle and King Macbeth succeeds him. Shakespeare fictionalizes everything later for Macbeth. So many theatrical productions and movies follow. Out damn spot!
1932 The 1932 Summer Olympics end. This is the Olympic year when gorgeous Buster Crabbe became a gold medalist (pictured left). Hollywood then snatched him right up for movie serials and action adventure franchises including Tarzan The Fearless
1945 Japan surrenders during WW II (the six year war will last only two more weeks.) but movie makers all over the world have never stopped telling the war's infinite stories. On that same day Steve Martin is born in Waco Texas. It only takes him another 68 years to get the Oscar he totally deserved
 

1946 Two actor birthdays: Blacksploitation actor Antonio Fargas who became "Huggybear" on TV's popular Starksy & Hutch and Susan Saint James TV of McMillan & Wife with Rock Hudson in the 1970s and Kate & Allie with Jane Curtin in the 1980s
1959 Marcia Gay Harden materializes in LaJolla California, presumably already perfect 
1963 Emmanuelle Béart, Manon of the Spring herself, and 8 time César nominee is born in France. On the same day in Los Angeles Clifford Odets dies from stomach cancer. Many luminaries of stage and screen visit beforehand. He came to fame as a highly political playwright (four of his works became movies: Golden Boy, Clash By Night, The Big Knife, and The Country Girl). He was also fond of the actresses: married to Luise Rainer during her back-to-back Oscar wins and also took up with Frances Farmer -- he's played by Jeffrey DeMunn in the 1982 biopic Frances.
1965 Jane Fonda marries director/producer Roger Vadim. Together they cook up Barbarella (1968) which lasts forever unlike the marriage

When you look at your page and you realize there are now half a million peeps here to hang with you... ❤️🍾🎉 excited to be creating with you guys. Thank you!!

A photo posted by Halle Berry (@halleberry) on Jul 4, 2016 at 1:17pm PDT

Halle Berry Instagrammed this a month ago. 50 is apparently the new 30 for the extraordinarily beautiful people.

1966 Superstar Halle Berry is born in Cleveland. Becomes the first African-American Miss World contestant twenty years later. Hits the movies 5 years after that with Spike Lee's Jungle Fever  as auspicious debut. Happy half century to the Best Actress winner.
1975 The Rocky Horror Picture Show gets its world premiere in London. It's the longest running film in theaters since it still shows regularly at many moviehouses around the world for weekly midnight screenings.
1980 Dorothy Stratten, a nude centerfold, is murdered by her boyfriend. The story was adapted to screen starring Mariel Hemingway and Eric Roberts by the genius Bob Fosse in Star '80 (1983), the influential artist's last film. 
1983 Mila Kunis is born in the Ukraine of the Soviet Union. Moves to Los Angeles seven years later and by the age of 11 she's already on TV
1987 Can't Buy Me Love opens in movie theaters. No one could possibly expect that nerdy Dempsey would reemerge years later into a sexy mature leading man that everyone called "McDreamy"

1992 Single White Female opens in movie theaters
1998 How Stella Got Her Groove Back starring Angela Bassett who still had hers (before she lost it and got it back heyyyy) hit movie theaters
2004 The cinematographer Neal Fredericks of sleeper phenomenon The Blair Witch Project (1999) dies suddenly in a plane crash on location for a film
2009 District 9 opens in the US, becomes a huge hit, and even goes on to Oscar nominations including Best Picture in one of the most surprising Oscar years ever (since no one knew when the year began that they'd shift to 10 Best Picture nominees and the studios definitely hadn't prepared for it.)