Lawrence & Hoult Reunited... At the Box Office

Jennifer Lawrence recently split from X-Man boyfriend Nicolas Hoult and now they're reunited ...sort of... at the box office. He's a sort of dead heartthrob with a thing for a charismatic blonde in Warm Bodies while she's a charismatic blonde with a thing for a barely living headcase in Silver Linings Playbook.

Top of the Box Office
01 WARM BODIES $19.5 *NEW*
02 HANSEL & GRETEL: WITCH HUNTERS  $9.2 (cum. $34.4) 
03 SILVER LININGS PLAYBOOK  $8.1 (cum. $80.3)  Beau's Review
04 MAMA  $6.7 (cum $58.2) 
05 ZERO DARK THIRTY $5.3 (cum. $77.7)

In other movie/money news: Bullet to the Head, the only wide release going up against the zombie romcom Warm Bodies, came in at #6 which is amusing since that's how you generally kill the walking dead; The Best Picture nominees continue to make a lot of bank in the bottom half of the top dozen box office with those long legs at the box office;  A Royal Affair which is competing with Amour for Best Foreign Film just crossed the $1 million mark in US arthouses, always a significant line for subtitled pictures. Amour has reached $2.5 million, the lowest grossing Best Picture for decades... though it's still in under 100 theaters. (Expansion still in progress. Stay tuned.) Globally speaking it's still slightly behind Caché and The White Ribbon as the most successful Haneke picture. 

What did you see this weekend? Or were you all about The Superbowl?

SAG Carpet Pt 1: Silhouettes and Character Arcs

Red Carpet Line-Up Returns. I don't know if you've missed it but I have. This two-part SAG edition is less quickfire chat and more epistolary but we haven't talked to Kurt Osenlund in way too long since he flew the coop for The House Next Door. 

NATHANIEL: Kurt  I miss you. You have moved to the far off land of Brooklyn and we never see each other. And yet, when I watch the Best Actresses walking the red carpet I know you're out there somewhere gazing at the same visions. So a few questions to kick things off about the Screen Actors Fashionista Guild.

Which of the Best Actresses did it for you? And was this in line with what you think of their performances or the inverse of that? Character arcs aren't cut from runway cloth but sometimes I think people judge the gowns based on how much they're currently loving the woman inside.

"Impossible" Naomi, Dress-Lining Jennifer, "Mama" Jessica, Marion Cotillard

poll by twiigs.com

Anyway, tell me your "best", both performance wise and clothing wise. (Don't cheat and say Helen Mirren since she didn't show. Or the cameras just didn't bother searching for her because 'getouttahereHitchcock'!). [More plus Supporting Actresses after the jump]

Click to read more ...

Silver Live-Blogging SAG Playbook (The Show!)

Previously: THE ARRIVALS

8:00 The announcer just said Zero Dark Thirty Jessica Chastain is "Zero Dark Flirty". Regret to inform that his was not even the worst pun of the intro. This was not even in the bottom ten of worst puns. Yikes. "Argo Seat Yourself"??? (And you don't even want to know how much television pays writers for this sort of thing. Can I apply?)

8:02 I Am An Actor from Jane Krakowski, Chris Tucker, Helen Hunt, Hal Holbrook, Sofia Vergara. Followed by Nicole Kidman with some hot razor cut flat iron hair to announce... 

8:06 SUPPORTING ACTOR. I predicted Tommy Lee Jones because of the huge audience response he gets in Lincoln. But perhaps I'm too stuck back in November and the TLJ hoopla has ended. The award goes to... oh, wow. Tommy Lee Jones. Who is not there. His absence does him no favors in a possibly very tight Oscar race.

8:08 Bradley Cooper, whose hair is unusually light brown fluffy. (I'm reminded of Dustin Hoffman in Tootsie ...as both Michael Dorsey and Dorothy Michaels) and Jennifer Lawrence introduce their own movie. They use a clip of the "silver lining" monologue over images of the cast. 

8:10 SUPPORTING ACTRESS. Justin Timberlake arrives in his 'suit and tie shit, suit and tie shit ♫' (plaid pattern potpourri but quite fetching)... and tries to do a little dance to the piped in canned show music [more after the jump]

Click to read more ...

Box Office Playbook: Jessica vs. Jennifer

As if doing battle like Best Actress Gladiators both Jessica Chastain and Jennifer Lawrence are all over the nation's theaters. They'll be horns locked for the next 5 weeks in the media, I'll bet. JLaw was joking about beating JChas to the Oscar on SNL -- too gently? -- but it was Jessica who won the box office. And twice over. The last time I remember that happening was Leonardo DiCaprio at Christmas 2002 I think (Gangs of New York and Catch Me If You Can?)  [UPDATE: Sharp-eyed TFE Reader Brian Z actually reminds us that it happened in 2011 too... also with Jessica Chastain for The Help and The Debt]

On a related side note: I just know I'm going to start calling them Jessica Lawrence and Jennifer Chastain before long; name slippage is coming!

Box Office Top Ten
01 MAMA $28.1 *NEW* Jose likes the wig
02 ZERO DARK THIRTY  $17.6 (cum. $55.9) Top Ten List  
03 SILVER LININGS PLAYBOOK  $11.3 (cum. $55.3)  Beau's Review
04 GANGSTER SQUAD  $9.1 (cum $32.2) 
05 BROKEN CITY $9 *NEW* 
06 A HAUNTED HOUSE  $8.3  (cum. $29.9)
07 DJANGO UNCHAINED $8.2 (cum. $138.3) More on Django
08 LES MISERABLES $7.8 (cum $130.3) Top Ten List
09 THE HOBBIT $6.4  (cum $287.3)
10 THE LAST STAND $6.3 *NEW* 

In other movie/money news: Skyfall became only the 10th movie to break the $300 million barrier in the US box office this decade (Alice in Wonderland and The Hunger Games are the only non-sequels in that list... though both are franchisey in that remake or kick-off kind of way); Two very expensive movie gambles Life of Pi and Rise of the Guardians will inch over the $100 million mark in the next few days which must be a relief even if it doesn't quite spell "big profit!"; Chasing Ice, a nominee for Best Original Song, crossed the $1 million mark which is a big deal for documentaries; Sony Pictures Classics are still being really conservative with Amour -- it's only in 36 theaters despite 5 Oscar nominations last week though they grossed nearly ½ a million this weekend; And despite nobody caring about it or talking about it whatsoever Tom Cruise's latest actioner Jack Reacher crossed the $75 million mark this weekend... Oscar season always makes it easy to forget that a huge portion of the moviegoing public never even thinks about "Oscar Season".

WEIRD, RIGHT? 

Speaking of the public -- though the specific and not the general --  what did you see this weekend?

the three most popular movie musicals since Cabaret. Les Misérables is nearing their lofty box office heights

P.S. Les Misérables only needs a few more weeks of heat -- which Oscar season will surely provide -- to pass Mamma Mia! and become the third most popular movie musical of the modern era stateside (after Grease & Chicago). Of course the atrocious Mamma Mia! has the absurd distinction of being so popular around the globe (over ½ a billion) that it's actually the most successful modern musical if you include the entire world in your overview. Usually we prefer to be international but Mamma Mia!? Blargh!

Terms of EnLinkment

E! Online Jessica Chastain sings Happy Birthday to Marc Malkin and sounds damn fine doing it. Laughs about the now broken 'Chastain Curse'. 
Vanity Fair looks back at their photos of our new Oscar Nominees
Self Styled Siren watches old movies with her mom over the holidays 
Timothy Brayton on Silver Linings Playbook. Lots of salient points in this mixed review which never once BELLOWS like the movie does.
The Hot Blogs Look what the Life of Pi team will be wearing to the Globes 

Just Jared Jennifer Lawrence and Nicholas Hoult are both available again. You're free to ask them out... well, separately I mean.
Pajiba an all female (photoshopped) Avengers - have you seen Alison Brie as Captain America?
The Geek Twins every Superman logo for the past 75 years. Oh yeah, I somehow didn't notice that Man of Steel is arriving for Superman's 75th Anniversary year. Good timing. 
Carpetbagger talks to Jacki Weaver who admits she didn't cast an Oscar ballot this year
The White House's legit, official, and officially hilarious response to the petition to build a real Death Star.  

Why would we spend countless taxpayer dollars on a Death Star with a fundamental flaw that can be exploited by a one-man starship?

Touchy Touchy Touchy - Everyone Gets So Touchy This Time of the Movie Year
In Contention Kris Tapley speaks his mind about the "Critics Choice Awards". I agree with almost all of this. The BFCA have always had a problem in trying to feel superior to the Globes but in practice being inferior or at least equally shameless about what they're actually up to with celebrity fawning. Trust that I understand the celebrity fawning impulse but I hope it gets better. Why not be a "principled alternative"?
IndieWire filmmaker Alex Gibney defends his attacks on Zero Dark Thirty 
Huffington Post Scott Mendelson is up in arms about the treatment of Kathryn Bigelow by the media
THR Quentin Tarantino thinks he's above criticism when it comes to discussions of violence in film
Film.com 'I don't agree with the Quvenzhane Wallis nomination'
Oscah Fevah "this has been a visual review of Les Misérables"

On Les Miz, please to note: I no longer cringe at the hyperbolic hate. That got boring after two weeks. I've officially turned a corner and I now find people's overwhelming loathing of Les Miz terribly amusing in all its narcimasochistic performativity -- if only one of the legion of haters would actually gouge their eyes out instead of just saying they'd rather do that or wanted to while watching it, than we'd have a story. Come on, people. COMMIT ! Tom Hooper did ;) Hating Les Miz is now the run amok mob equivalent of that nun orgy scene in Ken Russell's The Devils. And I love The Devils so I'm good here. Let it all out. Work yourself into a point-of-no-return frenzy!

Shirley Maclaine visit Downton Abbey

I Forgot to Mention This Weeks Ago
Michael Musto says that Shirley Maclaine's daughter has written a tell all. Good timing since Shirley Maclaine has been resurrecting her stardom lately with small movie roles (I wish she had more to do in Bernie) and a showcase television gig (sparring with the stuffy Brits of Downton Abbey... though her dialogue is bizarre, no?). So this book... Mommie Dearest 2.0? Uh oh.

Which movie star's parenting skills would you love to read about?