By David Poland poland@moviecitynews.com
Weekend Wrap-Up
When is a smash hit not a smash hit? When it’s Godzilla. Seventy-four million dollars in six days. The eighth-biggest opening weekend of all time. Fourth best four-day total ever. What a bomb! I guess the perception is partially the responsibility of people like me who have played up the possibility of a $100 million weekend. But really, I blame you. Those of you who have decided to HATE the film (and I mean HATE) managed to get some seriously bad buzz going by Friday. Godzilla’s first Friday generated $480,000 less than Deep Impact‘s first Friday. Godzilla won this internal competition by $1.4 million on Saturday, but Deep Impact won the Sunday race by $200,000. So, in comparing each film’s first three-day outing, Godzilla beat Deep Impact by less than $1 million. True, Godzilla had two days of must-see grosses before that Friday, but we’re talking Deep Impact vs. Godzilla here folks. I still don’t get it. Krillian’s List aside, I can’t imagine why people would hate this film the way they hate this film. The passion this movie has aroused threatens to make it the nuked lizard equivalent of Scorsese’s The Last Temptation of Christ — lots of angry passion that seems to miss the point. After all, it’s a Godzilla movie. Nonetheless, I will try to sort it out in tomorrow’s rant.
In the rest of the box office news, Bulworth tanked, generating $10.6 million over the four-day weekend in fourth place, but only $1.6 million of that came on Monday. That would be half of its Sunday number. Not good, but that was a lot better than Fear and Loathing In Las Vegas, which pulled in $4.2 million over four days for sixth place. Watch for this one on your video rental shelf in about 48 more hours. Deep Impact took second place, managing $19 million over the four-day weekend and is going to beat Godzilla to the $100 million mark with a current cume of $98.5 million. (Yes, they had two more weekends than El Lizardo to turn the trick.) The Horse Whisperer is looking pretty strong, pulling in another $13.7 million over the weekend for third place and a $32.3 million cume. Rounding out the top five is Quest for Camelot, managing just $3.7 million in its second weekend.
THE GREAT: The cinematography in Bulworth and The Horse Whisperer is amongst the best you will ever see in a movie theater. They are very, very different, but absolutely brilliant. In Bulworth, three-time Academy Award-winning Director of Photography Vittorio Storaro lights and shoots Los Angeles with a sharpness and beauty that is truly worthy of an $8 expenditure all by itself. (The movie wasn’t bad either. Warren Beatty gets a little lost in the third act, but that doesn’t ruin it completely.) Beatty, in his first film in eons without tons of soft-focus close-ups, still looks great, even if it’s in a worn-out kind of way. The colors are rich and sharp, but not the comic book way of the team’s previous collaboration, Dick Tracy (for which Storaro was nominated, but did not win Oscar gold).
Meanwhile, Academy Award-winner Robert Richardson shoots the western United States for Robert Redford in The Horse Whisperer, delivering shot-after-breathtaking-shot. Literally. After a while, as each unbelievable shot hit the screen, I laughed a little, amazed that there was another surprise for me, even in the silver hue of a snow drift. The images get less dramatic as the film continues (I think that’s intentional, as the characters lives slowly return to normalcy), but the work is spectacular, and, again, I really liked the movie. If you liked Ordinary People and The Bridges of Madison County, you are likely to love The Horse Whisperer, too.
THE GOOD: Finally caught City of Angels. I haven’t been a big Meg Ryan supporter, but I think this was by far her best work as an adult dramatic actress.
THE BAD: Fear and Loathing In Las Vegas is getting slammed every which way a movie can get slammed, but who cares? I really liked it. I don’t do drugs, so this is as close as I’m gonna get. Yes, it’s not about anything. Yes, it’s way, way, way over-the-top. No, you won’t be able to explain it to any of your friends after seeing it. But if you want to live Hunter S. Thompson, it’s a must see.
THE UGLY: Benicio Del Toro put on what looks to be about 30 pounds for his role as Hunter Thompson‘s lawyer, Dr. Gonzo. That belly is one of the scariest effects in the film.
TWO MOVIES EQUAL: Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas + Quest For Camelot = Fear and Loathing in Camelot. Johnny Depp is Warner Bros. executive Lancelot S. Thompson. After a really bad dose of drugs, Thompson fantasizes about spending $40 million on a musical about Camelot that no one wants to see and that features a two-headed singing dragon. Then, the terror continues as Uma Thurman can’t do press in her ninth month of pregnancy and The Avengers doesn’t do over $100 million. In the end, he wakes up in a pool of vomit at the junket for Lethal Weapon 4 and starts kissing Mel Gibson’s feet and praying to God. Based on a true story.
JUST WONDERING: How angry will you all be if you decide that Armageddon sucks, too?
BAD AD WATCH: Here we go again. The buzz on Hope Floats is very good, but why should we believe KABB-TV, Telenocias, Mademoiselle, US, Seventeen, KXAS-TV and David Sheenan of the L.A. CBS affiliate. Sheenan, the only “major” critic on the list, is also the guy who is touting Bulworth as “the most intelligently funny film of the decade.” Bulworth was good, but that’s a little bit silly there.
READER OF THE DAY: In the continuing saga of Krillian’s List, here are some reader adds to the list. Be warned! Krillian’s List contains info that might spoil the movie for you. The adds below shouldn’t ruin any surprises. But below “E ME” there are a few more that will. So, don’t read Krillian or the second set of additions if you want to be surprised.
Peter B. wrote: “Why weren’t there any guards guarding the entrance to the subway, and they could go through the hole in the fence? Why did all the eggs hatch at the same time, aren’t they laid 12 at a time? When they turned the cab around, weren’t there supposed to be Godzilla footsteps in their way?”
David C. wrote: “How did Godzilla instinctively know the topography of downtown Manhattan? He seemed to be able to weave in and out of buildings without any problem.”
Kyle Yamamoto wrote: “Was it me or did those gum balls roll about 100 yards?”
Brandon G wrote: “Godzilla was supposedly cold-blooded, but acted and moved as if it were warm-blooded. How did Godzilla know about the Panama Canal? And given that Manhattan was somehow the perfect island for him, how did it know to make a beeline for it? Who sits around in the rain fishing, without even wearing a raincoat? Why didn’t Godzilla just eat Matthew Broderick? Did the radiation strike mammals from its diet or something? That this god-awful movie was even made!”
