MCN Weekend Archive for June, 2015
The Weekend Report
Jurassic World took the hat trick as top viewing choice for the frame with an estimated $54.2 million and set a new speed record for a movie grossing $500 million. It now ranks fifth among all time domestic box office champs (unadjusted). And still radiating joy in second position was Inside Out with $52.2 million. Neither of the session’s new wide releases performed up to expectations with Ted 2 napping third in the lineup with $32.9 million and Max, the Afghan vet pooch, grossing $12.2 million.
Read the full article »Friday Box Office Estimates
Inside Out again leads Friday with Jurassic Park nipping at its heels. Jurassic Park has held like a family movie through its first two weekends, so expectations will be for more of the same this frame. Ted 2, which was projected at $50 million early in the week, then $40 million in the last couple of days, is looking like it will come up short on both of those marks. And WB’s fifth release in seven weekends, a family dog movie called Max, could end up being right in the middle of the WB summer pack in terms of openings with anywhere from $11m – $14m, depending on how strongly it plays today with families.
Read the full article »The DVD Wrapup: Timbuktu, The Bridge, Pit Stop, Dog Soldiers and more
When Kidane confronts the belligerent fisherman, the pistol he’s carrying to intimidate the man accidentally discharges, killing him. This sets off a series of events that puts Kidane in direct contact with the jihadists and their alternately severe and absurd interpretations of Sharia law. It outlaws music, dance, laughter, cigarettes and, even, the bare hands of women selling messy products in the market, while authorizing stoning adulterers to death, lashing outlawed musicians and accepting bribes and granting favors. Kidane’s biggest problem is his inability to come up with the compensation – 40 cows – ordered by the court, which includes a man who’s itching to steal the herdsman’s wife. If this was all Sissako gave us to ponder in Timbuktu, it would be an unbearable experience. Instead, he lightens the overall tone by demonstrating the determination of residents to get around the rules, even under the watchful eyes of the fanatics.
Read the full article »The Weekend Report
The debut of animated Inside Out had ‘em in the aisles clapping with an estimated $91.2 million opening. But that wasn’t quite enough as the second weekend of Jurassic World plowed ahead with $101.9 million, seconds away from a possible record speed to a $400 million gross. The frame’s other wide newcomer – urban high school comedy Dope – bowed to a disappointing $5.8 million.
Read the full article »Friday Box Office Estimates
Inside Out looks to be the second biggest Pixar opening ever, behind only Toy Story 3, with a launch (with Thursday sneaks) in the low 90s. Jurassic World holds well for a mega-opening, dropping just 55% Friday-to-Friday (remember to forget the $18.5m Thursday sneaks), suggesting an $86.5 million second weekend (382.5m cume), which would keep its domestic just ahead of The Avengers after two weekends. No other films are looking at $10 million or better for the weekend. The Overnight looks to be the strongest arthouse player with a strong $15k per-screen (maybe more, if it plays as a date film tonight) on three screens.
Read the full article »The DVD Wrapup: Welcome to Me, Wild Tales, Gett, Bob Hope and more
Any doubts that Wiig might not be able to accurately depict her character’s tortured mental state disappeared when leaked photos of a stark-naked Wiig, walking through a crowded Palms Spring casino, began to appear on celebrity-skin websites. It’s a brave performance and Wiig is excellent throughout Welcome to Me. How far her fans are willing to accompany Kleig into her journey into madness is open to question.
Read the full article »The Weekend Report
A trip to the past was well worth it as Jurassic World blew away the competition with an estimated $204.3 million debut. Roughly three of every four moviegoers that bought a ticket this weekend were watching familiar Raptors and the new monster on the block, Dominus Rex. There was no counterprogramming on the horizon.
Read the full article »Wilmington on Movies: Jurassic World
Ever since Jaws made his name and fortune in 1975 Steven Spielberg has been the king of the summer movie, and his production of this weekend’s nearly-record-breaking mega-hit Jurassic World simply continues that tradition. Where would we be if we didn’t have a shark, a dinosaur, a U.F.O., or an E. T. to run from or play with or queue up for? Even when his movies aren’t released in summer, they can feel like summery treats.
Read the full article »Friday Box Office Estimates
Universal’s explosive year (coming off their strongest year of profits without tentpoles) continues, as the return of Jurassic Park captures the imagination of the world 22 years after the original, opening to a then-record $18.2 million (including Thursday previews as seems to be the studio-chosen style right now). The lack of other wide newcomers and the holdovers paid some price on Friday for the Jurassic success. Two strong indie openings, as Me, Earl & The Dying Girl did $4613 per on 15 and The Wolfpack pulled $4550 per on two.
Read the full article »The DVD Wrapup: Camp X-Ray, Free the Nipple, Giuseppe Andrews, Pillow Book and more
Who knows how many of today’s straight-to-DVD movies will stand the test of time and find new audiences decades after their initial release? Some of today’s crop of genre filmmakers almost surely will be asked to look back on their early films in featurettes recorded 20 years from now for Blu-ray or whatever new format is being foisted on consumers.
Read the full article »Wilmington on Movies: San Andreas
That famous Fault we Angelenos dread cracks apart and sends much of Los Angeles and San Francisco crashing down into the streets, the freeways, and the ocean and tsunamis rise and skyscrapers topple…
Read the full article »The Weekend Report
It was a close race between the week’s newcomers with action-comedy Spy pulling ahead with an estimated $29.8 million to horror franchise Insidious Chapter 3 grossing $22.9 million. The third national newbie, Entourage, got a jump start on the weekend with a Wednesday launch that generated a sturdy $7.4 million two-day tally but lost steam going forward with an additional $10.4 million box office. Opening in modest release, the unconventional Brian Wilson biopic Love & Mercy bowed to $2.1 million.
Read the full article »Wilmington on Movies: Entourage
I never caught any of TV’s “Entourage” — the hit Hollywood-set comedy-satire about a movie star from Queens and the three hometown buddies who get dragged along (like Elvis’ Memphis Mafia) in the wake of his rise to fame and riches. But it always struck me, from its rep and reviews, as a show I might enjoy, just as the movie that‘s now been inspired by that TV series, struck me as something that might hand me a laugh or two (or even three). Which just goes to show how gullible I can be.
Read the full article »Friday Box Office Estimates
There was a lot of outraged buzz about Entourage this week, but after putting $7.4 million in the coffers on Wednesday and Thursday, the party seems over. Vinny and the boys will challenge Aloha for title of Worst 3-Day Opening Of The Summer (So Far). Almost three times as many people went to go see Melissa McCarthy in Spy on Friday, as the film likely wins the weekend with a Saturday bump and the best legs in the weekend’s Top 4. Friday’s #1 is Insidious 3, which opened to about half of what Insidious 2 did, but should manage an impressive $20m-25m for the weekend. Testament of Youth is the only new indie with a shot at $5k or better per screen this weekend.
Read the full article »The DVD Wrapup: McFarland USA, Scarecrows, Mickey Rourke, Justified, Rectify and more
Kevin Costner is typically effective as the high school football coach who’s fired for throwing a shoe at the starting quarterback – the wiseass deserved worse – and forced to look for work elsewhere. He finds it in a predominantly Mexican-American school in the Central Valley of California. As beneficiaries of the unionization of farm workers, led by Cesar Chavez, the families no longer are migratory and some have found ways to control their own livelihoods. They are still poor, however, and many of their kids are required to split their days between work in the fields and school, with little or no hope of going on to college.
Read the full article »Wilmington on Movies: The Apu Trilogy
The film, as much as any that I’ve seen in decades of watching movies, becomes an overwhelming experience. It stays with you, always: a work of art in the same vein and genre and of the same high quality as John Ford’s Depression America masterpiece The Grapes of Wrath and Vittorio De Sica’s neorealist Italian classic Bicycle Thieves (both among Ray‘s inspirations for his own films). In some ways, it is superior to either of them.
Read the full article » 1 Comment »DVD Geek: Jamaica Inn
Alfred Hitchcock himself would often speak disparagingly in interviews about his 1939 adaptation of the Daphne Du Maurier novel,Jamaica Inn, complaining about the star, Charles Laughton, and about costume films in general. Critics, taking his lead, also speak dismissively of the film, but it is actually a very enjoyable effort.
Read the full article »
