Weekend Predictions: 05-08-09

by Furious
May 8th, 2009

Though we’re still six weeks from the start of Summer, the Summer movie season is well under way. The latest contender for biggest movie o’ the year is Star Trek.

Without knowing much about the movie, you can tell by the fact there’s no subtitle that this is a do-over rather than any kind of a sequel. They’re taking Captain Kirk and the gang all the way back to the Starfleet Academy and making you forget everything you know about Star Trek. Those old farts just weren’t relevant to today’s sensibilities. It needs more special effects, more monsters, more sex, more dramatic camera angles, more contrast, more things whizzing past the camera, etc. And it’s relying on these modern crutches to bring in the crowds: the cast, though occasionally recognizable, lacks big names and the franchise pretty much wore out it’s …

Popularity: 31% [?]

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Weekend Predictions: 04-10-09

by Furious
April 10th, 2009

To celebrate Easter this weekend, Hollywood is giving us three new family movies, if, that is, kids can drag their parents to see Hannah Montana, parents can drag their kids along to see Observe and Report, or anyone at all wants to see Dragonball Evolution.

Hannah Montana the Movie is the biggest release this weekend, being crammed into 3,118 theaters. Last year, Hannah Montana/Miley Cyrus: Best of Both Worlds Concert Tour (which might win the contest for most descriptive title ever) set the record for the highest per theater average for a wide release in the history of the world, a totally asinine $45,561 per theater on the opening weekend. However this time around, the hype isn’t near as big and the movie isn’t advertised as a one week (wink-wink) engagement. I’m thinking the number this weekend will be a much more realistic $23,863,892. Even …

Popularity: 25% [?]

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How Long Is Long Enough To Start Talking About A Do-Over?

by Furious
March 11th, 2009

Though I have already grown awfully weary of superhero/comic book movies, most of the world has yet to embrace that view. You seemingly can’t hit up any movie website without finding a story about some superhero/comic book movie that is/will be/might hopefully be coming out. Even here, where I’m bitching about those movies.

The movie studios and their comic cohorts are trying to make a movie of every damn comic that’s ever been made. It’s like every obscure comic they can find. Fathom, Jonah Hex, or Preacher anyone? Yeah, apparently those are comic books coming soon to a theater near you.

With both popular and obscure superhero/comic movies in the works and decades of comics to pull from, you’d think there would be plenty of fresh new movies coming out for years. You’d think that, but you’d be wrong.

As we learned in …

Popularity: 14% [?]

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Weekend Predictions: 02-13-09

by Furious
February 13th, 2009

It’s understandable if you suffer a little déjà vu when you peruse the new releases this weekend. For the third week in a row we’ve got a new romantic comedy, a low profile action-centric movie, and a horror movie.

There is a Friday the 13th remake. I predict $31,622,044.

The second biggest release this weekend is Confessions of a Shopaholic. A romantic comedy based on the popular book of the same name. What differentiates this movie from He’s Just Not The Into You is the lack of big names and a PG rating. Maybe it’s just that I’m a dude, or maybe these movies are just directed at fans of the books, but even though I’ve seen the trailers for both these movies several times, I don’t really know what either one is about or what makes them different from each other. I guess the promise of romance and

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Popularity: 20% [?]

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Weekend Report: He’s Just Not That Into The Pink Panther

by Furious
February 10th, 2009

Despite having a real mixed bag of new releases to go with the mixed bag of previously released movies, there was a 22% increase in total box office from last weekend. It was nice, but the movies released this weekend were a little higher profile than last week. I guess that goes to show you that maybe the Super Bowl doesn’t have a huge impact on the box office.

Coming in at number one was the movie based on a plotless book, He’s Just Not That into You. Despite shamelessly capitalizing on the title of a book that shamelessly got it’s title from a TV show having no shame, it seems women were pretty hard up for a romantic comedy, not being satisfied with New in Town. The audience this weekend was 80% female, but methinks that will balance out a bit with Valentine’s Day this weekend. The movie took in

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Popularity: 20% [?]

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Time For A Predator Do-Over

by Furious
January 31st, 2009

Just because a movie was made, does that necessitate that it needs to be remade? That damn well seems the case lately, with practically every movie made between 1970 and 1990 getting a do-over.

The whole 3-D thing, it’s not just that it opens a new revenue stream for the studios. Part of the inertia behind it is so when all these movies are remade a second time, they’ll all be in 3-D. It’ll be different enough so that John Q. Moviepatron won’t realize that he’s seeing the same thing for a third time.

The rumors have started to solidify around a Predator remake. It’s been something Robert Rodriguez has been involved with for some time, but it’s getting closer to happening. Predator. Predator 2. Predator Remake. I didn’t know either the franchise was dead or that people were clamoring

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Popularity: 18% [?]

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Rebooting Tomb Raider- The Movie, Not The Game

by Furious
January 28th, 2009

Do you happen to remember the movie Lara Croft: Tomb Raider? How about Lara Croft Tomb Raider: The Cradle of Life? Yes? No? Doesn’t matter, they’re starting from scratch.

When Time Warner upped it’s stake in video game publisher Eidos in December, the film rights to Tomb Raider were part of the deal. Now they’ve announced the rebooting of the Tomb Raider movie franchise, replete with a reworking of the Lara Croft character- new back-story, villains, love interests, yippee! I mean that whole thing with her being a rich English adventurer following in the footsteps of her dad was sooooo tired. It totally needs a revamp because… who the hell knows? A total whitewashing of the franchise/character appears to be the only hope for the another Tomb Raider movie.

It’s not like I enjoyed either of the previous movies all

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Popularity: 14% [?]

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Truth In Advertising?

by Furious
January 19th, 2009

I inadvertently saw a commercial for Without a Paddle: Nature Calling, which was apparently released on DVD last week. It was news to me, but anything about this movie would be because I would never advertently try to gain any info on this movie. It must be a sequel to the Seth Green/Matthew Lillard/Dax Shepard barnburner Without a Paddle.

Ordinarily seeing a commercial for a sequel I would never see to a movie I never saw and have no plans to see would cause my brain to engage boob tube zombie mode where the images hit my eyeballs but fail to leave a lasting impression on my cerebral cortex. Unfortunately something caught my attention and now, for better or worse but most likely worse, I’ll forever have a part of my brain dedicated to Without a Paddle: Nature Calling.

So what was so incredible that it could break through my zombie-like state

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Popularity: 19% [?]

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Assessing The Weekend: Punisher Punishes The Box Office

by Furious
December 10th, 2008

What do you get when you have one new wide release and the previous five week’s picked over corpses? You get the fourth smallest weekend of the year at $76,677,578- a 50% decrease from the previous weekend.

The only new release of any size was Punisher: War Zone. Even though 2004’s The Punisher didn’t do much even with John Travolta’s name, Lionsgate felt it was wise to give the franchise a makeover without having any recognizable names. When Dominic West, Ray Stevenson, and Wayne Knight are the biggest names, you better have a damned good movie if you expect to make any money. But Punisher: War Zone is not a good movie. It pulled in just $4,271,451 with the only competition coming from movies released up to five weeks ago. War Zone’s weekend total equates to about

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Popularity: 15% [?]

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