Box Office Results and Weekly Movie News

Movies coming out this Friday!

Inkheart - A little girl (Bennett) rallies her friends -- both real and imaginary -- to rescue her father (Fraser), a bookbinder who can bring characters to life by reading aloud, from the clutches of an evil-doer (Serkis).

Underworld: Rise of the Lycans - An origins story which reveals the cause of the centuries-old blood feud between the Death Dealers and the Lycans. Lucian (Sheen), a powerful and influential Lycan, rallies his race in an uprising against the vampire king Viktor (Nighy). Joining Lucian is his secret lover, Sonja (Mitra), a vampire who empathizes with the Lycans and looks to help free them from slavery.

Killshot - A botched scam sends an old-school hitman (Rourke) and a young stick-up kid (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) on a mission to find and kill an innocent couple (Jane and Lane) in order to protect their identities.

Movies coming out on DVD!

Saw V
The Express
Max Payne
Repo! The Genetic Opera

Box Office results for the weekend!

1 Paul Blart: Mall Cop$33.8 M

2 Gran Torino $22.2 M

3 My Bloody Valentine 3D$21.9 M

4 Notorious$21.5 M

5 Hotel For Dogs$17.7 M

6 Bride Wars$11.7 M

7 The Unborn $9.8 M

8 Defiance $9.2 M

9 Marley and Me $6.3 M

10 Slumdog Millionaire$5.9 M

Box Office results for the weekend.

1 High School Musical 3: Senior Year $15.0 M

2 Zack and Miri Make A Porno $10.7 M

3 Saw V $10.1 M

4 Changeling $9.4 M

5 The Haunting of Molly Hartley $6.0 M

6 Beverly Hills Chihuahua $4.7 M

HSM3 stays alive over Halloween weekend, making it the #1 movie in America two weeks in a row. So for the past five weeks, it was Chihuahua for two, then Payne for one, and then Musical for two. Disney does well...
Kevin Smith's movie Zack and Miri Male a Porno didn't do as well as he had hoped and Saw V stayed up near the top probably with the Halloween crowd.
The lower spots were taken up by Max Payne, Eagle Eye, and Pride & Glory.

Box Office results for the weekend.

Thanks to Latino Review for checking out the Box Office results for this past weekend.

1 High School Musical 3: Senior Year $42 M

2 Saw V $30.5 M

3 Max Payne $7.6 M

4 Beverly Hills Chihuahua $6.9 M

5 Pride & Glory $6.3 M

6 The Secret Life of Bees $5.9 M

7 W. $5.3 M

8 Eagle Eye $5.1 M

9 Body of Lies $4.1 M

10 Quarantine $2.6 M

Not really surprised HSM took the lead. There is an infinite number of fangirls out there. I mean, do you see the hype coming out for Twilight?
The Saw franchise is starting to lose its luster, but there will probably be another 3 or 4 of them. And the news came out that Max Payne is actually not that good of a movie. Beverly Hills Chihuahua is still up in the Top 5. Be prepared to see a sequel.

Max Payne

Max Payne - I finally saw this movie, the first actual film I went out to see since Clone Wars back in August. I have played both games, so I know my Max Payne stuff. Here it goes.

Not bad. There were a lot of differences, most of the plot was streamlined to make it into a 92 minute film, but still kept the overall feel of the game. I do have a few problems. Like, the demon creatures that are seen as hallucinations after taking the drug. I can understand the whole metaphor and how they influence actions and how they turn the person into a schizophrenic, but they aren't really necessary.

And the character development is pretty terrible. I mean, if your wife and child were murdered, I should feel bad for you. And I felt bad for Max Payne in the game, but not in the movie. The game was about death and getting revenge. The movie was about redemption and finding peace. In the end of the film, Payne finds peace in getting revenge. In the game, there is no peace for Payne. He got his revenge, so what does he have now?

Even when there were flashbacks to what happened to his family....it was just kind of boring. In the game you lived through nightmare sequences, which were the best part of the game. You really felt the pain of Payne. I think the nightmare sequences should have been in the movie, but then it would have been rated R and John Moore would have been pissed and blah, blah.Mila Kunis's character, the mysterious Mona Sax from the game, isn't as interesting in the movie. he is just there...and then she isn't. Apparently I missed out on an extra scene after the credits that has her and Payne talking or something, but I didn't stay and now I am mad. I might have to go see it again for this one extra scene.

And Olga Kurylenko, who played Natasha Sax, was there mostly to give Mona some incentive to be in the movie and to provide some (actually the only) T & A in the film. Heck, you can see her again in the next Bond movie coming out next month.

In the end, the film wasn't THAT bad, but it just wasn't good. The game is very good though, so don't blame the game. But the movie could have been more, and most people will probably leave the theater unhappy about the plot but liking the action. And I mean the last 15 minutes of the film was really intense. I enjoyed the big gunfight in the building, but it didn't leave me satisfied story-wise.

The film looked gorgeous (darkness with the bright snow everywhere), but I think I am going to go play the game and enjoy it more than I did the movie.

5.9/10 "When the people a man needs get taken away from him, you can't ever go back to the way you were before."

Box Office results for the weekend.

I might make this a weekly thing from now on, just like my "Some news about this week" posts.

My prediction is correct! I said Max Payne would be the #1 movie in America and it is.
According to my last box office post, I mentioned that the #2 spot was in the air.
Guess which film nabbed spot #2......
If you guess Beverly Hills Chihuahua, you are correct.

Here are the current figures from yesterday.

1	Max Payne	$18.0 M
2	Beverly Hills Chihuahua	$11.2 M
3	The Secret Life of Bees	$11.1 M
4	W.	$10.6 M
5	Eagle Eye	$7.3 M
6	Body of Lies	$6.9 M
7	Quarantine

Max Payne takes the Box Office lead

My prediction that Max Payne would take the lead this weekend in the Box Office looks like it will be correct.
I'm going to have to wait for the statistics to come in Monday for the entire weekend, but according to the pools for Friday, Max Payne is the current #1 movie in America with three other films trailing behind.
W., The Secret Life of Bees, and Beverly Hills Chihuahua (2, 3, 4 in that order) are all pretty close to each other. Any one of these can be the potential #2 by the end of this weekend.

Here are the stats. More news to come! Catch ya' later!

1. Max Payne (Fox) - $6.75 million
2. W. (Lionsgate) - $4.3 million
3. The Secret Life of Bees (Fox Searchlight) - $4 million
4. Beverly Hills Chihuahua (Disney) - $3.2 million
5. Body of Lies (Warner Bros) - $2.37 million
6. Eagle Eye (Dreamworks/Paramount) - $2.2 million
7. Quarantine (Sony) - $2 million

Top Dog at Box Office

According to Latino Review, "For the second week in a row, Beverly Hills Chihuahua has once again wagged its tail into the #1 spot at the box office by making an impressive $17.5 million bringing its two week total to $52.5 million."

Quarantine placed #2 while Body of Lies ranked third.

I don't see Chihuahua staying at #1 with some interesting movies coming out this weekend, such as Max Payne.

Some news about this week

Movies opening this Friday! All plot summaries thank to IMDB.

W. - Texas Governor, George W. Bush, follows in the footsteps of his father, former President George H.W. Bush, in the wake of a controversial election to lead the United States of America.

Sex Drive - High school senior Ian (Zuckerman) "borrows" his brother's beloved '69 GTO and recruits his best friends (Duke and Crew) on a road trip from Chicago to Knoxville in order to hook up with a babe he met online.

Max Payne - Coming together to solve a series of murders in New York City are a DEA agent (Wahlberg) whose family was slain as part of a conspiracy and an assassin (Kunis) out to avenge her sister's death. The duo will be hunted by the police, the mob, and a ruthless corporation.

Movies coming out on DVD and Blu-ray!

Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull
American Gangster (Blu-ray)
Ultimate Matrix Collection (Blu-ray)

Fox Summer films not up to par

20th Century Fox had a poor list of summer movies that all ended up not doing so well at the box office.

Fox's co-chairman and CEO Tom Rothman said that the start of the year had gone well but had led into an 'off summer.'
"It's been pretty obvious to most film fans that Fox has had a terrible season. Meet Dave, The Happening, X-Files: I Want to Believe, Babylon AD, Mirrors and Space Chimps were among the releases that bombed at the box office.
"The summer was a disappointment and there's no two ways about that. Ultimately, the movies weren't good enough and we had made the decision because of the strike and other things that we were not going to rush certain movies."

The next few movies for 20th Century Fox should do well. With films like Max Payne, The Day the Earth Stood Still, and Wolverine scheduled to come out, Fox hopes to reestablish its movie fame.

Max Payne Goes from R to PG-13

In one of my earlier posts I explained how the director of the upcoming film Max Payne was upset because the MPAA gave it a R rating.
Moore believed the film would have to be altered completely in certain scenes to get the PG-13 rating. After the rating change though, Moore decided it was easier than he expected.

"…I didn’t have to change much. We trimmed some frames more for the sake of trimming frames than anything, but we got the rating without any major changes at all. I’m a little surprised that we changed their minds, effectively, but I’m happy about it. It proves that if you stick to your guns and you have the creative, and dare I say moral sense, that you’re in the right, that you can get the right thing done."So this will be another PG-13 film that borders on the R rating. I wonder if when the DVD comes out it will end up being 'Special Edition Unrated.'
The movie comes out the Friday after next with the much anticipated Dragon Ball trailer before it.

Max Payne

Director John Moore is pissed. He wanted Max Payne to be PG-13, which is a more profitable rating for a film (such as Dark Knight). The MPAA has given Max Payne a rating of R, and that did not make Mr. Moore happy at all.
According to the Hollywood News, this is his rant.

“The Motion Picture Association of America gave THE DARK KNIGHT a PG-13 rating and basically sucked Warner Bros.’ c*ck. The MPAA will never publish the rules. They’ll never tell a director, Here’s what’s going to get you an R, Here’s what’s going to get you a PG-13. People might think that’s impossible, but let me tell you, if I’m making a TV beer commercial, I know exactly what the rules are. The MPAA changes their rules willy-nilly and it depends on who’s seeing your actual movie at the time. It’s very difficult to get a hold on what’s acceptable. The only thing you can use is current standards. So I go and see The Dark Knight and I say, “Gee, that’s pretty gnarly for PG-13,” but I felt good about Max Payne after coming out of the theater. I thought Max wasn’t going to have a problem. And that’s not the case."

The rating may indeed hurt the film's box office profits, but my once dashed hopes for this film have risen since I saw the beginning of it. Watch and see for yourselves.

Dragon Ball

What can I say about this upcoming movie besides that my hopes aren't too high.
Look, I freaking love Dragon Ball Z. Was and still is my favorite anime.
And I know the movie is supposed to take place in our world, but the anime and manga doesn't....so why change that? I mean, James Wong is a decent director (he directed Final Destination 3) and the film is being produced by one of my favs, Stephen Chow (Kung Fu Hustle anyone?).
I have seen many pics, like those of Justin Chatwin as Goku (he was the kid in War of the Worlds) and Emmy Rossum as Bulma (Christine from Phantom of the opera).
The trailer comes out when Max Payne comes out, another movie my hopes aren't too high for, yet I will see anyway. More on this later folks!

Justin Chatwin as Goku holding a Dragon Ball



Kamehameha?

James Marsters, (Spike from Buffy) plays Piccolo, and I'm sorry, but he does not look Namekian.

Bulma.....thought she was supposed to have big blue hair......