Nerdy Rotten Scoundrel: Will Smith

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Sunday, July 1, 2012

WEEKEND BOX OFFICE: 'Ted' Outmuscles 'Magic Mike'

Two R-Rated films went head to head this weekend, and in the box office battle between a foul mouthed Teddy Bear and a team of male strippers led by Channing Tatum: the bear won. In additional news, Men In Black 3 has become the highest grossing entry in the blockbuster series starring Will Smith and Tommy Lee Jones, and The Amazing Spider-Man is out performing The Avengers' pre-US release numbers in some foreign markets according to box office accountants

Back here stateside, Ted, Seth MacFarlane's raunchy R-rated talking bear led leap onto the big screen was a huge success. The Mark Wahlberg and Mila Kunis starrer not only came in at number one at the box office, but over performed with an estimated take of over $54 million from Friday to Sunday.

Magic Mike, directed Steven Soderbergh, finished second despite offering a huge 'ladies night out' over the weekend. The film exceeded expectations and made it rain to the tune $39 million worth of singles. The semi-autobiographical tale of Channing Tatum's early days as a Florida stripper also boasted the box office eight packs of Matthew McConaughey, Matt Bomer (White Collar), Joe Manganiello (True Blood), and Alex Pettyfer (Beastly).

Though this weekend's numbers could have turned out entirely different had Paramount not made the 11th hour decision to push back its planned release of G.I. Joe: Retaliation from this weekend to March 29th of next year. The second film in the big screen G.I. Joe series also featured Channing Tatum, which would have had the actor competing against himself in two films on the same weekend. His role had been greatly diminished in the sequel also starring new headliners Bruce Willis and Dwayne Johnson, and according to sources, his character Captain Duke Hauser is actually killed off early in the film. It appears that Paramount's panic and release push is Universal and Warner Bros. box office gain.

20th Century Fox's Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter disappointed again in week two, sliding to #6 with a 69% drop from last week. Prometheus - love it, like it, or hate it - continues to be debated continually and furiously online, scored nearly $5 million, bringing its total to $118 million domestically. Snow White & The Huntsman holds tight in the top ten with $4.4 million (a sequel script is in development). Star Trek fans did not show up to support the new Captain Kirk, Chris Pine in People Like Us. Despite positive reviews for his performance opposite Elizabeth Banks and Michelle Pfeiffer, the family drama came in 10th place with just over $4 million.

1. TED - Weekend Gross: $54.1M

2. MAGIC MIKE - Weekend Gross: $39.2M
3. BRAVE - Weekend Gross: $34M, Total: $131.7M
4. MADEA'S WITNESS PROTECTION - Weekend Gross $26.4M
5. MADAGASCAR 3 - Weekend $18.8M, Total: $180M
6. ABRAHAM LINCOLN: VAMPIRE HUNTER - Weekend $6M, Total: $29M
7. PROMETHEUS - Weekend $4.9M, Total: $118M
8. MOONRISE KINGDOM - Weekend $4.8M, Total: $18.3M
9. SNOW WHITE & THE HUNTSMAN - Weekend $4.4M, Total: $145.6M
10. PEOPLE LIKE US - Weekend $4.3M

According to The Hollywood Reporter, Men In Black 3 is now the highest grossing entry in the Sony franchise, having passed the $589.4 million made by the original MIB in 1997. Men In Black 3 has racked up $599.4 million worldwide since its release in May, and the majority of that has been earned overseas ($429.8 million vs. $169.6 million domestic).

Per Deadline, another Sony film, The Amazing-Spider-Man is out pacing the box office numbers racked up by The Avengers in some foreign markets in its pre-US release. So far the reboot of the Marvel web slinger has already earned over $50 million in Asia and Europe. Spider-Man opens here on July 3rd (with Katy Perry: Part Of Me competing for 3D screens that week).

SOURCE: The Hollywood Reporter, Deadline

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Wednesday, May 23, 2012

Film Review - MEN IN BLACK 3 ★★½☆☆☆

Men In Black 3 is simply and exactly what it says it is: the third Men In Black movie in the series. It's been ten years since MIB2 if you can believe that, and this latest entry at times feels like a run of the mill go-round for Will Smith and Tommy Lee Jones.

As the story goes, its been 15 years since Jones' Agent K recruited Smith's Agent J into the super secret Men In Black alien task force. Sadly with this passage of time, we have to say RIP to some familiar MIB's. Our beloved Frank (the talking Pug) is no longer on the roster, or is Chief Zed (Rip Torn). Both absences are acknowledged, and are missed in this entry.

The plot? MIB arch enemy Boris The Animal (played by a snarling Jemaine Clement) escapes from the Moon's Lunar Max prison to exact revenge on Agent K, the man who not only captured him 40 years earlier, but also shot off his left arm. So he's still pretty pissed and sees fit to wipe K out from history by killing him in 1969 via a Hollywood no-frills time travel plot. Agent J is the only one who realizes K has been erased from the timeline and in turn travels back to the past to stop Boris of skewing history.

What's missing here is the truly fun banter between the day and night personalities of J and K. As written, their field partner relationship has sadly become stale after all these years. By the nature of the series run, Smith's Agent J is no longer the wet under the collar rookie, and that makes for far less fun with Jones' sorely veteran Agent K. But the plot remedy for that is to limit Jones' screen time and introduce us to young Agent K in 1969, played with dead-on uncanny confidence by Josh Brolin (and easily ranks up there with Rob Lowe's younger version of Robert Wagner's Number Two in Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me).

When dealing with the finer points of a time travel plot, screenwriters can either adhere to the rules with brain freeze inducing results (insert possible catastrophic universe ending paradoxes), or throw all thinking logic to the wind and just do it. The latter was the wise way to go here and no sci-fi mind games are put on the table.

Throughout the film, meaty back story details are teased and beg for some fleshing out, especially when we have gotten to know these characters since 1997, but get swept under the rug with the movie's brisk pace. While this can be a plus when many movies don't know when enough is enough, MIB3 jaunts from place to place like a film that was meant to be a chunk and change longer.

There were of course the reported script problems that lead to shutting down production halfway through filming, and although the story is in no way plagued with huge plot hole problems, it is a bit scant on needed rest stops by the time we reach the big showdown at Cape Canaveral as Apollo 11 is set for mankind's first manned moon landing.

Seven-time Academy Award winning make-up icon Rick Baker provides plenty of old school tangible eye candy visuals that help sell Boris The Animal and the various background creatures featured throughout the film. It's good to see that CGI FX haven't completely replaced old fashioned prosthetics. Danny Elfman returns to collaborate with MIB director Barry Sonnenfeld to once again deliver a rousing score that effectively helps to move the pacing of the film along even further.

Tommy Lee Jones has a surprisingly small role in the film. Older K for all intents and purposes merely bookends the film, which changes up the expected dynamic. But the addition of fun cameos by SNL's Bill Hader (as Andy Warhol), Emma Thompson and Alice Eve (as older and younger Agent O), and Will Arnett as J's partner in the alternate timeline, provide some solid extra support.

Men In Black 3 is a fun film, and yes it's in 3D, that sprints along and gets you harmlessly in and out of your theater seat in no time. But overall it doesn't quite pack the expected punch of a decade-in-the-making event film for our favorite sharp dressed alien investigators. Although it lacks a big 'must see' feel to it, Will Smith can be counted on here as Agent J to provide some light summer time travel adventure, and Brolin without question brings his A Game to K.