Heaven's Not Enough

Box office update: ‘The Help’ stays in first with $4.4 mil on Friday, as Hurricane Irene dampens results

Neolier — Sun, 28 Aug 2011 13:13:54 +0000

With or without Hurricane Irene, this was going to be a soggy weekend at the box office. But due to the storm, which made landfall Saturday morning in North Carolina and will travel through New York and the New England region all day Sunday, movie grosses may wind up being particularly weak. Theater chains such as AMC Theatres and Clearview Cinemas started closing locations in affected areas today and will keep them closed on Sunday.

As for Friday’s business, the top 10 films made an estimated $22.5 million — the worst Friday figure so far this year. The Help fended off three new releases to hold on to first place with $4.4 million on Friday, according to early estimates. Under ordinary circumstances, that result would suggest a $15 million weekend for the PG-13 drama. But depending on how much Hurricane Irene affects business today and tomorrow, The Help could finish the frame closer to $12 million. Either way, the late-summer breakout hit should win the weekend for the second time in a row.

In second, the Zoe Saldana revenge action flick Colombiana opened to $3.8 million on Friday, and should finish the weekend with about $10 million. The PG-13 movie received a strong “A-” rating from CinemaScore graders. However, according to the market-research firm, a surprising 68 percent of Colombiana‘s audience was at least 25 years old.

Younger moviegoers may have instead been checking out Don’t Be Afraid of the Dark, which debuted in third place with $3.6 million on Friday. The R-rated haunted-house film, co-written and produced by Guillermo del Toro (Pan’s Labyrinth), attracted a crowd that was 52 percent under the age of 25. But the scariest thing about Dark may wind up being its word of mouth, as CinemaScore audiences handed the movie a pitiful “C-” grade. The $25 million picture is on pace for a $9 million weekend.

The week’s third new release, the Sundance comedy Our Idiot Brother, fared the worst. The R-rated movie, starring Paul Rudd as the clueless brother of Elizabeth Banks, Zooey Deschanel, and Emily Mortimer, settled for fifth place with $2.4 million on Friday. As a result, it’s on track for an opening weekend of just $6 million or $7 million. And CinemaScore participants gave the film a discouraging “C+” rating. If there’s a silver lining here, it’s that The Weinstein Company acquired Brother for only $6 million.

Check back here on Sunday for the complete box office report.

1. The Help — $4.4 mil
2. Colombiana — $3.8 mil
3. Don’t Be Afraid of the Dark — $3.6 mil
4. Rise of the Planet of the Apes — $2.6 mil
5. Our Idiot Brother — $2.4 mil

Mortal Kombat: Classic Skins DLC Trailer

Neolier — Sat, 28 May 2011 11:28:42 +0000

Spartacus: Blood and Sand

Neolier — Thu, 16 Dec 2010 04:10:38 +0000

Sketches

Neolier — Thu, 26 Aug 2010 19:17:37 +0000

Wentworth Miller at Comic-Con 2010

Neolier — Wed, 28 Jul 2010 05:57:23 +0000

Louis Leterrier Interested in the Y: The Last Man Adaptation?

Neolier — Sun, 28 Mar 2010 00:36:19 +0000

There’s been talk of an adaptation of Brian K. Vaughn’s praised graphic novel series Y: The Last Man for a long time now. The most recent attempt had Shia LaBeouf attached to star in an adaptation directed by D.J. Caruso (Eagle Eye, Disturbia), but that never came to fruition. Courtesy of an exclusive scoop from Latino Review, apparently Louis Leterrier, director of the upcoming remake of Clash of the Titans as well as The Incredible Hulk, is now interested in taking on the project. Of course, with all the false starts the project has had, this is pretty much tossing up another prayer that the comic finds someone to direct this adaptation.

In case you don’t recall, Y: The Last Man takes place in a time where a mysterious plague has killed every male on earth except our “hero” Yorick Brown, who was somehow spared. The sole Y-chromosomed survivor is an amiable, headstrong young man, the son of a US congresswoman and, as it happens, an amateur escape artist. Yorick spends most of the story on the run from a tribe of self-styled Amazons bent on eliminating the last vestige of patriarchy. He is also trying to figure out why he survived through work with a bioengineer; hoping to reach his girlfriend in Australia; and, of course, contemplating the re-population of the planet.

This could be good and bad news for fans of the graphic novel, as it means there is at least new attention being brought to the series, but also that the attention is coming from a few filmmakers who are somewhat generic. The Incredible Hulk wasn’t awful or anything, but it wasn’t great, and Clash of the Titans looks like 300 meets Pirates of the Caribbean, which isn’t necessarily bad, but not all that promising either. Having never read the graphic novels, I can’t comment as to the perfect director to bring Vaughn’s pages to life, so maybe others can help. If not Louis Leterrier, who would you like to see direct Y: The Last Man?

Cropping image tryout

Neolier — Sun, 03 Jan 2010 02:57:03 +0000

Es que acaso somos tan estúpidos que cada vez tenemos que regresar.

Morning Sketches

Neolier — Sun, 30 Aug 2009 06:25:57 +0000

Nuevos posters de ‘Agora’, Amenábar ataca fuerte

Neolier — Sun, 30 Aug 2009 06:24:40 +0000

Hombre, su ’status’ no es el mismo desde que dejó para la Historia de nuestro Cine aquel peliculón llamado ‘Mar Adentro’. Y me refiero a este filme, porque por entonces, antes de su estreno, me parecía increible, e incluso una temeridad, que un director abonado al género del suspense a la española, que estaba tratando de tú a tú a Hollywood, se metiera en un fregao como aquél.

Se arriesgó, con el colchón de ‘Los Otros’, y acertó en mi corazón: ‘Mar Adentro’ ganó, entre otros galardones, el Globo de Oro y el Oscar a la mejor película de habla no inglesa en 2005, le puso la alfombra a Javier Bardem para que despegara su carrera en la Meca del Cine, y le consagró como realizador.

Así que, tirarse a una piscina como la de ‘Agora’, a pesar de que tengamos la érronea impresión de que tiene poca agua (= poco interés) y encima que está calentuja (= historia nada original), no me ha resultado extraño ahora.

Sony Buys Pitch For inFAMOUS Video Game Adaptation

Neolier — Thu, 30 Jul 2009 00:28:38 +0000

Sony Pictures and Sony Computer Entertainment of America are working out a deal to produce a film based on the recent PlayStation 3 exclusive game inFAMOUS, and THR reports that writer Sheldon Turner’s (The Longest Yard, Jason Reitman’s Up in the Air) pitch to adapt the game has been bought by the studio. The game follows Cole McGrath, a bike messenger who is gifted with extraordinary electrical powers when he is caught at the epicenter of a bomb blast that destroys much of his hometown Empire City.

inFAMOUS Video Game - Concept Art

“What excited me most about the game was it was the first of which I’ve come across that had a big idea and a character arc,” Turner tells THR. “It is, I believe, the future of gaming. The game, while big and fun, is at its core a love ballad to the underachiever, which is what our hero, Cole McGrath, is.”

I don’t agree with that take at all. At it’s core, inFAMOUS is exactly like the original Marvel comics, with a few modern storytelling tropes thrown in. Cole faces the classic ‘great power = great responsibility’ equation, and the game allows players to rise or fall with respect to the moral imperative by taking good or evil routes through the game. They’re nudged by Cole’s former fiancee, who believes he’s responsible for the bomb blast and has to be convinced of Cole’s good nature and by a best friend that increasingly attempts to trade on Cole’s new fame as Empire City’s superpower.

There’s a lot more story here than in a game like Dead Space, and a twist worthy of M. Night Shyamalan that occurs towards the end. Visually, the hook of the game was the explosive electrical powers, odd mutant gangs that plauge Empire City and Cole’s parkour-like ability to scale walls and rooftops. There’s a lot of good action to put on screen, and the story is solid enough that this could be one of the better game-to-film adaptations.