Weekend Box Office #80
Another weekend, another bunch of stuff that'll be on DVD in a few months anyway.
THE FORBIDDEN KINGDOM (3151 theaters). I guess this is a serious film, though every time I see the commercial, for some reason it seems like it is about to spin into a comedy but doesn't. Jackie Chan and Jet Li both have a lot of fans, so maybe this will make a little something. $11.7 million.
FORGETTING SARAH MARSHALL (2798 theaters). The reviews I've seen have all been pretty good, so this might click. $15.2 million.
88 MINUTES (2168 theaters). The hook is interesting, but this has been on the shelf for a while, and apparently has already been released on DVD overseas for almost a year. And word is that it isn't good Pacino. It'll be interesting to see if Pacino's name is enough to bring people in; he's made a lot of crap over the last 5 years, though the upcoming thing with DeNiro looks interesting. $7.7 million.
EXPELLED: NO INTELLIGENCE ALLOWED (1052 theaters). This is a Ben Stein documentary about how intelligent design theories are being crushed by those nasty science people. It's not supposed to be vary good, though it may play well in the middle of the country. $2.8 million.
posted by Scott the Reader @ 9:26 AM
8 Comments:
I felt the EXACT same way about The Forbidden Kingdom. Seeing Jackie with those dreads just turned on the "this is a comedy. The announcer is just putting on a front for the first 15 seconds of the commercial."
The Forbidden Kingdom is far better as a comedy than a serious film. It tried to be a bit of both but the serious parts fall flat. The comedy is terrific.
The first 15 seconds of the commercial had me waiting for the high concept hook to come in.
Of course it's a funny movie (it has Jackie in it, for chrissakes), but I thought, when first seeing the first half of the commercial, that it was going to be spoof-like.
Somewhere along the lines of Kung-Pow.
Sarah M. - 20 million
Kingdom - 9 million
88 minutes - 7 million
I think Forgetting Sarah Marshall is going to score HUGE. Knocked Up and Superbad numbers.
F. Sarah Marshall - 25 million
Kingdom - 13 million
88 minutes - 8 million
Expelled? - 5 hundred thousand =)
Might check out Forgetting Sarah Marshall next weekend if word of mouth is good.
Can't really expect Expelled to do well in theaters, surprised it even got made in Close-mindedwood, but I will definitely check it out when it's released on DVD.
Not a too many good things out right now, but all the suck is what makes good and great films so goddam special.
I'm going to get a DVD of Expelled when it comes out, and start the pile for my new drinking game (that thus far nobody is willing to play with me): Every time an argument is made using one of the 42 logical fallacies on the Nizkor list, anyone who doesn't call it out takes a drink. It's like Penn & Teller's Bulls**t meets Mystery Science Theater.
As for The Forbidden Kingdom, poor Jet Li. He's one of several cool Chinese action film actors who declined in American films (the most unfortunate being Chow-Yun Fat, who was absolute genius in John Woo's actually good Hong Kong films, and now does pablum like Bulletproof Monk). Even Jackie Chan was (funnier and) better in Hong Kong.
My kids and I saw Forbidden Kingdom last night and we all enjoyed it. It's a family film, but not too young for a 15 year old boy to enjoy. Sure, it's a tad schmaltzy but it's so characteristic of Chinese movies that you just go with it. I was reminded of my childhood where we saw every Bruce Lee movie that came out.
Susan
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