October 2013 Preview!

Here is a quick look at the films I plan to see in October:

Gravity (10/4/13)
Sandra Bullock and George Clooney star in Alfonso Cuaron's sci-fi thriller as astronauts stranded during a spacewalk after their shuttle gets hit by a piece of debris.

Parkland (10/4/13)
I don't know who thought it would be a good idea to cast Zac Efron, but everything else makes this seem like an interesting and thought provoking look at an event that is still controversial fifty years later.

Captain Phillips (10/11/13)
The first of Tom Hanks' Oscar contenders, based on the true story of Richard Phillips, captain of the MV Maersk Alabama which was hijacked by Somali pirates in 2009.

Kill Your Darlings (10/16/13)
Daniel Radcliffe. What more do you need?

12 Years a Slave (10/18/13)
Steve McQueen (the British one)'s third collaboration with Michael Fassbender, this time taking on slavery via the true story of Solomon Northup, a free black man from New York who was abducted and sold into slavery.

Carrie (10/18/13)
Remaking a classic is sometimes blasphemous, but I'm definitely interested in seeing Chloë Grace Moretz as Carrie White.

The Fifth Estate (10/18/13)
Another based-on-a-true-story, starring Benedict Cumberbatch as WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange.

Blue is the Warmest Color (10/25/13)
It won the Palme d'Or, but you might have a hard time finding a theater that will play it, considering its NC-17 rating.

The Counselor (10/25/13)
Michael Fassbender's second release this month, this time in Ridley Scott's drug trafficking thriller. Also starring Brad Pitt, Javier Bardem, Cameron Diaz, and Penelope Cruz.

Which new releases are you most excited to see in October?

Weekend Preview: Chance of Laughter

This is going to be a good weekend for fans of comedy, who have three very different films to satisfy their need for laughs. Sony's animated sequel Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs 2 is deliverator-ed into 4,001 theaters, romantic comedy Baggage Claim flirts into 2,026 theaters, and triple hyphenated Joseph Gordon-Lovett's Don Jon saunters into 2,422 theaters. After last weekend's warm-up lap, Rush goes full throttle into 2,297 theaters this weekend. And lastly, concert movie/fantasy adventure Metallica: Through the Never warms up with a 308 theater IMAX exclusive opening weekend.

At this point it looks like Cloudy 2 should easily be the first to reach the checkered flag. The first Cloudy, which also opened on the third weekend of September, grossed $30 million its opening weekend on its way to a respectable $124 million total domestic gross. It has been over a month since Planes flew into theaters, so Cloudy 2 definitely won't have much competition. The big question is whether family audiences have forgotten how much they've already spent this year on animated sequels/prequels/spin-offs.  But Sony's well executed marketing campaign reminds us how fun the first film was while also introducing the (mostly) adorable food-imals, which should help it capitalize on the goodwill left over from the first film. With four years of ticket price inflation as icing on the cake, Cloudy 2 has a chance at scoring the highest grossing September opening of all time, though a gross between $35 and $40 million is most likely.

Ron Howard's Rush earned an decent $200,000 last weekend from only five theaters. With rave reviews coming out of Toronto and its limited opening, this weekend could be a big win for Formula 1 fans.  The biggest challenge for the film is genre limitations. The sports drama genre has produced some hits, including seven with grosses over $100 million. However, it is crucial to look at which sports are scoring big at the box office. Of the top fifteen films in the genre, seven are about boxing, three football, three baseball, and one horse racing. Car racing has scored some major hits itself outside of the sports drama genre, but those are mostly constrained to the Cars and The Fast and the Furious franchises. What does this mean for Rush? For a sports drama film to be successful it must court more than just the fans of the specific sport. The filmmaker must bring stories and characters that will resonate with general audiences as well. I think Howard has achieved that, which should help Rush bring in $20 million this weekend.

Coming out of blockbuster season, there haven't been many romantic comedies in national release. The most recent is probably The Big Wedding which opened with $7 million back in April and ended its domestic run with $21 million. Baggage Claim looks to follow previous comedies Think Like a Man and Jumping the Broom, two comedies with predominantly black casts that turned very low budgets ($12 and $6.6 million) into box office wins ($91 and $37 million). Baggage will probably end up above Jumping's $15 million opening weekend, but nowhere near Think's $33 million.

While Don Jon is also technically a romantic comedy, its target audience seems a little harder to pin down than Baggage's. Some audiences will definitely be turned off by the porn angle, though those who enjoyed JGL's more actiony roles may be turned off by the romantic comedy label. However, there are always audiences looking for smart, funny, original films, and JGL's directorial debut seems to fit the bill. I expect it to gross around $15 million, which would be a respectable opening. More importantly, Don Jon needs to get good word-of-mouth coming out of its opening weekend if it hopes to hold well while the box office continues focusing on more adult fare.

Metallica brings us a film this weekend that sounds like it could be the most unique release of the month. Co-written, co-produced, and co-starring the band members, Through the Never tells the story of a roadie who has a surreal adventure during one of the band's shows. This seems to be much more like a feature length music video rather than your average music concert film, so it wouldn't really make sense to try to predict its opening weekend gross by comparing it to One Direction and Justin Bieber's concert movies. Hopefully the film's IMAX exclusive opening should help it achieve "event" status, which could bring its opening gross above $5 million despite its low theater count.

Also opening this weekend:
Antoine and Antoinette - one theater;
Hotel Normandy - one theater;
Inequality for All;
Morning - four theaters;
Muscle Shoals;
On the Job;
Shepard and Dark;
Therese;
We Are What We Are - two theaters;
The Wicker Man - Final Cut - one theater;
Wild Style: 30th Anniversary.

Tune in next week for a thrilling stand off between Alfonso Cuaron's Gravity and Ben Affleck vehicle Runner Runner.

Weekend Preview: Taking Prisoners

There is already talk about Hugh Jackman and Jake Gyllenhaal's Oscar prospects, but will that turn into box office proceeds? Prisoners will abduct 3,260 theaters this weekend, while yet-another-dance-movie Battle of the Year is going show its moves in 2,008 theaters. A week before its nationwide release, Ron Howard's Formula 1 biopic Rush begins its warm-up lap with a limited five theater New York/Los Angeles release. Also: Warner Bros. is giving us a chance to re-walk the yellow brick road, this time in IMAX 3D!

Prisoners should have no trouble taking over the box office this weekend. Despite the overall slowness of the September box office, smart action thrillers with big stars can usually manage to draw the more discerning adult audiences who are under-represented during the summer, and therefore feel less "theater fatigue." Recent examples include End of Watch ($13 million opening), Contagion ($22 million), The Town ($23 million), and The Brave One ($13 million). With a great cast including Jackman, Gyllenhaal, Viola Davis, Terence Howard, Paul Dano, and Melissa Leo, Prisoners should fall somewhere in the middle of the four films mentioned above. I expect it to gross around $17 million.

My expectations for Battle are a little bleaker. Dance movies are notoriously hard sells, especially dance competition films. Even the top franchise in the genre, Step Up, has been languishing in its recent installments. Step Up opened to a respectable $20 million back in 2006, but each sequel has fallen further from that mark ($18 million, $15 million, $11 million.) So how much demand is there for an original dance competition movie, especially now that its target audience is back in school? I expect Battle to have a hard time landing on its feet, and most likely fall short of the Step Up franchise's low tide mark. My prediction: under $10 million.

The Wizard of Oz is one of the most beloved films of all time, but do audiences really want to see the flying monkeys in 3D? Considering the continued decline in popularity of 3D films, I think it's surprising that Warner Bros. is releasing this now. The best opening weekends for 3D re-releases came from The Lion King 3D ($30 million) and The Phantom Menace 3D ($22 million), while Beauty and the Beast 3D, Titanic 3D, and Finding Nemo 3D all opened above $15 million. However, all of those films were re-released in over 2,000 theaters. Oz 3D is opening in 318. The fact that it's only in IMAX helps it achieve "event" status, but I don't think that will be enough to get it over $5 million.

Oscar-bait sports movies that open in limited release are somewhat of a genre to themselves. Rush will find itself in the good company of The Fighter ($300,010 opening in four theaters, seven Oscar noms, two wins), The Wrestler ($202,714 from four theaters, two noms), and Million Dollar Baby ($179,953 from eight theaters, seven noms, four wins). With Rush opening in five theaters, an opening around half a million would bode well for both the film's commercial and Oscar prospects.

Also new this weekend:
Enough Said - four theaters;
Haute Cuisine - three;
I Spit on Your Grave 2 - one;
My Lucky Star - 23;
Thanks for Sharing - 269.

Tune in next week for Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs 2's tête à tête (à tête) with comedies Baggage Claim and Don Jon.

Weekend Preview: Family Feud

Mob family versus haunted family. Luc Besson's The Family infiltrates 3,091 theaters while horror sequel Insidious Chapter 2 will try to scare audiences into 3,049 theaters this weekend.

Director James Wan has already had a great 2013, with scarer The Conjuring scoring an impressive $41 million opening on its way to a $134 million current total. Wan's first Insidious chapter opened two years ago with $13 million and ended its run with $54 million domestically. That film holds a 66% fresh rating on Rotten Tomatoes, but one crucial difference might spell disaster for Chapter 2: release date. The first film opened in April and played well through the summer. Chapter 2 on the other hand comes on the heels of a very good summer for horror: the top five horror films for the year have grossed about $352 million so far. So are audiences interested in another horror sequel after spending so much on original films like The Conjuring, Mama, and The Purge? Considering that only one more horror film is currently scheduled to be released nationwide for the rest of the year, Chloë Grace Moretz's Carrie remake, I think Chapter 2's chances aren't so hot. It won't match its predecessor's $13 million opening weekend and will probably have a hard time reaching $10 million.

Luc Besson is best known for his Transporter and Taken series, as well as cult sci-fi hit The Fifth Element (though not everyone is a fan of it.) His recent original films haven't fared as well, with both Lockout and Columbiana flopping domestically. Besson wrote and produced those films, so The Family is his first directorial effort to be receive a wide release domestically since his 2006 film Arthur and the Invisibles (which flopped domestically with $15 million.) The Family definitely has to contend with Besson's spotty domestic record (outside of the series mention above), but he usually is able to make up for that with worldwide performance. With a cast consisting of Robert De Niro, Michelle Pfeiffer, and Tommy Lee Jones the film should make around $15 million, but its end of summer release date will probably hold it below $10 million.

Tune in next week for Hugh Jackman's abduction thriller Prisoners and yet-another-dance-movie Battle of the Year.

Riddick

Riddick (2013)
Directed by David Twohy.

I'm not going to try to compare this film to Vin Diesel's first two Riddick installments because it has been a long time since I saw them. But I can say that I went in to the film with low expectations and I wasn't too disappointed.

My biggest complaint is that not much happens during the nearly two hour long movie. Riddick gets stranded and must survive in a hostel environment. Riddick fights mercenaries. Riddick fights scary (and pretty well designed) creatures. And the most interesting part of the story, his reign as Lord Marshall and eventual betrayal by Karl Urban's Vaako, is glossed over with just a short flashback. I would have liked to see much more of that part of the story, and much less of Diesel crawling through the desert.

My second complaint is the film's bad special effects. Riddick's $38 million production budget is pretty low for a sci-fi action CGI-fest, but that still should have been enough for the effects to be more consistent. The creature animation and the practical effects were well done, but most of the green-screened landscapes just didn't mesh well enough with the real elements of the scenes. The worst effects shots of the film were when the characters were using their hover bikes. Essentially every shot with a hover bike was cringe worthy.

On the other hand, the film did have some good fight scenes, and the action was well-paced throughout the film (except for at the end.) And while not all of the acting is superb, it is obvious that the actors, especially Diesel, enjoyed making the movie. So if you're a guy who enjoys action flicks but doesn't require them to have much of a plot, then you'll probably enjoy Riddick, especially since you'll get to see a lot more of Katee Sackhoff then she let you see in Battlestar Galactica.

Riddick opened in about thirty countries this weekend and earned around $26 million worldwide. That's only $12 million short of its production budget, so this should end up as a modest win for Universal. It seems Riddick was able to survive after all, and we will probably see more of him sometime in the future.

Loved it? Hated it? Share your thoughts in the comments below!

2.5 out of 5 stars.
Viewed September 8, 2013 at LOOK Cinemas Prestonwood in Dallas, TX.

Weekend Preview: Rule the Dark

Universal brings Vin Diesel's Riddick into 3,107 theaters as this weekend's only new nationwide release, but can he survive the box office darkness of September?

The first two Riddick movies, 2000's Pitch Black and 2004's The Chronicles of Riddick, have a combined domestic gross of $97 million. While neither wowed critically, Diesel's Furyan mercenary has an ever growing fanbase. This is most easily seen by comparing the opening weekends of Pitch Black ($11.5 million) and Chronicles ($24 million), which shows about a 110% increase. If Riddick continues that trend, then it's in for a $50 million opening weekend. The factors that will make that impossible include the nine year wait since Chronicles and the move to the first weekend of September rather than the beginning of June. However it is the only new nationwide release this weekend, so matching that film's $24 million opening should be possible.

Tune in next week to see if The Family will get scared away by Insidious Chapter 2.

The Spectacular Now

The Spectacular Now (2013)
Directed by James Ponsoldt.

To be honest, I wasn't originally going to see this in theaters. But I wanted to see a movie tonight and Closed Circuit has been getting pretty terrible reviews (and I have zero interest in that movie about that band) so I found myself settling in for a trip to the not-so-distant past that was high school. And I was pleasantly surprised.

The Spectacular Now tells the story of Sutter (Miles Teller), the always partying, yet occasionally profoundly wise, class clown who accidentally falls for the perpetually innocent Aimee (Shailene Woodley). In most cases the above sentence would have been enough to deter me from the theater, because those years are still pretty fresh in my memory and most filmmakers are unable to genuinely capture the essence of the high school experience.

But genuine is a great word for describing this film. The script feels genuine, as do the performances, and the directing, and even the incredible (and definitely challenging) long takes. These aspects all work together perfectly, almost making the film too genuine. Suspending disbelief isn't difficult when a film's honesty makes it seem like you could walk into any high school (or the one of your own memories) and find Sutter and Aimee kissing in the hallway between classes. There is a scene that almost betrays that honesty by forcing the audience to watch a very intimate moment. I felt that Sutter and Aimee wouldn't have wanted me to be watching, though in comparison to other films it was more tastefully presented.

Along with Teller and Woodley's touching performances, the film also benefited greatly from the supporting cast, especially Kyle Chandler, Mary Elizabeth Winstead, Brie Larson, and Bob Odenkirk.

As for the ending, it definitely left me wishing I could have spent more time with the characters. I really like that they chose to end it where they did, but I won't go into more detail for the sake of those who haven't seen it yet.

Let me know what you thought of The Spectacular Now in the comments below!

4 out of 5 stars.
Viewed September 4, 2013 at LOOK Cinemas Prestonwood in Dallas, TX.