'Benjamin Button' May Be 'Forrest Gump' Without AIDS
In this video, Talkshow with Spike Feresten puts forth the case that The Curious Case of Benjamin Button isn't so much "curious" as "Forrest Gump-esque". They might be on to something:
Angry, Old, Threatening Man Drama Somehow More Popular Than Miserable Comedy
The weekend box office totals, for your logbook:
1. Gran Torino - $29 million. That doesn't make any sense. So many people must have left the theater pissed that Gran Torino wasn't the one with feuding brides.
2. Bride Wars - $21.5 million. Is lady-quarreling losing its appeal?
3. The Unborn - $21.1 million. For a sequel, how about The Everborn? Some kind of disgusting freak that's perpetually being birthed. No?
4. Marley & Me - $11.4 million. Spoiler alert: the "me" in Marley & Me is all of us. Everyone loves Marley.
5. The Curious Case of Benjamin Button - $9.5 million, keeping the hope alive that this could still gross more than Bedtime Stories.
Weekend Box Office Results [Box Office Mojo]
'Marley & Me' Still a Great Movie
And this weekend's box office results were...
Same as last week. Sorry, no change. Still the dog one, the Sandler one, Ben Button, Get Hitler!, and Liar Liar. I'll get back to you if society ever decides there is a better movie than Marley & Me (unlikely--it's one of our best movies).
Christmas Weekend Went to the Dogs! Specifically, This Marley Character
And the movies you spent Grandma's Christmas tenner on were:
1. Marley and Me - $37 million, over $14 million of that coming from Christmas Day, giving the film the second largest Christmas opening ever. So I'm thinking, if I strung together a bunch of YouTube clips and call it Dogs Doing Things, would that make $100 million opening night or would it take the weekend?
2. Bedtime Stories - $28.1 million. Some people mean it when they say, "I will watch absolutely anything for a couple hours so long as I won't have to talk to my visiting relatives."
3. The Curious Case of Benjamin Button - $27 million. I guess curiosity really did kill the cat. That doesn't really apply here, but great curiosity-based saying nonetheless.
4. Valkyrie - $21.5 million. Tom Cruise just doesn't have the same box office power he did before he got so odd. Wearing an eye-patch throughout a movie? That's WEIRD.
5. Yes Man - $16.5 million. Jim Carrey and Adam Sandler both have top comedies. The '90s are back, but somehow I'm less entertained than when I had a driving learner's permit.
'Benjamin Button' International Trailer
Paramount has released a new trailer for The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, David Fincher's film about a man who was born in his eighties and ages backwards. It has a lot of new footage, but sadly doesn't touch on the part where Revlon scientists kidnap Benjamin Button and dissect him for his secrets. Give it a look:
'Curious Case of Benjamin Button' Poster
Here's the first poster for The Curious Case of Benjamin Button. Cleverly, the majority of the text is written backwards because Pitt ages backwards in the film. And his lips are horribly chapped because nothing sells a movie like sore, bloody lips.
'Curious Case of Benjamin Button' TV Commercial, Dudes!
Here's a new TV spot for David Fincher's The Curious Case of Benjamin Button. The more I see of this tale of Brad Pitt reverse aging, the more I think reverse aging wouldn't be so bad. I like the idea of being popular in the nursing home--even if it's because everyone thinks I'm their grandson--and if we ever get jet packs, it would be a real shame if I was too feeble to wear them. On the downside, it might be sad to watch your friends and loved ones age around you, but think about this: what about your enemies? You get to watch them die too!
Look at Brad Pitt Anti-Aging!
The LA Times (via First Showing) has some new shots from David Fincher's much-anticipated adaptation of The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, in which Brad Pitt plays a man born a very small old man who grows into a young man (i.e. he anti-ages).
Above is small, elderly, grossly barrel-chested Pitt clearly being patronized for his dancing ability, and four more increasingly-younger Pitts await below the cut.
'Curious Case of Benjamin Button' TV Spot, Courtesy of Strange TV-Recording Person
A new preview of David Fincher's The Curious Case of Benjamin Button ran during the Olympics last night. Fortunately for those who missed it, someone happened to be recording their television with a digital camera at the time (which people do, apparently), so here's it is. As a warning, the footage is pretty bad, and whoever recorded it is either on life support or stuck in an episode of 24 and about to go to commercial.
'The Curious Case of Benjamin Button' Trailer
As much as it's hard to endorse a movie based on an idea from famed idiot Karl Pilkington--that humans should be born around age 80 and age backwards--The Curious Case of Benjamin Button is apparently also based on a short story by F. Scott Fitzgerald (famous author!), is directed by David Fincher (famous director!), stars Brad Pitt (famous husband!), and looks pretty epic from this new trailer, so I'm going to give it a tentative thumbs up. But to be honest, if someone is going to make any film idea from Karl Pilkington, it should be his Clive Warren/Rebecca De Mornay psychological thriller. There's far more potential there.
