Oct 12 2009 Weekend Box Office: 'Couples Retreat' Better Than Not Seeing Anything New, Apparently
Your weekend top five:
1. Couples Retreat - $35.3 million. Given no other new options, audiences did what they always do and paid their $10-12 for whatever abysmal thing they were given.
2. Zombieland - $15 million. More than laughter, I was glad this movie provided me the knowledge that a meek, pathetic, white 20-something could survive in a post-apocalyptic zombie world. Phew!
3. Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs - $12 million, putting the film even further ahead of Meatballs, Meatballs II, and Meatballs III for the title of Highest Grossing Film with the Word 'Meatballs' in the Title.
4. Toy Story 1 & 2 - $7.7 million. I think I'll wait to see if it comes to theaters a third time before I'll see what this "Toy Story" is all about.
5. Paranormal Activity - $7 million. Pretty great considering it's only playing on 160 screens, cost next to nothing to make, and leaves all who see it permanently haunted by a Civil War-era specter.
Weekend Box Office Results [Box Office Mojo]
Oct 5 2009 Weekend Box Office: Zombies Still Popular Subject Matter
Sorry, Drew Barrymore, no Whip It this week:
1. Zombieland - $25 million. Killing zombies will always be a big crowd pleaser. At least until the zombies populations take over; then we'll probably pander more to them with brain-centric plots.
2. Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs - $16.7 million. As school cafeterias have proven time and time again, even a chance of meatballs is enough to pull in crowds. The chance of a flimsy Mexican pizza is pretty good, too.
3. Toy Story/Toy Story 2 3D - $12.5 million. Not too shabby, considering humankind had long ago experienced the Toy Stories.
4. The Invention of Lying - $7.4 million. Lying??? Was this about BUSH/OBAMA??? [Whichever you prefer is] NOT MY PRESIDENT! Political.
5. Surrogates - $7.3 million. Why see a movie about surrogates when you can stay in and explore the world of Azeroth on your noble mount?
Weekend Box Office Results [Box Office Mojo]
Sep 28 2009 'Cloudy with Meatballs' Has Same Stay-With-You Power of Ikea Meatballs
Your weekend box office top five:
1. Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs - $24.6 million, only dropping 18.8%. I bet Chef Boyardee is kicking himself right now for not working out some kind of tie-in.
2. Surrogates - $15 million. And thus, Bruce Willis loses his shot at becoming a big-name action star.
3. Fame - $10 million. You know how there's that Fame song where the kids sing about how, through being famous, they could live forever? These kids are not going to live forever.
4. The Informant! - $6.9 million. Did you remember to shout the title when asking for your ticket?
5. Tyler Perry's I Can Do Bad All By Myself - $4.8 million. Phew, I'm glad this was in the top five again as a reminder: I was about to offer Tyler Perry bad assistance! I sure would have looked silly.
Weekend Box Office Results [Box Office Mojo]
Sep 21 2009 'Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs' Outshines Megan Fox's Physical Form
Your weekend box office report:
1. Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs - $30 million, a strong debut that reflects America's love of both abundant food and things falling on people's heads.
2. The Informant! - $10.5 million. The Sorderbergh/Damon collaborative team is becoming the new Scorsese/DiCaprio. Except not really as acclaimed.
3. I Can Do Bad All By Myself - $10 million. With the continued success of Tyler Perry proving the viability of play adaptations, I really hope this doesn't lead to someone ever making the popular musical Shrek into some sort of feature film.
4. Love Happens - $8.5 million. You couldn't expect it to make much with such a controversial title.
5. Jennifer's Body - $6.8 million. Diablo Cody should stay out of horror and stick to what she writes best: illegitimate child comedy spoken over hamburger phone.
Weekend Box Office Results [Box Office Mojo]
Sep 18 2009 New Releases: Food Precipitation v. Love Occurring v. Megan Fox's Body v. Informant v. Poet
Would it kill you to get out of the house and see a movie this weekend? Here are some options:
Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs
Director: Phil Lord, Chris Miller
Starring: Bill Hader, Anna Faris, Bruce Campbell
Good if you want to see: falling food; fat kids squealing in delight.
Love Happens
Director: Brandon Camp
Starring: Jennifer Aniston, Aaron Eckhart
Good if you want to see: love happen; the heirs apparent to the Hanks/Ryan throne; the prequel to Affection Exists.
Jennifer's Body
Director: Karyn Kusama
Starring: Megan Fox, Amanda Seyfried, Adam Brody, Johnny Simmons
Good if you want to see: Megan Fox in demon mode; Megan Fox in standard babe mode; what new catchphrases Diablo Cody has in store ("Tweet all about it"?)
The Informant! (limited)
Director: Steven Soderbergh
Starring: Matt Damon, Buster Bluth, Quantum Leap, The Soup
Good if you want to see: corporate thriller as madcap comedy; fatter Matt Damon.
Bright Star (limited)
Director: Jane Campion
Starring: Abbie Cornish, Ben Whishaw
Good if you want to see: if John Keats in Love can match Shakespeare in Love's Oscar bait quotient.
Jun 29 2009 'Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs': Do the Meatballs Really Need to Shimmer with Grease?
Starting the day off with some flesh wad precipitation, here's the latest poster for Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs. If you've been waiting for a simplistic, nearly plot-free picture book of your childhood to be enhanced by a storyline, computer animation, and the hard-to-justify inclusion of a monkey, this is definitely the movie for you. Or, if you just want to see me vomit in a theater, this is also the movie for you, because if you show me this many giant, greasy, disgusting meatballs, painful memories of the Ikea cafeteria are definitely going to make me throw up.
Mar 30 2009 'Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs' Poster Losing the Battle
That battle being the Battle of Trying to Make Massive, Greasy Food Look Fanciful Not Incredibly Disgusting. Their glistening surfaces are too realistic, yet not photographic enough to make them at all appetizing. It turns out even cooked meat spheres have an uncanny valley.
Mar 18 2009 'Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs' Gets a Trailer, More Grounded Explanation
If you were one of those precocious kids that thought the frivolity of Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs could use a scientific explanation for the food precipitation and a relevant moral lesson about man playing God, this will be your CGI dream come true:
Continue Reading " 'Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs' Gets a Trailer, More Grounded Explanation "
Dec 9 2008 First Look at 'Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs'
Sony has released the first image from their adaptation of Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs, and it is full of pastel iced cream. What do you guys think? I'm kind of liking the vaguely clay-like appearance, but I think I'd like the guy's character design more if it were less blatantly a youthful Inspector Gadget with roots for hair:
Gadget seems alright with the issue, and impressed with my Photoshop finesse.
First Cloudy With A Chance Of Meatballs Image [Cinema Blend]
