The first international TV spot for Star Wars has come out in South Korea, and it gives us about 2.2 seconds of new footage, so keep your eyes open all the way through this thing. I can't wait to see if the reaction to the new Star Wars movie can match the apparent obsession felt this summer for Jurassic World- I'm almost not sure it can do it.
BOX OFFICE 8/07-8/09: 'Mi:5' Tops Again; 'Fantastic Four' a Disaster
Okay, so good news for Tom Cruise here, as MI:5 fell just 48% to come in with $29 million and bring the movie's total to $109 million, possibly on its way to a $200 million gross. But in catastrophic news, the new Fantastic Four movie suffered on three fronts- first, the film was absolutely decimated by the critics, with an abysmal 9% Rotten Tomatoes rating and a 27 on Metacritic (one of the lowest scores I've ever seen for the latter). Then, the day before the move opens, the director Josh Trank tweets that the studio is responsible for destroying the movie, the finished product of which was apparently not his version (say goodbye to Hollywood, Josh Trank), and finally the Fantastic Four bombed with audiences as well, earning just $26 million for the weekend and a dreadful "C-" Cinemascore from crowds (kind of hard to do). It's one of the lowest openings for a superhero film in history, and well below the two mid to high-50's openings for the previous, also terribly reviewed Fantastic Four movies in 2005 and 2007.
So what happens now? Well, I wonder whether 20th Century Fox, having failed now three times to successfully launch this property, might just sell the rights back to Marvel for 10% of the gross or so, rather than attempt to do something with it again. Makes sense, doesn't it? I don't think we're looking at a FF sequel anytime soon after this epic fail of a weekend. You really don't see things like the director of a movie publicly dismissing it outright before it even opens. It will suffer a massive drop next week and will likely struggle to make $60 million domestic, making it one of the genre's biggest bombs ever. The other new releases this weekend fared differently- The Gift, the retro-thriller from Joel Edgarton and starring Jason Bateman, actually outperformed with a decent $12 million for third place (boosted by stellar reviews) and Meryl Streep's Ricki and the Flash failed to crack the top five, opening with $7 million from over 1000 screens, one of the lower debuts for a Streep film. Aardman Studio's Shaun of the Sheep also landed soft, coming in with just $5 million, while the top five were rounded out by Vacation and Ant-Man.
Top 5:
- Mission: Impossible- Rogue Nation- $29.4 million
- Fantastic Four- $26.2 million
- The Gift- $12 million
- Vacation- $9.2 million
- Ant-Man- $7.8 million
In limited release, The Diary of a Teenage Girl became the latest Sundance film to disappoint at the box office, with a $13k per screen average in just 4 theaters. It had some of the very strongest reviews of the year, but the indie scene just hasn't caught fire in 2015 as we wait for Oscar season to jumpstart it. Next week it's the release of The Man From U.N.C.L.E. against the NWA biopic Straight Outta Compton, which could well be a breakout hit, if early buzz and strong tracking are to be believed. Also it's the limited release of Noah Baumbach's Mistress America, so there will be a strong slate to choose from next weekend. See you then!
Elle Fanning is a Transgender Teen in 'About Ray'
Boy, the last year and a half or so has really seen the trans community come to light like never before, hasn't it? You can probably point directly to Caitlyn Jenner, Laverne Cox and Transparent for leading the way. Here's another film that gives a major acting challenge to Elle Fanning as a teen in transition, with Naomi Watts, Susan Sarandon and Tate Donovan on board as well. About Ray comes out on September 18th.
Another Look at Greta Gerwig in 'Mistress America'
I can't wait to see this. Even though it looks more or less like a spiritual sequel to Gerwig and Noah Baumbach's last movie together, Frances Ha (which I loved and has grown more and more on me since seeing it), I'll be in for this one the moment it comes out on August 14th (limited release of course).
Vin Diesel is Bearded and Immortal in 'The Last Witch Hunter'
Boy, does this look like a mess. Goofy costumes, bad special effects at every turn, and random appearances by Elijah Wood and Michael Caine making long, humorless, on the nose speeches about the "very serious" events. What's worse is that it all looks played perfectly straight instead of embracing the camp, as obviously should have been required by this insane material. Yikes.
Brangelina Teams Up for 'By the Sea'
When I first heard about this Angelina scripted and directed movie, my first thought was that it'd be a self-indulgent vanity project. Nothing about this teaser makes me think otherwise. Self-consciously pretentious and artsy- sounds about right for something Jolie was in charge of. Anyway, it comes out in November for people who've been dying to see them together since Mr. and Mrs. Smith.
New Promo for 'The Martian'
I'm not sure if this is in the movie or not, but it's being treated as promotional material for the film, where the crew is debriefed before their mission. The more I see of this though, the more I'm convinced it's going to be Ridley Scott's first decent movie in a long time, probably since American Gangster. I have a good feeling about this one.
Intense New Trailer for Mountain Climbing Disaster Movie 'Everest'
Everest is set to open the Venice Film Festival in early September this year, ahead of its release date next month on the 18th. That's a pretty good sign for the quality of the film, or at least Universal's confidence in it (and Universal has had an absolutely banner year at the box office with Furious 7, Jurassic World and Minions dominating the global grosses, not to mention female targeted hits Fifty Shades of Grey, Pitch Perfect 2 and Trainwreck). It does look pretty intense, and it's been a long time (if ever) since there was an actual decent movie even related to mountain climbing- maybe this could be the first?
REVIEW: "Mission: Impossible- Rogue Nation" (2015) Tom Cruise, Rebecca Ferguson. Dir. Christopher McQuarrie
When franchises start to age they inevitably become something akin to episodes, like catching up with the old gang on a long running series. It happened with the original Star Trek movies, then with the Next Generation films- we see familiar faces, some new ones, and we go along with the gang on a new mission, one that routinely has nothing to do with the last one. They've become comfort food, and done well it can leave you satisfied and full, happy to welcome the show back when the next one comes along.
The mission this time is all twists and turns, hidden identities and old-fashioned spycraft stuff, helping it to resemble even more an episode of the old TV show from which the series was born. One of the appeals of the M:I movie franchise is how completely each new entry is allowed to belong to its director. The original 1995 film was very much a stylish, Brian DePalma mystery, in retrospect the least action-packed of the series. M:I II was John Woo's of course (the worst of the bunch), but looking back on that one, even with all the slow-mo and the doves it raised the bar for the actual stuntwork, and entries three through five have all had their own singular directorial touches, but felt more or less of a pace with each other as the "next episode" framework took hold. Most people all have a different ranking of their favorites (mine would be IV, III, V, I and II) which speaks to the creative freedom the studio (and Cruise as producer) has allowed each filmmaker in doing his own thing. This time, Valkyrie and Jack Reacher writer/director Christopher McQuarrie takes the reins to craft a twisty story that starts with Ethan hanging off a plane in mid-air and leads to the the dissolution and absorption of the IMF into the CIA, while Ethan takes on a fugitive status as he single-handedly tracks down the "syndicate," a rogue organization made up of former disgruntled special ops agents, the head of which (Sean Harris) is out to fund his terror activities and be a bug in Ethan's claw every step of the way.
Of course, Ethan's pals and recurring players Benji (Simon Pegg), Luther (Ving Rhames) and now Brandt (Jeremy Renner, returning as new series regular) join him for the fun eventually, and coming on board as a guest star sure to be replaced in the next film (the women always are) is Rebecca Ferguson as a pretty badass femme fatale who switches sides so many times it'll have your head spinning. The stunts are adequately impossible, as Ethan must hold his breath underwater for five minutes, drowns, is promptly resuscitated and immediately must proceed to a high speed chase, first in a car, then in a motorcycle, and suffers at least three would be fatal injuries in the span of an hour, but you have to suspend disbelief of course, since Ethan is more or less superhuman in these movies. The plot gets twisted up in knots as the syndicate head's plan is unraveled, the face masks and gadgets make their appropriate appearances, and Ethan saves the day in duly satisfying fashion. It's basically everything we would want, and even the questions some of these events pose are fun in the way it allows you to enjoy poking holes in the story. Questions like are there really only three people in the IMF? What was Rebecca Ferguson's secret backstory that they never actually revealed? Couldn't Benji have told Ethan he already made a copy of the disk they were chasing before they almost got themselves killed twice in attempting to retrieve it?
But in the end it doesn't matter so much, because the Mission: Impossible franchise has now reached that point where we simply go along for the ride and marvel as our hero Ethan Hunt, now in his 50's (presumably, as that's Cruise's age) still possesses all of his seemingly everlasting agility and athleticism and slick professional dedication to the "mission" above all else. He is the mission, and he's now become, at this point, the "living manifestation of destiny," as one character literally calls him in this movie. Whether that's Ethan or Tom Cruise himself is immaterial at this stage- as one of our longest lasting, hardest working movie action stars he keeps giving us the goods, and will do anything for the audience, even if it involves strapping himself to the outside of a plane that takes off and flies with him on it at 150 miles per hour. That's our Ethan, that's our Tom and it's comforting to know we still have him, giving us his all even in the later stages of his thirty year career.
* * *
Blood and Wisecracks Take Center Stage in the First 'Deadpool' Trailer
Huh. Now that I finally see this overhyped trailer that was previewed at Comic Con last month, I'm wondering if all that super self-aware snark mixed with graphic violence may turn out more annoying than funny. For some reason, the tone of this thing reminds me of Kick-Ass a little bit, which was a movie that definitely turned a lot of people off. Could be a niche audience for this by default. We'll see when it comes out next February (looks like a perfect fit for Valentine's Day, doesn't it?)
Blu-Ray Pick of the Week: "Hiroshima, Mon Amour" (1959)
One of the films that kicked off the start of the French New Wave, Alain Resnais's Hiroshima, Mon Amour is our blu-ray pick this week, now on in a Criterion Collection edition. This is an unconventional movie detailing a 90-minute conversation between a French woman and a Japanese man who have a brief affair, and trade memories that rarely match regarding their past and the bombing of Hiroshima after WWII. The movie was incredibly innovative in its use of flashbacks that don't add up and a non-linear way of storytelling that dazzled audiences (and critics) back in the late 50's, and helped to kick off the new movement in French filmmaking. It was an obvious influence on films like Last Year at Marienbad for instance, and you can see just how startling some of these techniques were at the time.
Trailer:
Gay Liberation Movement Kicks Off in First Trailer for 'Stonewall'
It's about time somebody made a movie about Stonewall, I'm just not sure it should have been Roland "disaster movie king" Emmerich. Seriously, this is the guy whose greatest hits include Independence Day and The Day After Tomorrow, and whose only attempt at historical fare was 2000's The Patriot, a cheese filled, bad history laden wannabe epic. He's got a good story here, but I'm thinking it will be just as cheesy and melodramatic as all his other films, which isn't good for movies based on true events, which really need no embellishment.
