Weekend Numbers Jan 23-25 pg 46(AS 64 mill, Mom's cookies 15)

[La Binoche]

I'm watching Cake and it's such an aimless film. Once you get past Jennifer's "likable bitch" character it's so dull. At least Still Alice has a sense of urgency. There's a ticking clock as she deteriorates. What will she lose next? When will she lose it all? Cake just wallows. 

[ddddeeee]

I'm watching Cake and it's such an aimless film. Once you get past Jennifer's "likable bitch" character it's so dull. At least Still Alice has a sense of urgency. There's a ticking clock as she deteriorates. What will she lose next? When will she lose it all? Cake just wallows.

They're both weak.

[Jack Nevada]

Still Alice is an awful film. It would be subpar even for a TV movie.

Edited January 24, 2015 by Mr Poopy

[acsc1312]

I'm never gonna get to see AS. Sellout after sellout after sellout.

[CoolioD1]

still alice is really good.

[tonytr87]

Stir of Echoes is an awesome movie. It is better than anything in wide release right now. Koepp has a pretty interesting filmography if you ask me.

 

[MovieMan89]

I'm watching Cake and it's such an aimless film. Once you get past Jennifer's "likable bitch" character it's so dull. At least Still Alice has a sense of urgency. There's a ticking clock as she deteriorates. What will she lose next? When will she lose it all? Cake just wallows. 

Haha, just saw that earlier today and I was thinking the whole time how the team involved must have had no idea what the hell they wanted to do with the film. The whole thing just hangs in the air like a cartoon word bubble that reads "..."

 

And Aniston's performance is boring. So she can do a dramtic film, woopie! Didn't see anything that most of her contemporaries couldn't have done with ease.

[GumbyandPokey]

All American Sniper shows are sold out until 10:30 at my theater. Full theaters all afternoon, too.

[Jessie]

Why are people so worried about MJ1? Cuz if youre not going to count AS as 2014, then technically GOTG won 2014 instead. MJ1 is #2 either way. Sorry bout it.

Winning a year with 340M with today's inflation is hardly anything to boast about, especially when your predecessor earned 425m

[Moviedweeb]

You hate the "inaccuracies" of Selma, but American Sniper is your #1 film?

 

 

Hate is a strong word (but let's say you wrote "disliked"). This is just my opinion of course, but American Sniper didn't bother me like Selma because it still reflected truth.

 

The way LBJ is portrayed in Selma is not only factually inacurate (and the film presents itself as historically accurate), but completely unnecessary since MLK is literally one of the most celebrated and influential Americans in history. Of all people, one shouldn't have to fudge history to make his accomplishments seem even more significant. He is already recognized as a groundbreaking pioneer who helped change US history forever. You don't see Spielberg making changes to Lincoln to elevate his accomplishments, because it's fucking Abraham Lincoln. He is considered one of the greatest Presidents and his story speaks for itself. As does MLK's. So yes that really bothered me since it was so incredibly unnecessary. You don't see The Theory of Everything altering history to make Stephen Hawking seem more brilliant, again because it's fucking Stephen Hawking. 

 

American Sniper is very much a character study and also a glimpse into the psychology of war. Chris Kyle could be fictional and it would have been just as powerful to me. It is less about him, in my opinion, than about being a soldier fighting Iraq. He might has well have been an amalgam of different people.

 

The changes to his story still reflect truth since the character accurately reflects many who serve in the military. None of the changes to his story are manipulative or even change how the war was presented. It is all very faithful to what has been going in the past decade.

 

The changes to Selma do not reflect truth and it doesn't accurately reflect the real relationship between LBJ and MLK and the formers importance to the civil rights movement. And that is to take nothing away from MLK's accomplishments, his brilliance and undeniable courage.

Edited January 26, 2015 by Clavius

[Jonwo]

Really? It's doing pretty well where I am, if you look for a screening of AS at 8ish on Cineworld's website, it's absolutely packed.

It opened to $3.6M in the UK which is nothing to write home about, but here it's doing pretty good.

American Sniper is doing decently considering this type of film never do well normally, I wouldn't be surprised if its takes the number 1 spot from Taken 3 this weekend but it depends on the drop for either film.

[4815162342]

Hate is a strong word (but let's say you wrote "disliked"). This is just my opinion of course, but American Sniper didn't bother me like Selma because it still reflected truth.

 

The way LBJ is portrayed in Selma is not only factually inacurate (and the film presents itself as historically accurate), but completely unnecessary since MLK is literally one of the most celebrated and influential Americans in history. Of all people, one shouldn't have to fudge history to make his accomplishments seem even more significant. He is already recognized as a groundbreaking pioneer who helped change US history forever. You don't see Spielberg making changes to Lincoln to elevate his accomplishments, because it's fucking Abraham Lincoln. He is considered one of the greatest Presidents and his story speaks for itself. As does MLK's. So yes that really bothered me since it was so incredibly unnecessary. You don't see The Theory of Everything altering history to make Stephen Hawking seem more brilliant, again because it's fucking Stephen Hawking. 

 

Actually Lincoln caught some flak for apparently omitting a couple major meetings the president had with abolitionist Frederick Douglass on the subject of the 13th Amendment.

[MovieMan89]

Hate is a strong word (but let's say you wrote "disliked"). This is just my opinion of course, but American Sniper didn't bother me like Selma because it still reflected truth.

 

The way LBJ is portrayed in Selma is not only factually inacurate (and the film presents itself as historically accurate), but completely unnecessary since MLK is literally one of the most celebrated and influential Americans in history. Of all people, one shouldn't have to fudge history to make his accomplishments seem even more significant. He is already recognized as a groundbreaking pioneer who helped change US history forever. You don't see Spielberg making changes to Lincoln to elevate his accomplishments, because it's fucking Abraham Lincoln. He is considered one of the greatest Presidents and his story speaks for itself. As does MLK's. So yes that really bothered me since it was so incredibly unnecessary. You don't see The Theory of Everything altering history to make Stephen Hawking seem more brilliant, again because it's fucking Stephen Hawking. 

 

American Sniper is very much a character study and also a glimpse into the psychology of war. Chris Kyle could be fictional and it would have been just as powerful to me. It is less about him, in my opinion, than about being a soldier fighting Iraq. He might has well have been an amalgam of different people.

 

The changes to his story still reflect truth since the character accurately reflects many who serve in the military. None of the changes to his story are manipulative or even change how the war was presented. It is all very faithful to what has been going in the past decade.

 

The changes to Selma do not reflect truth and it doesn't accurately reflect the real relationship between LBJ and MLK and the formers importance to the civil rights movement. And that is to take nothing away from MLK's accomplishments, his brilliance undeiable courage.

I think you missed the real point of DuVernay's portrayal of LBJ. Which was to highlight that he disagreed with MLK about the

timing of the bill, not the bill itself. LBJ was very political, like any smart president would be, and he had to play the politics game. Here's a good article that shows how history documents conflicting stories on the voting bill incident:

http://www.newyorker.com/news/amy-davidson/selma-fair-l-b-j

 

All of these types of films have some historical inaccuracies when you get down to it, primarily because there usually are conflicting reports of history. Now I think that LBJ's portrayal was on the harsh side, and his personal commitment to civil rights could have been highlighted better. But DuVernay chose for once to instead highlight how the black people themselves advanced their rights. Not the whites, which has been highlighted plenty of times in film. The Help, Lincoln, 12 Years a Slave, etc all feature white characters that essentially "save the day." Sure, in at least  the cases of those latter two it's portrayed that way because that's how it was. But the events of Selma on the other hand are a case where the African American's plights really are the primary reason for pushing the political hands into motion. It wasn't like slavery, where there just wasn't much they themselves could do to change it at the time. The attention should be squarely on the African American's  efforts in this case, and I think DuVernay was very adamant about that.

 

As far as your comments on AS, all I will say is that seems kind of silly to think of Kyle as an "amalgam" of soldiers, because he's not. He was a real person, not an amalgam. So if we are going to be nitpicking biopics for not portraying their historical people with enough accuracy, then AS should definitely be on trial too. You can find multiple accuracy complaints about it already, opposed to Selma which is basically just the LBJ portrayal.

[grey ghost]

At this point Johnny Depp would do Pirates 5 for an Applebees gift card.

[Blankments]

It's funny, whenever a phenomenon happens, I never seem to really feel it. I guess Frozen I kinda got to feel the hype, but like Guardians, I saw it three times in opening week to crowded theaters, and it didn't seem anything special. Maybe if I go to a packed Sniper show in a few weeks, then I'll feel this

[lab276]

Besides AS, the box office is terrible. 

 

Sorry guys, but one gargantuan movie cannot save the industry when we will have already our 2nd and 3rd films earning less than $5m in wide release on the 4th weekend of the year. 

 

I predict The Loft and Black or White, both really unnecessary films to also fail to make $5m.

 

 

Agreed, drawing conclusions about AS and the state of bo in the coming months is ill advised.

AS attracts an audience that isn t the blockbuster audience for the most part. This movie is an anomaly, nothing more.

If you take out AS, this year s oscar line up is one of the weakest one bo wise.

I don't understand this mindset. Sure if you take out the big movie of the year (or a big movie), the box office gets weaker. 1998 wouldn't be as great without Titanic, 2004 wouldn't be as great without Passion or Shrek 2. But there they were anyway. And the box office is not that weak anyway, October 2013 and May 2012, despite their big hits were meh, but this January is the best in five years. In ticket sales aiming for 120m which is above average.

[MovieGuyKyle17]

MOVIE FACT:

Kristen Chenoweth is in two of the movies opening this weekend. The Boy Next Door and Strange Magic.

[Cochofles]

Hate is a strong word (but let's say you wrote "disliked"). This is just my opinion of course, but American Sniper didn't bother me like Selma because it still reflected truth.

 

The way LBJ is portrayed in Selma is not only factually inacurate (and the film presents itself as historically accurate), but completely unnecessary since MLK is literally one of the most celebrated and influential Americans in history. Of all people, one shouldn't have to fudge history to make his accomplishments seem even more significant. He is already recognized as a groundbreaking pioneer who helped change US history forever. You don't see Spielberg making changes to Lincoln to elevate his accomplishments, because it's fucking Abraham Lincoln. He is considered one of the greatest Presidents and his story speaks for itself. As does MLK's. So yes that really bothered me since it was so incredibly unnecessary. You don't see The Theory of Everything altering history to make Stephen Hawking seem more brilliant, again because it's fucking Stephen Hawking. 

 

American Sniper is very much a character study and also a glimpse into the psychology of war. Chris Kyle could be fictional and it would have been just as powerful to me. It is less about him, in my opinion, than about being a soldier fighting Iraq. He might has well have been an amalgam of different people.

 

The changes to his story still reflect truth since the character accurately reflects many who serve in the military. None of the changes to his story are manipulative or even change how the war was presented.

ARE YOU serious???

AS makes a cowardly blood-thirsty psycopathic liar into a jingoistic, God-Bless-America “hero”.

[Lordmandeep]

ARE YOU serious???

AS makes a cowardly blood-thirsty psycopathic liar into a jingoistic, God-Bless-America “hero”.

 

It appears some people in American still listen to nonsense from  Micheal Moore 

[Donald]

No sat numbers?

you guys pissed.off RTH with your lack of appreciation!