Nicolas Cage Loses His Magic
This weekend a mind-bender seared the most eyeballs, an animated romp predictably held on, and Disney's latest adventurefest fizzled like a broken wand.
1) Inception — $60M
Did this movie really do well, or are we just living in Christopher Nolan's dream? Maybe this movie did badly and they just put the idea that it did well in our heads while we were sleeping so we'd say "Oh, I should see that, everyone else saw it," when in fact no one saw it. Maybe it bombed! Box office is all relative once you get into the whole dream realm. Who knows. What I do know if that I managed to go one whole weekend without anyone giving away any ssssecrets. I should probably go see it tonight just to get it over with. I heard something about Nolan filming a Suzanne Pleshette cameo back in 2008 or so. Is there any truth to that? I suppose I wouldn't mind that ending.
2) Despicable Me — $32.7M
Yeah, blah blah. Yet another computron kids movie does well. This one even has an annoying rap song that goes along with it. I don't know how it goes. It's basically the Inspector Gadget music and then some guy is like "Despicable me..." Bah. What an annoying title. And the lead character's name is Gru. Please, try harder to be quirky. Really. Hm, what's that? Much of the animation and design was done by Europeans? Oh for heaven's sake. And those little yellow pill-people things that we're supposed to love? I believe they're called "minions"? Ugh. The word "minions" was funny for a while maybe around 10 years ago, but its resurgence into popular speech eventually killed the joke. It's not unlike Saved by the Bell references. There was a Saved by the Bell reference on Pretty Little Liars (SUE ME) last week, and it was just like... None of these kids were even alive when that show was on. It was so weird. It was like they knew that sad older people would be watching it... But what they didn't know is that we're all very, very sick of Saved by the Bell references, especially easy ones about how Screech is a nerd. I blame this, completely fairly, on you, Despicable Me.
3) The Sorcerer's Apprentice — $17M
Uh oh. This is not good for a movie that cost $150m to make. I'm flabbergasted. Thunderstruck, even. How could this do badly? First, there's Nicolas Cage. America's finest living actor has been doing such good work these days, especially with his hair. Look how good Nicolas Cage looks in this movie. Ladies! Where were you this weekend? And c'mon, Alfred Molina was in this movie. Kids love Alfred Molina. They're always going on and on about Alfred Molina this, and Alfred Molina that, the kids are. I was taking some kids (don't worry, they're not mine) to see a Broadway show and I said "So, what do you want to see, kids? Lion King? Mary Poppins?" They all cheered back at me in unison, "Red!!" So we went to go see Alfred Molina in a play about Mark Rothko and the kids just loved it. So it really makes no sense that nobody wanted to see this movie this weekend. Maybe it's all Jay Baruchel's fault? He is French Canadian after all. Can't trust those people. Any day now they're going to inflate their whimsical colored balloons and the whole of Québec will just putter up into the sky, powered by pinwheels, off to go live with Gru or some shit. That's fact. So this is your fault, Baruchel. Go back to Notre-Dame-de-Grâce.
8) Predators — $6.8M
As this thing fell 70%, I guess the predator monsters got most of the audience last weekend. Was that their secret ploy? To fill the theater with popcorn-chomping fanboys — rich and delicious in Cheetos fat and slow and sluggish in a weed and root beer haze. Just easy picking, practice for the most dangerous game, the audience at a screening of Micmacs next weekend. Those are all skinny, wiry French expats who bicycle and eat salads. The smoking slows them some, to be sure, but as movie audiences go, they're probably the toughest. Well, unless there's a skiing documentary showing or something. But I don't know if they show those in theaters anymore. So yeah. Have fun, predator monsters! Sorry for your loss, Predators. May you live a long life on DVD, where people can watch from their homes in safety. (Until that alien egg in the basement hatches and their faces get impregnated with an acid alien baby.)
12) The Kids Are All Right — $1M, up 108% from last weekend, $27k per screen
Maggie Gallagher, are you still sucking it? You should continue to suck it, probably for a few more weeks. Just suck it until this movie says stop, 'k?