BOX OFFICE TOP TEN
1. Twilight - $70.5 Million ($70.5 Million)
2. Quantum of Solace - $27.4 Million ($109.4 Million)
3. Bolt - $27 Million ($27 Million)
4. Madagascar: Escape 2 Africa - $16 Million ($137.4 Million)
5. Role Models - $7.2 Million ($48 Million)
6. Changeling - $2.6 Million ($31.6 Million)
7. High School Musical 3: Senior Year - $2 Million ($86.8 Million)
8. Zack and Miri Make A Porno - $1.7 Million ($29.3 Million)
9. The Boy in the Striped Pajamas $1.6 Million ($2.6 Million)
10. The Secret Life of Bees - $1.2 Million ($35.6 Million)
Twilight opened at #1 at the box office this weekend with a whopping $70.5 million, knocking Quantum of Solace (which surpassed $100 million mark) down to #2 this week. Meanwhile, Bolt debuted strong at #3, pulling in $27 million, and Madagascar: Escape 2 Africa fell two spots to #4. The much-better-than-it-looks Role Models fell one spot to #5 with $7.2 million.
Come on, we're not done with Saw yet? Kevin Greutert, editor on all five Saw films, is set to direct Saw VI, which is slated for release on October 23, 2009. Mark Rolston, Tobin Bell, Costas Mandylor, and Betsy Russell are all set to return as well, while Patrick Melton and Marcus Dunston are currently writing the script. Spoiler: people die in fucked up ways, everybody's terrified and things are not what they seem. If you've kept with the franchise for this long, you might be better off with snuff films at this point.
Please tell me this is some sick joke. Josh Schwartz, creator of such staggering television masterpieces as Gossip Girl, The O.C., and Chuck has been hired by 20th Century Fox to write the script for X-Men: First Class.
That's right. Cause stuff like "integrity" and "honoring the franchise" mean nothing when stacked against the mainstream's retarded hysteria over flashy pop culture bullshit.
The film is set to focus on the new, younger set of mutants rather than the midlife-crisis-laden freaks of the prior three films. If this film isn't flashy, dangerous and hot-damn awesome, Schwartz can expect to be drawn, quartered and sent to the outer corners of the Marvel universe to rot for eternity.
Just sayin.
Despite Prince Caspian being a box-office disappointment last year, Disney's gearing up for the next installment in the Narnia franchise, Voyage of the Dawn Treader. However, there's a lot riding on the film, seeing that as of now Disney doesn't plan to continue the series after Dawn Treader. A few changes are also in store for the highly-anticipated film, and not all of them are good. For one, Disney has reportedly dropped plans to film on location in Malta, Iceland and Prague, citing expense issues. They also want the budget cut down to $100 million, a herculean task given the scope of production on the first two films. On the bright side, however, Son of Rambow's Will Poulter has been cast as Eustace Scrubb, a central figure in the Treader storyline. The film is also set to be shot at Baja Studios in Rosarito Beach, using the water tank created for James Cameron's Titanic. The shoot is slated to begin in January and take 4-5 months to complete.
Can you tell the difference between the three Bourne movies? I can't - in each of them, Jason Bourne is on the run, trying to figure out what's going on because he can't remember anything, and someone he cares about gets killed, which leads him to go on the offensive with a heaping side of vengeful badass. Big climax with a bunch of secret agent shit and awesome fighting. Did I miss anything? Well if I did, don't worry a bit about it, because you'll have plenty of opportunity to see it over and over again.
Universal has just inked a deal with writer Robert Ludlum's estate for exclusive rights to the Jason Bourne character, as well as first look at his other novels. That means the studio can run like hell with the franchise, moving ahead with three more planned Bourne movies. Matt Damon has only signed for the next film so far, but he may as well stick with it rather than run the risk of being the Pierce Brosnan to his successor's Daniel Craig.
The fourth Bourne installment will be directed by Paul Greengrass, who led both The Bourne Ultimatum and The Bourne Supremacy.
Ludlum only wrote two sequels to the original story, Supremacy and Ultimatum, before his death in 2001. However, his heirs commissioned novelist Eric Van Lustbader to continue the series with The Bourne Legacy, The Bourne Betrayal and The Bourne Sanction, on the condition of final approval on all screenplays and casting choices.
Expect the fourth Bourne film in Summer 2010.
To Hell With Originality, Part 51,924: Disney's planning a 3-D makeover of the 1991 animated classic Beauty and the Beast, the only animated film ever nominated for a Best Picture Oscar. According to Variety, the movie's original codirectors, Kirk Wise and Gary Trousdale, will supervise the project, which should be in production for roughly nine months.
The film's expected sometime in 2010, which will put it in the company of new 3-D versions of Toy Story 2, the massively anticipated Toy Story 3, Rapunzel, Step Up 3 and Tim Burton's remake of Alice in Wonderland.
Tim Blake Nelson, the dude who turns into the villain named Leader near the end of last summer's Hulk movie, recently confirmed that he actually signed on for a trilogy, regardless of whether or not Edward Norton reprises his role as the not-so-jolly green giant. "I'm signed on to do Hulk 2 and 3 whether Edward's there or not, so it's not even up to me," Nelson recently told MTV. "When I agreed to do Hulk, I signed off for two sequels, so it's a moot question. I certainly hope Edward is on the sequel, but that's up to Marvel and Edward."
The delicate words are undoubtedly due to the well-publicized dispute between Norton and Universal over the final version of the film, which makes the likelihood of Norton returning quite low.
Wow, who could've guessed - Summit Entertainment has already announced that they're officially moving ahead with a sequel to the bottom-feeding vampire emo porn flick Twilight, which has been out in theaters for all of about fourteen minutes. Thje next installment in Stephanie Meyer’s lame-ass bloodsucker series is called New Moon. Writer Melissa Rosenberg has already begun working on the script, as well as those of the other inevitable sequels to follow. Yay.
Tagged:
