Thursday, August 27, 2009

NEW Box Office Predictions


My predictions for Friday, August 28th - Sunday, August 30th

$24.1 --- The Final Destination
$22.9 --- Halloween 2
$21.2 --- Inglourious Basterds
$9.6 --- District 9
$6.6 --- G.I. Joe
$6.2 --- Julie & Julia
$5.8 --- Time Traveler's Wife
$3.4 --- Shorts
$2.3 --- Harry Potter
$2.3 --- G-Force

Check out the Derby

Inglourious Basterds




Aug 2009, Quentin Tarantino, 153 mins

Though District 9 may be the surprise hit of the summer, Inglourious Basterds is the best movie of the summer. Quentin Tarantino has woven together a film that can't help but entertain. The over indulgent running times of some summer flicks like Transformers 2, Public Enemies, and Funny People had become a major turn off to spending my Sunday afternoons at the cine-plex. However, there is the correct way to make a movie with a 2½ hour run time… the correct way is to make your movie filled with excitement and intrigue much the way Tarantino sculpted Basterds.


Brad Pitt does his best John Wayne impersonation as the lead basterd, Lt. Aldo Raine. Raine and his group of heavenly thugs lay down the law on any unfortunate ‘Natzees’ (spelled as it is pronounced throughout the film) they may come across. Eli Roth and Til Schweiger are both superb as supporting basterds.


As the stories unfold on screen, we start to see the climax coming together. Much like Pulp Fiction or Go, the outlying plot-lines do come to a head in a dramatic bang ‘em up fashion. Basterds is not a war movie in the way Saving Private Ryan or Platoon are war movies. It’s a fictitious dream theory meant only to entertain. Who said Hitler had to die in a bunker with Eva Braun? There is a fair share of grotesque scalping, bat bludgeoning, and blood splatter but it seems light enough for the dissections that some horror/war movies have shown in the past. I think the opening march in Saving Private Ryan was just as extreme if not more.


Of the many things that are worth mentioning about the Basterds, two standout more than anything; first, the performance of Christoph Waltz, playing Nazi Co. Hans Landa, demands early attention for the Best Supporting Oscar even this early in the game. Waltz gave such a spark of evil to Landa that he only needed to be seen for a split second to elicit fear. The second is Tarantino himself. His camera shots, the cinematography, and his ability to get the best from his actors plays out so beautifully on film.


Inglourious Basterds is the best film of the year to date.


Thursday, August 20, 2009

(500) Days of Summer

By Doug Carasso, our first AMM Contributor.




Jul 2009, Marc Webb, 95 mins

(500) Days of Summer is 95 minutes of movie heaven. Can you remember the last time you went to a film that was charming, funny, unpredictable, and fresh? Joseph Gordon-Levitt, who bears an eerie resemblance to the late Heath Ledger (could he be the next Joker?), and Zooey Daschenel, who previously charmed Will Ferrel’s Elf and here plays the breezy Summer, make an engaging pair, with an uncanny chemistry between them that one rarely encounters. They could be the next generation’s Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan.

The story concerns the ups, downs, sideways, and other directions in the relationship of this 20-something couple, at work, with friends, at play, in love, or not. The film is at times experimental, using camera techniques such as split screens and striking cinematography devices that, in a lesser film, would appear a failed attempt at making up for what is lacking elsewhere. Here, these methods spring naturally from the spontaneously evolving storyline and lend to the texture of the plot.

500 Days is a great date movie. It makes you feel good about not only the characters in the film, but also whomever you’re with watching the film. Take a peek during the film, and you will likely see a broad smile on the face of your movie-going companion(s).

What is it about this film that inspires such joy, such good will toward it? First, is the script – smart, funny, with unpredictable turns, and even an inspired and infectious musical number included. Then, perhaps most of all, there are the lead performers. Gordon-Levitt, whom most of us remember as a much younger actor, such as in 10 Things I Hate About You, is so winning that it makes you wonder what he or Hollywood have against each other that he has been kept from us in any prominent movie for so long. Deschanel also has a natural and irresistible charm. Together, Gordon-Levitt and Deschanel have that rare ability to make their every action not only interesting, but also matter.

By all means, see (500) Days of Summer. You’ll be glad you did.


Doug is a top Orange County Lawyer and a member of the Callahan and Blaine legal team.

District 9




Aug 2009, Neill Blomkamp, 112 mins

District 9, a film starring nobody, with a plot unlike anything I’ve ever seen, may just end up being the best popcorn movie of the summer. With a relatively minuscule budget of $30 million, D-9 pulls of a feat that many other films have failed at this summer, show some humanity. In a summer ruled by Alien robots and drunk mis-adventures in Vegas, who would of thought that a little Sci-Fi flick set in South Africa would even be a blip on the radar screen.

The film’s star, other then the cool and original styled aliens, is Sharlto Copley. Who is Sharlto Copley? I sure don’t know. Even on his IMDB page there is only one other acting credit for some project back in ‘05. Whoever the actor might be, his role as Wikus Van De Merwe, a sort of camp councelor for the stranded aliens is noteworthy. As the stiff and mild mannered Wikus, he acts with a sort of anti-intellegence much like Michael Scott in the British and American versions of The Office. You can’t not like him, even though his actions border on idiocracy.

The film, which never would have been made if writer/director Neil Blomkamp had landed his dream job at the helm of the much anticipated but derailed screen adaptation of the uber-popular video game series Halo, is also noteworthy. D-9 touches on a lot of human emotions due to the fact that the mistakes of its human characters directly mirror mistakes of true human history. The idea of being scarred of what we don’t know or don’t understand makes us a race of overly ethnocentric creatures. The sad last statement is the final moral meaning of the film and it poses the question, what does it take to accept and live with things we don’t fully understand?

In the end, D-9 has enough action for any fanboy and an engrossing enough screenplay to entertain the most critical of critics.

Box Office Predictions

UPDATE: 80 out of 520 this week, with 74% accuracy. Basterds comes in with a whopping $38.1 million, blowing away all estimates. That's over $12,000 per screen. Amazing. District 9 came in at $18.2, wiht G.I. Joe at $12.2.

My predictions for Friday, August 14th - Sunday, August 16th

$22.9 --- Inglourious Basterds
$19.9 --- District 9
$10.4 --- Shorts
$9.4 --- G.I. Joe
$8.8 --- The Time Traveler's Wife
$6.2 --- Julie & Julia
$3.9 --- Post Grad
$3.7 --- G-Force
$2.9 --- The Goods: Live Hard, Sell Hard
$1.0 --- X Games 3D The Movie

Check out the Derby

Thursday, August 13, 2009

Box Office Predictions

UPDATE: The unforseeable bombing of both Bandslam and The Goods has rattled even this prognosticator ot prognosticators. I ranked 293/503, with 73.25% accuracy. Actuals put District 9 at $37.4 (way more than I thought - I'll review by Saturday), followed by G.I. Joe at $22.3 and The Time Traveler's Wife in third with $18.6. Bandslam opened up to a dismal 25% of expectations, while The Goods barely managed half of its expected ticket sales.

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My predictions for Friday, August 14th - Sunday, August 16th

$27.9 --- District 9
$21.2 --- G.I. Joe
$18.9 --- The Time Traveler's Wife
$11.0 --- Julie & Julia
$9.1 --- The Goods: Live Hard, Sell Hard
$8.2 --- Bandslam
$5.4 --- G-Force
$5.1 --- Harry Potter
$3.6 --- Funny People
$2.8 --- Ponyo


Consistant with the two (2!) people who voted in this week's poll...

Friday, August 7, 2009

Box Office Predictions

UPDATE: The inaugural predictions were terrible. I ranked 256/562, with 77.6% accuracy. Actuals put G.I. Joe at $54.7, followed by Julie & Julia at $20.0 and Harry Potter in third with $8.9. Better luck next time.

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My predictions for Friday, August 7th - Sunday, August 9th

$39.5 --- G.I. Joe
$25.0 --- Julie & Julia
$11.2 --- Harry Potter
$11.0 --- G-Force
$7.4 --- Funny People
$6.9 --- A Perfect Getaway
$4.9 --- The Ugly Truth
$3.9 --- Aliens in the Attic
$3.9 --- Orphan
$3.8 --- Ice Age

Let me know what you think... comment!


Funny People




Jul 2009, Judd Apatow, 146 mins

Adam Sandler has long been rumored to have the chops to carry a dramatic picture; and over the past 5 years Judd Apatow has solidified his reputation as a mastermind of comedy. On paper, having these two work together in Apatow’s first attempt at a dramedy seems like a match made in bromance heaven. This being said, the final product felt empty of a true connection between the characters and the moody melodrama that filled most of the 140 plus running time. Call me a cynic but I probably had too high of hopes for Funny People. Judd Apatow can’t make a classic every time around. Though enjoyable for the most part, I’m not sure the genre that Apatow created needs to be complicated with such emotional deepness.


Comic writers often find it hard to relate stand up acts to the big screen – much of the reason that Carrot Top will always be the punch line of jokes and never the star of a budgeted movie. There are plenty of laughs in Funny People but the best jokes are told on stage, much the way a comedians “concert” film would be shot.


Seth Rogen’s character Ira, gets the job opportunity of a lifetime by getting to write jokes for Sandler’s semi-autobiographical character, George Simmons. George, an aging super comedian who has been a marquee name in comedy for years, find out he has a serious blood disease that will most likely be his final act. George returns to his roots of stand-up in hopes to have a few good laughs before he goes. Ira tries to be the friend of the dying “sad clown” but ends up writing himself into the story which is George’s life. He goes beyond his hired reach and tries to help George deal with his missteps before life’s regrets become irreconcilable.


That’s the gist of the first half of the movie. Mix in a little bit of Jonah Hill dropping some relevantly humorous pop culture references and you have a sustainable first act.


The second half of the movie plays as if the Lifetime Channel attempted to do a romantic comedy. They are forced to address the serious content on which this movie was based. This (sad to say) is wasted time in an Apatow flick. Jonathan Demme, maybe. Steven Spielberg, sure. But Apatow? I’m going to say no. The set ups are bad, the jokes are absent, and if not for Eric Bana’s hilarious performance as George’s nemesis, it would have been totally forgettable.


Funny People is a far cry from the good natured witty humor of The 40 Year Old Virgin and Knocked Up. The belly laughs are missing, the quotable jokes are missing, and the happy spirit is gone. By the time the final laugh and fade away occurred, I was ready to stretch my legs and leave. Regardless, I believe the rumor will continue that Adam Sander has the chops to carry a drama – this film will not silence the critics, nor the worshipers.