Drugs make you cool! Geckos are great at law enforcement. We can win the alien apocalypse. An old Lincoln works as an office. Seth Rogen’s comedy can save a movie! Paul Giamatti will wrestle lots of money right out of your puny hands! These are all lies.
Here’s the results of some of the millions you shelled out this weekend, and some other stuff you won’t see ever.
1) Limitless — $19 Million
So Bradley Cooper and his pocket full of magic beans tops the box office this week. And that just makes total sense since it’s not everyday in a movie some mousy, drab, rumple-person goes from geek to chic. That’s not something that ever happens in movies nowadays. Why, not since Melanie Griffith chopped off all her Jersey style hair-frizz, grabbed a pair of Reeboks, starched her shoulder pads, and stole a dress from Sigourney Weaver’s bony-ass has this happened in a movie. Nope. Not ever at all. Bradley is charting new territory by taking off his glasses, undoing that uncomely bun, shaking out his lustrous mane and becoming the va,va, va, voom we all hoped he’d be. Mostly, right? Maybe Robert DeNiro packs him a lunch in a cool lunch pail at the end of this thing, right before he stumbles into a real office.
2) Rango — $15.3 Million
In some sort of greasy hair-battle, Bradley Cooper managed to beat out the original oil-follicle Johnny Depp. Not that Rango isn’t an awesome movie. It so clearly is. But in order to sustain dominance, the viewing public needs to actually see an unkempt man parading himself in front of a movie camera with the hopes that he’ll either 1) turn into a heartthrob later on, or 2) rely on past 1980’s hotness to carry him through while he dresses up in various Halloween costumes. A Hawaiian be-shirted animated Gecko can only work for so many weeks until the audience is clamoring for more ratty hobo-ness. And if Johnny Depp can’t deliver, than well, they’ll just look for the next best thing — B.Coops serving Dim Sum and working on Wall Street until Harrison Ford DeNiro saves the movie by trying to steal his magic beans and his miracle shoulder pads.
3) Battle: Los Angeles — $14.6 Million
In with a bang, out with a farty whimper. The reviews of “blockbuster for the ages,” Battle: Los Angeles have not been good. Is it this year’s over-hyped Skyline? Maybe. After a decent opening week — yup, that $36 million got punched in the face reducing it by about $22 million. That’s a whole lot of people who decided they’d rather clip their toenails, or clean their gutters, or sew button eyes on socks, than go see Lt. Vasquez and Harvey Dent play shaky-cam Stratego with a bunch of alien-borg cockroaches or whatever the alien beings are now. There’s probably just as much satisfaction popping in a VHS tape of M. Night Shamaliarlans Signs and just watch that one scene with Joaquin sitting in the closet while the alien struts in an alley i.e. the only cool part of that movie. Simplicity!
4) The Lincoln Lawyer — $13.4 Million
The actor responsible for such enigmatic greats as Ghosts of Girlfriends Past, Fool’s Gold, and Failure to Launch, failed to financially outdo these less than well-received films, which obviously premiered amid a world of McConaughey hypnotism. Really. In the past he must have used one of his shirtless enchanted nipples as a beacon luring unsuspecting virgins to various palaces of cinema with promises of a sip from his sweat-filled armpit of love. There’s really no other explanation. The spell must be broken, since his lawyer doing lawyerly things from a Lincoln’s backseat riddled with Wendy’s bags and Marisa Tomei’s Oscar didn’t do the same amount of business this weekend. He may need to unleash the unencumbered pectorals yet again. No, we really don’t mean this.
5) Paul — $13.2 Million
While Seth Rogen is probably stewing in Judd Apatow’s pool surrounded by a mountain of chicken fingers, Simon Pegg and Nick Frost are having the best week ever! Shaun of the Dead and Hot Fuzz debuted at $3.3 million and $5.8 million, respectively. So for these guys $13.2 Million is like starring in Star Wars, or Battle: LA! Perhaps they’ve finally made it. Maybe now we Yanks will see them as more than just a couple of witty blokes who’ve mastered the shock-faced close up! It’s certainly possible. We like that Ricky Gervais an awful lot don’t we? Uh, well, okay. Maybe not everyone likes Ricky Gervais, but certainly we like Pegg and Frost better than Rowan Atkinson (Stupid Mr. Bean!) or Gordon Ramsey (Evil Mr. Arseface!). That’s something to aspire to — continue being cuddly and American-friendly, and not a cunty-pisser. Good luck, gentlemen.
Honorable Mention
Win Win — $154,000
The limited release indie didn’t make a whole lot of bank, but the reviews have been strong and Amy Ryan is in it, so basically it doesn’t matter. The King’s Speech gained only marginally better reviews and look what happened there? And in a fight we think Ryan could take on Helena Bonham Hair Nest of Algae Carter. That is if she doesn’t use her crazy person super strength, and she leaves her mismatched-shoes-of-power home for the brawl. Support your local indie flick, after all, these are the things that win awards. What? You thought comedies and science-fiction did? You silly aliens.