Well, you wake up with the monkey on your back, the hair of the dog somewhere in your throat, and oddly you’re wet…inexplicably. Sounds to most of us like you’ve just had a Hangover experience! Now run around frantically waving your arms and screaming at the heavens. This will help.
Not really. But at least there are a few guys who know exactly how you feel…and they’re running this town tonight. Continue reading
You know what we don’t get enough of? Movies that smash things. Sure, there are movies that blow things up, movies with car chases, or aliens who demolish cities in their attempts to take over the world, but movies that just out and out smash things with a hammer for nearly two hours… yeah, there’s just not enough of that. And as a society, apparently we clamor for that free feeling that most of us forget after toddler-hood…the ability to destroy with the swing of a hand.
Thor was sent to remind us.
Speedy tough guys, and Paul Walker…dancing bird-brains, the purpose of a fat suit, Robert Pattinson’s dilemma, and why Disney just needs to grow up.
This weekend’s movies need a time-out.
At the rate we’re going we could see a Who Framed Roger Rabbit remake in our lifetime. Hell, not only in our lifetime but probably before next Christmas. The cartoons are running the world. It really is like what happened in that Rabbit movie. Does this mean Christopher Lloyd will continue being weird? Probably. Who will voice the rabbit? Oh, silly, silly, humans. Russell Brand already has our souls.
Kids like movies, and parents need kids to be occupied for minimally two hours every weekend. Everyone wins! Or at least that’s what you think.
1) Rio — $40 Million
Apparently we like singing birds, or pelicans, or cockatoos, or whatever the big blue winged creatures are in this thing. Given Rio is the biggest weekend opener so far this year, I’m beginning to think there’s really no point to not being animated. If there isn’t a colorful, animated, talking animal making poop jokes and doing some sort of musical sing-a-long than this isn’t Toontown! Right? RIGHT? I’d like to think that the Black Eyed Peas doing their little rappa-lappa-ding-dong thing set to autotune and guttural monster sounds would annoy most of the viewing public, but apparently not. Apparently we enjoy birds saying things like “Drop it, drop it low.” Drop what low exactly? Do birds have badonkadunks? Are they rump shakers or club hoppers? Possibly. Oh what Walt Disney must be thinking when the animated world has gone from “Bippity Boppity Boo” to flailing bird asses. Is Rio about bird asses?
2) Scream 4 — $19.3 Million
Well, that’s not really a great number. But who cares, Wes Craven has successfully killed off more kids in a movie! Have we thought about this, really? How long has Wes Craven wanted to kill kids? It’s all a little strange, no? He really has a fixation with the slashing of the teens. Do people invite him into their homes? Or are they all like, “Um, no, Wes. We’d love to have you, but we, you know, have kids.” I would imagine this is like what Stephen King hears when he goes out anywhere. I’m sure it’s like, “Um, no, Stephen. My husband is a clown.” Work hazard, clearly. All in all, I guess it’s a bit of a boon that this movie is number two on the list, but $19 mil is a little low to really mark a movie a true success. Well, unless you’re David Arquette and you haven’t done the whole TV/movie thing in like forever while you watch your ex-wife hitting her stride on a pretty successful TV show co-starring her new boyfriend, a hunky guy who can swim in the ocean without a t-shirt. But you know, David, you can always have Wes Craven over for dinner, because, you’re not a kid.
3) Hop — $11.2 Million
Jesus Bunny Eggs! Well, they’re still popular, and rightfully so. Jesus Bunny Egg Day is literally right around the corner. I’m thinking this movie will hold out in the top five to at least get through the blessed event, because what else says religious glory than Russell Brand and jellybean poop? (The poop. See how it’s part of animation?) Who says Mr. gyrating crotch is a flash in the pan, and that he’ll never open a movie ever again? Clearly this Hop movie says otherwise. The kids and their parents obviously like his funny jokes all trussed up in snarky bunny clothes. He should do more of that then. No, no we don’t mean being himself in a movie while running around like an albino string bean. We mean he should just do animated voices. We like his British-y voice mumble don’t we? Well, I think that’s enough. Obviously we don’t actually need to have his body attached to say “Awww, how cute. He’s a cuddle wuddlekins.” Onward, then! Hop 2: The Jellybean Resurrection should be awesome.
4) Soul Surfer — $7.4 Million
This little movie about Christian surf angels is still trying to hold on. It didn’t rake in much over the weekend, but hey, at least it’s not Arthur. Not really sure what didn’t resonate with this movie. Seriously, James Franco has one of the most gruesome arm severing scenes in history and everyone just completely lost their brainbobbles over that whole thing. This girl gets her arm taken by a shark and everyone is kind of like meh? Like the shark should’ve had on a bib and used a steak knife, I guess. What’s it take to get a little awe around these parts? Yes, sure, maybe the religion angle wasn’t what some folks had in mind, but you would think more people would have gone out to support one-armed surfing, because, man, that’s kind of way cool. Instead, well, Wes Craven is out running around in a ghost mask terrorizing all sorts of Julia Roberts relatives. Or does Eric Roberts always look that way?
5) Hanna — $7.3 Million
Boring Eric Bana’s boring offspring was boring and impassive in this boring movie about a Kung Fu kid and all the surreally wacky crackpots she comes in contact with during her long, boring, running-for-forever movie. What was this thing even about? Was she a super-spy? A miracle child? Just what? At the end I still didn’t know, nor did I care. Cate Blanchett was there though, and even she was boring. I just don’t know. I would have liked there to have been something, just anything that made sense in Hanna. Mostly though it needed more story and less run-judo-chop-run and then that’s it. I’d much rather play the new Mortal Kombat game for PS3. Mortal Kombat= $59.99 and loads of fun. Hanna = $7.3 Million and loads of snoring loudly in the movie theater.
Blech. I can’t imagine what a Russell Brand kiss would be like. I imagine sort of like the mashing of sweetly decaying mango with the hairy tickle of an ape called Trudy.
You guys, though — you guys think he’s a movie God derived straight from Zeus’s naughty place. Behold what you’ve done.
1) Hop — $21.7 Million
A drunk bunny living in a penthouse. He’s walking the streets of New York City hoping to find love, a purpose, possibly a mother figure conjured out of a shrewish Mary Poppins person but with less singing, and more commentary than is comfortable about his sexual exploits. Since the biggest fear a drunk bunny can ever have is being a destitute drunk bunny, he needs to find a wife. Preferably one who’s obviously in the rages of a severe career meltdown to have thought hanging out with a drunk bunny, and his bevy of unfunny jokes about being a stunted toddler, was the way to say to the world, “Hey, I’m not just the wife of an actor whose best movie was being the best friend of another actor. Oh, no! I’m my own person. I’m funny. See! I’m funny!” cry, garble, cry, crumple-face. But the drunk bunny doesn’t want Jennifer Garner as his love interest. No, he wants Greta Gerwig, strange, indie, earnest-faced sibling-esque Gerwig, with whom he actually has no romantic chemistry, mostly because the world is really all about him, and his silly pants, and his Silly-Putty face-mush, and his desperate, all consuming need for us to love him, his bunny feet, and his dervish of random banter resulting in the destruction of comedy as we know it.
2) Arthur — $12.6 Million
Russell Brand (in a top hat no less!) and James Marsden are roommates! This dynamic duo team of Bosom Buddies is all about rock and roll, chicks (like literally) and Holiday Jesus marshmallow fun! R.Bro and J.Dude are going to set the world on fire with their ability to woo the likes of any upright standing female, from popstars to c-list actresses. No one will ever be better at catching the ladies than these two. Except they need to have access, and a ladies-only apartment building is just the place. Uh-oh…but they’re guys. What will they do? Well, of course dress up as women and move in! Hopefully no one will notice the two broad shouldered, coarse-haired, gigantic ladies with Adam apples the size of the Chrysler building. Of course they won’t. But every time these two lotharios come in close contact with the unsuspecting ladies, something wonky happens and oops what do you know hijinks ensue complete with make-up, pantyhose, and wigs made from the regenerating scalp Donald Trump keeps in a hyperbaric chamber. While Brand falls all over himself with his palsy-ridden, elastic bones — Marsden will keep the ladies entertained with his shirtless meanderings and mouth as wide as two Julia Roberts mandibles full of Velociraptor teeth and the skinless skulls of various paparazzi!
(Does it really matter that these two movies are completely different? No. It’s all interchangeable really. America has made no distinction between Russell Brand and the existence of movies that he isn’t the star of.)
3) Hanna — $12.3 Million
A blond snow princess will break all your body bones and then run for hours. This movie should have been titled, Hanna Will Run Nonstop — Pop Your Tibia — And Then Run Some More. The End. No, seriously, this was really it. Oh, some people will be all angry weird because she’s a running, bone-crunching machine. I imagine there are uses for these types of teenagers in the world. Instead of texting, sexting, and twittering their Facebooks off and the like, they should be trained to dislocate shoulders. I think this could be a useful trade. Sort of like working for the DMV. The people at the DMV secretly love their jobs, especially watching you walk from line to line, just to say that you don’t have Form B, or you didn’t fill out section 17a, and then send you back to line 4, which hasn’t moved in over an hour because line 6, which you’re currently in, sends everyone back to line 4. Yes, yes, I think there is joy in this. And so would there be for patella-punching teens. Imagine the DMV with more Kung Fu and broken kneecaps! Fantastic. Teens need an outlet, I think. I’d rather they slap an eardrum than let the bastion of exploitation named Teen Mom decide their futures. Right? Right.
4) Soul Surfer — $11.1 million
Well, obviously, if you want to see some sort of religious movie that stars a vicious non-human creature than you should see Hop, or Russell Brand and James Marsden yukking it up, or Peter Scolari doing dinner theatre in Albuquerque while he writes threatening messages to Tom Hanks. No, no, that’s not it. You should probably see this little movie about a girl with one arm and prayer. Or maybe not. This country is sad. We don’t like miracle sea-limbs. We’d much rather see a drunk vaudevillian carnival carney with Land of the Lost Chaka-brows. Yes, that’s it. Sorry soul-surfing teen with your celestial surf board. You’re really no match for the anointed, walking Katy Perry tattoo. He’s really that unstoppable. Maybe if you crash into him with your board and can maybe pop some patellas, like the snow princess who may have burst from Eric Bana’s boring loins, you may stand a chance of dethroning our new president, King Hairy Chuckle-Pants.
5) Insidious — $9.7 Million
Have they really tried to rid the house of all evil? Not just the little evils that live in the basement, or the attic, or under the sink. But all the little dusty evils under the bed? Because obviously, when they work their way up to the bed proper, they get caught in the mattress folds and then you have an infestation. That’s what leads to possession. It’s not really the evil you can see and hear. It’s the teeny, tiny, little evils that you can take with you to your office. The ones that stick to your desk chair and the carpeting. Next thing you know, you need an exorcism in your bedroom, and then at your office, because all the evils have procreated and multiplied. Now you have evils and devils. The devils…yeah, those are just the worst. They just impregnate everything. Next thing you know you have to burn your sheets, because you can’t just wash out the devil. You literally have to set it on fire and then buy all new things. But you better make sure you’ve completely rid the house of everything, or they’ll just come back, with more and more, because they’re so stubborn those evils and the devils. So just be sure you get it all.
Your Highness came in sixth place raking in $9.5 million, which means Natalie Portman’s brilliant Oscar follow-up was this close to getting in the top five this weekend, which would have meant at least something redeemable, maybe. To not even get on the board means starring in this movie was as bad a decision as she thought it would be. She’ll laugh it off, though. And when someone brings it up, she’ll look really tight in the face and remark how genius she thinks James Franco is and how much she’d like to work with him in the future on a more serious project. To which Franco will say, “Bong! Pass it over.”
Well, good for hopping bunnies! You would think the Crasstalk community had something to do with the success of a movie about one of our favorite animals, but a las no, it was all that scraggly-haired simpleton and his gyrating pants, mostly. Bummer. We’re not rewarded for anything, unless you also saw Gyllenhaal get all leapish this weekend, or something about possessed kids in houses of doom, and then, well, all you probably got was a ticket stub and something stuck to your shoe.
Let’s see if it was worth it. Continue reading
Girls can’t beat wimps. They’re suckers. Bradley Cooper and Robert De Niro are like Kevin Bacon, the degrees of separation are evident in one awful movie idea. Marisa Tomei hibernates like a bear. Johnny Depp probably prays everyday for the return of Richard Grieco…no, he doesn’t. Adam Sandler still exists.
These are the things you spent your money on this weekend, and one thing we hope you never spend your money on again.
1) Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Rodrick Rules — $24.4 Million
Snott Rockets and Armpit Farts abound! Well, that’s what I remember about middle school. Does this not still happen? Of course it does. Well, apparently bodily functions and boys running around giving each other noogies and other somewhat embarrassing things just beat out the girl dragon slayers, or Bratz doll doppelgangers, or samurai-chick road warriors, or fantastical girls failing miserably with the critics…whatever. Hard to believe a bunch of wimpy kids could beat a bunch of girls, right? What is this a Judy Blume novel? Maybe. Wimps rule and girls with short skirts can eat dirt! Mostly. Well, anyway good on the kids for bringing home the weekend bacon. Maybe they’ll get a third movie after all. I’d just like it to be less about Wimpy kids and more about Wimpy’s burgers, because when I think of “Wimpy” I prefer to think food covered in cheese, and not, you know, pre-teen angst, gym shorts, and dodgeball.
2) Sucker Punch — $19 Million
Well, hmmm. Didn’t we think that maybe this movie would kick ass? That it was going to be like 300 but with girls? Okay, maybe not 300. But at least a good little thing about “girl power?” Okay, I did. But apparently it’s not that. It’s not that at all. It’s kind of weird, dark, confusing, and dumb. So, that’s that. No sequel. No more discussion. It’ll probably be shuttled into that place where Battle: Los Angeles lives now…down by the river, in an old Winnebago, eating cold beans right from the can, and begging drifters and Charlie Sheen for change. You know who’s probably worried right now? Henry Cavill. Yup, the new Superman. Entertainment Weekly reports that this was “director Zack Snyder’s worst live-action debut, behind 300 ($70.9 million), Watchmen ($55.2 million), and Dawn of the Dead ($26.7 million).” Sure, Superman: Man of Steel will make loads more money, but you don’t want your last big film to be such a colossal failure leading into your next big film, especially when that big film is Superman: Christopher Reeve is Watching You. Do it right, Snyder, or we may have you talk to Bryan Singer about what the hell his problem was in 2006! Prada, dude?
3) Limitless — $15 Million
I don’t know how many more magic beans Bradley Cooper has left in his pocket, but certainly there can’t be that many remaining. I imagine even if he’s taking just one per week, like the leaves of the Golden Child‘s little life-sustaining branch of parsley, soon he’ll run out, and this little movie about the brain’s potential and his lustrous hair will peter out in a blur of Vidal Sassoon and the success of the A-Team. Robert De Niro may be a little sad since if he’s not Fockering his Focker he’s taking on roles like this where he plays an old wizened tree knob who teaches the young kids a thing or two about life, the world, or love. He’ll show us all “Love De Niro Style” in the upcoming movie farce, New Year’s Eve, that bastard cousin to the horrible Valentine’s Day starring Julia WideMouth, Ashton Coochhound, and Braidles Coopers! We’ve come full circle.
4) The Lincoln Lawyer — $11 Million
Marisa Tomei has been looking for her Oscar. She’s misplaced it. Last we saw, it was in the backseat of Matthew McConaughey’s Lincoln. What’s it doing back there? Well, it was obviously thrown back there with a lot of other garbage from 1992 like patent leather shoes, paisley ties, copious amounts of mousse, and Luke Perry’s day-glo shirts from the 90210 set. I imagine in a fit of anger and despair the Tomei is just screaming from the backseat “Vinny! Vinny! Yeah, you blend!” in a Brooklyn accent from the late 1960’s while waving a rat-tailed comb she confiscated from the Teresa Giudice: New Jersey Housewife real estate sale. The Oscar though, someone should really help her look for it. It’s a treasured piece of memorabilia that she needs to rub daily so it’ll do its magic and bring her a movie every half decade or so.
5) Rango — $9.8 Million
Somewhere Richard Grieco is contemplating where it all went wrong. Greasy, skull-fingered Depp walked out on one of the biggest shows on television, and in walked the Grieco just ready for anything. He had black leather, tough-guy boots, and a randy smirk. What else does anyone need to be a success? Talent? Charisma? Well, Grieco had that and more. There’s just no way that wimpy Depp kid should be an A-list star. Not when Grieco had a smoldering gaze and let’s face it, non-girlish features. “It’s totally not fair. That guy…that Depp kid never had to do penance in TV Movies or have the pressure to make another television show work (Booker), no, no, he just hooks up with some hurricane-haired, goth-goblin and just like that…instant career. Now, he’s even a bug and everyone loves him. I need more muscle shirts.”
That Adam Sandler movie with Adam Sandler doing the same thing Adam Sandler does in every Adam Sandler movie, but now with settling-for-crap Jennifer Aniston, Just Go With It, should reach the $100 million mark, becoming Adam Sandler’s 12th movie to do so. Now this is a stunning WTF moment. Just who are the people that are consistently looking at the trailers for Adam Sandler’s movies and saying, “Yup, I’m definitely seeing that. No matter what. I’m seeing that Adam Sandler movie.” Who are they? I’m discounting all of Adam Sandler’s family and perhaps even Kevin James’ friends, so that leaves roughly 300 billion people left. It’s hard to imagine 300 billion people have been hit in the head with baseballs, or fell off a boat, or rode a bicycle into a ravine or something resulting in knocked-brain disease…so what exactly is it that’s so compelling? Has he mastered some scientific way to compel us through the television? That must be it. Turn off your TV, Adam Sandler understands microwaves.