Mon, March 23, 2009
Apocalypse in 3...2...1...—10:08 AM
It's a good time to be me. I'm in love (with an actual person this time), and two movies that I'm incredibly excited about both opened this past weekend. One has Paul Rudd in it – enough said – and the other is Tony Gilroy's first film after Michael Clayton: a corporate espionage thriller-comedy starring Clive Owen and Julia Roberts. (Plus Tom Wilkinson and Paul Giamatti!)
As my soul mate and I settled into our seats for I Love You, Man, I brought up boxofficemojo.com on the iPhone, just to see how Rudd et al were doing. I assumed Clive & Julia would best them handily, but I was hoping for a good turnout for I Love You, Man since Role Models did very well and I'd like things to align so that we get Paul Rudd in every single movie. Imagine my surprise when I Love You, Man came in at number two, but not behind Duplicity!
How the fuck is it possible that Knowing came out on top? As best I can tell, it features Nicolas Cage predicting the Earth's implosion by completing one of those word search games – are people just flocking to it in hopes of unraveling its inscrutable trailer? Is there some sort of Razzie-based Nic Cage unbacklash going on? How in holy fuck does a Julia Roberts/Clive Owen movie open at #3? What kind of universe is this?
Check this out:
#1. Knowing: $25M - Metascore: 39, Tomatometer: 25
#2. I Love You, Man: $18M - Metascore: 71, Tomatometer: 82
#3. Duplicity: $14M - Metascore: 69, Tomatometer: 65
Now, I don't place a lot of stock in the opinions of critics, but this is insane! Worse, we can now look forward to studio chiefs green-lighting more bad Nicolas Cage movies, because apparently they're a huge profit center. ("Bring me more scripts! Make them badder and Cage-ier than ever!")
Bee Boy — Mon, 3/30/09 11:32am
Okay, having finally seen Duplicity – and having seen it fall to Knowing for a second week running – I'm completely at a loss to explain why it isn't making huge money, and why people are still staggering in to watch Nic Cage predict plane crashes by looking at the puzzles on a Shoney's kids' menu. I give up on society, people! (I mean, again!)