Mon, March 23

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!")

1 comment with related links

Thu, March 19

Who Was Julia Talking About?—12:46 PM

Just like you watch SNL when Alec Baldwin is on – or anything when Paul Rudd is on – you make sure to watch Letterman when Julia Roberts is on. She was on Tuesday to promote her new movie Duplicity, which is likely to occupy the top slot of this year's movie reviews from next week until Up comes out. She and Dave have excellent chemistry, but their best years are behind them and these days they mostly coast on the memories of those outstanding early appearances and then make coy, flirty jokes at one another. Still, if you're going to watch two people make coy, flirty jokes at one another, you could do a lot worse.

On Tuesday, Dave also talked Julia into telling a story about working with a difficult co-star. She had mentioned – as stars are contracted to do – how amazing it was working with her current co-star, Clive Owen, so Dave prodded whether or not she'd ever had the opposite experience. Julia proceeded to tell an expletive-laden story of working with one actor who snapped at the crew and threatened to run them over with his car. (Actually, tried to goad his driver into doing it.) Compared to the recent Christian Bale tape, it was mild stuff, but pretty enjoyable nonetheless – if for no other reason than her obvious discomfort retelling it. But Julia refused to say who she was talking about.

Off the top of my head, Nick Nolte from I Love Trouble seems like the obvious candidate. (It'd be hilarious if it were Tom Hanks from Charlie Wilson's War, given his reputation – but a couple of details from the story contradict that.) I suppose it could be Mel Gibson, but as nutty as he has turned out to be, he seemed a lot saner in the '90s and everything you hear from either one of them makes it seem like they're great pals. Aaron Eckhart from Erin Brockovich, perhaps? Tom Skerritt from Steel Magnolias? I'm trying to play this guessing game without cheating and peeking at her IMDb page – you guys have any other ideas?

0 comments