The Big Screen Bulletin 12.31.12: The Hobbit Stays #1 for Third Week!
Posted by Steve Gustafson on 12.31.2012
News and thoughts on Ewan McGregor potentially returning as Obi Wan Kenobi in Star Wars: Episode VII, what to expect from Jamie Foxx’s Electro in Amazing Spider-Man 2, Robert Downey Jr. shares new information about Iron Man 3, Quentin Tarantino discussing his next film and more!
Welcome to the Big Screen Bulletin! My name is Steve Gustafson and this is where we hit the big movie news from the weekend and anything else going on in the world of Hollywood!
Due to technical problems, I was unable to post my Hollywood 5 & 1. Fear not! It will return NEXT Saturday with a special WINNERS AND LOSERS: 2012 Edition!
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1. The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey $32.9 million ($222.7 million total) READ THE REVIEW!
2. Django Unchained $30.7 million ($64 million total) READ THE REVIEW!
3. Les Miserables $28 million ($67.5 million total)
4. Parental Guidance $14.8 million ($14.8 million total)
5. Jack Reacher $14 million ($44.7 million total) READ THE REVIEW!
6. This Is 40 $13.2 million ($37.1 million total) READ THE REVIEW!
7. Lincoln $7.5 million ($132 million total) READ THE REVIEW!
8. The Guilt Trip $6.7 million ($21.1 million total) READ THE REVIEW!
9. Monsters, Inc. $6.4 million ($18.5 million total)
10. Rise of the Guardians $4.9 million ($79.7 million total) READ THE REVIEW!
Box Office Survey!
Instead of me just repeating what you can see, how about we ask some questions about the weekend box office? Answer in the comments!
* Are you surprised The Hobbit remained #1?
* Will it remain on top for a fourth week?
BULLETIN BOARD
IGN, with the help of Box Office Mojo and BoxOffice.com, has put together a list of the biggest movie flops of 2012. In alphabetical order:
Battleship -- Budget: reportedly $209-225 mln; Domestic: $65.2 mln; Int'l: $237.6 mln Big Miracle -- Budget: $40 mln; Domestic: $20.2 mln; Int'l: $4.6 mln Dredd 3D -- Budget: $50 mln; Domestic: $13.4 mln; Int'l: 17.5 mln John Carter -- Budget: $250 mln; Domestic: $73.1 mln; Int'l: $209.7 mln The Oogieloves In The Big Balloon Adventure -- Budget: $20 mln; Domestic: $1.1 mln; Int'l: N/A People Like Us -- Budget: $16 mln; Domestic: $12.4 mln; Int'l: N/A Premium Rush -- Budget: $35 mln; Domestic: $20.3 mln; Int'l: $10.4 mln Red Tails -- Budget: $58 mln; Domestic: $49.9 mln; Int'l: N/A Rock of Ages -- Budget: $75 mln; Domestic: $38.5 mln; Foreign: $17.8 mln Ruby Sparks -- Budget: $8 mln; Domestic: $2.5 mln; Int'l: $3.9 mln That's My Boy -- Budget: $70 mln; Domestic: $36.9 mln; Int'l: $20.8 mln A Thousand Words -- Budget: $40 mln; Domestic: $18.5 mln; Int'l: $2.1 mln Wanderlust -- Budget: $30 mln; Domestic: $17.3 mln; Int'l: $4.2 mln The Watch -- Budget: $68 mln; Domestic: $35.4 mln; Int'l: $32.6 mln Won't Back Down -- Budget: $25 mln; Domestic: $5.3 mln; Int'l: N/A
You know where I'm going with this!
Casting of the Week!
Ewan McGregor spole to Total Film magazine about Star Wars: Episode VII, and here's an excerpt on what he had to say on the matter:
"I'd be up for it. If they need me to be Obi Wan Kenobi, I'd be happy to do it," McGregor said. "Who knows what the story would be? How could I be Obi Wan Kenobi? Oh, I'm in the force? With Liam [Neeson]? We're in there together? I'm up for it anyway. I will don the cloak again."
Do you want to see McGregor back as Obi Wan Kenobi?
GottaBeKidding!
With Django Unchained making waves at the box office, Quentin Tarantino has been talking about another period drama he's got on the boil, in the form of Inglourious Basterds spin-off, Killer Crow.
"My original idea for Inglourious Basterds way back when," explains QT, "was that this [would be] a huge story that included the [smaller] story that you saw in the film, but also followed a bunch of black troops, and they had been fucked over by the American military and kind of go apeshit."
"The black troops go on an Apache warpath and kill a bunch of white soldiers and white officers on a military base and are just making a warpath to Switzerland. So that was always going to be part of it, and I was going to do it as a miniseries, and that was going to be one of the big storylines."
"When I decided to try to turn it into a movie, that was a section I had to take out to help tame my material. I have most of that written. It's ready to go; I just have to write the second half of it…That would be the third of the trilogy. It would be called Killer Crow or something like that."
What do you think of Killer Crow?
Spider-Man!
Having recently been cast as the villain in The Amazing Spider-Man 2, Jamie Foxx has dropped a couple of tidbits about playing Maxwell Dillon, better known to comic-book fans as Electro.
"I'm going to keep it close to the chest but I followed the Spider-Man comic books," says Foxx of his take on the character. "And I would watch the television show growing up. It's a blessing."
In the comics, Dillon is an electrical engineer who finds himself gifted the ability to control electricity after being struck by lightning while working on a power line. It's a big role for Foxx, a fact that the actor is well aware of.
"It's incredible," he says. "Especially for my little daughter, who is there for the make-up tests and everything. It's another testament to Quentin Tarantino because without Django, I wouldn't be doing Spider-Man."
Do you think Foxx will be electric as Electro?
Warm Bodies!
The first four minutes of Jonathan Levine's, Warm Bodies, has arrived online, featuring Nicholas Hoult talking us through life as a zombie.
Set in a post-apocalyptic world where the majority of the population are zombies, the film swiftly brushes aside how exactly it all happened ("could've been a radioactive Outbreak monkey" supposes Hoult) in order to focus in on the plight of our hero, R.
He can't remember much of his old life you see, but when he stumbles across the girlfriend of one of his victims, some of his old human feelings come rushing back to the surface. Could a zombie be rehabilitated after all?
Take a look and leave your thoughts below!
Test Footage!
Over a year ago, Alcon Entertainment announced that Eddie Murphy would be lending his voice to the titular character in the live-action/CG hybrid adaptation of Hanna-Barbera's 1970's animated series Hong Kong Phooey. And three years earlier, Warner Bros. decided to utilize their rights to the Looney Tunes library, capitalize on the trend of families buying into the live-action/CG hybrid adaptations of cartoons like Alvin and the Chipmunks and The Smurfs, and bring Marvin the Martian to the big screen. However, now it seems like both those projects are dead as director Alex Zamm has posted animation test footage for both of these films, and that likely wouldn't happen if both the projects were still happening.
Will we ever see these make a big screen appearance?
Iron Man! Iron Man 3'sRobert Downey Jr. offered up a few tidbits about what Marvel has in store to kick off its cinematic Phase Two. Here's what Downey told Nuts UK when asked how this film compares with Jon Favreau'sIron Man 2:
"I think Shane's gone for a dark feel in this movie. It's a lot grittier and goes back to its comic-book roots. It's shaped into a really special movie - and Shane as been instrument [sic] in that."
Downey also spoke a bit about his co-star Ben Kingsley, who is playing The Mandarin, the leader of the terrorist group The Ten Rings:
"I always think there's something more terrifying about a villain who's a genius, as opposed to just relying on strength or ability. We all know what a fantastic actor Ben Kingsley is, and he pulls off the evil genius with real terrifying results."
We'll have to wait and see how much action Kingsley gets when Iron Man 3 kicks off the summer on May 3rd, 2013.
Avengers!
Earlier this year, SuperHeroHype had the opportunity to visit Industrial Light & Magic and speak with some of the artists behind 2012's biggest box office hit, Marvel's The Avengers. ILM has released a new featurette that shows off some of the complicated effects that went into building the film's epic finale.
Written and directed by Joss Whedon, Marvel's The Avengers stars Robert Downey Jr., Chris Evans, Mark Ruffalo, Chris Hemsworth, Scarlett Johansson, Jeremy Renner, Tom Hiddleston, Stellan Skarsgard, Cobie Smulders, Clark Gregg, and Samuel L. Jackson. The third-largest box office hit of all time, The Avengers earned more than $1.5 billion worldwide. It's still-untitled sequel is slated to hit theaters on May 10, 2015.
Trailer Talk
The first trailer for the crime thriller Dead Man Down, starring Colin Farrell, Noomi Rapace, Dominic Cooper, and Terrence Howard, has appeared online. It's the first English language film from Danish filmmaker Niels Arden Oplev, who previously directed Rapace in the Swedish version of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo.
Farrell plays Victor, a professional killer who is being blackmailed by Rapace's Beatrice, a woman from across the street who saw Victor murder someone and convinces him to help her get revenge on the man who maimed her in a violent crime.
Dead Man Down will be released by FilmDistrict on Friday, March 8.
I've been selected to be a speaker at CatalystCon East in March. I'll be presenting presenting 'Sex in the Media: From Pitch to Print; What Does Sex Really Sell?'. They gave me this pretty nifty button to share
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