Month: December 2017

Weekend Box Office: December 22, 2017

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Festivus preparations prevented this post from a prompt posting; please accept my sincere apologies! We have more movies this week. Let’s get into it.


Hostiles stars Christian Bale as an American soldier who must escort a Cheyenne war chief, and his family, across the West to his home in 1892. I’ve been staring at the subway posters for a long time and I don’t know what I think about any of this, but mostly I don’t feel good. I suppose Bale’s terrible soldier will learn to respect the noble Cheyenne by the end of the film, but the family will die.


Tiger Zinda Hai is an Indian thriller. It is the sequel to Ek Tha Tiger and tells the story of the 2014 ISIL abduction of 46 nurses.


Pitch Perfect 3 is the third installment of the Pitch Perfect series. Reviews are not good. The Bellas agree to perform one last time, for the USO. (Wasn’t the whole thing in Pitch Perfect 2 that the Bellas won singing an original song?)


The Post stars Meryl Streep as Washington Post publisher Katharine Grahame and Tom Hanks as Ben Bradlee as they race against the New York Times to publish reports about the Pentagon Papers.

Jumanji: Welcome To The Jungle is a loose sequel to 1995 film Jumanji film, which was very loosely based on the 1981 children’s book by Chris Van Allsburg. (His sequel, Zathura, was adapted in 2005.) Nick Jonas, Dwayne Johnson, Jack Black, Karen Gillan, and Kevin Hart star as the avatars of a few teens who are sucked into an old video game (it morphs from the board game) and must finish the game to get out.


All the Money in the World is that film they edited to take out Kevin Spacey. The thriller stars Mark Wahlberg as a man hired to get J. Paul Getty to pay the ransom of John Paul Getty III. Directed by Ridley Scott, the film also stars Michelle Williams and Christopher Plummer.


Happy End is an Austrian drama from Michael Haenke, so buckle up, girlfriend: octogenarian rich man with dimentia and a crumbling family, which includes a young girl poisoning her mother.


Crooked House stars Max Irons, Terence Stamp, Glenn Close, Gillian Anderson, and Christina Hendricks. A woman is hired to investigate a murder in this Agatha Christie adaptation.


Hangman stars Al Pacino as a detective trying to catch a serial killer.


Father Figures stars Ed Helms and Owen Wilson as brothers looking for their father in this biological family. Good if you have the sense of humor of a 14-year-old boy but want your comedy R-rated.


Along With the Gods: The Two Worlds is a South Korean fantasy drama about a firefighter who proves to have lived a pure and innocent life and is allowed to return to life following 49 trials. The film is breaking records overseas and seems awesome.

Releasing Monday, for Christmas:


Molly’s Game stars Jessica Chastain as Molly Bloom, a woman who runs high stakes poker games (for the Pussy Posse and Ben Affleck, of course) and becomes a target of the FBI. This film is directed by Aaron Sorkin.


Phantom Thread stars Daniel Day-Lewis in his last role as a tailor obsessed with the details of his life. This 1950s period drama is directed by Paul Thomas Anderson.

Box Office Weekend: December 15, 2017

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There’s a new Star Wars out, so, is anything else worth acknowledging?


Spent is an unrated dark comedy about bad people behaving badly when a rich man’s brain tumor doesn’t kill him.


Desolation is a horror film about a man stalking two women and a young boy who are just trying to hike off their enormous grief but can’t because some asshole in ’90s era sunglasses wants to murder them instead. I told you hiking is for suckers!


Star Wars: The Last Jedi, the latest Star Wars installment, looks to feature a shitload of Luke Skywalker, but also maybe Rey kicking ass?


The Thousand Faces of Dunjia is a Chinese fantasy-action film from Yuen Woo-ping. This is a remake of his 1982 film The Miracle Fighters.


Beyond Skyline is a sequel to the 2010 sequel Skyline.


The Soul of Success: The Jack Canfield Story is a documentary about motivational speaker Jack Canfield.


Killing for Love is a documentary about the murder of Derek and Nancy Haysom in 1985. Their daughter’s boyfriend Jens Soering maybe took the fall for the murder? Imogen Poots and Daniel Bruhl feature in this thriller-true crime investigation.


The Ballad of Lefty Brown is a Western starring some old white people. To paraphrase my friend Julia, unless the Western does something new, I’m not interested.


Fukrey Returns is the sequel to 2013’s Fukrey, a comedy about four wacky, slacker brothers. They’re back to make more easy money.


Gotti is a biographical drama about mob kingpin John Gotti. Unfortunately, it stars John Travolta (WHY), is directed by Kevin Connelly (WHY). Travolta is joined by his real-life wife Kelly Preston, in the role of Victoria Gotti, and his daughter Ella Bleu plays Gotti’s daughter Angel. So it’s one big Travolta party, and I have to wonder how the Gotti Family let this stinker happen.


Permanent is a 1980s coming-of-age comedy about a smart young lady who gets a bad perm. Kira McLean stars as our heroine; her parents are portrayed by Rainn Wilson and Patricia Arquette.


Ferdinand is an animated inspired by the best-selling, much beloved children’s book Ferdinand the Bull. I am boycoting this on principle. Fuck this movie. And John Cena.

Here is the 1938 animation from Disney which sucks less:

And coming out Wednesday:

The Greatest Showman is a musical about P.T. Barnum. I think this is good for Navani, but a hard pass for this writer. This Oscar bait stars Hugh Jackman, Michelle Williams, Zendaya, and Zac Efron.

Box Office Weekend: December 8, 2017

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Welcome back to a timely review of this week’s releases! This post was written in advance of December 1’s releases, but I’m sure last week’s big box office draw was the Titanic re-release. We have only a handful of releases, which is just fine; I am amped for I, Tonya.


I, Tonya stars Margot Robbie as hated figure skater Tonya Harding. Allison Janney is Tonya’s cruel stage mom and Sebastian Stan is Tonya’s ex-husband. Nancy Kerrigan is portrayed by Caitlin Carver, which I know you wanted to know.


Just Getting Started stars two old guys (Morgan Freeman, Tommy Lee Jones) as two old men in a retirement community who are at each other’s throats.


Kaleidoscope is a thriller starring Toby Jones as a man recently released from prison…who revisits old trauma after a visit from his mother. Ew?


The Disaster Artist is a film about Tommy Wiseau and the making of his film, the worst movie ever, The Room. James Franco plays Wiseau and the cast includes brother Dave Franco and pal seth Rogen.