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Weekend Movie News Wrap Up: September 20, 2009

Niall Browne — Sun, 20 Sep 2009 21:05:03 +0000

This week:

The outlook for the box office is Cloudy With A Chance Of Meatballs; Scott Glenn delivers Zack Snyder a Sucker Punch; Rebecca Hall is a Liar; Gael Garcia Bernal and Kate Hudson are Earthbound and Richard Gere, Don Cheadle and Ethan Hawk are Brooklyn’s Finest.

Box Office

Cloudy With A Chance Of Meatballs hit the top spot at the box office this weekend with a hefty $30 million debut. It shows that animated films in 3D are big money.

Matt Damon and Stephen Soderbergh go together like er… George Clooney and Stephen Soderbergh. The Informant! had a $11 million-ish opening – which isn’t bad for an arty comedy film. Is Damon bankable without Bourne? Time will tell.

Tyler Perry’s I Can Do Bad By Myself dropped down to third place this weekend with a gross of $10 million. The total take for the film is nearly at $40 million, so it looks like another hugely profitable film for Perry.

Jennifer Aniston and Aaron Eckhart’s Love Happens had a disappointing start with a $9 million weekend. The terrible title and poster probably didn’t help.

Jennifer’s Body (the film, not Aniston’s) had a really bad start with just $7 million in the bank over the weekend. The much-hyped Megan Fox film shows that the actress isn’t a star and that Diablo Cody’s Oscar hype might be wearing off. I can only assume that Fox will be sending Michael Bay some flowers and an apology in the hope that he casts her in Transformers 3.

9 made another $5.2 million for a $22.5 million total. That’s a lot of numbers in a sentence that isn’t about math.

Quentin Tarantino’s Inglourious Basterds scalped another $4 million for a $110 million total.

The Final Destination banked another $3.5 million for an impressive $63 million cumulative tally, meanwhile All About Steve grossed a smidgen less giving the Sandra Bullock film a $26 million total. At least The Proposal still shows she can anchor a hit.

Sorority Row brought in just over $2.5 million giving the fright film a grand total of just $9 million. A spot on the DVD shelf awaits!

Movie News

1. The gruff and wrinkled Scott Glenn has joined the cast of Zack Snyder’s Sucker Punch.

According to Variety:

“Set in the 1950s, the pic revolves around Baby Doll, a girl who creates an alternate reality to escape the every-day world after her stepfather commits her to a mental hospital with plans to have her lobotomized. Glenn will play a mentor and guide to Baby Doll and the other girls in the asylum.”

The actor will share the screen with the less gruff and wrinkly Jena Malone, Abbie Cornish, Vanessa Hudgens, Amand Seyfried and Emily Browning.

Source: Variety

2. British actress Rebecca Hall has joined the cast of Richard Linklater’s Liars A-E.

According to The Hollywood Reporter:

“The actress will play the role of Bacall Loomis, a woman who sets out on a road trip during the Obama inauguration to reclaim items that used to be hers from ex-boyfriends.”

Source: The Hollywood Reporter

3. Gael Garcia Bernal is in negotiations to star opposite Kate Hudson in Earthbound.

The film follows a terminally ill woman who falls in love with her doctor.

Is it just me or does this sound really, really terrible? I mean could they try and make it any more cliched? I think not.

Source: Variety

4. Overture Films has acquired the distribution rights to Anton Fuqua’s latest Brooklyn’s Finest for $2 million.

“(The film) follows three Brooklyn cops who end up at the same deadly location after experiencing diverging career paths.”

The action-thriller stars Richard Gere, Don Cheadle and Ethan Hawk.

It sounds Fuqua and Hawk are trying to reclaim their Training Day mojo, while Gere is patrolling the same neighbourhood as 1990’s Internal Affairs.

Source: Variety

That’s it for now. See you at the movies.

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Carla Gugino Gets A ‘Sucker Punch’ From Zack Snyder

Ross Miller — Tue, 04 Aug 2009 15:03:56 +0000

It has been announced that Carla Gugino (Sin City, Watchmen) has joined the cast of Zack Snyder’s upcoming action-fantasy flick, Sucker Punch. Gugino joins the previously announced Emily Browning (who replaced Amanda Seyfried), Vanessa Hudgens, Abbie Cornish, Jena Malone and Jamie Chung (the latter two replacing Emma Stone and Evan Rachel Wood). All of them, excluding Gugino, are currently in fight training.

Sucker Punch is about a teenage girl known as Baby Doll (Browning), who is sent to a mental institution by her evil stepfather who plans to have her lobotomized in 5 days. Before that happens, the girl and her fellow female inmates and friends enter into an alternate reality to try and plan their escape from the institution. Gugino will play Mrs. Schultz, some sort of adult figure within the institution (I’m guessing a doctor or some other sort of authority figure).

Gugino is one of those actresses that pops up here, there and everywhere in the movies. From well-known comic book adaptations to smaller indie films, she’s almost always a pleasure to watch on-screen (in more ways than one). I’m looking forward to seeing her work with Snyder again after appearing in Watchmen earlier this year.

Carla Gugino as the original Silk Spectre in 'Watchmen'

I am interested to see what Snyder has in store for us with his first truly original movie (everything he’s worked on so far has been some sort of adaptation). He’s written the script, as well directing the film, so that, plus the fact that (so far) it has an all-female cast, makes me excited to see how it’ll turn out.

We need more women kicking ass in Hollywood – having the guy who made 300 and Watchmen give us bucket loads of that can’t be a bad thing in my eyes.

What do you think of Gugino joining Sucker Punch? Are you looking forward to this movie?

Instead of the previous release date of October 8th, 2010, Sucker Punch was recently pushed back to March 25th, 2011. Shooting is set to start this Fall in Vancouver.

Source: THR via FirstShowing

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Green Lantern & Sucker Punch Pushed To 2011

Rob Keyes — Thu, 07 May 2009 16:24:10 +0000

Delays, delays and more delays!

Two movies we’ve been hearing quite a bit of updates about in recent times are being pushed back from next year into 2011. These two movies are Green Lantern and Zack Snyder’s Sucker Punch.

A few weeks back, Screen Rant reported on the hefty $150 million budget that was being allocated by Warner Brothers for the production of Green Lantern. In that article, Screen Rant writer Kofi discussed the strange December release date for the Green Lantern movie that was set to open in December of 2010 and hoped that we wouldn’t get close to that date and see it mysteriously get pushed back to the following summer (a la Harry Potter 6).

Well, three weeks later it happened and now Green Lantern is scheduled to open June 17, 2011. It will share the summer with several Marvel superheroes from upcoming Thor and Captain America movies as well as Sony’s Spider-Man 4. That’s assuming we don’t see even more delays.

As for Zack Snyder’s Sucker Punch, much of the news we’ve been hearing lately has to do with some lead actresses dropping out of the movie. Perhaps that has something to do with the delay as now, instead of an October 8, 2010 release, Sucker Punch will hit theaters March 25 2011.

Interestingly enough, back in February, Screen Rant master Vic discussed many of the upcoming WB movies and pondered which movies would be delayed. Both Sucker Punch and Green Lantern were on that list and now both are being delayed – what a surprise!.

What do you think about waiting many more months for the releases of these two movies?

Source: Box Office Mojo

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Sucker Punch Finds New Lead Babe

Rob Keyes — Tue, 31 Mar 2009 17:07:44 +0000

Just prior to the opening of Watchmen, Screen Rant reported on the next big budget Zack Snyder project – an original piece co-written by Steve Shibuya that features an all-female cast.

The movie, titled Sucker Punch focuses on the lead character, Baby Doll, who was to be played by Amanda Seyfried (pictured on the right, above). However, last week Seyfried was forced to drop out of the project due to her previous commitment to HBO’s Big Love which will be filming its fourth season during the production of Sucker Punch.

Now, it’s being reported that a replacement for the lead role has been found. According to Entertainment Weekly, Emily Browning (The Uninvited, Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events) will replace Seyfried as Baby Doll in this Warner Brothers production.

The plot synopsis is as follows:

Sucker Punch tells the story of a girl named Baby Doll who is confined to a mental institution by her evil stepfather, who intends to have her lobotomized in five days. While imprisoned, she imagines an alternative reality to hide her from the pain. In this fantasy world, where she needs to steal five objects to help her out before she is deflowered by a vile man.

A unique idea to say the least…

It’s unfortunate that Seyfried had to drop out as she’s super talented and this is a major breakout role. That being said, I liked what I’ve seen from Ms. Browning as well so I’m confident she’ll do the role justice.

I’m looking forward to seeing what Zack Snyder will present us with in his first original screenplay – I’ve liked all of Snyder’s work thus far, so by default I have pretty high expectations for this movie.

What do you think of the new lead and the film’s story?

Sucker Punch begins shooting this fall and it is scheduled to hit theaters October 10, 2010.

Source: Entertainment Weekly

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Zack Snyder’s Next Movie = Babefest

Ross Miller — Thu, 05 Mar 2009 02:44:21 +0000

After Zack Snyder is done with Watchmen his next project is going to be a $100 million action/fantasy called Sucker Punch. It seems that the Warner Bros.-produced 1960s set film will have an all female cast, with several actresses already in talks to appear in the film.

Amanda Seyfried (Jennifer’s Body, Mama Mia) is in talks to play the lead character of Baby Doll, with Vanessa Hudgens (High School Musical), Abbie Cornish (Stop-Loss), Evan Rachel Wood (The Wrestler, Across The Universe), and Emma Stone (Superbad) also being looked at for suppporting roles.

The plot synopsis for the film is pretty out there:

Sucker Punch tells the story of a girl named Baby Doll who is confined to a mental institution by her evil stepfather, who intends to have her lobotomized in five days. While imprisoned, she imagines an alternative reality to hide her from the pain. In this fantasy world, where she needs to steal five objects to help her out before she is deflowered by a vile man.

Wow, that’s not exactly the type of film that comes to mind when the term “all female cast” gets thrown around. However I must say it sounds like a very cool idea, certainly a unique one anyway. And much like my beloved The Descent, the all female cast is sure to make it stand out amongst other movies.

As Snyder says himself - “I already did the all-male cast with 300, so I’m doing the opposite end of the spectrum.”

Well, apart from the Queen, Zack, but we get what you’re saying…

What surprises about this flick is the pretty hefty $100 million dollar budget it has. I mean it’s not like 300 or Watchmen where Snyder has a much loved original source material to work off of. This is a script written originally by him, so the only reason I can think WB would risk that money is because of the success of 300.

However I wonder if that budget will stay has high as it is if Watchmen fails to do as well as the studio is hoping…

Sucker Punch, which is to be produced by Snyder and his wife Deborah, is set to start principal photography late this year and an October 8th 2010 release date has been already been announced by WB.

Sources: /Film and Entertainment Weekly

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Which One Of These Release Dates Will Change?

Vic Holtreman — Wed, 25 Feb 2009 20:40:21 +0000

Some new release dates have been announced by Warner Bros. for some pretty big movies, including Green Lantern, the final Harry Potter film, Sherlock Holmes, Jonah Hex and Clash of the Titans. The dates range from late 2009 all the way to summer 2011, and one of these movies picked a date that will make things interesting as far as a box office battle (if the date sticks).

Sherlock Holmes – December 5, 2009

Clash of the Titans – March 26th, 2010

Inception (Christopher Nolan’s next film) – July 16, 2010

Jonah Hex – August 6, 2010

Sucker Punch (Zack Snyder’s next film)- October 8, 2010

Green Lantern – December 17, 2010

Harry Potter – July 15, 2011

Clash of the Titans will be directed by Louis Letterier (The Incredible Hulk) and it seems pretty clear that we won’t be getting another Batman film for a while with Chris Nolan tackling Inception next (described as a sci-fi action film). Zack Snyder will follow up Watchmen (which at this point people aren’t hazarding a guess whether it will be huge or bomb) with Sucker Punch, which Snyder describes as “Alice in Wonderland with machine guns.”

One interesting release date is the one assigned to Green Lantern. A Christmas release for a superhero movie? That is quite strange and I don’t know what significance we can ascribe to that at this point. Right now Martin Campbell (Casino Royale) is still slated to direct.

What box office battle am I referring to? Well back in September, Marvel announced its Avengers movie release date: July 15, 2011.

So what is Warner Bros. thinking with releasing the final Harry Potter film (Deathly Hallows part 2) on the same date as The Avengers? Are they trying to get Marvel to move their date? Do they think these two films cater to completely different audiences so it doesn’t matter? Or are they really spoiling for a box office showdown?

Source: ERC Box Office via Cinematical

Image: Joe Bergeron

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