Weekend Movie News Wrap Up: June 28, 2009

This week:

The box office is Transfomed; Ryan Reynold’s career is Buried; Lorenzo di Bonaventura knows Jack Ryan; Zac Efron grows up and Daniel Craig moves into his Dream House.

Box Office

Transformers: Revenge of The Fallen blasted into the top spot with a powerful $201 million in its first five days. The Michael Bay sequel overcame horrendous reviews to show that all an audience wants is giant robots and Megan Fox. You can bet your butt that Transformers 3 will be on its way soon!

With a second weekend take of $18 million it looks like The Proposal is the bridesmaid. The Sandra Bullock comedy has now banked $69 million. A final take of $100 million is pretty much a cert.

The Hangover brought in $17 million bringing giving the hit comedy a mighty total gross of $183 million. Look for the film to cross the magic $200 million mark in a week or so.

Up has now hit the quarter billion mark for Disney/Pixar. After taking $13 million this weekend, it looks like the animated film has a few more weeks in the top ten.

Cameron Diaz’s terrible looking My Sister’s Keeper opened with a very mild $12 million. Unless a miracle happens it looks like Diaz’s days on the A-List are over. No wonder she’s set to re-team with Tom Cruise, but that’ll only slow the slide.

Year One dropped a huge 70% this weekend with a weekend gross of just under $6 million. With just $32 million in the bank this has to be a disappointment for all involved.

The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3 took in another $5.3 million giving the Tony Scott film a $53 million total. Look for the film to end with about $65 million.

Star Trek is approaching $250 million, making it the most successful film in the series.

Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian took another $3.5 million from moviegoers giving the family fiilm a $163 million total.

Dropping out of the top ten is Land of The Lost and Terminator Salvation. The films have grossed $46 million and $121 respectively.

Movie News

1. Ryan Reynolds has chosen his next film project after the double whammy success of Wolverine and The Proposal .

Mr Scarlett Johansson will star in Buried, a film that sounds slightly more serious than the Hugh Jackman and Sandra Bullock starrers.

“Reynolds will star in Buried, playing a civilian contractor who’s kidnapped in Iraq and awakens buried in a coffin in the desert, armed only with a cell phone, a candle and a knife.”

Rodrigo Cortes will direct the film that starts shooting next month in Barcelona.

Will this be the role needed to finally break Reynolds onto the A-list? Maybe, but at least he has the Deadpool movie on the way.

Source: Variety

2. Moviehole spoke with Transformers producer Lorenzo di Bonaventura about the new Jack Ryan film. The block-busting producer stated that one of the main hold-ups with the film is that the filmmakers are worried that they won’t be able to top the other films in the franchise.

He also stated that he had been talking to Phillip Noyce who directed Clear and Present Danger and Patriot Games about returning to the series. The Australian director who is currently working on Angelina Jolie’s Salt hasn’t made a firm commitment though.

Lorenzo di Bonaventura said:

‘’No, we were just – we’ve been working – I mean, yes. We did talk about it, actually, prior to Salt. And we’ve been so focused on Salt that neither of us has really had time to think about talking about Jack Ryan. So, he’s going away on vacation now, for a week – or — vacation’s the wrong way. You know, he worked like crazy. He needed to take a week and breathe, so that’s what he’s doing right now.”

He also admitted that they were looking for a younger star to step into the shoes of Alec Baldwin, Harrison Ford and Ben Affleck.

Source: Moviehole

3. Teen heartthrob Zac Efron will in a new untitled thriller for Mandate Pictures.
Nothing is known about the thriller that will be produced by Greg Shapiro, Jason Barrett and Leslie Dixon.

Dixon also wrote the script which is expected to be Efron’s foray into a more mature role after bolting on the Kevin Bacon role in the Footloose remake. Chace Crawford nabbed the lead in the remake and he will be joined by Julianne Hough.

Source: Variety

4. Daniel Craig is starting to fill out his between Bond schedule with a role in Jim Sheridan’s Dream House.

“Craig would play a man who moves his family to an idyllic small town, only to find his house haunted by its former inhabitants, who were murdered there.”

While the film sounds like the usual generic horror fair it should be noted that Irishman Sheridan has been behind such heavy hitting films as My Left Foot, In The Name of the Father and The Field.

Daniel Craig is set to return as James Bond in Bond 23. That won’t be its real title.

Source: The Hollywood Reporter

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