USA Weekend Box-Office Summary
Buat yang hobby nonton, ni dia yg kita-kita perlu buat referensi (For that hobby watched, this is necassary for the movie’s referention):
Week Of 3rd October 2008
1) Burn After Reading
Director: Ethan Coen Joel Coen
Stars: Brad Pitt, Frances McDormand, George Clooney (Full Cast)
Studio: Focus Features
The Plot: A disk containing the memoirs of a CIA agent ends up in the hands of two unscrupulous gym employees who attempt to benefit from the discovery.
Rating: 
Comment: The Coens want to make you laugh again, less than a year after bringing Anton Chigurh to life and saddling away with 4 Oscars for their efforts. While I don’t think BAR will reach the same level of pop culture-saturation as NCfOM, I guess there’s something to be said for a movie in which most everyone in the theater will understand the ending? Sigh … The word from Venice is: The only problem with the film is that, at 96 minutes, it leaves you wanting so much more.
Source: http://www.imdb.com/nowplaying/#topten
2) Lakeview Terrace
| Lakeview Terrace |
Director: Neil LaBute
Stars: Samuel L. Jackson, Patrick Wilson, Kerry Washington (Full Cast)
Studio: Screen Gems
The Plot: An LAPD officer (Jackson) will stop at nothing to force out the interracial couple (Washington and Wilson) who just moved in next door …
User Rating:
Comment: It’ll be fun to see Patrick Wilson in thriller mode (one of two genre flicks this season for the former phantom and soon-to-be owl — look for him in Passengers next month), and I’m pro Kerry Washington (Ray) getting more notice, but if Neil LaBute isn’t careful, he’s going to find himself, like, rebooting a franchise or remaking his own early film for his next project. And if he tries to pass this off as anything but a cheap-and-easy mainstream release, we’re going to laugh at him just like we laughed at Roland Joffe when he tried to promote Captivity as a film with a message.
Source: http://www.imdb.com/nowplaying/#topten
3) Eagle Eye
Director: D.J. Caruso
Stars: Shia LaBeouf, Michelle Monaghan, Rosario Dawson (Full Cast)
Studio: DreamWorks SKG
The Plot: Two strangers (LaBeouf and Monaghan) become the pawns of a mysterious woman they have never met, but who seems to know their every move. Realizing they are being used to further her plot for a political assassination, they must work together to outwit the woman before she has them killed.
User Rating:
Comment: When Disturbia surpassed everyone’s expectations last spring, DreamWorks execs quickly reunited Shia LaBeouf and director D.J. Caruso for a second project, and it’ll be interesting to see if all the kids who swooned for Shia in a retooled Hitchcock thriller will be as engaged by our hero (who lost his real life, real-world innocence this year) trying to prevent political terrorism. By the way, there are a lot of screenwriters present here — perhaps an indication of how quickly this was rushed into production, which is confirmed by the release-date slippage from August (summer vacation) to late in the back-to-school season.
Source: http://www.imdb.com/nowplaying/#topten
4) Nights In Rodanthe
Director: George C. Wolfe
Stars: Diane Lane, Richard Gere, Christopher Meloni (Full Cast)
Studio: Warner Bros. Pictures
The Plot: A doctor (Gere) who is traveling to see his estranged son sparks with an unhappily married woman (Lane) at a North Carolina inn
User Rating:
Comment: After The Notebook
became one the best recent examples of a sleeper hit, producers fought
for the rights to the unoptioned novels of Nicholas Sparks.
Superproducers Denise Di Novi and Bruce Berman secured Rodanthe and assembled an appropriate cast, as well as an interesting director pick in George C. Wolfe (Lackawanna Blues).
Though we love Richard Gere, Diane Lane, and their Hollywood misses and
hits, the question remains whether they can help reignite the romantic
drama by pulling in a big audience on opening weekend or, a la The Notebook
turning favorable word-of-mouth into staying power at the box office.
If you listen closely to the trailer, after the part where Diane says,
“We saved each other,” Richard whispers, “from career oblivion.”
Meanwhile, we wish Diane’s hair was just a little longer here.
Source: http://www.imdb.com/nowplaying/#topten
5) Fireproof
Director: Alex Kendrick
Stars: Kirk Cameron, Erin Bethea (Full Cast)
Studio: Samuel Goldwyn Films
The Plot:
A firefighter (Cameron) and his wife (Bethea) begin a 40-day experiment
known as “The Love Dare” in an attempt to save their marriage.
User Rating:
Comment: While we all snicker at the notion that Kirk Cameron won’t kiss anyone but his wife, Fireproof
has quietly because one of the must-see movies of a busy fall weekend.
Don’t be surprised if Cameron’s faith leads to a Top 10 debut come
Monday morning.
Source: http://www.imdb.com/nowplaying/#topten
6) Igor
Director: Anthony Leondis
Stars: John Cusack, Molly Shannon, Steve Buscemi (Full Cast)
Studio: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM)
The Plot:
Tired of playing second fiddle to his “Master,” a talented laboratory
assistant (Cusack) looks to win the annual Evil Science Fair with his
own creation.
User Rating:
Comment: I sense that Igor’s storyline mirrors the experiences of
director Anthony Leondis, who has spent his career thus far laboring
over direct-to-video sequels at Disney. Given his own animated
creation, the first project from Exodus Film Group (who should have Bunyan and Babe in theaters sometime next year), Igor looks like it’ll appeal to kids and Tim Burton fans alike; check the teaser trailer for a peep at the dark fun to be had this fall.
Source: http://www.imdb.com/nowplaying/#topten
7) My Best Friend’s Girls
Director: Howard Deutch
Stars: Kate Hudson, Dane Cook, Jason Biggs (Full Cast)
Studio: Lionsgate
The Plot:
Tank (Cook) makes a living as an uncouth womanizer hired by guys who
want their girlfriends or wives to reconsider leaving them. But what
happens when his behavior has the opposite effect on Alexis (Hudson),
the love of his best friend’s (Biggs) life?
User Rating:
Comment: Is Kate Hudson being punished for taking time off to have kids or
something? If not, why does she have to star alongside these two bozos?
Seriously! As for Jason Biggs, isn’t there some American Pie DVD sequel requesting your presence? And Dane Cook, can’t you take a parkour class or something — you know, mix it up a little. Your public gripe with Lionsgate over the poster for MBFG
was kinda funny, but were you really expecting them to dig deep for
marketing funds (or ideas) here? Why don’t you just turn your still
funny “You Suck at Photoshop” monologues into your next project.
Source: http://www.imdb.com/nowplaying/#topten
Righteous Kill
Director: Jon Avnet
Stars: Robert De Niro, Al Pacino, Carla Gugino (Full Cast)
Studio: Overture Films
The Plot:
Two veteran New York City detectives (De Niro and Pacino) work to
identify the possible connection between a recent murder and a case
they believe they solved years ago; is there a serial killer on the
loose, and did they perhaps put the wrong person behind bars?
User Rating:
Comment: I’ve watched the trailer a few times, and I have to say that I wish RK’s premise excited me as much as the long-awaited pairing of these two acting legends. That said, I have to keep in mind that the script was written by Russell Gewirtz, the pen behind Spike Lee’s excellent Inside Man, so I imagine there are more twists in store than the one I already know. (And it’s a good one, even if you have seen it before.)
Source: http://www.imdb.com/nowplaying/#topten
9) Miracle at St. Anna
Director: Spike Lee
Stars: Derek Luke, Michael Ealy, Laz Alonso (Full Cast)
Studio: Touchstone Pictures
The Plot:
A murder committed by post-office worker Hector Negron in 1984 sets in
motion an investigation that ties back to the experiences of a
battalion of black American soldiers who became trapped in a Tuscan
village during WWII.
User Rating:
Comment: The Emmy-winning “When the Levees Broke” and the box-office topping Inside Man
have made Spike Lee one of the busiest independent director/producers
on either coast (Lee has sequels to both projects in mind, too; in
fact, IM 2 is being written right NOW!), and now he’s bringing a different WWII perspective to the big screen with Miracle at St. Anna. And he’s not stopping for air while taking swipes at Clint and the Coens and
angering Italians for revising bits of their WWII history. So will some
other sort of miracle earn Lee his first-ever Oscar? Well, I imagine he
has a better chance than, say, Oliver Stone this year, but a lot is
riding on how Disney will market the film and how much of a push it
will receive. (We hear Disney had to put the kibosh on Lee’s Eastwood
comments, however, if he wants to make a good impression on the Academy
– a move which might cause the director to abandon studio filmmaking
for a spell?) Another factor not helping his campaign: The fact that Anna didn’t exactly stir audiences at its Toronto Film Festival premiere.
Source: http://www.imdb.com/nowplaying/#topten
10) The Family That Preys
| The Family That Preys |
Director: Tyler Perry
Stars: Kathy Bates, Alfre Woodard, Sanaa Lathan (Full Cast)
Studio: Lionsgate
The Plot:
Faced with a series of secrets and scandals that are threatening to
tear their respective families apart, old friends Charlotte Cartwright
(Bates) and Alice Pratt (Woodard) embark on a cross-country road trip
in hopes of finding a way to end the drama and rebuild their familial
connections.
User Rating:
Comment: Wait, there’s no Madea aboard this trip? Hmm, well, Tyler Perry better hope for a Why Did I Get Married?-sized hit, and not another Daddy’s Little Girls
experience with his sixth theatrical release, which has yet to generate
much buzz on the summer-movie circuit. (I think it’s the quiet before
the storm over at Lionsgate, however, as the studio ramps up to release
11 films between August and December — a schedule that include
guaranteed hits such as Saw IV and Transporter 3, awards-bait in the form of W. and Religulous, and clunkers such as My Best Friend’s Girl and Punisher: War Zone.)
My suggestion for marketing Preys: Promote it like a Bucket List
for women, and make sure press outlets act dumbfounded if another Perry
film debuts at #1. (P.S. The playwright plays a construction worker
this time around, which really makes us giggle.)
Source: http://www.imdb.com/nowplaying/#topten
