Tom Cruise’s box office fortunes have taken a turn for the worse recently with two flops in less than a year – Jack Reacher: Never Go Back and this summer’s The Mummy. The star will attempt to turn that around next weekend with American Made.
The true life crime pic reunites Cruise with his Edge of Tomorrow director Doug Liman and finds him playing Barry Seal, pilot turned drug smuggler for the Medellin cartel in the 1980s. Costars include Sarah Wright, Domhnall Gleeson, and Jesse Plemons. Unlike his two previous pictures, Made is receiving positive reviews with a current 89% rating on Rotten Tomatoes.
That positive word-of-mouth might help, but I could also see Made opening somewhat lightly with hopes of smallish declines in subsequent weekends. Unlike most of Cruise’s recent work, this isn’t an action or sci-fi project that audiences have become accustomed to seeing him in during recent years. Its box office potential should rely solely on his drawing power (which has waned) and the approving critical notices.
I’ll estimate that American Made generates a mid teens debut.
American Made opening weekend prediction: $15.5 million
Well folks – summer is winding down and on the movie calendar, that means fall ushers in Oscar contenders, film festivals, and all kinds of other eagerly awaited releases! Today on the blog, I bring you my 10 most awaited pictures of the season. Getting the list down to that number wasn’t exactly easy, so I’ll cheat a bit and mention some that just “missed the cut”. They include sequels (Kingsman: The Golden Circle, Thor: Ragnarok), star vehicles like American Made with Tom Cruise and Roman Israel, Esq. with Denzel Washington, and Academy contenders like Battle of the Sexes, The Greatest Showman, Suburbicon, Darkest Hour, All the Money in the World, and The Disaster Artist.
Yet here are the ten that my personal movie calendar is most looking forward to (listed alphabetically):
Blade Runner 2049
Release Date: October 6
35 years after Ridley Scott made his landmark sci-fi pic, Sicario and Arrival director Denis Villeneuve enters this visually stunning world with Ryan Gosling, Jared Leto, and Robin Wright and Harrison Ford returning as Deckard.
Downsizing
Release Date: December 22
It may not be out until Christmas, but buzz will be out soon for this Oscar hopeful as it screens in Venice in just days. Alexander Payne’s fantastic filmography includes Election, About Schmidt, Sideways, The Descendants, and Nebraska. His latest is a sci-fi comedy/drama starring Matt Damon, Kristin Wiig, Christoph Waltz, Alec Baldwin, Neil Patrick Harris, Jason Sudeikis, and (get used to hearing this name) Hong Chau, who’s already garnering Supporting Actress talk.
NO TRAILER AT PRESS TIME
It
Release Date: September 8
Fall essentially kicks off with this adaptation of one of Stephen King’s greatest works. Trailers for It looks scary as hell and it could compete for both biggest September debut ever and highest horror opening of all time.
Justice League
Release Date: November 17
DC’s version of The Avengers has been the subject of shaky buzz, but I’m curious to see how Batman, Aquaman, The Flash, and others meld together. Oh… there’s another one in the form of Gal Gadot’s Wonder Woman, who just happened to headline the summer’s unexpected largest domestic hit (beating out other superheroes like the Guardians and Spidey).
mother!
Release Date: September 15
Darren Aronofsky’s latest looks to be in the vein of his Oscar nominated Black Swan and that’s a very good thing. Jennifer Lawrence, Javier Bardem, Ed Harris, and Michelle Pfeiffer star and if this trailer is any indication, we’re in for something very intriguing.
Murder on the Orient Express
Release Date: November 10
Michelle Pfeiffer makes another appearance on this list as she’s part of an impressive ensemble embroiled in this adaptation of Agatha Christie’s famed novel. Kenneth Branagh directs himself in the lead as Hercule Poirot. Other familiar faces include Johnny Depp, Daisy Ridley, Penelope Cruz, Judi Dench, Willem Dafoe, and Josh Gad.
The Papers
Release Date: December 22
As in the Pentagon Papers and the Washington Post‘s battle with the Nixon administration to release them. You think this one has Oscar bait potential? It’s directed by Steven Spielberg and stars Meryl Streep and Tom Hanks.
NO TRAILER AT PRESS TIME
Phantom Thread
Release Date: December 27
Here’s how little is really known about this project… we’re not even sure Phantom Thread is its title. What do we know? It’s master filmmaker Paul Thomas Anderson’s latest and reunites him with his There Will Be Blood star Daniel Day-Lewis.
NO TRAILER AT PRESS TIME
The Shape of Water
Release Date: December 8
Visionary director Guillermo del Toro’s latest looks to be a visual and potentially dramatic winner judging from its trailer. Sally Hawkins and Michael Shannon star in this 1960s set tale of a woman’s friendship with a strange creature.
Star Wars: The Last Jedi
Release Date: December 15
Last, but oh so far from the least. Rian Johnson takes over directorial duties for the year’s most anticipated release with Luke Skywalker (Mark Hamill) gaining significantly more screen time and Carrie Fisher making her final bow as Princess Leia.
And there you have it, folks! Let us look forward to a hopefully glorious autumn season…
TheMummy is many things to Universal Pictures and it has many conflicting tones to go along with it. The film shares the name of franchise of the Brendan Fraser flicks started in 1999 and little else. Most importantly, it’s the premiere title of the studio’s planned Dark Universe series which will bring back invisible and wolf men and Frankensteins and their brides.
Perhaps that’s why TheMummy can often seem like a preview of what’s to come. Based on this initial offering, the Dark Universe and its grand designs to bring back the classic monsters of Universal’s past is iffy but not without some occasional charms.
A prologue tells the tale of Princess Ahmanet (Sofia Boutella), Egyptian royalty primed to rule her land. Family complications alter that course so she goes on a murderous rampage which results in her mummification. Her story is buried for centuries until present day.
That’s when Nick Morton, a former soldier still in Iraq to pillage treasure with his comedic sidekick (Jake Johnson) inadvertently unearth the Princess’s tomb. Our title character has serious cursing skills and uses them on Nick and others. Thus begins an attempt to destroy her and get Mr. Cruise back to his normal self.
The screenplay makes the decision to make Nick a bit of an anti hero. He’s a slight jerk who’s in it for himself for a good portion of the running time. There are shades of Cruise’s character in EdgeofTomorrow, a better film to be sure. It allows this movie star a chance to be funny at times, a little cowardly, and it’s kind of fun to watch Cruise play it.
What the script doesn’t do is provide any development to his archeologist love interest and investigative partner Jennifer (Annabelle Wallis). We’re told the two shacked up a couple of nights before we meet them, but their connection is pretty much non existent. As mentioned, it’s sometimes a hoot to see Nick as a louse. When the screenplay tries to get us to care about his feelings for Jennifer, it falls flat.
For that matter, the lovely Boutella isn’t much of a scary villain. Sidekick Johnson has a few humorous bits, but gets lost in the shuffle mostly. There’s not much time for character development sans Cruise’s take on his part. Russell Crowe is here as Dr. Jekyll so we know he gets to have some duality in his role. His performance is just fine, though one suspects his real opportunities will come later in this universe.
This Mummy works best when it goes campy – something I wouldn’t have guessed. A number of moments going for intentional chuckles work. However, the studio has much to set up and allowing director Alex Kurtzman and his slew of writers go full out camp doesn’t happen. This creates an uncomfortable mix of horror, adventure, and the aforementioned and often successful self parody. Much of TheMummy is filled with action sequences that are indistinguishable from other summer blockbusters (though a zero gravity plane crash is nifty). We don’t really care about what’s happening because Universal seems in a hurry to get to the next monster mash. Yet I’ll be figuratively damned if I didn’t enjoy some of it.
Bloggers Note (06/08/17) – poor reviews and word of mouth have caused a revision from $38.7M to $34.7M
Universal Pictures is hoping that next weekend’s The Mummy both successfully reboots their Brendan Fraser led franchise that began in 1999 and starts off their “Dark Universe” series to pleasing results. The action/horror flick features Tom Cruise in the lead role with Annabelle Wallis, Sofia Boutella, Courtney B. Vance, and Russell Crowe in the supporting cast. Alex Kurtzman directs the reported $125 million production.
The aforementioned Dark Universe franchise is slated to bring us new additions of the Invisible Man, Frankenstein, Van Helsing, and Wolf Man sagas over the next few years. Our previous Mummy series gave us the original 18 years ago, which opened to $43 million and ended up earning $155M domestically. 2001 sequel The Mummy Returns was the high mark with a $68 million premiere and $202M overall haul. 2008’s The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon was a low mark with a $40 million debut and $102M total.
This brings us to Mr. Cruise. He’s not the box office draw he once was and it’s worth noting that only the Mission: Impossible franchise and 2005’s War of the Worlds have made over $40 million out of the gate. That is probably the number The Mummy is poised to reach and that probably means a second place showing after the sophomore weekend of Wonder Woman. I’ll put it right under that mark.
The Mummy opening weekend prediction: $34.7 million
Sadly, this morning I write a post I didn’t expect to with the news that Bill Paxton has passed away at age 61. For even casual movie fans, Paxton was a very familiar face that starred and co-starred in blockbusters such as Aliens, TrueLies, Twister, and Titanic.
Upon hearing the news of his death, I began to realize just how present he’s been in my movie watching existence over the last three decades plus. I first knew of him as Chet, the bullying older brother in WeirdScience. If that is a guilty pleasure pic, his performance is one of the best pleasures in it. It’s a terrific comedic performance.
Just one year later, his role in Aliens stuck out in that fantastic sequel with one-liners like “Game Over, Man!” That same year, he starred in Kathryn Bigelow’s vampire cult classic NearDark.
All told, Mr. Paxton has about a dozen DVDs and Blu-Rays sitting on my shelf. Like I said, he was truly a part of many of our collective filmgoing experiences from the 1980s on. He was alongside Tom Cruise just three years ago in the solid EdgeofTomorrow and was a rival tabloid cameraman to Jake Gyllenhaal in my favorite picture of 2014, Nightcrawler.
His TV credits include headlining HBO’s “Big Love” and just a few weeks ago, his CBS crime drama “Training Day” (based on the 2001 Denzel Washington film) premiered. His final movie will be TheCircle with Tom Hanks and Emma Watson. It opens in April.
Other notable onscreen efforts range from Predator2 to Tombstone to ASimplePlan and U–571. Today I wish to highlight a trio of lesser known titles worth seeking out:
Two are from 1992. Trespass finds him and William Sadler as firefighters who find a treasure map that pits them against drug dealers Ice Cube and Ice-T. It’s great gritty fun. OneFalseMove is an intense crime thriller from director Carl Franklin and written by Billy Bob Thornton. Gene Siskel named it as his favorite movie of that year and it is impressive.
Paxton turned to directing himself in 2001 with Frailty, an underrated and effective thriller where the actor plays a religiously fanatical father. I just watched it again recently and it made me wish Paxton had directed more.
What Bill Paxton did leave us with is his own treasure trove of performances to enjoy. He will be missed.
Nearly four years ago, Tom Cruise had a decent performer in the form of JackReacher, based on a series of thriller novels by Lee Child. The pic opened to $15 million over the Christmas holiday in 2012 and eventually took in a solid $80 million.
Still, that gross was not enough to figure a sequel was automatically warranted. Yet here we are with JackReacher: NeverGoBack, which re-teams Cruise with his LastSamurai director Edward Zwick and costars Cobie Smulders. The director of the its predecessor, Christopher McQuarrie, moved onto make the fifth Mission: Impossible and will reportedly do the sixth.
Whether this earns enough to see a third installment is questionable. Of Cruise’s last five pictures that he’s headlined, Reacher is actually the lowest grosser. The sequel will almost surely make more in its opening weekend, but it’s not exactly a fair comparison. Movies released over the Xmas weekend almost always open lower than they would over a typical weekend and develop longer legs in subsequent winter frames. So while the debut should be larger, I’m not sure it reaches $80M domestic in the long run.
I don’t see this getting much higher than mid 20s or much lower than $20M. My prediction essentially splits the difference.
JackReacher: NeverGoBack opening weekend prediction: $23.9 million
For my Ouija: OriginofEvil prediction, click here:
The Mission: Impossible franchise has followed one common thread throughout its near two decade existence: star Tom Cruise has allowed the directors to put their unique spin on each entry. Brian De Palma with the original. John Woo with the follow-up. JJ Abrams with part three and Brad Bird with the fourth. That approach is somewhat abandoned in #5, Rogue Nation. New director Christopher McQuarrie seems content to borrow here and there from what we’ve seen before and let the formula stand without a more personalized approach to the material. While that may lead to a small degree of disappointment, don’t be too dismayed. The formula is the formula is the formula and Mr. Cruise has got it under control.
Rogue Nation finds the IMF (Impossible Missions Force) in a dire position as the CIA (headed by a welcome Alec Baldwin) has folded it to their oversight. This doesn’t sit well with super agent Ethan Hunt (Cruise) who’s in the midst of a mission to take down the shadowy Syndicate, an international crime ring. He may not have the support he’s used to stateside, but Ethan does have his usual suspects around. That includes techie Simon Pegg (who shines with the most screen time he’s had in the series thus far), Jeremy Renner’s field ops head, and Luther (Ving Rhames), who always turns up to help his old buddy. The new face is Ilsa (Rebecca Ferguson), an MI6 agent whose allegiance is constantly in question. It is unknown if Ilsa ever worked with James Bond, but let’s assume so for the coolness factor.
If you know those pictures, you know plot is secondary and the grandly conceived action sequences are the real focus. Cruise does his own stunts (as he incessantly loves to remind us) and this finds him jumping on departing aircrafts, having to hold his breath underwater for lengthy periods of time, and showing off his motorcycle skills on twisty roads. Per usual, we hopscotch from Paris to Vienna to London to Morocco. We get those nifty masks we first saw in 1996.
The fifth go round feels familiar but Cruise brings enormous energy to the series he keeps returning to. Renner sort of gets the short shrift (especially compared to Pegg) and it’s the second franchise along with Avengers where he’s not particularly given anything of substance to do. At least we don’t get a boring and out of left field family backstory like we did in Avengers: Age of Ultron. Ferguson is a welcome presence as she gives her British spy her all.
Even though McQuarrie doesn’t give a unique spin on Ethan and company like Bird accomplished last time with Ghost Protocol, the series is such a well oiled machine that the results are still a lot of fun. And it still mostly shines.
Tom Cruise is back for his fifth go round as IMF agent Ethan Hunt in Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation, opening Friday, July 31st. The now nineteen year old franchise should give the series another solid hit, following the goodwill left over from 2011’s critically acclaimed and audience pleasing fourth entry, Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol.
Besides Cruise, Rogue features returnees Jeremy Renner, Simon Pegg and Ving Rhames, in addition to new cast members Rebecca Ferguson and Alec Baldwin. Let’s take a trip down memory lane for openings of past flicks:
Mission: Impossible – $45.4 million debut with eventual $180.9M domestic gross in 1996
Mission: Impossible II – $70.8 million debut over four day Memorial Day weekend in 2000 with $91.8 million premiere since it opened on a Wednesday with eventual $215.4M domestic gross
Mission: Impossible III – $47.7 million debut with eventual $134M domestic gross in 2006
Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol – $44.1 million debut over four day Christmas weekend in 2011 with eventual $209.3M domestic gross
As you can see, Protocol technically had the lowest opening of the franchise, but held strong in subsequent post holiday weekends to generate the second largest haul of the series. That bodes pretty well for audience anticipation for Rogue, yet it doesn’t have the benefit of a late year release when titles tend to experience smaller drop offs from weekend to weekend.
Rogue Nation stands little chance of reaching the opening heights achieved by part two, but I do believe it will manage the second highest roll out. I will predict a debut in the low to mid 50s range.
Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation opening weekend prediction: $52.3 million
Over two years ago on this here blog, when it was in its infancy, I did the 007 Files where I wrote individualized blog posts on all 23 Bond flicks. That got me thinking about other series I could do the same with and in January 2013, I started The Ethan Hunt Files and wrote about the first Mission: Impossible pic from 1996.
I had every intention of writing about the other three in short order. For whatever reason I did not follow up. With the fifth M:I picture Rogue Nation debuting in July, I decided it was time to resume this series of posts and we continue with Mission: Impossible II from the summer of 2000…
And what an interesting film it is, especially considering the franchise entries that preceded it and followed it. M:I II stands out as the strangest pic in the series and the one that fits in least with the rest. Two words explain the main reason for this: John Woo. The acclaimed action director took over directing duties from Brian De Palma for the second picture and didn’t have an ounce of hesitation about turning it into a bonafide Woo affair with all the slow motion shots, quick cuts, and (yes) doves that come along with it. There are certainly some similarities to the original – foremost of which is the continuation and multiplication of those fancy face masks.
Unlike Mission 1, here we have Tom Cruise’s Ethan in a romantic relationship with the gorgeous Nyah (Thandie Newton), a jewel thief who is the ex of Sean Ambrose (Dougray Scott), an IMF agent gone bad who Ethan is after. Ambrose has stolen a nasty virus called Chimera, as well as its antidote, in an effort to make billions on the pharmaceutical market. Nyah is enlisted to get back in the good graces of her evil ex to get information, but not before she falls in love with Ethan first. They do so during a car chase in which Ethan nearly kills her, then kisses her. It happens.
Ethan is given his mission by the new head of IMF, played by Anthony Hopkins in what is essentially a glorified cameo. Our hero is conflicted by sending Nyah into such a dangerous mission. This all might’ve worked a bit better if the chemistry between Cruise and Newton felt authentic. We simply have zero investment in their romance and by the time Nyah bravely infects herself with the virus, you don’t really mind if Chimera wins. And a lot of the film could have been improved if Scott’s performance as our head villain wasn’t so utterly unremarkable. Some may know that M:I II’s production went into overtime and it forced Dougray Scott to be dropped from playing Wolverine in that same summer’s X-Men. An unknown actor named Hugh Jackman stepped in at the last minute. This is a good thing and Scott went from the next potential Wolverine to that dull M:I II villain that kinda looks like Ewan McGregor.
Ving Rhames returns as Luther, Ethan’s fellow agent who excels in counting down the clock as Hunt performs those impossible stunts. Rade Serbedvija gives a somewhat delightfully off kilter performance as the doctor who created Chimera and Brendan Gleeson is the nefarious owner of the corporation exploiting the virus for financial gain.
The De Palma Mission was a rock solid spy thriller anchored by three first rate action centerpieces: the aquarium sequence, the Langley infiltration and the train finale. In part two, there’s the bio chem lab sequence and the motorcycle chase finale that are front and center.
Neither are as memorable as anything from the previous effort. There’s also the Cruise rock climbing business in the beginning which basically exists so its stunt loving star can look cool rock climbing.
In hindsight, M:I II is easily the weakest link of this franchise. It doesn’t much feel like a Mission feature anymore as much as a John Woo movie with Ethan Hunt in it. Acclaimed screenwriter Robert Towne (who cowrote the first) has sole credit here and a hefty portion of the dialogue, particularly Newton’s, is a bit cringe worthy. Mission: Impossible II has enough fairly cool action to satisfy your average teenage boy, but it pales next to the rest of the Missions. And there’s no excuse for Limp Bizkit reworking that classic TV series theme either.
So while its reputation has deservedly soured in recent times, that didn’t stop part two from becoming a huge global success and earning over half a billion worldwide. It also was the highest domestic grosser of summer 2000 and virtually guaranteed a third go round for Hunt and his IMF team.
Here are the facts:
Film: Mission: Impossible II
U.S. Release Date: May 24, 2000
Director: John Woo
Screenplay: Robert Towne
Budget: $125 million
Worldwide Box Office: $546.3 million
The Ethan Hunt files will return with Mission: Impossible III
We’ve arrived at my top five most anticipated 2015 Summer Movies, set to start rolling out in about three weeks through the end of August. If you missed my first two posts covering numbers 15-6, have no fear, just click here:
This brings us to the heavy hitters on my list of must-see flicks for the season.
And away we go:
5. Mad Max: Fury Road
Release Date: May 15
As mentioned in my first post, this July’s Terminator: Genisys didn’t make my top 15 cut because of what I consider its blah trailer. Mad Max: Fury Road represents the opposite. It looks flat out awesome as director George Miller reboots the series some 35 years after the first Mad Max with Mel Gibson. Tom Hardy steps into the title role with Charlize Theron costarring.
4. Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation
Release Date: July 31
Pushed up from its original December release date, Tom Cruise’s fifth Mission pic brings in his Jack Reacher director Christopher McQuarrie. Series regulars Ving Rhames, Jeremy Renner, and Simon Pegg are back and joined by Alec Baldwin. 2011’s Ghost Protocol was a high point for the franchise and let’s hope this keeps it going.
3. Jurassic World
Release Date: June 12
The famed dino franchise begun by Spielberg gets a reboot with director Colin Trevorrow taking over and Star Lord himself Chris Pratt and Bryce Dallas Howard headlining. The trailer has me ready to return to that dastardly park immediately.
2. Tomorrowland
Release Date: May 22
Disney has enlisted their Incredibles director Brad Bird (he also directed the aforementioned Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol) for this live-action tale featuring George Clooney, Britt Robertson, and Hugh Laurie. The plot is being kept under wraps, but the trailer suggests a visual feast. With Bird behind the camera, expect something special.
1. Avengers: Age of Ultron
Release Date: May 1
The first picture of the summer is my most awaited and is certainly poised to be the season’s highest earner. Three years after teaming Iron Man, Captain America, Hulk, Thor, Black Widow, Hawkeye and more – Joss Whedon is back again directing Marvel’s superhero team in the breathlessly awaited sequel to the second highest grossing domestic earner of all time. James Spader voices the title character villain. Don’t be surprised if this has the largest opening weekend in box office history – beating out, yes, The Avengers.
And that’ll do it, friends! I hope my list assists you with your popcorn viewing pleasure coming very soon…
