So I guess I’ve seen 35 movies that came out in 2009. These are just the movies I have seen. If you’re upset that something isn’t on the list I probably didn’t see it. Some have pictures under them but some don’t. Why? I don’t know I just didn’t feel like it.

Movies I Enjoyed not in the Top 10

Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen- This movie was terrible but it was so entertaining. I would put it in the Top 10 but it was just so bad that it doesn’t deserve it.

State of Play- This movie was well put together with solid performances from Russel Crowe, Ben Affleck, Helen Mirren, and Rachel Mcadams. The movie twists and turns until the end. It’s rocking an 84% at Rotten Tomatoes.

Wolverine: X-Men Origins- This movie was also very entertaining but apparently it doesn’t follow the comic book at all. Still it’s great.

Angels and Demons- This is much better than its predecessor, The Da Vinci Code. It’s very entertaining and non-stop. It keeps you guessing until the end.

I Love You, Man- Funny movie. Very enjoyable.

Observe and Report- Surprisingly a very funny movie. Seemed like it would be like Paul Blart but rated R. It was really funny with plenty of laugh out loud moments.

The Twilight Saga: New Moon- Terrible story but much better than the first film. Very entertaining. I shouldn’t like this movie but I do. I have faith in you Mike Newton.

Fanboys- Funny movie that’s put together pretty well. People who aren’t fans of Star Wars made not find it funny. It has Kristen Bell as well.

The Taking of Pelham 123- This wasn’t that great of a movie but it was still enjoyable. I like Denzel. Who doesn’t?

Public Enemies- “You know I usually don’t say this about a movie but it was flawless.” Jason Tugend said this about the movie. It wasn’t that good. Still it was pretty good and definitely enjoyable. You can’t go wrong with Christian Bale and Johnny Depp in the same movie.

Zombieland- This was a surprisingly good movie. It was really funny. Woody Harrelson plays a great part as does Jesse Eisenberg(He’s only in movies that end in land).

Law Abiding Citizen- This wasn’t a great movie but it was an interesting movie. It keeps you on the edge of your seat.

Ninja Assassin- The movie itself was horrible but it was so awesome.

Paranormal Activity- I hate horror movies but this was well done. It freaked me out so I don’t think I enjoyed it. I in fact wish I never saw it because I had to go to work the next day with two hours of sleep. I was literally pushing my seat back to get farther away from the screen. It was terrifying in my opinion and many of the people I’ve talked to think so too. However, some thought it was lame.

Adventureland- When I first saw this movie, I didn’t really like it but my sister did. So she watched it again with her friend the next day so I watched it again. I liked it better that time and since then the movie has grown on me. It’s not great but it’s still enjoyable and well done. Did I mention…?

Moving on

Movies that were OK

9- It had potential but never really got off the ground. It was weird. However, it had good parts and interesting ideas.

The Soloist- Before seeing it I heard it was an excellent movies. It wasn’t that great. Robert Downey Jr. puts up another great performance as well as Jamie Foxx. It was an interesting story that was delivered weakly. I still cried though because the relationship between RDJ and Jamie Foxx is great. 

Movies that were not so good

2012- One of the worst movies I’ve ever seen in my life and definitely the worst movie I saw this year. People left the theatre before it was over. The best part was when somebody farted rows above us.

My Bloody Valentinein 3D- The only reason this movie made any money was because it was in 3D. Good decision on their part.

Knowing- This movie sucked. Roger Ebert gave this four stars. That’s all the preview said because it had nothing else to go on. It was a bad movie that could not be saved by Nicholas Cage’s horrible acting.

Terminator: Salvation- I’d say this is probably the best of the worst but this was so disappointing. Nothing happened. It was weak. They just tried to throw in every memorable line from the other movies and of course ARNOLD.

The Cake Eaters- Don’t worry about it. It was bad. The only thing it had going for it was a great performance by Kristen Stewart. If you’ve ever wondered if Dukemich was a loser, the answer is yes.

Gamer- This movie was weird. I hated it but at least it had Gerard Butler being a badass. I apoligize to my friends for wanting to see this.

The Informant!- Matt Damon had a great performance in the movie but it just became redundant for the last half hour. Frankly, it just wasn’t that funny. I don’t remember laughing out loud once.

The Men Who Stare at Goats- When discussing the worst movies of the year, The Men Who Stare at Goats has to be in the running. The cast was stacked but it wasn’t very funny. It was really weird and I wasn’t sure what they were going for unless they really wanted to fail.

The Top 10

#10 Sherlock Holmes- Excellent acting by Robert Downey Jr. Great chemistry between Jude Law and RDJ. Had an interesting plot that maybe was a little farfetched but hey it’s Sherlock Holmes. It was a very entertaining movie. I don’t know how close it stayed to the real Sherlock Holmes but from what I’ve seen it was accurate enough. He lived at 221B, which is why they showed it twice during the movie for no apparent reason other than to please true fans. He was known for his ability to think quickly and pull things out of his head like it was nothing(obviously he’s Sherlock Holmes). He also didn’t respect his body. All are portrayed in the film very well.

#9 Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince- I didn’t read any of the books because I don’t enjoy reading but I thought the movie was well done. It had a great blend of humor to counteract the darkness. It’s probably my favorite of the series but I don’t feel like I really know enough to talk about it. I haven’t read the books and I’m told the books are better. I am reading The Deathly Hallows though. Anyway, it was a solid movie. You could tell Daniel Radcliffe, Emma Watson, and Rupert Grint  have played the same role for years. They just keep getting better and better. Alan Rickman is the man.

#8 Invictus- You can’t go wrong with Matt Damon, Morgan Freeman, and Clint Eastwood. The movie was excellent and I’m really disappointed nobody is seeing this movie. Sam walked out on it. How do you pay $8.75 for a movie and then walk out? Anyway the casting was excellent. When I say excellent I mean right on. Morgan Freeman is the closest you can get to Nelson Mandela. I’m told Matt Damon doesn’t look like the character he played. Apparently the player was much taller but Damon is a convincing rugby player. However, the story itself is what made that movie. I still don’t understand rugby.

#7 Taken- LIAM NEESON!!!! Our intramural basketball team is known as the Liam Neeson’s. That’s because we saw this movie before we came up with the team name. This is one of those movies where you just want to keep rewinding to see what just happened. Liam Neeson is 57-years-old and he was beating people up as if he were 27. He obviously had a great performance. Famke Janssen plays the same role in every movie, the repulsive woman. Whether she’s the phoenix, Lenore, or the crazy chick from Goldeneye you don’t want to be around her. She plays that part really well. LIAM NEESON!!!!!!

#6 The Hangover- The Hangover is one of the funniest movies I’ve ever seen. Not only was it funny but it was also put together very nicely. The fact that it was a mystery added to the movie. Where’s Doug? That just made it even more entertaining. It’s really non-stop laughter. I’ve seen it three times and I’ve laughed just as hard every time. It was in theatres for a ridiculous amount of time but ssjrem can tell you all about that. The acting was great and the character choices were perfect. One of the greatest comedies ever.

#5 Star Trek- Wow, what a movie. I really thought this movie would fail especially with Eric Bana playing the main villain but he actually did a nice job. It’s rocking a 94% at Rotten Tomatoes. You don’t have to be a fan of Star Trek to like it yet it still pleases the hardcore fans. Great casting choices except for Harold from Harold and Kumar. That’s just tough to get passed but if you can he does actually do a nice job. Before this movie the best Star Trek movie was First Contact. This surpassed First Contact by so much. It truly saved the Star Trek franchise.

#4 Avatar- Go see it in 3D. Truly experience Pandora. The movie was excellent. It’s a good thing Sam Worthington got into something other than Terminator: Salvation. Talk about being truly taken out of reality. That’s what really did it for me. It was visiually striking. The plot wasn’t as strong but it wasn’t bad at all. I really liked the plot. Learning the traditions of the tribe was very interesting. The audience learned with Jake Sully. It was great to learn how the tribe became one with nature. In fact I have my hair connected to my laptop as I’m typing this post. I want one of those birds. I felt the two and a half hour runtime but I didn’t really care. The movie(especially the end) was truly epic.

#3 District 9- I had to see this movie twice. It was so shocking the first time I saw it that I couldn’t even form an opinion. The movie was shocking, funny, action-packed, disgusting, and disturbing. It was excellent. It also served as a metaphor for what is happening in Johannesburg. It was very well put together and the shock value was extraordinary. I never left a movie theatre feeling that way. The actor who played Wikus did an excellent job. My favorite part of the movie was the display of the power of the alien weaponry. Man that was awesome. Definitely see it just be prepared for a movie like no other.

#2 Inglourious Basterds- I bounced back and forth on which movie should be #2. In the end, it had to be Inglourious Basterds. Quentin Tarantino made yet another great movie. Surprisingly this movie had coherence. It moved from beginning to end. I love the way he keeps building the tension with long dialogue. I love how he has two plots that meet at the end. “The Bear Jew” is the best character. Brad Pitt does a great job as Aldo Raine. The actor who plays the “Jew Hunter” does a great job(that’s a bingo!!!). Tarantino also put two great looking women in the film. However, if you want to win me over with a movie just stick Samuel L. Jackson in it. He only narrates for two parts but it’s great. Also, Tarantino’s best films are Pulp Fiction, Kill Bill Vol. 1 and 2, and Inglourious Basterds. All have Samuel L. Jackson. The killing of Nazis is awesome and graphic. The end is insane. Why isn’t this number one? Well…

#1 Watchmen- Watchmen is one of the greatest movies I’ve ever seen so of course it tops the list. Rorshach is one of the greatest characters of all-time. Every line he says is quotable. It’s a great story that forces you to think. It has great action scenes and an ending that will make you think about it after you leave the theatre. The movie was almost three hours long. The director’s cut is three hours long but it doesn’t feel like it at all. I got so engrossed in that movie that the time flew by. It didn’t feel like three hours at all. The movie had excellent character development. You knew all the heroes. The action sequences were sometimes very graphic, which was awesome(I expect nothing less from Zach Snyder who also directed 300). It had plenty of those ooohhhhhh!!!! moments. It’s a great story that is not as difficult to follow as people say it is. It’s not like any movie I’ve seen before. The graphic novel pretty much did it all for the movie but I like the movie better. If you have the time, read the graphic novel and watch the movie.

I’d like to hear your opinions on this.

Speaking of Quentin Tarantino Kill Bill Vol. 3 is coming out in 2014 according to the Internet Movie Database.

See ya.

 1. Tyler Perry’s I Can Do Bad All By Myself.

 I’m predicting this to open at number one because these Tyler Perry movies have a built audience that comes out to see every single one of his movies. When his first film, Diary of a Mad Black Woman, opened to number one back in 2005, I was more shocked than I had ever been by a box office result. I had never heard of the film. Not once. I had absolutely no clue what it was. That has never happened before or since. It’s unheard of. But, yeah, I hate Tyler Perry and I don’t think he or his TV show or these movies are funny at all. Not to be racist or anything, but I really think it’s because I’m not black. I just don’t get the humor. And it annoys me when I see these movies do well. Anyway, I’m calling for this to open to about 23 million, which is right in line with his usual fare, though I wouldn’t be surprised to see this breakout and open to 30 million or even more.

2. 9

 A lot of people on the forums at Box Office Mojo are predicting pretty low numbers for 9. However, I occasionally have to be optimistic about things and I really hope that this film does well. I thought that the trailer was amazing and I really expect good things from it, but, yeah, it’s kind of a tough sell. Even though he’s not really all that involved with it, I think it’s a smart move to heavily advertise Tim Burton’s name. He has quite a nice little fanbase. 9 is opening on a Wednesday, which will absorb some of the business it could potentially do over the weekend proper, but I’m still hoping this could do well. So, I’m guessing about 17 million for 9, which is being kind of generous, but I really do want to see this do well. I’m not being very objective about this, but oh well.

3. Sorority Row. I’m going to say about seven million for this. September is traditionally one of the worst months in terms of box office and studios often dump the not good enough for the summer shit in this month. Sorority Row is a perfect example. Seven million sounds good to me.

4. Whiteout: about 6.5 to 7 million. See above.

5. Inglourious Basterds: I’m going to say about 6.5 million. Movies tend to suffer bigger drops after holiday weekends. But Basterds has been pretty well received, so I don’t think it should fall too hard. I could be wrong, though.

6. The facts that it’s coming off a holiday weekend and it’s a horror movie make me feel like The Final Destination is going to fall apart. So, I’m going with 4.6 million.

7. All About Steve hasn’t been well received at all, so I feel like it’s gonna get hit hard. Let’s go with about 4.5 million.

8. District 9 has been holding pretty decently and I don’t the holiday will affect it to much at this point, so I’ll go with 3.9 million this weekend. It’s already over 100 million and has exceeded expectations by a longshot, so I’m quite happy for it.

9. Julie and Julia: 3.7 million sounds good to me.

10. I think Gamer is going to get destroyed this weekend. I could honestly see it falling over 70% this weekend, which is massive and all, but it wouldn’t surprise me. The average prediction at BOM was about 4.6 million this weekend, but I thought that was way too conservative. There is no way this will fall under 50%. So, I’m going with a gargantuan decline all the way down to 2.7 million. I must say, though, that I’m somewhat surprised by its respectable 6.5 at IMDB. But, whatever, those are my predictions. Adios, everyone. We’ll see how I did with all this on Sunday or Monday or Tuesday or whenever the fuck I get around to it. Until we meet again.

Instead of a single-member of theChez.net doing this review, we decided to do a conglomerate and average it. We all saw it, and we all loved it, but just how much is the question? Each one of us did a short little review with a rating that I then averaged.  Be sure to click past the break to see what each of us had to say about the film.

Average and Chez.net Final Rating:     0.25/5 Chezwicks

kturt133′s Review

District 9 was one of those movies that comes around once in a while that makes everyone think about the future, and what we would do in a similar situation. While it’s surely not as plausable as a movie such as “V For Vendetta” is, it makes you wonder how you would feel about aliens in a similar situation.

In the District 9, the aliens, referred to as Prawns, are treated as less than scum.Everyone; blacks, asians, spaniards, you name it, are all racist towards them and want them to either leave Earth, or die. They all think that it’d be a wonderful solution to reduce the crime rate that the Prawns have brought to Johannesburg, South Africa.

Without ruining most of the movie, I can without a doubt say that it is an enjoyable movie to say the least. It has everything you look for in a man movie, except the bitches. It has explosions, aliens, explosions caused by aliens, human vapoizations, some black shit getting shot into a guys face, metamorphasis, and tons of kickass alien weaponry that seems like something straight out of the Ratchet and Clank games.

But it’s also something much deeper than that. Beyond this obvious dude flick exterior lays something much more serious. It’s a story of the man who was once heartlessly dealt with the Prawns, eventually had to rely on them in a time of need. There was tons of great moral undertones in the movie, and I walked away from the theater wondering about the future, and smiling so that hopefully I get to shoot one of those kickass lighting-emitting grenade launcher thingies.

In conclusion, District 9 is a great movie. I give it 0.25/5 Chezwicks.

mikexuanle’s Review

Science Fiction movies are like grains of sand, stars in the sky, number of court cases OJ has:  innumerable and ever growing.  Most of these movies are photocopies of one another and very rarely do we get the pleasure of watching the exceptions… something so original come out of something so cliche. Believe this: District 9 is THE exception.

It is a fanciful rollercoaster ride of emotions that is only experience in the best of  entire Science Fiction genre.  At any point of the movie, you feel torn up inside.  You are angry, wanting to throw your hands up ans scream.  You are pitiful, wanting to crawl up in a ball and sob.  You are happy, wanting to dance gleefully and smoke a bowl.  You are empowered, wanting to grab an alien blaster and shoot that mother fucking gangster who wants to eat your arm.

District 9.  The best district there is.

Rating: 0/5 Chezwicks

dukemich’s Review

Before I get to the review I just have to say this. As we all know when you go to see a movie previews are shown before the movie begins. In all the years that I’ve paid to go see a movie in the theatre, I’ve NEVER seen worse previews in my life. I did not want to see one movie. Legion, Surrogate, Halloween II (Apparently we need to see all of them again), The Final Destination, Saw VI, Zombieland, and Cirque Du Freak. C’mon we can do better. Moving on

I’ve never seen anything like this movie. From the limited previews, I really didn’t know what to expect. I was in shock when I left the movie theatre and had no idea what I thought about the movie. District 9 takes you on an emotional roller coaster with plenty to process in about two hours time. District 9 was informative, funny, disgusting, awesome, sad, and shocking. The films use of the documentary format made it seem that the events occurring in the movie were actually happening. The TV cameras took you into District 9 so you could see where the aliens were living. You could see their lifestyle. You could see the slums. You could see the gangs. You could see the horror. You could see the relationship that the humans have with the aliens. For about two hours I was in District 9. District 9 transitioned between documentary format and regular movie format very well. The acting was great even though I’ve never heard of any of the actors.

The only flaw that I had with the movie is the fact that very little is explained. How did the humans learn the alien language? Why did the alien ship land in Johannesberg? What planet are the aliens from? However, if all this was explained the movie would have been six hours long so I understand why a lot of questions were left unanswered.

I really don’t know what else to say. This movie was incredible. Go see it. I can’t explain it. You really have to see it for yourself.

I’ll give this a 1/2 chez.

ssjrem’s Review

District 9 is easily one of the best movies of the year thus far. Though I don’t think it quite matched up to Watchmen, the intense moral overtones and the incredible journey of the main character makes this a fascinating movie. I loved the way in which this film turns the usual alien invasion plot completely on its head. I feel as though it portrayed it in a much more realistic way than we’ve previously seen in movies like Independence Day or War of the Worlds. And considering the fact that the budget for the film was only 30 million dollars compared to a budget of more than 200 million dollars for Transformers, the special effects are amazing. It’s remarkable what people can do with limited funding sometimes. Niel Blomkamp might very well become a very well-known name in years to come. He’s certainly set the bar pretty high.

0.5 chezes out of 5.

phil0s0rapt0r’s Review

This was the best movie I’ve seen in a long, long time.  The previews looked amazing… but the movie– I didn’t expect it to actually be as good as the previews made it out to be.  The storytelling was itself was worth the anal raping I took to get into the movie. The character of Wikus was portrayed excellently by Sharlto Copley. Instead of your typical badass who goes apeshit on the aliens, unleashing thousands of rounds of bullets or somehow uploading a virus to the mothership, Wikus is more or less incompetent; an antihero if I’ve ever seen one. Furthermore, the moral and ethical questions that this movie raises are fascinating. Without going into too much detail, let’s just say I give it two tentacles up!

0.25 / 5 chezwicks

Hydro033′s Review

Smart, disturbing, action-packed, and interesting. District 9 had it all. Although not a perfect movie, District 9 comes up as one of the most solid science fiction films of the decade (a genre I’m very partial and biased towards). I couldn’t help but love the idea of aliens that were simultaneous hazardous and humane. At first you hate them, then you know them, then you question your opinion, as did the main character, Wikus. The film raised a very difficult question: how would we treat organisms that are so like us, but so different at the same time? Going back to ssjrem’s post about sapience, how would we react to encountering it? Would we be hostile? Accepting? Mutualistic? Or Parasitic? The question will remain.

Technically, the movie was astounding. The special effects, the acting, and the sound, the characters, and the dialogue were all fantastic. A few things I did dislike. The “Stone Cold Steve Austin” villain character – it was just cliche. The story was great, but a government with a bad intention is getting old. Like dukemich, I would like a few questions answered – especially the language thing, I think they just blew by that for the ease of the film. I think the documentary style to add realism was very poorly implemented. It should either of been dropped or used more often. For a sci-fi film, then ending was rather emotional and heart-wrenching, at least for me. I don’t want to ruin the movie for you, the reader. So, please go see it for yourself and enjoy it, because you will. 0.5/5 Chezwicks.

Posted in 1, Movie Reviews, Movies and TV Tagged: 9, aliens, district, district 9, movies, review, south africa, wikus ]]> http://thechez.net/2009/08/25/district-9-congolmerate-review/feed/ 1 hydro033 district_nine quarterchez quarterchez nochez 1/2 chez 1/2 chez quarterchez 1/2 chez http://thechez.net/2009/08/24/inglourious-basterds-scalp-competition/ http://thechez.net/2009/08/24/inglourious-basterds-scalp-competition/#comments Mon, 24 Aug 2009 19:27:58 +0000 ssjrem http://thechez.net/?p=1282 ]]> by ssjrem

Well, two weeks in a row now, the number one picture has exceeded expectations and by a fairly considerable margin at that. Last week, we had District 9. This week, the throne belongs to Inglourious Basterds.

Wow, I would not have called this much for Inglourious Basterds. And since I keep spelling that wrong, I’m goint to just call it IB from now on, okay? Anyway, I guess the combination of Quentin Tarantino and Brad Pitt was pretty potent. Audiences may have also been in the mood for some good old fashioned bloody ass whoopings. Anyway, IB makes about 37.6 million this weekend, right on par with what District 9 pulled in last weekend. These debuts are especially impressive considering the time of year, as late August is usually a pretty shitty time of year. IB has an 87% at Rotten Tomatoes and is currently rated an 8.7 at The Internet Movie Database, putting it at number 38 on the site’s Top 250. Though, a movie will almost always be at its highest rank at the end of its first weekend. I wouldn’t be surprised at all to see it fall out of the top 50 with time. But still, given both of those, IB stands a pretty good chance at 100 million. Then again, I said the exact same thing about District 9 last weekend and things didn’t exactly go swimmingly for last week’s champ.

District 9

District 9 takes a bit of a hit this weekend, but it could’ve been a lot worse. I was hoping D9 could have managed really good legs and become something of a sleeper hit, but it’s rather difficult for a summer to have two sleeper hits. We’ve already the Hangover (which is now up to an astonishing 268 million) so it would be kind of tough for D9 to pull of something like that. Anyway, it fell 49% to 18.9 million. I was kind of worried that people would rush out and see this first weekend and then it would just completely fall to pieces, much like Cloverfield, which by comparison fell 68% in its second weekend. D9 has gotten its total up to 73 million and it’s got an outside shot at 100 million. This was a damn fine movie and I would love to see it hit that milestone.

G.I. Joe falls a decent 44% to 12.5 million. Admittedly, this is a movie that no one expected to have good legs. The grand total’s up to about 120 million now and it’s running a little behind Fantastic Four’s pace, so I’m going to say this will finish up around 150 or so.

In fourth, we have The Time Traveler’s Wife, which falls 46% to a little over 10 million, bringing its total to 37 million, which isn’t bad, I guess. It’s budgeted at 39 million, so I think this will be fine in the long run.

Julie and Julia holds quite well, slipping just 25% to nine million. Again, the plot of this movie seems like one of the dumbest things I’ve ever heard in my entire life, but whatever works for people. With a total at 59 million currently, I’ll say this could reach about 75 to 80 million.

Debuting in sixth, we have Shorts. If I thought Julie and Julia had a stupid plot, this movie blows it out of the water. It made 6.6 million, which isn’t very good. I’m hoping that this falls off the face of the earth next weekend.

G-Force continues its decline down the top ten and hopefully soon, I won’t have to write about it anymore. A 4.2 million weekend brings the total to 107 million. How does a movie like this make over 100 million while D9 is going to struggle to hit that mark? Well, yeah, D9 is an R-rated movie with no recognizable stars and aliens that would never be described as “cute. ” So, it’s kind of a tough sell. Eh, whatever.

Another 3.5 million lifts Harry Potter up to 290 million. This is definitely going to get over 300 million. Not by much, but it will break that milestone, probably ultimately finishing with 302 or 303. If nothing else, the last three Harry Potter films have been pretty consistent, all finishing between 290 and 305 million.

Ugly Truth: 2.85 million. Total of about 83 million.

And, finally, getting completely ignored and barely opening in the top ten, we have Post Grad, starring Alexis Bledel, the girl from Gilmore Girls. You know, if you asked me, I would say that Lauren Graham, who played her mother on the show, is definitely hotter. But that’s just me. Anyway, Post Grad makes just 2.6 million and will be gone by next weekend.

So, Inglourious Basterds did way better than I thought, as I had pegged it around the mid 20s. But I’m glad because it was a really good movie. If no one else does, I might do a review in the coming days. Anyway, next weekend, we have two movies I am going to try my hardest to stay away from, but I wouldn’t be surprised at all if I ended up seeing one of them. The Final Destination and Halloween 2 both open next weekend and I don’t understand the studios’ decisions to release competing horror films on the same weekend. Reaction to the first Halloween was mixed and The Final Destination is in 3-D (though what isn’t these days) so I’ll say that TFD should fairly easily win the weekend. Then again, as the last few weeks have shown me, my predictions are pretty far off sometimes. It seems like the box office is going into complete shit mode for the next few months. Aside from 9, there isn’t a single film I’m terribly interested in seeing until December, which kind of sucks. I’m just going over the release schedule and it seems like a lot of garbage. Man, I really hope Avatar doesn’t disappoint.

Yep, so District 9 opened on top this week. Though, obviously that was to be expected. I was going around on forums last week looking at people’s predictions and I was kind of off put. A lot people were predicting it to open in the high teens or lower 20s. A few people even thought that the Time Traveler’s Wife would beat it out. Well, thankfully, they were way off.

District 9

I saw District 9 this past weekend and let me tell you, it was one damn fine movie. Well, actually I saw it twice. I saw it with a few friends on Friday night, then went again on Sunday with several of my fellow Chez writers. I wouldn’t say if it was good enough that I’d suggest seeing twice within a 48 hour period, but I very much enjoyed both times. Anyway, District 9 beat expectations by a solid margin, opening to 37.4 million. This is a very impressive debut for a movie no one had heard a few months ago. Furthermore, it stars absolutely no one famous and the only recognizable name attached to the movie, Peter Jackson, was heavily emphasized. I was very pleased with the movie and I hope to see it too well. It had a very impressive 88% at RT, which is especially good for a science fiction movie. Critics and the general public often react very differently to movies, though. I do hope that this continues to do well in the weeks to come. Unless it crashes and burns from this point, it should definitely reach 100 million. It’d need mighty good legs to hit 200 million, though, but I wouldn’t rule it out.

G.I. Joe

 You know, all things considered, G.I. Joe’s fall this week really isn’t that bad. It dipped 59% to 22.3 million this weekend and what with the terrible reviews and the very nature of the box office these days, any drop under 60% would be considered a success for this. The total now stands  98.6 million. It’s running pretty much at exactly the pace as the first Fantastic Four movie, so if continues to do so, it should be able to get its way up to about 150 or so. Not half bad.

Opening at number three, we have The Time Traveler’s Wife. I have no idea what this movie is about and I have no desire to see it at all. It only had a 36% at RT, so critics haven’t been too kind. Despite this, it opened to a pretty solid 18.6 million. I don’t expect good legs from this, though, but it’s too early to have an idea of where it will end up.

Julie and Julia drops a bit, falling 40% to 12 million. Considering the competition from The Time Traveler’s Wife, the drop isn’t that bad. That total’s up to 43 million, so hitting 100 is out of the question. I’m guessing about a 70 million total.

G-Force, in fifth place this weekend, actually has a good hold for the first time, dropping just 30% 6.9 million for a sum of 99 million. Hmmm, I wonder if it will get to 100…… It’s a stretch, but I think it will get there.

I hadn’t even heard of The Goods: Live Hard, Sell Hard until like last Thursday. Anyway, it doesn’t do well at all, opening to just 5.6 million. I don’t expect much to come from this.

Another 5.1 million brings Harry Potter up to 283 million. At the same point, OOTP had grossed 272 million, so Half-Blood Prince is holding on to its lead. If it continues along at the same pace, I think it’ll crawl just over 300 million, becoming the second movie in  the series to crack the milestone after the first film way back 2001.

The Ugly Truth makes 4.5 million for a 77.5 total. That’s all I got to say.

Before I discuss the next film, let me just say this. Hayao Miyazaki is a GOD. He is a very celebrated Japanese film-maker who’s films rake in the dough and smash records in Japan. However, he’s never garned the same kind of success state-side. He has a small but very loyal following here, myself being in that group. I’ve seen most of his films and one of them, Princess Mononoke, is one of my top five favorite films of all time. Most of his films have gone into limited release in the states, but Buena Vista took a bit of a chance and opened Miyazaki’s lastest film, Ponyo, wide on its opening weekend. The result? A resounding “eh.” It made just 3.6 million. Admittedly, it was only in 927 theatres compared to 4007 for, say, G.I. Joe, but still, it’s pretty disappointing. I highly doubt I’ll end up seeing Ponyo in theatres because absolutely no one would go with me. I really need a girlfriend who’s into anime. Sigh.

On that note, we round out the top ten with Funny People, which continues to get clobbered. People really, really fucking hate this movie. It dropped another huge 62% and made another 3 million to bring its sum up to just 48 million, which is a massive disappointment. Well, this sort of thing happens every now and then. I guess no movies are really fool-proof successes.

Yep, so I guess that’s it. Next weekend, we have Inglorious Basterds, which I will almost undoubtedly see, some stupid movie staring the chick from Gilmore Girls and some stupid movie about a wishing rock or something. Until we meet again.

The new movie directed by Neill Blomkamp and produced by the legendary Peter Jackson (Lord of the Rings, King Kong) is earning cirtical praise. Rottentomatoes.com, the movie review mega-site, rated the movie with extremely positive scores (currently at 95% average with top critics at 100% average on Thursday Aug. 13th, 2009). Pretty good for Blomkamp’s directorial debut and a movie during the summer slump. I’m excited to see it doing well and hope that people give it the support it needs at the box office.

Rottentomatoes.com Consensus: Technically brilliant and emotionally wrenching, District 9 has action, imagination, and all the elements of a thoroughly entertaining science-fiction classic.

It is an action movie, but it is being deemed “smart” unlike some other action movies this year. *cough* Transformers *cough* It is said to have a sense of reality and gravitas that grips you. The plot reads as follows: “An extraterrestrial race forced to live in slum-like conditions on Earth suddenly find a kindred spirit in a government agent that is exposed to their biotechnology.” The movie releases tomorrow, Aug. 15th, 2009. Get out and see it – support good movies instead of shit like Transformers, The Ugly Truth, G-Force, and Night at the Museum 2.

Well, after several weeks of the box office not living up to levels from a year ago, G.I. Joe comes along and rescues the summer box office, which had been in a bit of a rough patch for the past few weeks. This is especially good news in August, normally the weakest of the summer months in terms of box office.

G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra

Number one this weekend is obviously G.I. Joe. I have to admit that it did a fair bit better than I expected. I only pinned it around 44 million, but it ended up with 54.7 million for that weekend. That is a very solid number. Both critics and moviegoers don’t seem to care for it too much, so I don’t think it will have great legs, but 100 million is a guarantee and it could get up to about 130 or so. This debut is actually rather impressive considering August is a pretty weak month for openers. Only three movies (The Bourne Ultimatum, Rush Hour 2, and Signs) have opened to more in the month of August. I haven’t seen this yet and I don’t really think it looks that good, but I wouldn’t be surprised at all if I ended up seeing it anyway. My friends and I never really have anything to do….. Anyway, let’s move on to number two!

Julie and Julia

I love Amy Adams. I thought about just putting up a sexy picture of her, but I’m going to try to stop doing that. I think it got a little stale. Anyway, I don’t understand this movie at all. It seemed like it had one of the dumbest premises ever. It just seems weird. Anyway, though, it connected pretty well with its target audience of older women and debuted solidly to 20 million. It’s rated 76% at Rotten Tomatoes and has a solid 7.8 in user ratings on The Internet Movie Database. Movies like this tend to have pretty good legs, too, so I would say that 100 million is a possibility. It’s not likely, but it’s certainly possible.

3. G-Force makes another 9.9 million this weekend for a total of 86 million. It’ll get over 100 million, but not by much. It’s been having unusually large declines for a kids’ movie, especially one in 3-D. Maybe the 3-D novelty is starting to wear off.

4. Harry Potter sees its gross chopped in half from last weekend, pulling in 8.9 million to lift the total to 273.8 million. At the same point, Order of the Phoenix had grossed 261 million. Half Blood Prince is pulling in a little less per weekend now, so it will continue to see its lead picked away. I do think it will end up outgrossing OOTP, though. 300 million seems like a stretch; a total in the mid 290s seems in store.

5. Wow, people really hate Funny People. I guess it really must suck. First, it underperformed last weekend. Now, it falls like a rock. It decreased 65% from last weekend and fell from first to fifth and has grossed only 40.5 million so far. That is massively disappointing. Well, shit happens, I guess.

6. The Ugly Truth makes about 6.7 million. Total up to 68.8 million. Katherine Heigl is hot. I have nothing more to say.

7. I read Roger Ebert’s review for The Perfect Getaway and it made me laugh. He didn’t know what the movie was about and thought it was a comedy going into it when it fact it’s a horror movie. Honestly, I wouldn’t even know this movie existed if I didn’t do all this movie and box office shit on the Internet. I haven’t seen a single advertisement for this movie, though it certainly helps that I never watch TV. Anyway, it made a little under 6 million. Yeah, uh, this is probably going absolutely nowhere.

8. Aliens in the Attic manages one more weekend in the top ten, falling 50% to a little more than 4 million. The total stands at 16 million against a 45 million budget. How one spends 45 million dollars on a movie like this is just beyond me.

9. (500) Days of Summer makes a somewhat surprising appearance into the top ten. It just expanded from a limited release. It made 3.7 million this weekend and add to that the money it made while in limited release, it’s up to 12.4 so far. It’s got a very impressive 89% at Rotten Tomatoes and also has an 8.7 at IMDB, making it currently the 129th highest rated movie on the site. I imagine that ranking will fall; they usually do with time, but that’s still very impressive. I love Zooey Deschanel. I’ve loved her ever since Elf. I thought she looked really good as a blonde, but I do like her as a brunette even more. Anyway, let’s move on.

10. Orphan falls 51%, makes 3.7 million, and raises its total to 34.8 million. Not bad.

Anyway, a number of big summer blockbusters fell from the top ten this weekend, so I’ll give them a send off. Transformers is up to 394 million, The Hangover’s up to 262, The Proposal’s at 155, and Ice Age is at 188. Yeah, I did really shitty in the derby this week. I’d rather not comment on it. So, yeah, next weekend brings us District 9, a movie which has me very intrigued. I could imagine it sucking, but I I do think that there is a lot of potential. I’ll probably see it opening weekend, so expect a review from me or Dukemich soon enough. I guess that’s it. Peace out.

The movie of the year, Watchmen, comes out tomorrow on DVD. Watchmen is also the greatest book I’ve read this year. Watchmen is smart and action packed. The effects are a lot like the movie 300 because it was directed by the same person, Zach Snyder. It’s a very long movie with a run time of 2 hours and 43 minutes but the time flies by because it’s so intense. Basically, the movie begins with a bang when an unknown assassin kills a member of the Watchmen, which peaks Rorschach’s(another Watchmen member) interest and he investigates the murder. While this is going on the world is on the brink of a nuclear holocaust and nobody knows how to stop it. It’s extremely violent with a side of nudity. It’s a great movie that doesn’t veer from the book at all. The book just has more information on the characters. I’m going to get it tomorrow. I suggest you do the same.

But before this turns into a Watchmen review(too late) I should talk about the movies in the future. So far this year we’ve had some good movies such as Watchmen, Star Trek, Harry Potter, and The Hangover. We’ve also had some entertaining movies in Taken, Wolverine, and Transformers 2. So what now? What’s left for the year of 2009?

Honorable Mentions:

G.I. Joe: This will probably be an awful movie but it has potential to be very entertaining. It has Dennis Quaid in it and that’s always a plus. I don’t have high hopes.

Funny People: This movie has potential to be well… funny. It has Adam Sandler and Seth Rogan(I’m pretty sure he’s in every comedy) in it. Both are well… very funny people.

Couples Retreat: Malin Akerman(plays Silk Spectre II in Watchmen and she’s hot), Kristen Bell (equally hot and works well in comedys), Jason Bateman(Arrested Development, Hancock, Dodgeball, he’s funny in all 3), Ken Jeong(guy from the Hangover, very funny), Vince Vaughn (obviously funny), and Jon Favreau(his last name is almost Favre lucky for him it’s not, anyway he’s funny in the Replacements and I Love You, Man). As you can see the pieces are there for a solid comedy.

2012: This movie has potential to be very entertaining in a Day After Tomorrow way. I don’t really like John Cusack in the leading role but he’s a good actor. I liked him in Runaway Jury.

All Right Now let’s move on to the Top 5

5. New Moon

The Saga continues with a new director, Chris Weitz, brought in for better special effects. To the guys that are going to be forced to see this with their girlfriends, you probably won’t like it but it won’t be the worst movie you’ve ever seen. It’ll have it’s moments with some fighting but remember it’s a love story. I’m sure this would be a lot of people’s most anticipated movie of the year.

The movie features actress Kristen Stewart.

Actor: Rob Pattinson

Actor: Taylor Lautner

Actress: Dakota Fanning

Another Excellent actor/actress

In the words of Andy Samberg, “Confession time.” Those are all pictures of Kristen Stewart(and probably a little over the top). However, I’m sure the there will be more girls there to see Rob Pattinson and Taylor Lautner than guys to see Kristen Stewart.

4. District 9

I don’t know much about this movie from the previews but it’s intriguing and gives yet another perspective on what would happen if aliens landed on earth.

3. Shutter Island

Martin Scorcese and Leonardo DiCaprio team up again in a thriller. This movie looks so intense and mysterious. It seems to have a solid cast with DiCaprio, Mark Ruffalo(Collateral), and Jackie Earle Haley(plays Rorschach in Watchmen). The last time DiCaprio and Scorcese teamed up it was in The Departed. Enough said.

2. Sherlock Holmes

This movie seems to be a sure bet. It doesn’t matter if  he’s a super hero or black guy, anything that Robert Downey Jr. touches seems to turn to gold. Jude Law will do his part and Rachel McAdams is great. This will be the perfect movie to see on Christmas. It will have some action with a side of humor and of course mystery.

1. Inglorious Basterds

First and foremost this is narrated by Samuel L. Jackson(great job at the ESPYs last night). Last time he narrated a movie was the Farce of the Penguins which was funny but Inglorious Basterds will be a different kind of narrating obviously. Also, World War II is my favorite of all the wars and I am a history buff. Furthermore, it’s directed by Quentin Tarantino. He directed one of the greatest movie’s of all-time, Pulp Fiction. Combine all that with the brutal killing of Nazis. That’s just an incredible movie. Some notable actors/actresses in the movie are Brad Pitt, B.J. Novak(The Office), and Diane Kruger(National Treasure, Troy).

Well that’s what’s left. I really doubt anything will touch Watchmen.

One more thing:

We’re good.