The Best Romantic Comedy Ever Made Has the Best Weekend Ever
Love truly conquers all, especially when that love takes the form of a cynically made American rip-off of a far-superior British movie and it stars horrible people like the fellow in this picture. That kind of love is unbeatable.
1) Valentine's Day — $52.4 million
Yes, you read that right. This critical darling went and made a twentieth of a billion dollars this long weekend (well, not long for us, sigh). It is the biggest President's Day weekend opening ever, which officially means... what? Is Ashton Kutcher a bankable movie star now? Are the Jessicas Biel and Alba? And what of Topher Grace? What does this mean for him? The implications of Valentine's Day making so very many monies could be far-reaching and terrifying. Or it could just be that it was Valemtimes this weekend, just like in the movie, and that Black Eyed Peas song from the preview usually gets people all worked up and wanting tonight to be a good night (it never is) and some boyfriends are really uncreative so they said "Hey, babylove, let's go to Valentine's Day for Valentine's Day," and then when they woke up yesterday morning before going to the movie with their girlfriend (or boyfriend!) they said, "Tonight's gonna be a good night," and for a moment there they were the most American person in the world.
2) Percy Jackson & the Olympians: The Lightning Thief — $31.1 million
Hey, so let's say that, hypothetically, we saw this movie on Saturday. Because, again hypothetically, the movie we really wanted to see (Legion) wasn't playing at Kip's Bay and our friend had read the first Percy Jackson book when her younger cousin left it down the Shore this summer and she said it was kinda fun, like Harry Potter but about Greek gods, and then we, hypothetically, were like "OK, the preview seemed kinda fun, let's do it." Let's just say that happened. So from this imaginary perspective we'll give a review of the movie: Basically it's about a kid named Logan Lerman who's going to be a movie star one day so he had to slog through some potential franchise muck to get there and Pierce Brosnan plays Pierce Brosnan As A Horse, who runs a camp in the Catskills for children of very, very promiscuous gods. There's a minstrely satyr played by the other, actual black dude from Tropic Thunder and a girl love interest who is just Logan Lerman in a wig. A befuddled Cahterine Keener shows up as Mom, plus Uma Thurman stops by to snack on some scenery as Medusa. In the end, none of it makes really any sense and there's a climactic battle scene that involves magic Converse sneakers. Melina Kanakaredes from Providence is in it for a hot minute with a terrible and inexplicable British accent, and Sean Bean has never played anything but the character he plays in this. That kid Logan Lerman is going to be a real looker when he gets a few years older, and that's about all there is to say for the movie. Hypothetically.
3) The Wolfman — $30.6 million
Hey how about that! A movie starring the unlikely pair of Benicio del Toro and Emily Blunt did some pretty nifty business this weekend. Good for them. There's not really that much to say about this movie, other than that it's funny to think about a big studio people's meeting and the head guy being like "Hey, what're we gonna do about that Twinkle movie and the werewolf kid, the Tyler Laterals or whatever his name is? We need something like that." And then some timid junior associate raising her weird hand and saying "Benicio del Toro?" And instead of getting fired for suggesting a grizzled tree sloth of a man as a viable competitor for Teendream St. Hardbody over there, she gets promoted and her movie gets made and then it does well. Sometimes that's just how things work, apparently.
5) Dear John — $15.3 million
This film lost about half of its audience from last week's big debut, mostly because of that damn Taylor Swift/Hector Elizondo romcom. You just can't compete with a duo like that. If only someone really teen-swoony like that was in Dear John. Was Benicio del Toro unavailable?
16) Legion — $1.5 million
Oh look. This movie has only made about $38 million since its release. Which is a shame. Maybe if it was playing at certain movie theaters on certain weekends certain people could have gone to see it instead of watching a ragtag group of Greek bastards globe-trotting to exotic places like New Jersey and Tennessee (this is where they go in the movie, hypothetically). Maybe then the movie would be doing better. We're just saying. A simple suggestion. Hey people who pulled Legion out of a lot of movie theaters: Have you ever heard Pierce Brosnan, dressed up as a CGI horse-man, say the line: "That's why your mother stayed with that terrible man [Joe Pantoliano]. His powerful odor hid the scent of your royal blood"? Yeah, well. Some of us might have heard that happen this weekend. It is something one doesn't forget easily. Hypothetically.