Terminator: Genisys’ order to “Come with [it] if [we] want to live” is studiously ignored, Magic Mike XXL only ends up in a light shower of dollars, they tried to make people watch Amy and people said “Yes, yes, yes”, and Other Box Office News.
Ah, 4th of July weekend! The five-day stretch where everybody, in their great patriotic American duty, travels down to the cinemas to watch the latest wares that Hollywood has to peddle! Past years have seen films like Despicable Me 2, The Amazing Spider-Man, various Transformers movies, a Twilight instalment, and (obviously) Independence Day launch in this lucrative and prestigious slot in order to help fuel that great American past-time: ignoring your families and friends by sitting down and shutting up for two and a bit hours! And, sure, last year was kind of a major disappointment, but those movies weren’t going to set any box offices on fire, anyway. This year had two supposedly highly anticipated sequels to beloved franchises, plus the continuing success of two of the strongest box office holdovers to come along in an age! Everything was going to be peaches and cream, right?
Well, not exactly. If you’re a holdover, this weekend was pretty great for you, at least. In the three-day statistics (which are the only numbers that matter in this house), Jurassic World grabbed a hold of that number one slot for the fourth straight week in a row with just under $30.9 million, whilst Inside Out just cannot seal the deal with $30.1 million for second place. Of course, with numbers that close, things could switch when actuals come in, and Inside Out apparently won the five-day weekend quite handily if we looked at things like that, so this isn’t exactly information that is going to send Pixar executives in existential crises about whether their time is really up or not. After all, it’s neck-and-neck with Jurassic World and has been for three straight weeks. That’s like if I lasted 12 rounds against Brock Lesnar. Sure, I didn’t win, but I got some good hits in as he was treating my body like a Stretch Armstrong!
Good News, folks! Terminator: Mega Drive is a failure! For an expensive blockbuster with a beloved franchise attached to it and the intention of starting a brand new trilogy from it (like every single blockbuster ever nowadays), it did appallingly! Over the five-day weekend, the film could only manage $44 million, whilst the three-day weekend cut that down to just $28 million! To make matters even better, it was crushed by Jurassic World, another expensive blockbuster with a beloved franchise attached to it, in proof positive that people will skip your film if it as utter miserable shit as Terminator: CD is! Also in Good News: in the land of limited releases, Amy, the Amy Winehouse documentary directed by Asif Kapadia (the man responsible for 2011’s excellent Senna), got off to a fantastic start with $220,000 from 6 screens for a $37,000 per screen average.
Bad News, folks! Magic Mike XXL has crashed and burned! Perhaps forever cautioning Hollywood studios from making movies solely for the female or homosexual gaze, XXL could only scrape together $26 million from the five-day weekend, and $11 million from the three-day weekend. Who knows why this happened? Maybe everybody saw the trailer to this one, remembered the trailer to the first Magic Mike and went, “Oh, no! I’m not falling for that again!” Maybe certain prospective audience members didn’t have anyone to go with and felt too ashamed to go alone? Maybe everybody who saw it the first time was in too much pleasure to risk going back for seconds, or incapable of communicating to their friends just how brilliant the film is? Or maybe, just maybe, it could have something to do with the fact that THE MOVIE OPENED ON A WEDNESDAY, YOU BLITHERING IMBECILES! Why would you do that?! Do you hate making money? Do you?
Much like Judgement Day and Jai Courtney’s inexplicable leading man career, this Full List cannot be stopped. It can only be delayed for a short period.
Box Office Results: Friday 3rd July 2015 – Sunday 5th July 2015
1] Jurassic World
$30,900,000 / $558,137,000
Good lord, this might actually reach $2 billion. It’ll at least get close enough that it’ll cross that threshold when its inevitable re-release comes along in a few years’ time, and maybe even dethrone Avatar at that point, too. This is mind-blowing to me. In fact, everything about everything that isn’t to do with the film itself is mind-blowing to me: the rampant mega-success with the public, the extreme vitriol with which it’s been received by everybody I know and follow on Twitter, with many all but claiming its success to be an indicator of the death of cinema with the general public. I don’t get that, but nor do I get the earth-shattering success it’s been having. I stand by my review but… it’s a fun dinosaur movie that’s honestly kinda terrible. It’s not brilliant and it’s not an abomination. Can somebody please fill me in on how both sides got to their respective stations? I’m confused, and I don’t like not understanding people, it’s one of the many reasons why I’m so miserable all the time.
2] Inside Out
$30,105,000 / $246,160,000
Have I ever mentioned that I love Amy Poehler? Because I do, and I think that she’s amazing, and that this train of praise and adoration that she’s currently on is more than deserved. Seriously, she’s wonderful and I admire the ever-loving heck out of her.
3] Terminator: 32x
$28,700,000 / $44,156,000 / NEW
I hate this movie. I hate this movie with a burning passion. I hate its simultaneously needlessly complex and nowhere-near-as-clever-and-complex-as-it-thinks-it-is plot. I hate its dreadful special effects. I hate how I was not once scared or intimidated by a skinless Terminator. I hate its insipid exposition-heavy and grade-school level dialogue. I hate how dreadful absolutely everybody is in this movie despite many people showing that they are far better actors and actresses elsewhere. I hate the fact that it restages so many moments from the first two Terminator films and expects easy nostalgia points for doing so under the untrue guise of “subversion”. I hate its utterly pathetic excuse of a Sarah Connor. I hate its awful action scenes. I hate how it won’t even reach for being obviously and extravagantly bad, instead just settling for mediocrity and expecting everyone to not get angered enough to take it to task for that. I hate the fact that it was fucking right about doing that and that everyone is letting this one pass with a shrug of their shoulders instead of the righteous fury it deserves. I hate it I hate it I hate hate hate hate hate hate hate it!
I don’t hate Terminator: Jaguar as much as I hate Entourage, but I hate it more than Paul Blart: Mall Cop 2, and the fact that 2015 Film is trying so very hard to keep Paul Blart from the Top 5 of my Bottom Films of 2015 list is a genuine thing that we should be concerned about.
4] Magic Mike XXL
$11,600,000 / $26,656,000 / NEW
In complete contrast to Terminator: Dreamcast, I adore Magic Mike XXL, as my super peppy review helpfully demonstrates. It is a thing of wondrous majestic beauty, especially in the way that it is super progressive in all of these brilliantly quiet ways whilst still being nearly two hours of blatant wonderful fan-service. I really cannot stop thinking about this movie, and I’m probably going to see it again next week. I might even see if Lucy’s up for coming again, although I get the feeling that that first time was enough for her. You seriously should have heard her when Backstreet Boys started on the soundtrack, it was magnificent and I was feeling exactly the same as her!
5] Ted 2
$11,000,000 / $58,334,000
Well, in four days’ time, I guess I’ll find out if my fondness for Seth MacFarlane has to once again be affixed with a giant specific asterisk and hidden from sight unless directly brought up. At least we still have American Dad! and his excellent voice acting. Those can’t ever be taken away from me.
6] Max
$6,610,000 / $25,349,000
Oh. I guess the fact that this is apparently rubbish has cut those seemingly long legs short after all. Or maybe we all saw Marley & Me and are now automatically sceptical about any film with a dog because we don’t want to cry when something bad happens to it. Either works.
7] Spy
$5,500,000 / $97,846,000
Ex-Disney CEO and Professional Tit Michael Eisner stated his belief, at the Aspen Ideas Festival (which is a real thing and I can’t believe that either) on Thursday, that “the hardest artist to find is a beautiful, funny woman.” Prefacing the following with an acknowledgement that “I am going to get in trouble, I know this goes online”, which should be as clear an indicator as humanly possible to stop talking, he believes that “usually, unbelievably beautiful women… are not funny.”
I don’t think I need at add anything more to that. Although I will say that I bet that Eisner’s wife is just thrilled to know that her husband finds her either ugly or a humourless shrill.
8] San Andreas
$3,030,000 / $147,373,000
How many of you spent your 4th of July watching Independence Day? Come on, don’t be shy! It’s good to remind yourself of how much dumb, slightly guilty fun that movie is before the sequel comes along and is inevitably terrible!
9] Me and Earl and the Dying Girl
$1,320,000 / $4,004,000
God, this is like my own personal version of the monster from It Follows. It’s coming, it can’t be stopped, there is no way of getting away from it, and it will get me. Urgh. I just want to get this over with, already, please. Films that are clearly going to be terrible but that I have to see anyway are the worst.
10] Dope
$1,098,000 / $14,104,000
You people disgust me.
Dropped Out: Insidious Chapter 3, Mad Max: Fury Road, The Avengers: Age of Ultron
Callie Petch knows when to go out and when to stay in.