Rise of the Planet of the Apes may have won the box office for a second weekend in a row, but The Help was the real story: perfect Cinemascore marks, strong opening weekend earnings, Oscar buzz and some major controversy. As the summer movie season winds to a close, this could be the one film you're still talking about come Thanksgiving. So! Let's talk about it!
That awesome Bring It On musical about to hit Los Angeles for a preview run? It might not happen -- at least if the film's original screenwriter Jessica Bendinger has any say. Bendinger, through the Writers Guild of America, has filed a claim that states Bring It On: The Musical production company Beacon Communications Corp. is exploiting Bendinger's rights without her consent. Said the screenwriter, who has been left out in the cold like a Clover from the home video Bring It On sequels as well: "Imitation is not the sincerest form of flattery. Compensation is." Beacon's counsel says the claim is without merit. [THR/Hollywood, Esq.]
Also in this Monday edition of The Broadsheet: The Lone Ranger's big budget gets one explanation... Austin Powers 4 may not be as close to happening as you hoped (feared)... Kevin Smith's last film will actually be two films... and more ahead.
Hail Caesar! Again! Rise of the Planet of the Apes was the top choice for ticket buyers at the multiplex, becoming only third film this summer to lead the box office for two weekends in a row (Thor and Transformers: Dark of the Moon were the other two). Outside of the strong runner-up showing for The Help, the frame wasn't as kind to newcomers: Final Destination 5 disappointed, 30 Minutes or Less lived up to diminished expectations and Glee: The 3D Concert Movie couldn't even crack the top-ten. Your Weekend Receipts are here.
Consider this the big screen version of gridlock. The simians from Rise of the Planet of the Apes headed a crowded box office on Friday night earning $7.8 million in ticket sales, though both The Help ($7.5 million) and Final Destination 5 ($7.3 million) stayed within striking distance of the No. 1 spot. As for the other newcomers, 30 Minutes or Less earned enough to land in fourth place, while Glee: The 3D Concert Movie took a slushie to the face in sixth. Your Friday Box Office is here.
Big, bad news, Lone Ranger fans: According to Deadline, Disney has decided to halt production on Gore Verbinski's The Lone Ranger, which was to star Johnny Depp as Tonto and Armie Hammer as the titular masked crusader. The pricey blockbuster was to begin filming this October, but too many other $200M+ projects set up at the studio may have led to the project's demise.
Another summer week draws to a close today -- and not a bit too soon, after five days worth of catsuit drama, Dirty Dancing remake controversy, stoner-on-Santa Claus violence and Breaking Dawn sex talk. Let's take a look at some of our favorite stories from the past few days before kicking the weekend off with a Four Loko-related arrest. Just kidding! I think we all learned our lesson from that troublesome Twilight star.
It has been ten years since Mike Myers last brought his swingin' 'tude and awful dentistry to international man of mystery Austin Powers, and perhaps for good reason -- by the time Myers rolled around the 1970s with Beyonce's Foxxy Cleopatra in 2002's Austin Powers in Goldmember, the series had lost some of its driving mojo. Now, after taking a decade to recharge, the franchise is said to be headed back to the spotlight with a new sequel, according to a report by HitFix's Drew McWeeny.
Renny Harlin (Die Hard 2, Cliffhanger, 12 Rounds) is not the first director -- or the second or third or heck, the 20th -- you'd expect to direct a serious movie about a recent political conflict that resulted in numerous human rights violations, civilian deaths, and tenuous relations between Russia and neighboring Georgia. But that's just what the genre veteran did in the Aug. 19 pic 5 Days of War, telling The New York Times he "wanted to shift to films that he said would 'allow me to look at myself in the mirror' in the morning." Congrats, Renny! You're that much closer to making up for Cutthroat Island. [NYT]
Looks like not everyone gave The Help a pleased-as-punch A+ CinemaScore rating; in an open letter released this week, The Association of Black Women Historians decried the film and Kathryn Stockett's source novel of the same name, citing what they describe as "widespread stereotyping" in the film's depiction of the black experience in the Jim Crow South.
Oh, great. Just when we thought Armie Hammer's kiss with Leonardo DiCaprio in Clint Eastwood's upcoming J. Edgar Hoover biopic was going to be explosive, Eastwood himself is confirming that he's leaving the first FBI director's sexual orientation "open to interpretation." I know a certain TV personality who might have damning evidence to the contrary.
With this morning's news that Disney is courting Never Let Me Go director Mark Romanek to helm a Cinderella remake, it has become even more apparent that Hollywood is not going to keep its hands off of our Disney princesses. (Already, we have at least two Snow White reboots underway, one sensual Little Mermaid project in development, and a Hailee Steinfeld Sleeping Beauty redo.) In fear of which princess project will be announced next, Movieline has outlined four worst-case-scenario Disney adaptations that might make, say, the inevitable live-action Pocahontas action reboot seem less horrific in comparison.
In I-have-nothing-to-say-to-this news, 50 Cent and Goldie Hawn enjoyed a lunch date today. Quaint! The meeting probably has something to do with Curtis "50 Cent" Jackson's desire to do more movies, though I wouldn't count out a possible studio collaboration either. Goldie's a hell of a singer! For real! At any rate, this lunch date is an odd occurrence, and we need to properly caption in it. Jump in with us.
Kellan Lutz revealed that his buddy Robert Pattinson has casually discussed the prospect of becoming a fashion designer. Now that's exciting: Who wouldn't want to buy a scarf or puka shell necklace from the label Vampy Pattz or Cullen's Collective or whatever? I'm in. And better yet, I'm helping R-Pattz on the way to his goal of becoming the next Christian Dior/Jon Gosselin. Here are ten fashionable items he should hawk.
Oh, lovely: After staging his body-stitching horror pic The Human Centipede (First Sequence) in Germany and getting banned in the U.K. for upping the twisted thrills (and the number of victims) in the Britain-set Human Centipede II (Full Sequence), director Tom Six plans to finish his trilogy in the good old U.S.A. "We're going to shoot the third film entirely in America and it's going to be my favorite," he said during the Empire Presents... Big Screen event in London, where he promised that the threequel would "make the last one look like a Disney film." Hold onto your asses, America. [Empire via Twitch]
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