Latest news with #TheNumbers
New York Post
7 days ago
- Entertainment
- New York Post
‘Lilo & Stitch' remake on its way to having biggest Memorial Day weekend opening ever
It's saying 'Aloha' to A-lot of money. The 'Lilo & Stitch' live-action remake is on its way to becoming the biggest Memorial Day weekend opening for a movie ever. The Disney film raked in $55 million on its opener, Friday, alone, according to The Numbers. Advertisement It's also the second-highest grossing opening weekend in 2025, after 'A Minecraft Movie,' according to Variety. The Post, however, was not impressed, and thought Disney 'turned the story into a soulless downer, made its color palette practically sepia and tacked on an extra half hour of dead air.' 3 The 'Lilo & Stitch' live-action remake stars Maia Kealoha as Lilo in her film debut. ©Walt Disney Co./Courtesy Everett Collection Advertisement In second place was 'Mission: Impossible — The Final Reckoning' the eighth and final installment of the Tom Cruise-led series, with sales of $24.8 million. The action spy flick, which also opened on Friday 'is overblown, inanely plotted, clotted with expository dialogue and boundlessly self-congratulatory … but … it's also fun to watch,' NPR said in its review. Contrary to its title, it does not mark the 62-year-old action king's final film — by any means. 3 'Mission: Impossible — The Final Reckoning' star Tom Cruise has no intention of retiring. ©Paramount/Courtesy Everett Collection Advertisement 'I actually said I'm going to make movies into my 80s. Actually, I'm going to make them into my 100s,' Cruise said in an interview with The Hollywood Reporter at the film's New York premiere. The movie, which cost $400 million to make, is also one of the most expensive ever made since it was filmed during the COVID-19 pandemic, two Hollywood strikes and increases in inflation. 3 'Final Destination Bloodlines' is the sixth installment of the franchise. ©Warner Bros/Courtesy Everett Collection The supernatural horror thriller 'Final Destination Bloodlines,' which was landed in the No. 1 spot last Friday, upon its release, fell two notches to third with a $5.5 million take. Advertisement Tying for fourth with $2.4 million each was 'Sinners,' on its sixth Friday in theaters, and 'Thunderbolts*' on its fourth. The bull-riding drama 'The Last Rodeo,' which was released on Friday, took the fifth spot with sales of close to $2.1 million.
Mint
23-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Mint
What the controversial new 'Snow White' can teach Hollywood
'Snow White', Disney's live-action remake of a beloved animated film, had an icy reception before its release in cinemas on March 21st. A trailer posted three months ago has earned just 60,000 likes and over 1m dislikes. 'If I saw this movie on a plane I would still walk out,' grumbled one YouTube user. 'We thankfully have the technology nowadays to make the animation look worse than the original from 1937,' groaned another. Among the remake's many sins are seven in particular: the dwarves, who have been cheesily rendered with computer-generated imagery (CGI), after a row over whether it was politically correct to have actors with dwarfism in the roles. (In the face of criticism, Disney recast the film's dwarves as 'magical creatures'—whatever that means.) There is also the issue of Rachel Zegler, the actress chosen to play Snow White, who panned the original film as 'extremely dated' and said that the prince 'literally stalks' the princess. It turns out fans do not like it when a remake's heroine villainises the classic film that inspired it. By respinning familiar tales, remakes can offer studios a surer path towards commercial riches. In the amount of pushback and controversy it has faced, 'Snow White' is unusual. But in another way the film reflects a current trend, which is for studios to reach further back in history for source material. From 2020 to 2024 the average age of the source films that new remakes were based on was 35. That is about 13 years older than from 2011 to 2015, according to our analysis of data from The Numbers, a film website. What makes for a successful remake? It is a question on the minds of many Hollywood executives, as well as cinephiles. To answer it, The Economist analysed 200 remakes released since 1995; each had a minimum of 5,000 ratings on IMDb, an online movie database. (Our analysis only includes remakes of films, not adaptations of books.) Three lessons stand out. First, it is not enough to use state-of-the-art special effects; computer-generated imagery needs to be handled carefully. Of the 20 worst remakes (as measured by IMDb audience ratings), half are horror films, in part because of their use of unconvincing special effects. In the fifth-worst-rated, a remake in 2005 of John Carpenter's cult classic 'The Fog' from 1980, a supernatural, vengeful fog descends on an island town off the coast of Oregon. Cheap shocks substitute for tension: viewers have complained that the fog moves too quickly and that ghosts in the fog (never clearly visible in the original) are hokey, a complaint also made by viewers about the dwarves in the new 'Snow White'. Second, comedies come with grave risks. This is the worst-performing genre for remakes, earning an average IMDb rating 1.5 points (out of ten) lower than the originals. Comedy remakes also tend to make the least at the box office. Not a single one significantly outshines the original film it was based on, according to audience ratings. It may be that viewers of comedies and horrors crave an element of surprise, which is hard to offer in a faithful remake, because audiences already know which gags and gasps to expect. The best remakes get their inspiration from abroad. Since 1995 about a third of the top remakes have been based on foreign source material, including six of the top ten. So are the only two remakes to have won Academy Awards for Best Picture: 'The Departed' (2006), based on a Hong Kong film, and 'CODA' (2021), based on a French-Belgian one. Unfamiliarity with the originals may mean that audiences come in with lower expectations and without any attachment to the original. Take 'Bugonia', starring Emma Stone, set to be released in November. It is an English-language remake of a South Korean film; instead of a male chief executive, the new story centres on a female one. However, audiences, lacking knowledge of the original, are unlikely to kick up a fuss about the change. The same cannot be said of the new 'Snow White', which seems destined for an unhappily-ever-after ending. For more on the latest books, films, TV shows, albums and controversies, sign up to Plot Twist, our weekly subscriber-only newsletter
Forbes
21-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Forbes
‘A Minecraft Movie' Is Already Coming To Streaming On Max In June
The Jack Black and Jason Momoa blockbuster A Minecraft Movie is set to debut on streaming on Max in June. Based on the iconic Mojang video game Minecraft, A Minecraft Movie debuted in theaters on April 4. To date, the film has earned $417.8 million domestically and $512.7 million internationally for a worldwide box office tally of $930.5 million against a $150 production budget before prints and advertising, per The Numbers. In addition to its big box office numbers, A Minecraft Movie spawned a TikTok craze during its theatrical release with the film's "Chicken Jockey" scene, which at times got out of hand in theaters where fans threw concessions and caused damage. Rated PG, A Minecraft Movie arrived on digital streaming on May 13 and will be released on 4K, Blu-ray and DVD with bonus features on June 24. Warner Bros. Discovery announced on Wednesday that A Minecraft Movie will arrive on Max in June, but did not indicate an exact release date. The title was a part of the list of new and catalog titles that Max (soon to be HBO Max) releases monthly. Currently, the June Max calendar only lists A Minecraft Movie as 'coming soon.' Streaming tracker When to Stream is estimating that A Minecraft Movie will arrive on Max on June 20, since that is the only date on the release schedule where a big premiere is not listed. When to Stream is typically accurate with its release date reports, but without Warner Bros.' announcement or confirmation of the actual date, the estimated date is just that. Max offers three subscription tiers. Viewers can get a basic tier with ads for $9.99 per month or an ad-free tier for $16.99 per month. A deluxe, ad-free tier with 4K Ultra HD programming is available for $20.99 per month. Per Warner Bros. Discovery's press release revealing Max's June 2025 streaming calendar, the official summary for A Minecraft Movie reads, 'Welcome to the world of Minecraft, where creativity doesn't just help you craft, it's essential to one's survival! Four misfits — Garrett 'The Garbage Man' Garrison (Jason Momoa), Henry (Sebastian Hansen), Natalie (Emma Myers) and Dawn (Danielle Brooks) — find themselves struggling with ordinary problems when they are suddenly pulled through a mysterious portal into the Overworld: a bizarre, cubic wonderland that thrives on imagination. 'To get back home, they'll have to master this world (and protect it from evil things like Piglins and Zombies, too) while embarking on a magical quest with an unexpected, expert crafter, Steve (Jack Black). Together, their adventure will challenge all five to be bold and to reconnect with the qualities that make each of them uniquely creative … the very skills they need to thrive back in the real world.' A Minecraft Movie is directed by Jared Hess (Napoleon Dynamite) from a screenplay by Chris Bowman & Hubbel Palmer and Neil Widener & Gavin James and Chris Galletta. Also starring Jennifer Coolidge, A Minecraft Movie is coming to Max in June with a specific release date yet to be announced.
New York Post
17-05-2025
- Entertainment
- New York Post
‘Final Destination: Bloodlines' coming in hot on opening weekend
Warner Bros' 'Final Destination: Bloodlines' pulled in an impressive $21 million in its debut Friday, on its way to what is projected to be a record-breaking opening weekend. Insiders predict the horror flick will breeze past the franchise's best opening weekend to date, which brought in $41.3 million adjusted for inflation for 2009's 'Final Destination 4.' 4 'Bloodlines' star Kaitlyn Santa Juana plays a college student who inherits deadly premonitions about her family. Warner Bros. Advertisement The movie is expected to put an end to 'Thunderbolts*' reign at the top of the box office charts. The Marvel movie continued to hold the No. 1 spot this week, raking in $43 million in the US, according to industry website The Numbers. 4 'Thunderbolts*' follows an unconventional team of antiheroes on a mission that forces them to confront their dark pasts. ©Walt Disney Co./Courtesy Everett Collection Advertisement 'Thunderbolts*' grossed $143 million in domestic sales since it theater debuted on May 2 — and totaled $286 million across the globe. 4 'Thunderbolts*' is the latest Marvel movie. IMDB Meanwhile 'Sinners,' the musical horror film starring Michael B. Jordan, earned the second spot, earning $32 million this week. Advertisement The movie, set in the Mississippi Delta in 1932, has earned $229 million since its debut on April 17. 4 'Sinners' stars Jordan in dual roles as criminal twin brothers. ©Warner Bros/Courtesy Everett Collection
Business Insider
14-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Business Insider
The 'Final Destination: Bloodlines' scene where a guy is dragged by his nose ring took 5 days to shoot, the actor said
The "Final Destination: Bloodlines" trailer shows a character getting dragged by his nose piercing. The actor Richard Harmon said the ambitious stunt involved real fire and took five days to shoot. He also told BI he had freedom to get weird with his character, and asked to lick a garbage truck. "Final Destination: Bloodlines" is the sixth chapter in the franchise, which has made over $600 million worldwide since in launched in 2000, according to The Numbers. The new film follows a student Stefani (Kaitlyn Santa Juana), who has a disturbing dream of her grandmother dying in an accident on a skyscraper in 1968, despite the fact that the older woman survived the incident. Richard Harmon plays Erik, Stefani's cousin, who works in a tattoo parlor and is covered in piercings. In a standout scene in the film, he's working late when he gets his septum ring caught on a chain attached to a ceiling fan, and cleaning fluid accidentally catches fire below him. He told BI that no computer-generated effects were used to film the scene. "That was all legitimate. I just had wires on behind me, so if the wire broke, I wouldn't have my nose ripped off. But yeah, they did all that practical. The fire was real, the chain is real," he said. Explaining how the crew kept him safe while filming the stunt, he said: "The chain had a bit of a breakaway weight, so if the wires were to give out and I got a little bit of pressure on it, the chain would break. It wouldn't hold me up, but it was a ton of fun. "We shot that sequence actually over five days, which is a lot of time to shoot one thing." Erik is foul-mouthed, impulsive, and reckless throughout the film. He even provokes Death to murder him while pretending to have sex with a garbage truck. Asked how much freedom he had with the character, particularly with the garbage truck scene, Harmon said: "The making love to the garbage truck, coitus, so to speak, the beast with two backs, that was in the script, actually!" he recalled, adding that he chose to take the scene a step further.
