'Lamb of God': Diablo Cody's Directorial Debut

Looking to get behind the camera is Diablo Cody and she'll be helming Lamb of God, a script that she wrote for Mandate Pictures. This will be her first time directing after having written a few notable and prolific works.

Here's a quick synopsis:

The comedy follows a young conservative religious woman who loses her faith after a plane crash, decides to go to Las Vegas to live the life of a sinner, and on her journey finds her way back to her faith.

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Box Office - Better Than a Chance for 'Meatballs'

A very strong weekend performance, one that was highlighted by bigger-than- expected Saturday and Sunday, pushed Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs to an easy victory at the box office. The film checked in with $30.1 million, which is about 20% more than it appeared the movie would make after its Friday debut.

The Saturday number - $13.1 million - represented a 60% climb from day one to day two. That's a good start, and should equate to about $85 - $100 million domestically over the life of its run. And when you consider that Sony is only using about 3,100 theaters, that's a healthy amount of money. There were some shake-ups in the top five, though. The Informant! jumped to second place, and even though you wouldn't look at $10.6 million as a big success, I think given he more limited release, it's a good sign for the Steven Soderbergh-Matt Damon comedy. I Can Do Bad All By Myself dropped from first place to third, and Love Happens crept into the top five with just over $8.4 million.

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Box Office - 'Jennifer's Body' Eaten Alive on Friday

The only bad news for any new release this weekend seems to be directed at Jennifer's Body, the new horror dark comedy starring Megan Fox. Estimated to make about $12 - $15 million this weekend, the movie got off to a very slow start on Friday, earning only $2.8 million, according to Box Office Mojo.

Horror movies generally start fast and fade quickly. The majority of them show signs of decline beginning on day two, and if that holds true for Jennifer's Body, then this film might make about 40 - 50% of the opening weekend projections. So much for Megan Fox moving tickets on her own. Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs led the Friday box office easily, which is no surprise. Based on its $8.1 million debut, Meatballs should be headed toward $25 million or so this weekend. You'd think Sony would want more from its animated film, because that's not a very competitive number when you look at similar Pixar and DreamWorks movies. But as we've seen with Ice Age this year, the US market isn't the only one cartoons can exploit, so perhaps that's the plan here, as well.

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Movie Review - 'Jennifer's Body'

Jennifer's Body Starring Megan Fox, Amanda Seyfried, and Johnny Simmons Directed by Karyn Kusama Rated R

It can and has been argued that the first influential slasher movies and the zombie flicks that set that sub-genre in motion were metaphors. Friday the 13th warned against the promiscuity of teenagers and Night of the Living Dead was a cautionary tale of consumerism. Jennifer's Body could be a metaphor for the all-too-destructive world of high school, seen through the eyes of the haves - in this case, Jennifer Check (Megan Fox) - and the have-nots, embodied by Needy Lesnicky (Amanda Seyfried). Whether or not writer Diablo Cody (the Juno Oscar winner) means this tale to be allegorical doesn't matter. It works that way and more literally as a horror comedy. True, it isn't always successful, usually a by-product of some questionable pacing employed by director Karyn Kusama, but on the whole, Jennifer's Body gets where it's supposed to go, and we go fairly willingly along for the ride. Despite what appear to be wide extremes separating them, Jennifer and Needy are best friends forever (abbreviated as BFFs on the girls' lockets and pronounced "Biffs"). Jennifer is the cheerleader all the boys want and all the girls want to be. In fact, outside of Needy - for Seyfried herself is very pretty, but is obviously dressed down here for effect - Jennifer is the only really attractive girl we see in the movie. That can't be accidental. And while Jennifer is everything, Needy - as her name suggests - is next to nothing, at least in the crippling and petty worlds of teenage social strata. The friends attend a local concert at which Jennifer seems hypnotized by the dreamy lead singer (Adam Brody). A fire breaks out at the venue and seeking "safety," Jennifer drives off in the van with the entire band. Needy returns home alone but is visited later that night by her friend Jennifer, bloodied, beaten, hungry, looking possessed. There's no good explanation for it, especially the next day when Jennifer is at school as beautiful and playful as ever. "Where's it at, Monistat," she jokingly asks Needy in science class the morning after. Soon after, high school boys start dying and you, like Needy, can put the pieces together. The beauty-is-only-skin-deep moral has been marched out hundreds of times, but never quite like this. With Diablo Cody's wicked writing and the macabre story, the message does have a little bit of impact if you're looking for something beneath the surface. Cody's writing is extremely unique, and she slashes her way through screenplays with hipster comments and half-rhymes. There are times that it gets in the way and times that her style truly elevates the scene. Kind of a wash, really.

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Fearless Forecast: Mostly Sunny for 'Cloudy'

It won't be a stellar weekend at the box office, however there will be a vast improvement in the performance of the top ten over last week's number. If you'll recall, we only had two movies - I Can Do Bad All By Myself and 9 - that earned over $10 million from Friday to Sunday, and 9 just barely broke that barrier. The box office has actually been down since The Final Destination opened; that weekend was 25% off the previous week's business.

So it will rebound slightly now, but it won't hit those heady highs of summer. Three new movies are poised to go over ten million, but really only one has a chance to be a big hit by traditional standards. The 3-D Sony animated movie Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs might be a little too irreverent for family audiences over the long haul, but adults in particular should have a good time with it. Because it's the only movie opening in over 3,000 theaters, it has a natural advantage. And because it's the only 'toon that invites younger viewers in about two months, that won't hurt. There has been so much written about Jennifer's Body and Megan Fox over the past few months that the performance of the movie seems like an afterthought, if it's a thought at all. But because it's fairly low budget it should be successful even if it's kind of a one-weekend wonder. And wonder may be making too big a thing out of it. But if it hits $10 million this weekend and goes on to do $30 million in the US, Fox could argue that it will have been worth it. Certainly, the film will do better than Fox's fall 2008 release, How to Lose Friends and Alienate People, which made about $41.

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