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GTBP CONNECT
Sunday, June 14, 2009 at 11:05AM The news continues to be good for The Hangover, which this weekend became the first movie this summer to repeat as the top choice at the box office. In ten days, the bachelor party comedy has tripled its budget, zooming past $100 million, and in doing so has outperformed one of the strongest performers in Pixar's history.
Saturday, June 13, 2009 at 10:51AM We told you on Thursday that The Hangover would likely repeat as the top movie in the country. It had made $70 million in its first week, but seemed to be the only movie with a lot of heat at the moment, including the new releases. And it appears that the repeat is a sure thing.
Friday, June 12, 2009 at 12:01AM | The Taking of Pelham 123
Starring Denzel Washington, John Travolta, and John Turturro  |
It happens from time to time that the two leads in a movie should switch places. Sometimes it's just an aesthetic change; the kidnapping movie The Clearing probably would have been more revealing if a desperate Robert Redford had abducted the wealthy and collected Willem Dafoe, just to play it against type.
In other cases, you've got two big name actors simply playing the wrong roles. Take, for example, the remake of the 70s heist movie The Taking of Pelham 123, which stars the estimable Denzel Washington and John Travolta.
Denzel is one of the greats, as natural and believable an actor as we've ever seen. He's got depth, power, charm, intelligence, and everything else you need. Because of that, Denzel can play a wide variety of roles. John Travolta is cast as the villain here, and even though his archetypal bad guy has remained virtually the same since Broken Arrow over a decade ago, he just goes on cackling.
You could give Travolta the Denzel role, that of a public transit dispatcher put in the crosshairs by a hijacker who has assumed control of a subway train in New York, and he could run with it. Outside of a scene or two, there's not much required of the role. But he's the villain, and because Travolta is so remarkably bad at playing them and Denzel so proven at showing nuance even when the character may not expressly call for it, you're left wondering how good this pretty average thriller could have been with one simple change.
Thursday, June 11, 2009 at 11:53AM There's something cool about a surprise hit, especially a really good one. I loved The Hangover both times I saw it, and while we had a hunch it would do well, nobody anywhere thought we'd have a potential $150 million smash on our hands.
Monday, May 25, 2009 at 8:04PM I'd consider myself a Tony Scott fan. I think, on the whole, he makes pretty good action films. They're not as smart as he wants them to be, perhaps, but if I had to take the last ten years of, say, Michael Bay or the last ten years of Tony Scott, I'd go with Scott.
