Movie Buzz 5-25

Well, The Avengers is still ruling the box office this last weekend! Battleship took the number two spot (taking $25.5 million) with The Dictator coming third ($17.4 million). Dark Shadows moved down to fourth place, with What to Expect When Expecting came in at number five ($10.5 million).  Let’s see how they did and if they’re worth the money![1]

Note: We only review films in wide release.  

The Dictator—R

This film is about a dictator of an African country, who is determined to make sure democracy never comes to his nation. It stars Sacha Baron Cohen, Ben Kingsley and Anna Faris. Despite getting mostly positive reviews, ratings just make it past the 50/50 mark. This is probably because of Sacha Baron Cohen’s unique humour, political satire mixed with crude punch lines. The Guardian sums it up best “The Dictator isn’t going to win awards and it isn’t as hip as Borat. Big goofy outrageous laughs is what it has to offer.”

So is it worth the money? Yes, if it’s your type of humour!

• Box office rank: 3
• Film Critics Say: Metacritic- 59 (Positive)
• Rotten Tomatoes: 60% (Positive)
• Consumers Say: Metacritic- 6.9 (Positive)
• Rotten Tomatoes: 60%  (Positive)

What To Expect When You’re Expecting—PG-13

What To Expect When You’re Expecting is about five couples who are about to have a child and soon discover the ups and downs, twists and turns of pregnancy. It has an all-star cast including Cameron Diaz, Jennifer Lopez, Elizabeth Banks, Brooklyn Decker, Anna Kendrick, Matthew Morrison, Ben Falcone, Rodrigo Santoro, Dennis Quaid, Chace Crawford, plus many, many more! Critics are giving this movie mixed to negative reviews while consumers seem to like it (although there aren’t many reviews to go by at the moment). Roger Ebert says “This is a good-hearted movie with some winning performances, but it has so many characters (including a boys’ club of new dads) that the plot nearly stalls with gridlock. It’s clever but the stories are thin soup.”

So is it worth the money? Maybe, it’s another “if you like that genre” film!

• Box office rank: 5
• Film Critics Say: Metacritic- 42 (Mixed)
• Rotten Tomatoes: 24% (Rotten)
• Consumers Say: Metacritic- 6.0 (Positive)
• Rotten Tomatoes: 83%

Battleship—PG-13

Based on the game Battleship, the film is about international fleets of naval ships taking part in a war game exercise. They discover an armada of hostile alien crafts which turns their exercise into a real life battle to save the world. Another mixed to negative reviews from the film critic but audiences seem to agree. So here are two reviews that represent the mixed to negative reactions best. Of the mixed reviews, Time says “Just as blockbusters have made the hard turn towards fantasy heroes who solemnly go about their business in high-def-but-low-impact 3D cage matches, Battleship is an unapologetically goofy, surprisingly enigmatic, refreshingly self-deprecating deviation from the norm.” And the negative review from Rolling Stone “Battleship is all noise and crashing metal, sinking to the shallows of Bay’s Armageddon and then digging to the brain-extinction level of the Transformers trilogy” and “Way to go, Battleship: Take the crassest of cynical junk, slather it in jingoism and sell it as rah-rah fun for right-wingers.”

So is it worth the money? Maybe

• Box office rank: 2
• Film Critics Say: Metacritic- 41 (Mixed)
• Rotten Tomatoes: 35% (Rotten)
• Consumers Say: Metacritic- 4.4 (Negative)
• Rotten Tomatoes: 57%  ( )

What’s opening in theatres this weekend?

Men in Black III (latest review results—65% Film Critics, 95% Consumers. Rotten Tomatoes)

Tags: MIB3, The Avengers Box Office, Tommy Lee Jones, Will Smith