Star Trek Into Darkness weekend box office: Downright disappointing domestic debut (photo: Benedict Cumberbatch as Khan in Star Trek Into Darkness) J.J. Abrams’ Star Trek Into Darkness, featuring Chris Pine as Captain Kirk, Zachary Quinto as Spock, and Benedict Cumberbatch as Khan, took in an estimated $22 million at 3,668 North American venues on Friday, according to studio figures found at Box Office Mojo. Is that good or bad? Well, let’s just say that this weekend Star Trek Into Darkness should end up collecting approximately $20-28 million less at the domestic box office than early estimates indicated. (Check out comparisons between the Thursday opening of Star Trek Into Darkness and the more impressive debuts of other movie sequels.) Star Trek Into Darkness vs. Star Trek:…



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STAR TREK INTO DARKNESS Weekend Box Office: Highly Disappointing Debut?

Star Trek Into Darkness box office: Solid or disappointing domestic debut? (Photo: Chris Pine as Captain Kirk and Zachary Quinto as Spock in Star Trek Into Darkness) J.J. Abrams’ Star Trek Into Darkness, starring Chris Pine as Captain Kirk and Zachary Quinto as Spock, has to date grossed $13.4 million in North America, including from 336 late-night Wednesday IMAX shows and all-day showtimes at 3,668 locations on Thursday. As explained by Ray Subers at Box Office Mojo, first-day figures may have been below par because Paramount Pictures changed Star Trek Into Darkness‘ release date last week — the Star Trek sequel was to have opened on Friday. (Addendum: Barring an unexpected Saturday and Sunday surge, “disappointing” is the word for Star Trek Into Darkness’ domestic…



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STAR TREK INTO DARKNESS Box Office: Solid or Disappointing?

Gravity trailer goes ‘bong!’ as George Clooney and Sandra Bullock go flying George Clooney and Sandra Bullock become the victims of an unfortunate incident while watching the sun rise. Skin cancer? Nope. Do they get mugged? Nope. What happens then? As you can see in the Gravity trailer below, following a loud Bong, Bam, Boom! Clooney and Bullock quite literally go flying. Something — was it a meteorite? Intergalactic debris? — has collided against their spacecraft (or space shuttle or whatever). See, they’re watching the sun "rise" from way up there. Check out the Gravity trailer below. (Photo: George Clooney in Gravity movie.) Gravity trailer: 2001: A Space Odyssey Meets Lost in Space Meets Apollo 13? The Gravity trailer, or rather, teaser, provides quite bit…



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GRAVITY Trailer: George Clooney and Sandra Bullock Tour the Solar System

Pacific Rim Trailer: Jaegers fight Kaiju to save humankind from extinction — but should they bother? Michael Bay’s Transformers 5 (or 6 or 7, sorry, lost count) has a new trailer — er … scratch that. Let me start again: Guillermo del Toro’s Pacific Rim has a new trailer. Before you check it out, remember that every similarity between del Toro’s Pacific Rim and Bay’s Transformers movies (and Matt Reeves’ Cloverfield and Steven Spielberg’s War of the Worlds and Peter Berg’s Battleship and Gareth Edwards’ upcoming Godzilla remake and TV’s The Mighty Morphin Power Rangers and …) is mere coincidence. After all, the Pacific Rim screenplay (credited to del Toro and Travis Beacham) is based on an "original story" — aka film treatment — penned…



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PACIFIC RIM Trailer: Human Apocalypse Postponed?

Joss Whedon Much Ado About Nothing: Oscars Outdoors film series Joss Whedon’s Much Ado About Nothing will kick off the 2013 "Oscars Outdoors" summer movie season on Wednesday, June 5 at the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences’ open-air theater in Hollywood. Much Ado About Nothing stars Amy Acker (Alias), Alexis Denisoff (How I Met Your Mother), Clark Gregg (Iron Man), Nathan Fillion (Waitress, Castle), Fran Kranz (Cabin in the Woods) and Sean Maher (The Playboy Club), all of whom are expected to join The Avengers director Joss Whedon for a post-screening Q&A moderated by KCRW’s Matt Holzman. Oscars Outdoors screening films also include two upcoming releases: Morgan Neville’s documentary about backup singers, Twenty Feet from Stardom (June 6), and Academy Nicholl Screenwriting Fellow…



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Joss Whedon MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING: Oscars Outdoors 2013

The Great Gatsby Cannes 2013: Leonardo DiCaprio on logically soggy red carpet Baz Luhrmann’s The Great Gatsby opened the 2013 Cannes Film Festival on Wednesday evening. The Gatsby red carpet looked like a cross between the Academy Awards (Steven Spielberg, Leonardo DiCaprio, Carey Mulligan, Tobey Maguire) and Dancing with Stars (loud music, with a handful of dancers performing in ’20s-costumes). (Photo: Leonardo DiCaprio on the 2013 Cannes Film Festival’s The Great Gatsby red carpet.) On the Cannes Film Festival’s video of the Great Gatsby red carpet, you can watch Carey Mulligan getting nearly decapitated by a take-no-prisoners umbrella; Leonardo DiCaprio telling an interviewer, "I can’t hear a word you’re saying," and then walking on as if said journalist was invisible; and Tobey Maguire getting called,…



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THE GREAT GATSBY Cannes 2013: Leonardo DiCaprio Wades Through Red Carpet

Into the Woods movie: Chris Pine and Jake Gyllenhaal singing? (photo: Chris Pine Star Trek Into Darkness) Chris Pine (Star Trek Into Darkness) and Jake Gyllenhaal (Brokeback Mountain) — maybe, possibly, who knows — to be featured in a musical directed by Rob Marshall. Sounds weird? Well, why? If Russell Crowe can be cast as a mumbling — ahem, singing — Javert in Tom Hooper’s Les Misérables, why can’t Captain Kirk and the Prince of Persia demonstrate their singing talents (or lack thereof) in Marshall’s movie adaptation of the 1987 Broadway hit Into the Woods? Johnny Depp and Meryl Streep have already been cast in Into the Woods, to be released by the Walt Disney Studios sometime this decade. And only yesterday it was announced…



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INTO THE WOODS Movie Singers Chris Pine, Jake Gyllenhaal?

Will Smith: The Wild Bunch remake (photo: Will Smith in After Earth) Will Smith has been mentioned in connection with Focus, the caper tale that was to have starred Ben Affleck and Kristen Stewart, and is to star in Edward Zwick’s Hurricane Katrina drama The American Can. But that’s not all. His producing company is working on a remake of the Broadway musical Annie — which got a less-than-satisfactory screen version back in 1982 — and apparently he wants to revive The Wild Bunch as well. Set during the Mexican Revolution of the 1910s, Sam Peckinpah’s ultra-violent 1969 classic Western features William Holden, Ernest Borgnine, Edmond O’Brien, and other movie veterans as a group of outlaws fleeing from Robert Ryan while out to do one…



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Will Smith THE WILD BUNCH Remake?