(Photo by Warner Bros/Courtesy Everett Collection)
Ben Affleck chose the right friends early on: His first notable appearance was in 1992’s School Ties, which happened to co-star Matt Damon. The two would go on to become household names after co-writing and co-starring in the Oscar-winning Good Will Hunting. And a few years after School Ties, Affleck starred in Kevin Smith’s Chasing Amy, and is now a regular fixture in Smith’s View Askewniverse. Damon, Smith, and Affleck would all work together in 1999’s iconoclastic Dogma.
Later on in his career, Affleck would pal around with Michael Bay, creating two bombastic feasts together: Armageddon and Pearl Harbor. He’s worked with some of the most legendary directors of their time, like John Woo (Paycheck), John Frankenhemier (Reindeer Games), Richard Linklater (Dazed and Confused), and David Fincher (Gone Girl) — experiences we’re sure all went into Affleck’s own directing career, which culminated in the Best Picture-winning Argo.
Affleck’s recent stint in the DCEU has left his image relatively unscathed: His Batman was considered among the best things out of Batman v Superman and Justice League. And after some highly public personal issues and with his last directorial effort, Live By Night, a Rotten bomb, Affleck’s now on something of a comeback trail for 2020. The Last Thing He Wanted‘s single-digit Tomatometer was probably the last thing Affleck wanted at this point. But his 2020 sports drama The Way Back transcended the inspirational sports template, giving him a meaty role to sink his teeth into, and it impressed critics along the way. Next, he’ll be directing an adaptation of The Big Goodbye, which details the making of 1974’s Chinatown. Until then, we’re ranking all Ben Affleck movies by Tomatometer!
(Photo by Universal / courtesy Everett Collection)
Martin Scorsese followed his Best Picture and Director-winning The Departed with his most directly entertaining, plot twist-heavy movie, a psychological thriller starring Leonardo DiCaprio investigating a remote asylum with a missing patient. Of course, it’s apparent from the beginning things aren’t as they seem…
If you’re looking for more movies like Shutter Island, why not start with the grandaddy of unreliable narrator movies: The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari. It may be 100 (!) years old, but it still has the power to spook and captivate.
Part of Shutter Island‘s fun is that it encourages viewers to participate in solving the mystery, poke holes in the movie’s established reality, and look for the actual truth. It requires filmmaking mastery to create these puzzle boxes, so it’s not surprising some of our most beloved directors built their reputation on these: Alfred Hitchcock (Rebecca, Vertigo), David Fincher (The Game, Gone Girl), Christopher Nolan (Inception, Memento), Darren Aronofsky (Black Swan), and David Lynch (Mulholland Drive).
Movies like Shutter Island are all about building paranoia, like the hero has tapped into something true and sinister that nobody else is taking seriously. And frequently they’re told from a female perspective: Along with the already mentioned Black Swan, there’s also The Girl on the Train, the classic Diabolique, and Clint Eastwood’s Changeling, starring Angelina Jolie, who’s convinced the missing son the police have returned to her is not her boy.
Psychological thrillers like Shutter Island differ from typical mysteries in that the nature of the film itself is the central mystery, as opposed to, say, figuring out who the murderer is. Movies in this vein include Open Your Eyes (remade as Vanilla Sky), John Frankenheimer’s Seconds (which helped drive Brian Wilson over the edge in real life), the sci-fi noir Dark City, the relentlessly scary Jacob’s Ladder, and A Scanner Darkly, arguably Keanu Reeves’ best movie made in that period between The Matrix and the Keanussance.
And if you’re looking for something more basic and primal, check out Identity or Secret Window. Not too taxing on the mind, but they’ll still give it a good twist.
The Screen Actors Guild Awards held their annual ceremony on Sunday, Januray 25 in a televised event at Los Angeles’s Shrine Auditorium. Birdman took home another trophy — for Best Ensemble — though The Theory of Everything‘s Eddie Redmayne beat Michael Keaton for Best Actor, while Netflix’s Orange is the New Black came away with a couple of big wins. Read on for the full list.
The Oscar nominees were announced last Thursday, and we here at Rotten Tomatoes have been pretty fortunate to sit down and chat with a whole lot of them. If you’re still unsure who to root for in the Best Picture race, or you’d just like a little more info on the films being honored on February 22, check out our various interviews with the casts and filmmakers of Selma, The Theory of Everything, Nightcrawler, American Sniper, The Hobbit, and more.
Actor Chris Pine, Academy President Cheryl Boone Isaacs, and directors Alfonso Cuarón and J.J. Abrams announced today the nominations for all 24 Oscar categories at a live news conference at the Academy’s Samuel Goldwyn Theater in Beverly Hills. Read through for the full list of nominees.
This week on home video, we’ve got David Fincher’s latest blockbuster thriller, Liam Neeson’s latest tough-guy role, an acclaimed romance, and a musical biopic, as well as a bunch of noteworthy indies. Then, on TV, we’ve got the final season of a popular HBO series, as well as the most recent seasons of a number of other cable shows. Read on for the full list:
Based on the bestselling novel of the same name by Gillian Flynn, David Fincher’s latest thriller scored well with critics and even sparked a little bit of awards season buzz. Ben Affleck plays Nick Dunne, a former journalist who moves back to his hometown with his wife Amy (Rosamund Pike) in order to take care of his sick mother. When Amy disappears on the day of their fifth anniversary, a very public search begins, and Nick soon becomes the prime suspect. But not everything is as it seems, and troubling details emerge about both Nick and Amy, complicating the investigation. Critics praised Fincher’s typically dark and stylish work on Gone Girl, which was aided by an intelligent script and strong performances from Affleck and Pike, and rewarded the film with a Certified Fresh 89 percent on the Tomatometer. The only extra on the release is an audio commentary with David Fincher, but it’s a twisty, sometimes unpredictable yarn that should make for solid viewing if you haven’t seen it.
Liam Neeson continues his late career action renaissance with A Walk Among the Tombstones, another film based on an eponymous novel (by Lawrence Block). This time, Neeson is Matthew Scudder, a former NYPD officer-turned-private detective who’s battling alcoholism. When his services are enlisted to track down a man who has killed his client?s brother’s wife, Scudder becomes entangled in a conspiracy involving drug traffickers, the DEA, and a pair of killers with a grisly M.O. Though Tombstones relies on some familiar genre clichés, critics did find that Liam Neeson got to flex a bit more dramatic muscle here than, say, in the Taken films, and that was enough to earn the film a 65 percent on the Tomatometer. Bonus features include a discussion of the Matt Scudder character between Block and writer/director Scott Frank, as well as a look at the different characters in the film.
Several years ago, it might have been a stretch to imagine that the year’s most critically acclaimed romantic drama would star Alfred Molina and John Lithgow as a same-sex couple, but that’s exactly what happened in 2014, as Love Is Strange won the Golden Tomato Award for the best-reviewed romance. Directed by Ira Sachs, the film stars Molina and Lithgow as George and Ben, a gay couple living in New York who are finally able to marry after forty years together. When George loses his job, however, the newlyweds are forced to live apart from each other temporarily, and George and Ben must deal both with the separation itself and with the complicated family dynamics of their new living situations. Bolstered by powerful performances from the two leads and poignant, graceful treatment of its subject matter, Love Is Strange earned a Certified Fresh 94 percent on the Tomatometer. Extras include an audio commentary with Sachs, Lithgow, and Molina, a making-of doc, and a Q&A session from the LA Film Festival.
John Ridley won an Oscar for penning the script for 12 Years a Slave last year, and he followed that up by writing and directing a biopic of iconic rock star Jimi Hendrix starring OutKast’s Andre Benjamin. One of the big stories surrounding the film was the Hendrix estate’s refusal to allow any of Hendrix’s music in the film, and although that did put a damper on things, most critics felt the film was a solid effort. The story centers on the year Hendrix spent in London before the release of his seminal album Are You Experienced, focusing on his rise to stardom and his early relationships during that period, including the time he spent with Kathy Etchingham (Hayley Atwell) and Linda Keith (Imogen Poots). Though some critics felt the narrative was a bit uneven and bemoaned the lack of classic Hendrix tunes, most appreciated the look at a lesser known period of Hendrix’s life and praised Benjamin for his uncanny portrayal of the legendary guitarist, leading to a 67 percent Tomatometer score.
Another acclaimed HBO series came to a close in 2014 after five Certified Fresh seasons, and though its final year wasn’t without its flaws, fans will no doubt miss the shady exploits of Enoch “Nucky” Thompson (Steve Buscemi). Boardwalk Empire‘s farewell season ran for an abbreviated eight episodes and extensively employed a flashback structure to provide more context for Nucky’s rise and inevitable fall, and while some critics were put off by the constant glimpses into Nucky’s past, most agreed that they made the series ending more rewarding. In addition, season five brought closure for several of the show’s other beloved characters, including Eli Thompson (Shea Whigham), Chalky White (Michael K. Williams), Gillian Darmody (Gretchen Mol), Nelson Van Alden (Michael Shannon), Al Capone (Stephen Graham), and of course, Margaret (Kelly Macdonald). The Complete Fifth Season Blu-ray comes with four commentary tracks and eight behind-the-scenes pieces focusing on the shooting locations of the series.
The People’s Choice Awards opened the season of award shows on the evening of Jan 7th at the Nokia Theatre in Los Angeles. Check out the list below to find out who the fan favorites were in 2014.
The full list of nominees for the People’s Choice Awards 2015 was announced today by Anna Faris and Allison Janney at the Paley Center for Media in Los Angeles. The contenders were entirely chosen by fans, who cast over 70 million votes in the past few weeks.
Read through for the full list of movies and TV nominations, and don’t forget to visit the People’s Choice Awards website to help choose the winners.
On Wednesday, Januray 7, the Writers Guild of America (WGA) released their list of nominees for their annual WGA Awards, honoring outstanding writing in film, television, radio, and new media. The ceremony itself will take place on Saturday, February 7 at the Hyatt Regency Century Plaza Hotel in Los Angeles, but you can check out a select list of the nominees below:
Boyhood
97%
Awards season is on, and with everything that is going on from December through February, it’s difficult to keep track of who is getting what. To help you with that, we created the Awards Leaderboard, a ranking of movies by the number of awards won and their respective categories. Read on to find out where your favorite movies stand, and who is leading the pack.
Hollywood’s lucrative holiday movie season kicked off with two event films which both connected with their respective audiences delivering a potent one-two punch driving the box office to its best sales in three months. Disney’s animated action-comedy Big Hero 6 opened at number one with an estimated $56.2M from 3,761 locations for a muscular $14,943 average.
It was the second best toon opening of the year trailing only the $69.1M bow of February’s The LEGO Movie which finished its domestic run with about 3.75 times that amount. The PG-rated Hero was based on a lesser-known Marvel property and came into the marketplace as a crowd-pleaser that could play to many audiences. Reviews were very good and paying audiences also were quite pleased as the CinemaScore grade was a sturdy A.
Families made up the bulk of the audience at 72%. Given the comic-based nature of the source material, and that the new sci-fi pic Interstellar lured away fanboys this weekend, Big Hero 6 could branch out in the weeks to come to non-family moviegoers. Baymax and pals had broad appeal as the male/female split was dead even. Studios love to open toon tentpoles in early November for the long runs that could follow boosted by school holidays this month like Veterans Day and Thanksgiving. Breaking $200M domestic is certainly possible. Hero opened a few notches ahead of the $49M debut weekend of Wreck-It Ralph, another fanboy-type toon unleashed in early November. Saturday’s healthy 52% boost indicates good word-of-mouth.
Globally, Big Hero 6 will take its time to roll out with many key territories waiting for the Christmas season or even January for its openings. Russia launched two weeks before the U.S. to capitalize on local school holidays and has grossed a solid $18.2M to date. Japan opens December 20 and should be one of the top-grossing territories since Disney toons do gangbusters there plus Hero has many Japanese influences in the film. China has not yet been dated.
Opening in second place was Christopher Nolan’s new sci-fi epic Interstellar with Paramount reporting a weekend estimate of $50M over the Friday-to-Sunday period. Early shows on IMAX screens and film prints began on Tuesday night putting the cume at $52.2M. Playing in 3,561 locations, including 368 IMAX screens, the PG-13 saga averaged a robust $14,041 per theater over the weekend period. Reviews were generally good, but were not positive across the board.
The $50M weekend figure reported by Paramount was an aggressive number. It includes a very optimistic 21% decline for Sunday which is much lower than what all other studios are reporting for their wide releases this weekend. Other live-action pics are all projecting Sunday drops of 35-50%. Even animated films which normally hold up well Saturday-to-Sunday are projecting larger Sunday declines. And on this same weekend last year, even with Monday being a holiday, all live-action films in the top ten suffered Sunday declines of 32% or higher. Mathematically and historically speaking, it would be extremely unusual for Interstellar at this time of year to post a Sunday drop in the neighborhood of 21%.
However, that low drop does conveniently make the weekend estimate a nice and even round number which looks better in news reports than something in the $40M range. Should Interstellar‘s Sunday drop like most other live-action films do at this time of year, the weekend gross would actually be closer to $48M. Fall films have football to compete with on Sundays which are especially distracting for movies that appeal to older men. Plus schools are in session on Monday so comparing Interstellar to summer films would not give a true picture.
Opening weekend Sunday drops for other live-action films in the October-November corridor include 35% for Captain Phillips, 34% for Gravity, 31% for 2012, and 29% for Skyfall which had an observed holiday Monday for Veterans Day. Since all box office numbers reported on Sundays are just “estimates,” the final grosses to be reported on Monday will indicate the true performance. Many industry insiders questioned Paramount’s reporting earlier this year for the opening weekend of its high-profile sequel Transformers: Age of Extinction. Most with access to the same data pegged the weekend at roughly $98M (still a great number) but the studio reported an even $100M.
Despite what final numbers will show, Interstellar still opened with muscle especially for an original 2D film that runs nearly three hours. Starring Matthew McConaughey, Anne Hathaway, Jessica Chastain, and Michael Caine, the space travel saga skewed older as expected with studio research showing that 75% of the crowd was over 25. Cross-gender appeal was strong – especially for this genre – as the male/female split was 52/48. Interstellar drew upon the starpower of the cast as well as the brand name of Nolan who ranks today as among the top directors in Hollywood.
Compared to other sci-fi films, Interstellar opened a bit below Gravity‘s $55.8M and the $51.1M of Prometheus. Both of those benefitted from 3D surcharges, especially the Sandra Bullock hit which made the bulk of its cash from 3D screens. So it can be argued that Interstellar and Gravity both attracted roughly the same amount of people on opening weekend. Gravity was about half as long of a film, but with multiplexes having more flexibility in early November to offer multiple screens, there were plenty of showtimes to absorb demand for Interstellar. Nolan’s last film The Dark Knight Rises had the same length as Interstellar but still opened to a massive $160.9M. Avatar, an original sci-fi film from a beloved director, also had a similar length and opened to $77M. It had 3D surcharges, but also lower 2009 prices, half as many IMAX screens, plus a major blizzard shutting down many theaters. Long movies can still open huge.
The wide release kicked off on Friday with $17M but Saturday increased by only 8% to $18.4M. And this is with some of that upfront demand being taken away by the special midweek showings. Gravity saw a much better 32% Saturday boost. Add in Interstellar‘s so-so B+ CinemaScore and it becomes unclear what future weeks will have in store. The sci-fi pic has generated a wide variety of opinions from those who have seen it. Luckily, it has only mild competition on its second weekend.
More than one third of the weekend gross for Interstellar came from higher-priced premium large format screens. 368 IMAX screens grossed $13.4M for 26% of the total while other PLF screens collected $5.2M, or 10.5%. Nolan has long used IMAX cameras to film parts of his movies.
Overseas, Interstellar commanded a terrific $80M opening weekend from 62 markets for a worldwide launch of $132.2M. All key territories opened day and date this weekend except for China which launches Wednesday and Japan which opens on November 22. Korea easily led the international markets with $14.1M. IMAX delivered a hot $7.2M from 206 screens which will be joined later this week by over 170 additional screens in China. Budgeted at $165M, Interstellar looks well on its way to grossing north of $500M worldwide which is a tough stratosphere to reach for a non-franchise film.
Leading the fall leftovers was the unstoppable David Fincher thriller Gone Girl which slipped only 28% in its sixth weekend to an estimated $6.1M. The Fox release has now amassed an impressive $145.4M which is the best ever for the director and now third highest in Ben Affleck’s career after his big-budget Michael Bay flicks Armageddon ($201.6M in 1998) and Pearl Harbor ($198.5M in 2001). Two-time chart-topper Ouija followed with an estimated $6M, off 44%, for a new total of $43.5M for Universal.
Well-reviewed indie pics with wide distribution followed. St. Vincent dipped only 21% to an estimated $5.7M while Nightcrawler fell 47% in its sophomore frame to an estimated $5.5M. New sums are $27.4M for The Weinstein Co. and $19.8M for Open Road.
Some top Hollywood stars took the next few slots. Brad Pitt’s tank drama Fury grossed an estimated $5.5M, down 38%, putting Sony at $69.3M to date. The Keanu Reeves actioner John Wick dropped 49% to an estimated $4.1M giving Lionsgate $34.7M so far.
Kidpics rounded out the top ten. The Steve Carell hit Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day declined by 47% to an estimated $3.5M for a $59.2M total for Disney. Fox’s toon The Book of Life tumbled 66% with Baymax stealing away kids this weekend. The estimated $2.8M take lifted the cume to $45.2M.
Another Oscar hopeful saw a successful platform launch as the Stephen Hawking drama The Theory of Everything bowed to an estimated $207,000 from only five locations in New York, Los Angeles and Toronto for a scorching $41,400 average. Earning good but not great reviews, the Focus release will slowly expand in the weeks ahead. Eddie Redmayne is currently seen as one of the front-runners in the Best Actor race this awards season.
The top ten films grossed an estimated $145.4M which was down 8% from last year when Thor: The Dark World opened at number one with $85.7M; and down 9% from 2012 when Skyfall debuted in the top spot with $88.4M.
Brad Pitt’s World War II tank film Fury topped the North American box office charts opening to an estimated $23.5M for Sony. The brutal R-rated drama averaged a sturdy $7,406 from 3,173 locations and opened in between the $22M of George Clooney’s The Monuments Men from February and the $25.7M of Tom Hanks’ Captain Phillips from this same month last year. All skewed to an older adult audience using an A-list actor as the anchor.
Fury< scored good reviews from critics and pleased paying audiences too as evidenced by its good A- CinemaScore grade. Studio research showed that the crowd was, not surprisingly, 60% male and 51% over 35. Connecting with older men at this time of year is often difficult due to sports competition from NFL and college football plus the baseball playoffs. While Fury< did not score one of top ten opening weekends of Pitt's career, its older skew, good buzz and light competition over the next two weeks should allow the $68M production to build nicely. And overseas potential is solid given the star's drawing power and the Germany-set story.
Despite competition from Brad and the other new releases, two-time champ Gone Girl held up quite well in its third round slipping only 33% to an estimated $17.8M and joining the century club in the process. This fall’s biggest hit has now banked $107.1M and could find its way to the vicinity of $150M from North America. Only five September/October releases have ever climbed to that level before. Girl cost $61M to produce and may reach a global gross five times that amount.
The new animated offering The Book of Life premiered in third place with an estimated $17M from 3,071 sites for a good $5,536 average. That was about even with the recent toon The Boxtrolls which bowed to $17.3M and a $4,987 average in late September. Both were non-sequels offering a unique visual style for family audiences. Fox’s PG-rated Book had Mexican influences from its director, producer and source material and 30% of the audience was Latino. Overall demos showed the crowd to be 57% female and 54% under 25. 3D screens made up 31% of the gross, a low figure but common nowadays for toons. Book of Life features voices from Channing Tatum, Zoe Saldana, Diego Luna, Christina Applegate, Ice Cube, and Cheech Marin plus earned positive reviews.
The best weekend gross among the sophomore titles was an estimated $12M for Disney’s Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day. Off only 34%, the Steve Carell comedy has collected a sturdy $36.9M to date and could be headed for the neighborhood of $70M.
Author Nicholas Sparks suffered his worst opening weekend ever for a film based on his novels as the romance The Best of Me opened in fifth to an estimated $10.2M from 2,936 locations for a mild $3,474 average. It was the ninth movie adapted from his books but audiences did not show up. Reviews were terrible and starpower was low with Michelle Monaghan and James Marsden anchoring. The PG-13 entry was released by Relativity which has not yet opened a film north of $13M this year.
The effects-heavy thriller Dracula Untold fell 58% in its second weekend to an estimated $9.9M boosting the cume to $40.7M for Universal. A solid $95.7M from overseas markets during these pre-Halloween weeks has raised the global gross to $136.4M.
Fellow sophomore The Judge held up moderately well with an estimated $7.9M, off 40%. The Warner Bros. release has grossed a modest $26.8M and looks headed for about $45M. The studio’s horror hit Annabelle dropped 50% to an estimated $7.9M as well for $74.1M to date making it 2014’s highest grossing fright film. A final of close to $90M seems likely.
A pair of September hits rounded out the top ten. Denzel Washington’s The Equalizer grossed an estimated $5.5M, down 44%, for a $89.2M cume for Sony. Fox’s The Maze Runner fell 40% to an estimated $4.5M banking $90.8M to date. Both will reach nine digits.
Oscar hopeful Birdman got off to a thunderous start in platform release debuting to an estimated $415,000 from only four locations in New York and Los Angeles for an eye-popping $103,750 average. That was the second highest opening weekend average of any film over the past two years. Only Wes Anderson’s The Grand Budapest Hotel fared better when it bowed last March to a $202,792 average. Both were released in four theaters on the first weekend by Fox Searchlight.
Directed by Alejandro González Iñárritu, Birdman stars Michael Keaton, Zach Galifianakis, Edward Norton, Emma Stone, and Naomi Watts and earned sensational reviews. The R-rated film is eyed as a major contender in the picture, director, cinematography, and acting races. Searchlight will expand Birdman on Friday into 18 new markets for a total of about 50 theaters and continue to roll the awards contender out into November.
Also faring very well in its limited release debut was the race relations satire Dear White People which grossed an estimated $344,000 from 11 playdates for a strong $31,273 average. The Roadside Attractions release has earned great reviews across the board and also took home a Special Jury Award from Sundance last winter.
The top ten films grossed an estimated $116.3M which was up 28% from last year when Gravity remained at number one with $30M; and even with 2012 when Paranormal Activity 4 opened on top with $29M.
