After Earth: 18 reviews, 3 positive. 17%. It is going to reek.
Now You See Me: 5 reviews, 4 fresh. Some chance that it will end up fresh.
It would seem that the studios do indeed seem to believe that they have duds on their hands, but I’m not sure why they think that about Now You See Me. Everything about After Earth seems terrible. Trailer, clips shown on Letterman, the nepotism, etc.
Note that the weekend after a big holiday weekend is considered a dumping ground. Probably the worst weekend to release a tentpole movie during the summer movie season. The studios are not expecting much out of these. And probably just going thru the motions on After Earth.
Also, even the positive reviews aren’t all that positive: “doggedly straightforward … modestly entertaining … very little humor”. The other two aren’t much better: “It’s easy to snark on ‘After Earth.’ It’s dumb, Jaden Smith can’t act and some genius decided it would be a good idea to have the characters speak in an indiscernible accent.”“The movie spent a lot of time teetering on the verge of failure”.
By contrast, the negative reviews are unabashedly negative: “a wince-inducing drag”; “bears the mark of a work-for-hire who has all but given up”; “waiting for that respite brought about by the damn thing finally getting to its silly, telegraphed point”; “the crashing bore that is ‘After Earth’.”
Well, here’s a quote from Will Smith about how they raise their kids:
It’s from this article. I’m not a parent, but I would think letting your kids do anything they want with explanation might be to permissive and let them start being spoiled. I was a smart kid, I could have easily explained why it would be best for me to miss school more, or stay up all night, or not have a summer job. But that doesn’t mean it would have actually been good for me. Also, Jaden does hang out with Justin Bieber, who is definitely not a great influence in how to be a good, thoughtful person. There were reports that Bieber had his recent birthday party at a club in London and threw a fit when 14-year-old Jaden wasn’t allowed in. Other than that, he also has a fledgling rap career and has designed or wants to design his own fashion line.
I don’t blame Jaden too much. Many teenagers are annoying and arrogant. It’s just that he also has rich, well-connected parents who can indulge his every whim.
Also, has everyone noticed the family’s names? Will, Jada, Willow, and Jaden? It’s not that naming your kids after yourselves is necessarily bad, but along with the comments about starting a Hollywood dynasty, the parents sound like huge narcissists. Maybe no more than most Hollywood people, but still.
My newspaper carried reviews for both of these movies in this morning’s (Thursday’s) paper, both by critic Roger Moore and both unfavorable. (The review for “After Earth” sounds like it may have been the same one Snooooopy read.)
I’ve said it before, I’ll say it again. As long as people keep buying tickets to garbage, they’re going to get more garbage. “After Earth” is currently 14% Rotten at RT, but I bet it’ll make more money this weekend than “Mud” (99% Fresh), “Before Midnight” (97% Fresh) and “The Stories We Tell” (95% Fresh), the latter two I can’t wait to see, combined.
There is something odd going on about Will Smith. Some people claim that he is a closet Scientologist, but the pattern stuff doesn’t sound much like CoS. Don’t think I want to know.
Still only 20 reviews (falling below 50% fresh) at RT for Now You See Me. That is surprisingly few for late on Thursday before release.
I think you’ll like “Mud” – saw it last week. It’s the only film besides “Before Midnight” I’m planning to see in theaters between April and July…but now I’ll investigate this “Stories We Tell” you mentioned, and thanks!
I am certainly willing to defer to you, as you no doubt have far more knowledge in this area, but … you sure about this? My local paper runs its weekly entertainment section on Thursdays, and it always has a review of at least one film opening that Friday. These aren’t local reviewers (this is a medium-sized city in Iowa, for Pete’s sake, we’re happy to have the movin’ pitchers at all), but nationally syndicated reviews. Still, they are published a full day before the films open.
Well, look at his last three films: The Happening made $163 million on a $48 million budget; Devil made $63 million on a $10 million budget; The Last Airbender made $319 million on a $150 million budget. That’s disappointing compared to what he used to pull in – The Village made $256 million on a $60 million budget, Signs $408 million on a $72 million budget, Unbreakable $248 million on a $75 million budget, Sixth Sense $672 million on a $40 million budget – but you could do a lot worse.
(The real question is, why did Lady In The Water get made?)