Given that the previous Terminator movie, Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines made $150 million and the first Night at the Museum made $250 million, I guess it’s not a surprise that Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian beat Terminator Salvation on their opening weekend. It’s still kind of like seeing Ben Stiller kick sand in Arnold Schwarzenegger’s face. I wonder, with three previous movies and one TV series out there, if the Terminator market is pretty saturated already. Which begs the first (non-spoiler-y) question about the new movie:
1. Just how many time-lines are there by now?There are at least two. According to the original Terminator, “Judgment Day,” when self-aware military defense program Skynet launched a devastating attack on humanity, took place on Aug. 29, 1997. T2: Judgment Day attempted to avert that disaster, but according to Terminator 3, the heroes only postponed the robot holocaust, which began on July 24, 2004. This puckish whiteboard tries to explain it, but muddies the waters even further. I can’t say I noticed anything in Terminator Salvation that directly contradicted Terminator 3 (apart from the obvious recasting), but it’s getting pretty darn confusing. And this doesn’t even address “Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles.”
HANG TIME: Russell (left) and Carl Fredricksen from Up
The stereotypical summer movie aspires to be a simple pleasure, and usually gets it half right. Simplicity is the stock-in-trade of Hollywood tentpole films. Even a full sentence may be too long to sum up a summer blockbuster’s premise: Ideally, it fits into a tagline, a Tweet or an icon.
Regardless of which movie you see, where you see a film offers its own delights. Several of the summer biggies will be in 3-D (including Pixar’s Up), a few will have IMAX versions, and many will play at the summertime’s quintessential venue, the Starlight Six Drive-In. Doubtless a few of the season’s hits will screen at the Fox Theatre Summer Film Festival, the titles of which are to be announced.
Screen on the Green continues this year at Centennial Olympic Park, and with the exception of Oscar-nominated Dreamgirls (June 4), it’s devoted to 1980s flashbacks, including Back to the Future (May 28); Field of Dreams (June 11) and Home Alone (June 18) — which, granted, came out in 1990 but was made in the 1980s. For June 25, audiences can vote for one of three 1980s films: Big, Ghostbusters and The Princess Bride. (I’d vote for Ghostbusters, but would bet on The Princess Bride.)
The summer movies of ‘09 may make the Screen on the Green lineup two decades from now. Apart from the already released X-Men Origins: Wolverine, this summer’s light on the joy of superheroes. Here’s a guide to the most-hyped releases to come, along with the simple pleasures they’re shooting for.
Angels & Demons (May 15) THE JOY OF: sleek, empty eurothrillers; saying naughty things about the Catholic Church IN OTHER WORDS: Tom Hanks and director Ron Howard reunite for the follow-up to The Da Vinci Code. Dan Brown published the novel Angels & Demons first, but the new film still follows Hanks as globe-trotting, conspiracy-unraveling symbologist Robert Langdon, who journeys to Rome to uncover a mystery involving the Vatican, the Illuminati and, uh, antimatter. (Note to self: Google the word “symbologist.”)
Now that the long-anticipated, much-hyped pop epic Watchmen has reached theaters, we can finally get on with our lives… by anticipating the soon-to-be-hyped pop epic summer movies! Several studios have recently released a batch of new, full-length trailers for the would-be biggest blockbusters of the hot months, including the latest from Pixar and several relaunches of science fiction’s most lucrative franchises. Based on these clips, which do you most want to see?
X-Men Origins: Wolverine (May 1)
Oscar host Hugh Jackman stars in this prequel to the X-Men trilogy that fills in the backstory of Wolverine and should answer questions like, “How old is he?” “Why does he have a metal skeleton?” and “Why is Liev Schreiber portraying Sabretooth, a bad guy played by huge wrestler Tyler Mane in the first film?” Director Gavin Hood previously made some heavy dramas, including South African Oscar nominee Tsotsi and the homeland security thriller Rendition, but hasn’t helmed a huge Hollywood action franchise before. At any rate, it’s the season’s only big comic book movie.
Given that the previous Terminator movie, Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines made $150 million and the first Night at the Museum made $250 million, I guess it’s not a surprise that Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian beat Terminator Salvation on their opening weekend. It’s still kind of like seeing Ben Stiller kick sand in Arnold Schwarzenegger’s face. I wonder, with three previous movies and one TV series out there, if the Terminator market is pretty saturated already. Which begs the first (non-spoiler-y) question about the new movie:
