July continues to be blockbuster season, with major titles and beloved cult hits occupying this weekend.
One Year Ago--July 19, 2019:
New Wide Releases:
The Lion King--1/$191.8 million/$543.6 million/2/53%/55--Disney didn't really change much of the script of their 1994 classic, which substitutes the original's gorgeous traditional animation for photo-realistic CGI. Of course, the problem with making what's essentially a song-and-dance-and comedy extravaganza look like a nature documentary is that it robs the now realistic-looking animals of their expressions, a problem the studio and directer Jon Favreau managed to avoid in their 2016 redo of The Jungle Book, but seem to have no idea how to work around here. Audiences clearly didn't care, as they ate up the spectacle, which did admittedly boast a strong cast, including Donald Glover as the adult Simba, Beyonce (who sings a new song) as the adult Nala, Chiwetel Ejiofar as Scar, Billy Eichner and Seth Rogan as Timon and Pumbaa, John Oliver as Zazu, and James Earl Jones reprising his role as Mufasa. Even though the film was completely animated, Disney pretended that it was a live-action film and refused to submit it for consideration as an Animated Feature at the Oscars. It did, however, get a nomination for its Visual Effects.
Director: Jon Favreau
Five Years Ago--July 17, 2015:
New Wide Releases:
Ant-Man--1/$57.2 million/$180.2 million/14/83%/64--The Marvel Cinematic Universe rolled on with this entry, which established a somewhat more comic tone than its predecessors. Paul Rudd starred as a cat burglar trying to go straight who gets chosen, pretty much against his will, to be the next wearer of a special suit, designed by scientist Michael Douglas, that can shrink the wearer to the size of an ant (hence the title), much the chagrin of Douglas's semi-estranged daughter Evangeline Lilly. Corey Stoll played the obviously evil CEO of the tech company Douglas founded who has his own ideas of what to use shrinking technology for. Even though this is the only MCU movie after 2011 to not top $200 million domestic, it still got a direct sequel in 2018.
Director: Peyton Reed
Trainwreck--3/$30.1 million/$110.2 million/28/84%/75--It's rather startling how fast Amy Schumer has receded from the pop culture landscape considering that only five years ago, she seemed to be on the cusp of superstardom, thanks to both her acclaimed sketch comedy show and this romcom, which starred Schumer as a commitment-phobic journalist who finds herself falling for a doctor (Bill Hader) she interviewed for a story. Director Judd Apatow recruited his usual sterling supporting cast, including Brie Larson as Schumer's sister, Tilda Swinton as her boss, John Cena as her FWB, and LeBron James, who quickly proved himself to be a much better actor than, say, Michael Jordan or Shaquille O'Neil, as himself.
Director: Judd Apatow
Mr. Holmes--10/$2.4 million/$17.7 million/106/88%/67--That would be Sherlock Holmes (Ian McKellen) in yet another take on the legendary sleuth in a decade full of them. This one is a portrait of the detective as a very old man, dealing with the onset of dementia as he struggles to remember the details of his last case. Laura Linney played his housekeeper and caretaker. This one got good reviews, particularly for McKellen, and did OK business, but didn't really become a breakout hit.
Director: Bill Condon
New Limited Releases:
Bajrangi Bhaijaan--$8.2 million/131/87%/NA--Just a week after Baahubali: The Beginning had the best North American opening of a Bollywood movie in 2015, this drama, about a man who is determined to reunite a lost little Pakistani girl with her family after they got separated at a train station, would end up as the year's highest grossing Bollywood movie on the continent, even if it opened a bit below Baahubali.
Director: Kabir Khan
The Look of Silence--$0.1 million/382/96%/92--This hugely acclaimed documentary, a sequel to the equally-acclaimed 2012 doc The Act of Killing, followed the brother of a victim of the mass Indonesian killings of 1965 as he confronted some of the men who were responsible. Like its predecessor, the film was nominated for the Documentary Oscar.
Director: Joshua Oppenheimer
Ten Years Ago--July 16, 2010:
New Wide Releases:
Inception--1/$62.8 million/$292.6 million/6/87%/74--Director Christopher Nolan was able to keep the plot of this action drama a near-secret until it opened, making this the rare summer blockbuster that arrived with a sense of mystery around it. Luckily, the film lived up to the expectations placed on it, ending up as the highest-grossing completely original film of the year. Leonardo DiCaprio (in his second movie of the year, after Shutter Island, about the manipulation and unreliability of memory) played a corporate spy who is able to steal information by invading his targets' dreams. His latest victim (Ken Watanabe) turns the tables, demanding that they plant an idea in a rival's (Cillian Murphy) head, a task far more difficult than simply extracting information. Joseph Gorden-Levitt played DiCaprio's partner, Ellen Page his new recruit, Tom Hardy another team member, Marion Cotillard DiCaprio's late wife, and Nolan regular Michael Caine as DiCaprio's father-in-law. The film would be nominated for eight Oscars, including Best Picture and Original Screenplay, and would win four, for Cinematography, Sound Mixing, Sound Editing, and Visual Effects (many of which were practical).
Director: Christopher Nolan
The Sorcerer's Apprentice--3/$17.6 million/$63.2 million/50/40%/46--Nicolas Cage played a sorcerer who learned his magic from Merlin himself, who has spent centuries looking for Merlin's heir. That turns out to be college kid Jay Baruchel, who at first is quite skeptical of the existence of magic. Together, they must stop an evil wizard (Alfred Molina, seemingly trying to make up for the fact he was one of the few British actors to never land a role in a Harry Potter movie) from reviving another evil wizard to take over the world. Disney probably shouldn't have tried to release this would-be franchise starter and special effects extravaganza against another special effects extravaganza.
Director: Jon Turteltaub
Fifteen Years Ago--July 22, 2005:
#1 Movie:
Charlie and the Chocolate Factory--$28.3 million
New Wide Releases:
The Island--4/$12.4 million/$35.8 million/76/40%/50--A rare box-office misfire from bombastic director Michael Bay, this action drama (set in the far-off year of 2019) starred Ewan McGregor and Scarlett Johansson as inmates in a facility that they are told is protecting them from the contamination that has destroyed the outside world. McGregor discovers the truth about the facility, and the two of them escape, with mercenaries hired by facility head Sean Bean, in close pursuit. Michael Clarke Duncan played a fellow inmate, Djimon Hounsou a mercenary, and Steve Buscemi as a facility employee who helps McGregor and Johansson. Bay would have much more commercial (if not critical) success with his next film, Transformers.
Director: Michael Bay
Bad News Bears--5/$11.4 million/$32.9 million/82/48%/65--Speaking of rare misfires, this wholly unnecessary remake of the quintessential kids sports movie was directed by Richard Linklater. Billy Bob Thornton takes over Walter Matthau's role as the team's borderline-alcoholic coach, who manages to lead his team of losers to the championship game. Marcia Gay Hardin played the mother of one of the team's players, and Greg Kinnear played a rival coach. Only a couple of the kid actors did much after the movie.
Director: Richard Linklater
Hustle & Flow--7/$8 million/$22.2 million/110/82%/68--After playing mostly supporting roles for year, Terrance Howard made the most of this starring role as a pimp who wants to become a rapper. Discovering he does have talent, an old friend (Anthony Anderson) and his associate (DJ Qualls) helps him produce several songs, with backup from a pregnant hooker (Taraji P. Henson). Isaac Hays played another friend of Howard, and Chris "Ludacris" Bridges played a successful rapper who agrees to listen to Howard's demo tape. Howard would receive an Oscar nomination for Best Actor, and the film's signature song, "It's Hard Out Here for a Pimp" would be the surprise winner for Best Original Song. A decade later, Howard, Henson, and director Craig Brewer would reunite for the successful prime time soap Empire.
Director: Craig Brewer
The Devil's Rejects--8/$7.1 million/$17 million/124/54%/53--This gory sequel to 2003's cult hit House of 1000 Corpses has also become a cult hit, though it was only a minor success at the time. The murderous clan of the first film, including Sid Haig and director Rob Zombie's wife Sheri Moon Zombie go on the run, slicing and dicing their way through various cast members while a sheriff (William Forsythe) who maybe just as crazy as the killers, relentlessly persues them. The third part of the trilogy wouldn't be released until 2019.
Director: Rob Zombie
Expanding:
March of the Penguins--10/$4.4 million
Twenty Years Ago--July 21, 2000:
New Wide Releases:
What Lies Beneath--1/$29.7 million/$155.5 million/10/46%/51--Robert Zemeckis had a 2000 that even his old friend Steven Spielberg might be jealous of, directing two films that ended up in the year's Top 10, though this supernatural thriller was much less well received critically than his Christmas smash Cast Away. Michelle Pfeiffer becomes convinced that her house is haunted, but her husband Harrison Ford dismisses that idea. However, as she continues to investigate... The fact that neither Ford nor Pfeiffer had had a big hit in a few years made the huge success of this film somewhat surprising.
Director: Robert Zemeckis
Pokemon the Movie 2000--3/$19.6 million/$43.8 million/58/19%/28--It was probably foolish to expect the nation's parents, who had already sat through one Pokemon movie with their kids in November, to pluck down more money for another hour and a half with pre-teen Pokemon trainer Ash Ketchum and his yellow electric mouse Pikachu, particularly when the show was still continuing to run daily on TV. Nevertheless, even if the film only made about half of its predecessor, it still turned a nice profit. However, hopes that each ones of these films would result in an $80 million gross were dashed--and would be dashed even more when Pokemon 3 didn't even make as much as this one's opening weekend.
Director: Kunihiko Yuyama and Michael Haigney (English dub)
Loser--8/$6 million/$15.6 million/111/24%/35--Unwisely tempting fate with that title, this college-set romcom starred the all-American couple of Jason Biggs (in his first major role since American Pie) and Mena Suvari (in her first role since American Beauty) as NYU freshmen who are attracted to each other, but are pulled apart by his obnoxious roommates and her relationship with equally obnoxious professor Greg Kinnear. Dan Aykroyd continued the tradition of Canadian comedy legends playing Biggs's father. Directed by Amy Heckerling, whose previous one-worded title romcom starring young people (see below) is much more fondly remembered.
Director: Amy Heckerling
The In Crowd--12/$1.5 million/$5.3 million/148/2%/14--This poorly received thriller is about a teenage girl (Lori Heuring), recently released from a mental institution, who befriends a local rich girl (Susan Ward) only to gradually discover that her new friend is even more psychotic than she is. This probably wouldn't have done well anywhere on the schedule, but opening it in the middle of July pretty much ensured it would die a very quick death.
Director: Mary Lambert
Twenty-Five Years Ago--July 21, 1995:
#1 Movie:
Apollo 13--$12.5 million
New Wide Releases:
Clueless--2/$10.6 million/$56.6 million/32/80%/68--While not a massive hit in 1995, this modern updating of Jane Austen's Emma has become arguably the second-most iconic movie of the year, after Toy Story. Alicia Silverstone, who until then had primarily been known for appearing in a series of Aerosmith videos, starred as a Beverly Hills high school girl who thinks she knows the perfect romantic partners for her various friends, only to eventually learn she's totally...well, see the title. In addition to Silverstone, Dan Hedaya as Silverstone's loving-but-grumpy father, and Wallace Shawn (who, between this and the aforementioned Toy Story, had an incredible year) as a teacher, the cast boasted a number of young actors on the cusp of fame, including Brittany Murphy, Donald Faison, Breckin Meyer, Jeremy Sisto, and, in his film debut, Paul Rudd as Silverstone's former stepbrother. This film helped launch both the Jane Austen movie craze of the mid-90s and the high school movie craze of the late-90s.
Director: Amy Heckerling
Free Willy 2: The Adventure Home--6/$7 million/$30.1 million/60/31%/NA--After Willy the killer whale had been freed in the surprise 1993 hit, he finds himself needing to be freed again in this sequel, this time from an oil spill and the plotting of an evil oil tycoon. Jason James Richter returned as the kid who needed to free Willy once again, and Michael Madsen, in one of his few nice guy roles, returned as his foster father. Followed by a third sequel in 1997 that couldn't even muster a million dollar opening.
Director: Dwight H. Little
Thirty Years Ago--July 20, 1990:
#1 Movie:
Ghost--$12.5 million
New Wide Releases:
Arachnophobia--3/$8.1 million/$53.2 million/22/92%/67--What doctor Jeff Daniels hoped for when he moved from San Francisco to a small California town was some peace and quiet. What he got was an invasion of deadly South American spiders in this old-fashioned creature feature. After said spiders start killing off the town's residents, Daniels teams with exterminator John Goodman and spider expert Julian Sands to kill the nest before they escape into the wider world. Steven Spielberg executive produced the directorial debut of his longtime partner Frank Marshall
Director: Frank Marshall
Navy SEALS--4/$6.5 million/$25.1 million/50/19%/38--The summer's second military recruitment video disguised as a feature film, this one is at least less of a Top Gun ripoff than Fire Birds was. Then again, Fire Birds starred Nicolas Cage and Tommy Lee Jones, while this one stars Charlie Sheen. He played a Navy SEAL who channels Tom Cruise by playing by his own rules on missions to track down a terrorist. Michael Biehn played his commanding officer, and Bill Paxton and Dennis Haysburt played fellow SEALS.
Director: Lewis Teague
New Limited Releases:
The Freshman--$21.5 million/57/94%/78--Matthew Broderick played a NYU film student who becomes entangled in a scheme involving the FBI, an endangered Komodo dragon, and a mob boss (Marlon Brando) who bears a striking resemblance to Marlon Brando in The Godfather. Brando got much acclaim for spoofing arguably his most famous role in this very well-received comedy. Bruno Kirby played Brando's nephew, Penelope Ann Miller, Brando's daughter, and Maximilian Schell as a famous chef.
Director: Andrew Bergman
Thirty-Five Years Ago--July 19, 1985:
#1 Movie:
Back to the Future--$10.3 million
New Wide Releases:
E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial--2/$8.8 million/$40.6 million/21/98%/91--And so continued the summer of Spielberg, when even his three-year-old movies became huge hits. Of course, this was, at the time (and for nearly 12 years thereafter) the highest-grossing film in history, and its successful re-release was undoubtedly helped by it not having been released for home viewing in any format since the end of its year-long theatrical run. The boy (Henry Thomas)-and-his-alien story would finally hit home video in 1988 and make its television debut in 1990, before returning to theaters in 2002 for a controversial (but still successful) 20th anniversary re-release.
Director: Steven Spielberg
The Man With One Red Shoe--7/$3.1 million/$8.7 million/93/47%/31--This spy farce, one of the many, many remakes of French comedies Hollywood churned out during the 80s and 90s (this one based on 1972's The Tall Blond Man With One Black Shoe) starred Tom Hanks as an ordinary guy who, thanks to his footwear choices, finds himself the innocent dupe in a battle between two CIA higher-ups (Dabney Coleman and Charles Durning) who are attempting to frame each other. Jim Belushi played Hanks's friend and Carrie Fisher Belushi's wife, who is having an affair with Hanks.
Director: Stan Dragoti
New Limited Releases:
Day of the Dead--$5 million/115/81%/60--As the zombie apocalypse ravages the surface, soldiers and scientists co-exist uneasily in an underground bunker, where the scientists are attempting to figure out a cure to the pandemic. Slowly, it becomes clear that the leadership of both groups is no longer mentally stable. George A. Romero's third zombie film went out unrated, which allowed for the maximum amount of gore but limited the number of theaters that would show it. Like its predecessors, it would become a cult film, though it is much less well-regarded than Night of the Living Dead and Dawn of the Dead. It would be 20 years before he would return to the zombie genre with 2005's Land of the Dead.
Director: George A. Romero
The Legend of Billie Jean--$3.1 million/129/40%/45--Helen Slater, who did not become a superstar after the previous fall's Supergirl, starred in this drama as a teenager whose attempt to get money to repair the damaged scooter of her brother (Christian Slater, in his film debut) quickly spirals out of control sending the two siblings (who, in real life, were not related to each other despite sharing a last name) on the run. Peter Coyote played a sympathetic detective.
Director: Matthew Robbins
Forty Years Ago--July 18, 1980:
New Wide Releases:
Cheech and Chong's Next Movie--$41.7 million/16/NA/66--They were going to think of a better title to this follow-up to Up in Smoke, but then they got high. They were going to write a coherent plot, but then they got high. Instead, this movie is basically a series of vignettes involving Chong (Tommy Chong) hanging out with Cheech's (Cheech Marin) visiting cousin (Cheech Marin). The film is probably most notable for an early filmed appearance of Paul Reubens's Pee Wee Herman, which reflected the character's original, much more adult persona than the version that would eventually have a big adventure and a playhouse.
Director: Tommy Chong
Honeysuckle Rose--$17.8 million/39/50%/NA--Legendary country singer Willie Nelson made his leading man debut, playing a country superstar who bears a remarkable resemblance to Willie Nelson. He's married to Dyan Cannon, though him being constantly on tour has led to a strain in their marriage. When new guitarist Amy Irving joins his band, Nelson finds himself attracted to her, and makes decisions that could put his marriage in jeopardy. The movie debuted the song "On the Road Again", which would become one of Nelson's signatures, and would receive the film's only Oscar nomination.
Director: Jerry Schatzberg
New Limited Releases:
Oh! Heavenly Dog--$6.2 million/80/NA/41--This rather bizarre attempt by Benji director Joe Camp to take his famous canine in a more adult direction briefly starred Chevy Chase as a PI investigating a case in London. When he is murdered early on, he finds himself reincarnated into a cute dog--yes, Benji--and has to solve his own murder, while falling in love with journalist Jane Seymour, who might have her own connection to the murder. Chase would have much better luck when his other big summer comedy opened.
Director: Joe Camp
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