Late February/Early March has seen its share of blockbusters, and seen its share of wannabe blockbusters that flopped. It also has seen a large number of movies that would go on to be cult hits.
One Year Ago--February 28, 2020:
New Wide Releases:
The Invisible Man--1/$28.2 million/$70.4 million/5/91%/72--After the first two months of 2020 produced six horror movies that, at best, underperformed, Hollywood finally came up with one that both critics and audiences embraced. Elisabeth Moss starred as a woman who escapes her abusive scientist boyfriend (Oliver Jackson-Cohen). After he seemingly commits suicide a few weeks later, strange things begin to happen, events that Moss becomes convinced are caused by...well, read the title. This started life as part of the quickly defunct Dark Universe franchise, with Johnny Depp in the title role, but was greatly revamped.
Director: Leigh Whannell
My Hero Academia: Heroes Rising--4/$5.9 million/$13.3 million/25/90%/70--A feature film spin-off of the hugely popular anime series about the students at a school for aspiring superheroes, this has the class under siege from a villain who hopes to steal their powers so he can rule the world. While not a big hit, the film did well among fans of the show.
Director: Kenji Nagasaki
New Limited Releases:
Saint Frances--$0.04 million/211/99%/83--A young woman (Kelly O'Sullivan, who also wrote the screenplay) accepts a summer job as a nanny for a rambunctious six-year-old (Ramona Edith Williams) after the girl's moms (Charin Alvarez and Lily Mojekwu) have another baby. This well-reviewed indie wasn't able to find an audience.
Director: Alex Thompson
Straight Up--$0.02 million/259/93%/66--In this low budget romcom, a gay man (James Sweeney, who also directed) finds himself falling for (though not in a sexual way) a struggling actress (Katie Findlay) and the two attempt a loving relationship with sex not on the table. Betsy Brandt and Randall Park played Sweeney's parents. This one got solid reviews, though even without the pandemic, it likely wouldn't have broken out.
Director: James Sweeney
Expanding:
Impractical Jokers: The Movie--7/$3.6 million
Five Years Ago--February 26, 2016:
#1 Movie:
Deadpool--$31.1 million
New Wide Releases:
Gods of Egypt--2/$14.1 million/$31.2 million/87/15%/25--This poorly received fantasy, shot in Australia and filled almost entirely with white actors, starred Nikolaj Coster-Waldau as Horus, God of the air, who, on the day of his coronation to be King of Egypt, is overthrown by his uncle Set (Gerard Butler), and has to team up with a mortal thief (Brenton Thwaites) to save his throne and overthrow his tyrannical uncle. Geoffrey Rush played Ra, the Sun god, Bryan Brown played Osiris, the God of the underworld, Rufus Sewell played a mortal, and Chadwick Boseman played Thoth, the God of wisdom. The big-budgeted film was rejected by both critics and audiences, becoming one of the year's bigger flops.
Director: Alex Proyas
Triple 9--5/$6.1 million/$12.6 million/127/54%/52--One of those occasional movies that has a far better cast than its quality and its budget would suggest, this involves a crew of criminals who are forced by the wife of a mobster (Kate Winslet) to break into a government office to find information that could clear her husband of criminal charges. The gang's plot involves one of them, a corrupt cop (Anthony Mackie) setting up his new partner (Casey Affleck) to get killed, thereby distracting the police during the heist. Other gang members include Chiwetel Ejiofor, Aaron Paul, and Norman Reedus, with Gal Gadot as Ejiofor's girlfriend, Michael K. Williams as a police informant, and Woody Harrelson as a cop tracking the gang. Despite the impressive cast, critics felt it was a second-rate Heat ripoff, and audiences largely ignored it.
Director: John Hillcoat
Eddie the Eagle--6/$6.1 million/$15.8 million/117/81%/54--The second biopic of an Olympic athlete in two weeks (after Race) and the second film about an underdog at the 1988 Winter Olympics (after 1993's Cool Runnings), this starred Taron Egerton as Michael Edwards, who, after not making the British skiing team, decides to switch to ski jumping in an effort to make it to the Olympics, even though Britain hadn't sent a ski jumper to the Games since the 1920s and he had never ski jumped before. Hugh Jackman played a former ski jumper who agrees to coach Egerton, with Christopher Walken as Jackman's mentor and Jim Broadbent as a BBC commentator. The film was well-received by critics, but given that American audiences weren't interested in a film about an American athlete, it was probably a stretch to think they'd be interested in a film about a British one. The film was directed by Dexter Fletcher, who four years later would direct Egerton in Rocketman.
Director: Dexter Fletcher
Ten Years Ago--March 4, 2011:
New Wide Releases:
Rango--1/$38.1 million/$123.5 million/22/88%/75--Animated modern western from Gore Verbinski, his only non live-action film to date, starred his favorite actor, Johnny Depp, as the titular Rango, a pet chameleon who finds himself over his head when he's appointed to protect a small, drought-stricken desert town filled with anthropomorphic animals. Verbinski was able to recruit an impressive voice cast, including Isla Fisher, Abigail Breslin, Ned Beatty, Alfred Molina, Bill Nighy, Stephen Root, Harry Dean Stanton, Ray Winstone, and Timothy Olyphant. The film also attracted solid reviews and box office, and a year after its release, would break Pixar's four-year winning streak by taking the Animated Feature Oscar.
Director: Gore Verbinski
The Adjustment Bureau--2/$21.2 million/$62.5 million/56/71%/60--When a Congressman (Matt Damon) and a dancer (Emily Blunt) meet by chance, they discover that they have run afoul of the titular bureau, who are in charge of making sure human events follow a strict plan--and their romance is not part of said plan. Anthony Mackie, John Slattery, and Terence Stamp play bureau agents. This latest adaption of a Philip K. Dick story did solid business.
Director: George Nolfi
Beastly--3/$9.9 million/$27.9 million/104/21%/40--The second attempt to turn Alex Pettyfer into a star in three weeks, this Beauty and the Beast riff managed to make I Am Number Four look good. Pettyfer played an arrogant pretty boy who gets turned into a monster (in this case bald with weird face tattoos) by witch Mary-Kate Olsen (her last acting role to date), with the promise he'll be transformed back if he finds someone to love him. That turns out to be Vanessa Hudgens, the daughter of a drug addict. Neil Patrick Harris played Pettyfer's blind tutor, Peter Krause his father, and Dakota Johnson, in only her third film, as a conquest of Pettyfer. The film got awful reviews, and ended up making only half as much as Number Four.
Director: Daniel Barnz
Take Me Home Tonight--11/$3.5 million/$6.9 million/148/28%/42--In this 80s-set romcom, aimless college grad Topher Grace decides to lie to high school crush Teresa Palmer about his career path while they attend a wild party. Hijinks ensure. Dan Fogler played Grace's best friend, Anna Faris Grace's sister, Chris Pratt Faris's boyfriend, Michael Biehn Grace and Faris's father, and smaller parts for Michelle Trachtenberg, Bob Odenkirk, and Gennifer Goodwin. This one was filmed in 2007, but sat on the shelf for four years. Based on the reviews and the box office, it might have well stayed there.
Director: Michael Dowse
Fifteen Years Ago--March 3, 2006:
#1 Movie:
Madea's Family Reunion--$12.7 million
New Wide Releases:
16 Blocks--2/$11.9 million/$36.9 million/86/56%/63--Standard issue thriller as alcoholic cop Bruce Willis has to escort witness Mos Def to the courthouse 16 blocks away, only to have to fight through what feels like the entire police department, as Def's testimony will expose many of them as corrupt. David Morse played Willis's former partner who is leading the brigade in stopping the duo. The fact that this couldn't beat the second weekend of a Madea movie helped highlight Willis's fading star power, and explains why Def, who seemed on the verge of breaking out through the aughts, never really did. This is the last film to date directed by Richard Donner.
Director: Richard Donner
Ultraviolet--4/$9.1 million/$18.5 million/122/8%/18--This sci-fi thriller starred Milla Jovovich as a resistance fighter trying to protect a kid (busy child actor Cameron Bright, in the second of four movies he'd be in during the first half of 2006) whose blood might contain the cure for a deadly plague. Jovovich's star power (and people possibly misreading the title of this PG-13 film as "Ultraviolent") helped it open decently, but bad word of mouth coupled with worse reviews killed it pretty much immediately after.
Director: Kurt Wimmer
Aquamarine--5/$7.5 million/$18.6 million/121/51%/51--Two teenage girls (Emma Roberts, in her first leading role in a movie, and pop star JoJo, billed under her real name of Joanna Levesque) discover a mermaid (Sara Paxton) in a swimming pool in their small coastal town, and because she has three days to prove to her father that love exists to avoid an arranged marriage, try to set her up with a local lifeguard (Jake McDorman). Reviews weren't too bad for this movie aimed rather obviously at young girls, but said girls didn't really show up to the theater.
Director: Elizabeth Allen
Dave Chapelle's Block Party--7/$6.5 million/$11.7 million/150/92%/84--Comedian Chapelle had made headlines in 2005 when he walked away from his humongous successful sketch comedy series Chapelle's Show. This concert movie, produced before he left the show, was the first major project involving him to be released in the aftermath. Chapelle performed stand-up and sketches in between a truly impressive list of musical acts, including Kanye West, Mos Def (in his second movie of the weekend), Erykah Badu, The Roots, Common, John Legend, and a reunited Fugees. Despite the critical acclaim, the film burned out fast, ultimately not even doubling its opening weekend gross.
Director: Michel Gondry
New Limited Releases:
Sorry, Haters--$0.007 million/547/37%/43--This little-seen thriller starred Robin Wright Penn as a TV producer who befriends a Muslim cabbie (Abdellatif Kechiche) whose brother is being held in Guantanamo Bay. At first, she seems interested in helping him, but she has much darker motives. Sandra Oh played her boss. Penn got across-the-bored raves, but most critics felt the film went completely off the rails during the second half.
Director: Jeff Stanzler
Twenty Years Ago--March 2, 2001:
New Wide Releases:
The Mexican--1/$20.1 million/$66.9 million/36/54%/43--The first team-up of Brad Pitt and Julia Roberts (three weeks away from winning her Oscar for Erin Brockovich, which would celebrate its one-year anniversary in two weeks) was in this violent action-comedy, in which Pitt played a mob gofer who gets sent to Mexico to retrieve the titular gun, while Roberts, as his fed-up girlfriend, gets herself kidnaped by a gay hitman (James Gandolfini, in his first major movie role since the premiere of The Sopranos). Director Gore Verbinski recruited an impressive supporting cast, including J.K. Simmons, Bob Balaban, Michael Cerveris, David Krumholtz, and, in a late-in-the-film extended cameo, Gene Hackman. Critics were underwhelmed, and while the film did decent numbers, it was a disappointment given the leads. Pitt and Roberts would have much better luck with their other crime comedy of 2001, Ocean's Eleven, when that opened at the end of the year.
Director: Gore Verbinski
See Spot Run--3/$9.7 million/$33.4 million/70/23%/24--Lowbrow kids comedy about an FBI dog who ends up in the custody of mailman David Arquette (in his second movie in two weeks, after 3000 Miles to Graceland) and kid Angus T. Jones (his first major role a couple of years before the premiere of Two and a Half Men). What they don't know is that his both his FBI master (Michael Clarke Duncan) and two hitmen (Sopranos co-star Steve Schirripa and Joe Viterelli, who somehow was never on The Sopranos) are searching for him. Leslie Bibb played Jones's mother and Arquette's love interest, Anthony Anderson played Arquette's best friend, and Paul Sorvino played the mob boss who put a hit out on the dog. Critics were understandably unenthusiastic, but the film was low-budgeted enough that it made a profit.
Director: John Whitesell
New Limited Releases:
The Caveman's Valentine--$0.7 million/217/45%/44--Not even the presence of Samuel L. Jackson could get too many people interested in this mystery-thriller, in which he played a schizophrenic homeless man who becomes convinced that a famous photographer (Colm Feore) murdered a young man found outside of the cave Jackson lives in. Tamara Tunie played Jackson's wife (or at least his hallucinations of his wife), and Anthony Michael Hall played a businessman who has a memorable encounter with Jackson. Opening, for some reason, almost three weeks after Valentine's Day, this failed to break out of art houses.
Director: Kasi Lemmons
The Widow of Saint-Pierre--$3.2 million/163/90%/73--On a tiny, French-owned island off the coast of Newfoundland in the mid-19th century, the wife (Juliette Binoche) of the local military commander (Daniel Auteuil) takes it on herself to reform a convicted murderer (Emir Kusturica) staying in the military post's brig. That proves to be an issue because he's awaiting execution as soon as a proper guillotine can be imported. This French-Canadian co-production did decent business on the art house circuit.
Director: Patrice Leconte
Twenty Five Years Ago--March 1, 1996:
New Wide Releases:
Up Close & Personal--1/$11.1 million/$51.1 million/31/31%/NA--Rookie reporter Michelle Pfeiffer is hired by Miami station manager Robert Redford, who ultimately mentors her into one of top television journalists in the country, while the two of them fall in love. Stockard Channing played an anchorwoman who becomes jealous of Pfeiffer, Joe Mantegna played Pfeiffer's agent, Kate Nelligan Redford's ex-wife, and Glenn Plummer as a cameraman. This was based loosely--very, very loosely--on the life of NBC anchorwoman Jessica Savitch. Even though critics weren't impressed, the star power of the leads helped make it a decent performer. The closing credits Song "Because You Loved Me" was Oscar-nominated.
Director: Jon Avent
Down Periscope--2/$7.2 million/$25.6 million/62/12%/39--Kelsey Grammer, whose sitcom Frasier was considered the height of mainstream sophisticated humor, went hard the other way with what is, to date, his only major theatrical vehicle. In this navel comedy, he played a rebellious officer who is finally given the chance to captain his own submarine, except it is a rickety diesel-powered sub to be used in a war game, with a motely crew including Lauren Holley, Rob Schneider, Harry Dean Stanton, Patton Oswalt, and Harland Williams. Bruce Dern played an admiral who dislikes Grammer, William H. Macy (who would be in a much better comedy the following week) as a rival sub commander, and Rip Torn as an admiral who does like Grammer. It got horrible reviews and its gross explains why most of Grammer's subsequent film appearances have been in supporting roles.
Director: David S. Ward
Thirty Years Ago--March 1, 1991:
#1 Movie:
The Silence of the Lambs--$10.6 million
New Wide Releases:
The Doors--2/$9.2 million/$34.4 million/39/57%/62--Oliver Stone followed up his second Best Director Oscar with this biopic of 60s musician Jim Morrison (Val Kilmer) and his tumultuous life. Meg Ryan and Kathleen Quinlan played girlfriends of Kilmer, Frank Whaley and Kyle MacLachlan as fellow members of The Doors, Crispin Glover as Andy Warhol, and small roles for Billy Idol, Michael Madsen, Costas Mandylor, Debi Mazer, Mimi Rogers, Paul Williams, Jennifer Tilly, and Stone himself. Critics raved about Kilmer, but the film itself garnered much more mixed reaction, and it was eventually overshadowed by Stone's other movie of 1991, which would open at Christmas.
Director: Oliver Stone
Shipwrecked--7/$3.9 million/$15.1 million/76/NA/NA--Disney picked up this Norwegian family film, based on a classic adventure novel from that country, about a teenage cabin boy (Stian Smestad) who, as the title implies, is shipwrecked on a tropical island with the treasure that the ship's new captain (Gabriel Byrne), who was secretly a viscous pirate, had been smuggling. The original cut of the film featured dialogue in both English and Norwegian, depending on the scene and the characters, but for the American version, all the Norwegian was dubbed into English.
Director: Nils Gaup
New Limited Releases:
My Heroes Have Always Been Cowboys--$3.6 million/134/33%/NA--Scott Glenn starred in this drama as a professional bull rider who has to ride bulls in order to save the family ranch. This attracted a surprisingly strong cast for a low-budget indie drama, including Ben Johnson as Glenn's father, Kate Capshaw as Glenn's once and current love interest, Tess Harper as his sister, Gary Busey as her husband, Balthazar Getty as Capshaw's son, Mickey Rooney as a family friend, and western movie regulars Dub Taylor and Clu Gulager in small roles. If the studio had hoped that Glenn's work in The Silence of the Lambs would bring people to see this, they were disappointed.
Director: Stuart Rosenberg
Thirty-Five Years Ago--February 28, 1986:
New Wide Releases:
Pretty in Pink--1/$6.1 million/$40.5 million/22/74%/56--Arguably John Hughes's quintessential teen romcom, this starred his frequent muse Molly Ringwald as a poor girl from the wrong side of the tracks who begins to date rich guy Andrew McCarthy, much to the chagrin of her quirky best friend (Jon Cryer), who is not-so-secretly in love with her, and his best friend (James Spader) who dislikes Ringwald for turning him down. Harry Dean Stanton played Ringwald's father, Annie Potts, her boss and friend, with Andrew Dice Clay as a club bouncer, and Gina Gershon and Kristy Swanson, in both their first credited movie roles, as classmates of Ringwald. The film received mixed reviews when first released but is now considered one of Hughes's (who wrote, but didn't direct) most beloved movies.
Director: Howard Deutch
House--2/$5.9 million/$19.4 million/47/57%/44--Sean S. Cunningham, who directed the first Friday the 13th, and Steve Miner, who directed the next two, teamed up for this horror comedy that owes a debt to Poltergeist. A writer (William Katt) moves into his late aunt's house hoping to get his next book completed, only to discover that its haunted. George Wendt played his disbelieving neighbor, Wednt's Thursday night compatriot Richard Moll played Katt's old friend, and Mindy Sterling has a small role. While the film wasn't a big hit critically or commercially, it did well enough to earn an in-name-only sequel the next year, and has gone on to be a cult hit.
Director: Steve Miner
Forty Years Ago--February 27, 1981
New Limited Releases:
Scanners--$14.2 million/53/70%/60--David Croenberg's breakthrough film in the United States, this sci-fi/horror flick starred Stephen Lack as a powerful "scanner" or telepath, who is attempting to track down an evil scanner (Michael Ironside, in one of his first major roles) who is assassinating scanners who oppose him. Jennifer O'Neill plays a scanner who joins forces with Lack, and Patrick McGoohan played a scientist who studies scanners. Reviews at the time were mixed, but the film did well at the box office, and quickly became a cult classic. It would be followed by a pair of straight-to-video sequels a decade later.
Director: David Croenberg
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