Weekend box-office – 6th to 13th of March 2014 – will Non-Stop take flight?

It’s a good time to be Liam Neeson! As if starring in Star Wars, Taken, Schindler’s List and Batman Begins wasn’t enough, he’s following the huge box office success of Taken 2 with the brilliant Lego Movie, were he plays the face-switching lawman Good Cop/Bad Cop, and new box office candidate Non-Stop. The plane-set thriller seems to be lauded by some and loathed by others but the true success of a blockbuster lies in the money but it faced, in the UK, the debut of America’s three-week number-one smash hit Ride Along and, in the US, biblical epic Son of God, which was tipped to follow in the footsteps of The Passion of the Christ to become a surprise box-office sweep. Let’s see how they did.

US:

1. Non-Stop – Director: Juanne Collet Serra – $28.9 million
2. Son of God – Christopher Spencer – $25.6 million
3. The Lego Movie – Phil Lord, Chris Miller – $20.8 million
4. 3 Days to Kill – McG – $5 million
5. The Monuments Men – George Clooney – $4.9 million

UK:

1. The Lego Movie – Chris Miller, Phil Lord – £3.2 million
2. Non-Stop – Juanne Collet Serra – £2.7 million
3. Ride Along – Tim Story – £1.4 million
4. The Book Thief – Brian Percival – £1.3 million
5. Mr Peabody and Sherman – Rob Minkoff – £0.8 million

Non-Stop has cracked the box office this week but the Lego Movie held firm at the top against three major new entries in the UK. Non-Stop made nearly three times less than Taken 2. Compared to its US run, Ride Along made a poor UK opening while WW2 drama The Book Thief made a modest fourth place debut. This week I scored 5/10 taking my running total to 85/180.

US:

1. 300: Rise of an Empire – Noam Murro
2. Non-Stop – Juanne Collet Serra
3. Mr Peabody and Sherman – Rob Minkoff
4. Son of God – Christopher Spencer
5. The Lego Movie – Phil Lord, Chris Miller

UK:

1. 300: Rise of and Empire – Noam Murro
2. The Lego Movie – Phil Lord, Chris Miller
3. The Grand Budapest Hotel – Wes Anderson
4. Non-Stop – Juanne Collet Serra
5. Ride Along – Tim Story

Liam Neeson and Julianne Moore in Non-Stop, this week’s US number one.

Will Arnett, Elizabeth Banks, Alison Brie, Chris Pratt and Morgan Freeman (left to right from Batman) in The Lego Movie, this week’s UK number one.

Weekend box-office – 27th of February to 5th March 2014 – will The Lego Movie build on its success

Can epic animation The Lego Movie keep up its winning ways? You’d think so but McG’s new star bloated action thriller 3 Days to Kill and Paul WS Anderson’s disaster epic Pompeii arrived to challenge the Danish bricks.

US:

1. The Lego Movie – Director: Chris Miller, Phil Lord – $31.5 million
2. 3 Days to Kill – McG – $12.3 million
3. Pompeii – Paul WS Anderson – $10 million
4. RoboCop – Jose Padhila – $9.4 million
5. The Monuments Men – George Clooney – $8.1 million

UK:

1. The Lego Movie – Phil Lord, Chris Miller – £6 million
2. Mr Peabody and Sherman – Rob Minkoff – £1.7 million
3. Tinkerbell and The Pirate Fairy – Peggy Holmes – £1.2 million
4. The Monuments Men – George Clooney – £1.1 million
5. RoboCop – Jose Padhila – £0.9 million

Lego continues its reign of terror on the box office meaning RoboCop, Pompeii and The Monuments Men continue disappointing box office runs. I scored a disappointing 3/10 from last week, taking my running total to 80/170, but hopefully I can improve with these predictions:

US:

1. Non-Stop – Juanne Collet Serra
2. Son of God – Christopher Spencer
3. Pompeii – Paul WS Anderson
4. The Lego Movie – Phil Lord, Chris Miller
5. RoboCop – Jose Padhila

UK:

1. Non-Stop – Juanne Collet Serra
2. The Lego Movie – Phil Lord, Chris Miller
3. Ride Along – Tim Story
4. The Book Thief – Brian Percival
5. Mr Peabody and Sherman – Rob Minkoff

Emmet Brickowski (Chris Pratt) in The Lego Movie, this week’s UK and US box-office number one.

The Super-Bowl 2014 Trailers special: Transformers 4, Noah and more!

We’re not venturing into sports just yet but the American Football extravaganza known as Superbowl is a huge event for advertising. With well over 100 million Americans watching, companies have to pay the whopping sum of $8 million dollars just for a one minute advertising slot. Only the biggest of big budget, big star blockbusters can afford to make the cut so you may be quite surprised when I tell you that among the nine titanic efforts trailered last night is the new project from Darren Aronofsky!

But before we get to that, we have the matter of a movie I recently predicted to make over a billion dollars. I speak of the fourquel of a monster series – Transformers: Age of Extinction.

Director Michael Bay (Armaggedon, Pearl Harbour, Bad Boys) returns to the series after a quick, and unsuccessful, break to make Pain and Gain. The franchise hopes to continue it success with an new human cast with Mark Wahlberg, Nicola Peltz and Jack Reynor, replacing the old guard of Shia LaBeaouf, Rosie Huntington-Whitley and Megan Fox. This time, the Autobots are at battle with the villainous Dinobots and the technology tycoon Harold Attinger (Kelsey Grammer), the former is revealed in the very first trailer. The film also stars Stanley Tucci and Peter Cullen. July 10th.

The second instalment in this nine-part epic is Marvel’s very own Captain America: The Winter Soldier. We’ve seen footage from this before but Superbowl unveiled the second trailer, which offers more in depth look at new antagonist The Winter Soldier (Sebastian Stan). The plot pitches Captain America (Chris Evans) still adjusting to life in the 21st Century as well as working with SHIELD Agents such as Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson), Crossbones (Frank Grillo) and Falcon (Anthony Mackie) to bring down a new menace who’s terrorising Washington. Cap 2 also stars Emily VanCamp, Samuel L Jackson, Robert Redford, Cobie Smulders, Dominic Cooper, Hayley Attwell and Toby Jones and is directed by Anthony and Joe Russo. March 28th.

The Amazing Spider-Man 2 is next. Marc Webb returns to direct the sequel which increases the stakes for Peter Parker (Andrew Garfield) who has to balance life between his superhero alter ego Spider-Man, who’s battling Electro (Jamie Foxx), Rhino (Paul Giamatti) and the sinister father/son double act of Oscorp (Dane DeHaan as Harry and Chris Cooper as Norman), and normal life with the grieving Gwen (Emma Stone) and lonely Aunt May (Sally Field). The new trailer can be found here. To be honest, I’m not that impressed. April 18th.

Following on from their “Across the Internet” campaign, Muppets Most Wanted has launched a new ad in which the new doppelganging villain Clementine literally reaches out to us Across the Internet. Tina Fey, Ty Burrell, Stanley Tucci, Ricky Gervais, Lady Gaga, Tom Hiddleston, Salma Hayek, Christoph Waltz and Danny Trejo make up the human cast alongside the classic Muppets such as Kermit, Miss Piggy, Fozzie, Gonzo, Sam the Eagle, Beaker, Dr Honeydrew, Walter and Animal. Flight of the Conchords/The Muppets’ James Bobin directs. March 28th.

With a premise of no CG, just expensive cars going ridiculously fast, video game adaptation Need for Speed is actually in good shape. It sees newly released ex-con Tobey Marshall (Aaron Paul – Breaking Bad’s Jesse Pinkman) getting back into the dragraces that got him locked up for a year. Upon hearing the news, Marshall’s ex racing partner Dino (Dominic Cooper – Marvel’s Howard Stark) puts a bounty on his head. Scott Waugh (Act of Valour) directs a huge cast including Michael Keeton, Dakota Johnson, Scott Mescudi and Imogen Poots. The superbowl spot can be found here. March 12th.

We return to the aforementioned Darren Aronofsky who, after impressing with the likes of Black Swan, The Wrestler, Pi, Requiem for a Dream, The Fountain, makes his comeback with a huge budget and cast list for his new epic picture Noah. The new trailer is available but I’m shocked that a director as prestigious as Aronofsky would fall to the depths of a Twitter hashtag; this time it’s “#TheFloodIsComing”!. The film stars Russell Crowe, Anthony Hopkins, Jennifer Connelly, Emma Watson, Logan Lerman, Ray Winstone, Kevin Durand, Douglas Booth, Nick Nolte and Frank Langella. April 4th.

Pompeii seems to me like one of the potential box office clunkers of the year with a decent cast list which doesn’t match its huge budget but director Paul WS Anderson (Event Horizon, Resident Evil) may prove me wrong. The new trailer unveils a fair bit of spectacle so the film won’t rely on the cast of Kit Harrington, Carrie Anne Moss, Emily Browning, Jessica Lucas, Kiefer Sutherland, Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje, Jared Harris and Jessica Lucas alone. May 2nd.

3 Days to Kill launched a new trailer too. McG (This Means War, Terminator: Salvation, We Are Marshall, Charlie’s Angles) directs this new action thriller starring Kevin Costner as an dying agent who teams up with his daughter for one last assignment which get him the life saving drug he needs. Also starring Amber Heard, Connie Nielson and Hailee Steinfeld. February 21st.

Lastly, we have another Kevin Costner project. Draft Day sees the manger of American Football’s Cleveland Browns who’s struggling to find the number one draft pick for his team. Costner will star alongside Terry Crews, Jennifer Garner and Ellen Burstyn while director Ivan Reitman (Ghost Busters, No Strings Attached). April 11th