Weekend box-office – 16th to 29th of August 2014 – will TMNT deem Stallone and co Expendable?

As you may know, we’ve been away a little while so for this week’s box-office scoop we’ll have to cover the past two weeks of ticket sales.

The beginning of the summer season of film produced hit after hit: Captain America 2, Spider-Man 2, Maleficent, Transformers: Age of Extinction, Godzilla and X-Men 7 all greatly impressed. The second half of it has had the odd exception such as Guardians of the Galaxy or Dawn of the Planet of the Apes but has generally underperformed. This week’s attempt at ending a disappointing summer is Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, dim in prospect but the fans of the cartoon are in legion. Last week we predicted it’d top the chart but let’s find out how it really did.

US:

1. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles – Director: Jonathan Liebesman – $65.6 million
2. Guardians of the Galaxy – James Gunn – $42.1 million
3. Into the Storm – Steven Quale – $17.3 million
4. The Hundred-Foot Journey – Lasse Halstrom – $11 million
5. Lucy – Luc Besson – $9.5 million

UK:

1. The Inbetweeners 2 – Damon Beesley, Iain Morris – £12.5 million
2. Guardians of the Galaxy – James Gunn – £3.3 million
3. Dawn of the Planet of the Apes – Matt Reeves – £1.7 million
4. Planes: Fire and Rescue – Roberts Gannaway – £1 million
5. How to Train Your Dragon 2 – Dean DeBlois – £9 million

TMNT hasn’t quite been the smash to elevate this summer from its sunken spirits but it’s still a very impressive debut, similar to this year’s 22 Jump Street and Maleficent. However, it might not have the same legs internationally. Anything over $500 million worldwide may be unlikely. Marvel’s interstellar Guardians have decreased drastically but a half-a-billion gross appears to be on the cards. Disaster thriller Into the Storm has made a fairly modest $20 million while Lasse Halstrom’s latest, The Hundred-Foot Journey, has made a surprise entry in this week’s top 5. In the UK, fans of the hit comedy show The Inbetweeners will likely be thrilled to hear that the second feature spin off of the series now has the title of this year’s highest UK opening weekend, ahead of Transformers: Age of Extinction. This week I’ve scored 8/10.

US:

1. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles – Jonathan Liebesman
2. Guardians of the Galaxy – James Gunn
3. The Expendables 3 – Patrick Hughes
4. Let’s Be Cops – Luke Greenfield
5. The Giver – Phillip Noyce

UK:

1. The Inbetweeners 2 – Damon Beesley, Iain Morris
2. The Expendables 3 – Patrick Hughes
3. Guardians of the Galaxy – James Gunn
4. Dawn of the Planet of the Apes – Matt Reeves
5. How to Train Your Dragon 2 – Dean DeBlois

For the next week of releases, we’re trying to place three new releases in the US box office, no mean task. The Expendables 3, a sequel to a pair of greatly high grossing films and starring one of the year’s biggest ensembles (Stallone, Snipes, Statham, Schwarzenegger, Gibson, Ford, Banderes, Grammer, Li, Crews, Lundgren, Couture), may be set to flop giving a fighting chance to comedy Let’s Be Cops or drama The Giver.

US:

1. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles – Jonathan Liebesman – $28.5 million
2. Guardians of the Galaxy – James Gunn – $25.1 million
3. Let’s Be Cops – Luke Greenfield – $17.8 million
4. The Expendables 3 – Patrick Hughes – $15.9 million
5. The Giver – Phillip Noyce – $12.3 million

UK:

1. The Inbetweeners 2 – Damon Beesley, Iain Morris – £4.3 million
2. Guardians of the Galaxy – James Gunn – £2.1 million
3. The Expendables 3 – Patrick Hughes – £1.7 million
4. Dawn of the Planet of the Apes – Matt Reeves – £1.1 million
5. How to Train Your Dragon 2 – Dean DeBlois – £0.6 million

Considering that previous instalments have taken $300 million plus, The Expendables 3 will have to go down as a huge flop. Well publicised pirating may have been its downfall but I’d think the fact that none of the Expendables have had a non-franchise commercial hit in years. The new TMNT instalment has dropped greatly from its opening weekend but that’ll be no worry to an already impressive domestic tally. On both sides of the Atlantic, Marvel’s space opera Guardians of the Galaxy is continuing to impress. British comedy sequel The Inbetweeners 2 has decreased two thirds of its debut taking of £12 million so the first film’s total of £50 million bay be out of reach. This week I’ve scored 6/10.

US:

1. Guardians of the Galaxy – James Gunn
2. Sin City: A Dame to Kill For – Frank Miller, Robert Rodriguez
3. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles – Jonathan Liebesman
4. If I Stay – RJ Cutler
5. The Expendables 3 – Patrick Hughes

UK:

1. Lucy – Luc Besson
2. The Inbetweeners 2 – Damon Beesley, Iain Morris
3. Sin City: A Dame to Kill For – Frank Miller, Robert Rodriguez
4. Guardians of the Galaxy – James Gunn
5. What If – Michael Dowse

Megan Fox and Pete Ploszek in Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, this week’s US number one.

Joe Thomas, James Buckley, Blake Harrison and Simon Bird in The Inbetweeners 2, this week’s US number one

US remake of The Raid casts Frank Grillo, Spielberg works get release date and Luke Evans features in new poster for Dracula

Indonesia’s action mega-hit The Raid wowed Western audience back in 2011 with its cracking violence proving one of the big thriller hits of the year. Its huge cult following inspired the equally admirable Raid 2 but talks of the inevitable US remake have been taking place for sometime, to the original’s fans’ disappointment. Director Patrick Hughes (The Expendables 3, Red Hill) has cast Frank Grillo as his lead for the English language redo. Grillo is the star of Captain America: The Winter Soldier, End of Watch and The Grey and does have martial-arts credits with a Black Belt in Jujitsu.

After the disappointing end to development of Robopocalypse and American Sniper, legendary director Steven Spielberg is finally back on his feet with two new films, both of which finally gained official release dates. Spielberg (Jaws, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, Raiders of the Lost Ark, ET, The Temple of Doom, The Colour Purple, Empire of the Sun, The Last Crusade, The Lost World, Amistad, Artificial Intelligence, Minority Report, Catch Me if You Can, The Terminal, Munich, War Horse, Jurassic Park, Lincoln, Schindler’s List, Saving Private Ryan). His two new projects are a Tom Hanks (The Da Vinci Code, Captain Phillips, Forrest Gump, Philadelphia) starring Cold War thriller (Oct 2015) and Roald Dahl adaptation BFG (July 2016).

Finally tonight we’ve got a pair of brand new posters for fantasy action Dracula Untold. This marks the feature debut of Gary Shore while Welsh star Luke Evans (The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug, Fast and Furious 6, The Great Train Robbery) will play the future vampire alongside Charlie Cox (Stardust, Broadwalk Empire), Sarah Gadon (Enemy) Samantha Barks (Les Miserables) and Dominic Cooper (Captain America: The First Avenger).

Cold War thriller – October 16th 2015

The BFG – July 1st 2016

Dracula Untold – October 3rd

The Raid – 2015

Toby Kebbell cast as Fantastic Four’s Doctor Doom and Stallone, Statham, Schwarzenegger, Snipes and more in Expendables 3 posters

The recent trend of having a dozen character banners for a blockbuster hasn’t taken a new twist today. Normally, each poster’s unveiling is staggered up to the release but ensemble action sequel The Expendables 3 has taken the risky step of going for every member of the giant cast all at once. It’d be pretty extensive work to publish them all so we’re only going to unveil a quick sample but you can enjoy all of the cast here. The film features Sylvester Stallone, Jason Statham, Terry Crews, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Dolph Lundgren, Jet Li, Randy Couture, Antonio Banderas, Harrison Ford, Mel Gibson, Wesley Snipes, Kelsey Grammer, Kellan Lutz, Ronda Rousey, Victor Ortiz and Glen Powell. Red Hill’s Patrick Hughes directs.

It’s fair to say that Fox have missed out on a major opportunity to cast Dredd and About Time’s brilliant Domhnall Gleeson, who was rumoured alongside Eddie Redmayne and Sam Riley, as Doctor Doom. The Fantastic Four’s nemesis has been confirmed to be portrayed by The Counsellor and Dead Man Shoes star Toby Kebbell. We shouldn’t judge too quickly; Kebbell will be raising his profile with major roles in Dawn of the Planet of the Apes and Warcraft. The four titular superheroes will be played by Michael B Jordan, Kate Mara, Miles Teller and Jamie Bell and are directed by Chronicle’s Josh Trank.

The Expendables 3 – August 15th

The Fantastic Four – June 18th 2015

Action triple-bill special with Need for Speed, The Expendables 3 and Fast and Furious 7

After the tragic death of Paul Walker last month, the production Fast and Furious 7 has been in a halt; the summer 2014 release date fell apart. The sequel will now have to deal with the huge competition of 2015. Star Trek 3 , Warcraft (March 11th), Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales, Avatar 2, Finding Dory (June 17th) and Angry Birds (July 1st) have already spilled into 2016 to avoid ’15’s Batman vs. Superman (July 17th), Ant-Man (July 31st), The Avengers: Age of Ultron (May 1st), Cinderella (March 13th), The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 2 (November 20th), The Bourne Betrayal (August 14th), Assassin’s Creed (August 7th), San Andreas (June 5th), Bond 24 (October 23rd), Mission: Impossible 5 (25th December), The Good Dinosaur (November 25th), Inside Out (June 19th), The Minions (July 10th) and Star Wars: Episode VII (18th December). Fast 7 is directed by James Wan (The Conjuring, Insidious, Saw) and stars Vin Diesel, Dwayne Johnson, Michelle Rodriguez, Jordana Brewster, Tyrese Gibson, Kurt Russell, Jason Statham and the late great Paul Walker.

Need for Speed is a plotless game franchise that relies on the thrill of its gameplay alone for success. While the series has constantly churned out excellence year by year, you wouldn’t think this format would be decent cinematic material but Act of Valor director Scott Waugh is confident that with his brilliant cast, Aaron Paul (Breaking Bad), Dakota Johnson (The Social Network), Imogen Poots (The Look of Love), Michael Keaton (Batman) and Dominic Cooper (Captain America), he can make Need for Speed a hit. An awesome new poster has come in for your own admiration.

You can now relish in the first teaser for The Expendables 3. Red Hill’s Patrick Hughes directs the overgrown cast in this action sequel which features, from left to right in the trailer, Mel Gibson, Harrison Ford, Antonio Banderas, Randy Couture, Jason Statham, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Terry Crews, Dolph Lundgren, Sylvester Stallone, Jet Li, Victor Ortiz, Kelsey Grammer, Wesley Snipes, Kellan Lutz, Glen Powell and Ronda Rousey (aka the least feminine ensemble you’ve ever seen)! Jackie Chan, Milla Jovovich and Nick Cage are still rumoured for roles.

Need for Speed – March 14th 2014

Fast and Furious 7 – April 10th 2015

The Expendables 3 – August 25th 2014