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Well, today’s the day! In many countries, Wanted opens in theaters today. It’s been getting some pretty good reviews. MSN Movies gave it 4.5 out of 5 stars, while Rotten Tomatoes gave it a 74% (which is actually pretty good for RT!) and calls it a “fast-paced, crackling thrill ride tailor-made for the Summer audience”.
I agree with that. It’s the perfect Summer blockbuster extravaganza to me. I like movies with a deep and meaningful story, movies like The Kite Runner; I like artsy foreign films like Amelie. But sometimes I just like to sit back and enjoy a high energy action flick with impossible story lines and stunts that would leave real people dead. I like to just let go of reality and watch a movie that is laced with adrenaline, and every trailer or clip I have seen promises that Wanted is exactly that.
I can’t wait to see it. Our weekend is too packed to see it now, but I’m hoping to see it next weekend. My birthday is coming up in less than two weeks so I’ve already decided that would be one fun thing to do to celebrate.
Who’s going to see it this weekend? If you do see it, please leave your review here in the comments, but please be sensitive about any spoilers for the people who are still going to be waiting awhile before watching it.
(Ha, I just heard the preview for the movie on my local radio station as I was uploading the photos. Angelina Jolie has such a distinctive and seductive voice.)
Images used with permission: Splash News Online
WHOPEE!!!
2 of Angie’s flicks in top five – #2 and #4!!!
nklec posted this at imdb -
So Wanted, Universal’s Angelina Jolie/James McAvoy starrer, debuted to $19.1M Friday and $17.5M Saturday from 3,175 venues for a $51.1M weekend. It marks a new franchise for the studio which expected only $35+M from this stylish summer actioner. It turned out to be the best June opening ever for an R-rated movie, beating Knocked Up’s $30.6M, and the 6th highest R-rated opening of all time (behind The Matrix Reloaded, The Passion Of The Christ, 300, Hannibal, and Sex And The City) and the 3rd biggest R-rated action film (behind The Matrix Reloaded’s $91.7M, and 300’s $70.9M). It’s also the biggest opening ever for a live-action Angelina movie and she proved a big draw: Cinemascore said the main reasons given for choosing to see Wanted were the action (67%) and Jolie (61%). Exit polling showed the audience breakdown was 52%/48% male to female, 51%/49% under age 30 to over age 30.
deadlinehollywooddaily.com/
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from http://www.boxofficeprophets.com
Who is to thank for the large success of Wanted? Universal mostly, but big thanks have to go to Angelina Jolie, who might be the leading female summer name working today. She added her voice to Kung Fu Panda, which opened to over $60 million only a few short weekends ago, got Mr. & Mrs. Smith above $50 million, and helped open Beowulf over $25 million. The woman embodies sex appeal, and brought males out in force for the aptly titled Wanted. Also, her adoptions and willingness to take on human rights issues ring true with women, which may have made the fairer gender more apt to check this one out (and James McAvoy would have helped in that department as well). McAvoy is turning into a star, and the above-the-title recognition for Wanted adds to the success he found in Atonement, and will find if he ends up in The Hobbit as Bilbo Baggins.
As stated, Wanted was once a graphic novel, and with a string of hits coming out of the graphic novel industry, this one won’t be the last. The poster boy for the graphic novel is 300, the film that starred no one but looked cool, as it became a $70 million opener and a $210 million domestic finisher. Sin City opened to $29 million, finished with $74 million, and now has two sequels lined up for the near future. V for Vendetta also earned over $70 million domestically, and the list goes on. Graphic novels are the perfect fit for Hollywood films – they can be over-the-top, violent, and drip with good ideas. Hopefully, we will see many more in the near future.
nklec posted this at imdb.
from http://www.boxofficeprophets.com
Who is to thank for the large success of Wanted? Universal mostly, but ***big thanks have to go to Angelina Jolie, who might be the leading female summer name working today.*** She added her voice to Kung Fu Panda, which opened to over $60 million only a few short weekends ago, got Mr. & Mrs. Smith above $50 million, and helped open Beowulf over $25 million.
The woman embodies sex appeal, and brought males out in force for the aptly titled Wanted.
*****Also, her adoptions and willingness to take on human rights issues ring true with women, which may have made the fairer gender more apt to check this one out*****
(and James McAvoy would have helped in that department as well). McAvoy is turning into a star, and the above-the-title recognition for Wanted adds to the success he found in Atonement, and will find if he ends up in The Hobbit as Bilbo Baggins.
nklec posted this at imdb -
So Wanted, Universal’s Angelina Jolie/James McAvoy starrer, debuted to $19.1M Friday and $17.5M Saturday from 3,175 venues for a $51.1M weekend. It marks a new franchise for the studio which expected only $35+M from this stylish summer actioner.
It turned out to be the best June opening ever for an R-rated movie, beating Knocked Up’s $30.6M, and the 6th highest R-rated opening of all time (behind The Matrix Reloaded, The Passion Of The Christ, 300, Hannibal, and Sex And The City) and the 3rd biggest R-rated action film (behind The Matrix Reloaded’s $91.7M, and 300’s $70.9M).
*****It’s also the biggest opening ever for a live-action Angelina movie and she proved a big draw: Cinemascore said the main reasons given for choosing to see Wanted were the action (67%) and Jolie (61%). Exit polling showed the audience breakdown was 52%/48% male to female, 51%/49% under age 30 to over age 30.*****
deadlinehollywooddaily.com/
Referred to Angelina’s big draw, and her adoptions/humanitarian work being part of that draw.
OK, this is silly. 2 box office analyses from 2 websites under mod. 2 sentence post about the analyses’ crediting Angelina – also under mod.
Hey guys! Wanted is in the top box office with $51.1 mil already, I knew it. I haven’t seen the movie but I knew it’s going to rock the movie goers. Angie’s still the #1 actress, bar none…
I’m very happy for Wanted & The whole cast, Angie commands the box office for a rated R movie that’s really awesome. I knew she will pull this one, to all who haven’t seen the movie yet, go out & watch it. Really a great & full of action movie.
God bless the Jolie-Pitt’s.
@Lara
I didn’t see that scene either. I didn’t even realize it was missing till now.
I saw Wall-E today and I have to say WANTED was better. (Got a free mini poster for WANTED =] Its awesome Cause you get to see Angie and her matching gun. My little sister got one for Kung Fu Panda But Tigress wasn’t on the poster. =[)
And it is rare to see people clapping at the theaters these days with a bunch of crappy movies and every once in a while there are some exceptional movies (Like Wanted) where people applaud. =] (When I saw Enchanted people were clapping after each song!!)
What a ride? Can’t wait for the DVD to come out! Fox and Wes’s characters played well against each other.
Angie is magnificent and James absolutely rose to the occassion and dare I say he challenged Angie’s limelight very well! I loved all the performances and the twists were not predictable to me.
What can I say about Morgan…Great as usual. I would have wanted to see more of him and Common, but I think am just being greedy now!!!!!!!! LOL
The clapping at end was VERY cool!
@Passerby
LOL you helped Wall-E by paying for it only to sneak into Wanted!
At least you could have given the money to KFP and then snack into Wanted. That way Angie would still have benefitted… hehehe.
It’s a pity about Wall-E the concept is good, but it sounds boring. Particularly with no dialogue for almost 1 hour. But it is Pixar and am sure it was beautifully drawn. Hope to see it this week!
@Passerby
LOL you helped Wall-E by paying for it only to sn%ak into Wanted!
At least you could have given the money to KFP and then gone to Wanted. That way Angie would still have benefitted… hehehe.
It’s a pity about Wall-E the concept is good, but it sounds boring. Particularly with no dialogue for almost 1 hour. But it is Pixar and am sure it was beautifully drawn. Hope to see it this week!
Last night I saw wanted for the third time. This time I took my sister to see it also. She was absolutely enchanted. After the movie I wanted to say something to her and she said “please, be quiet”:))) “don’t talk to me now. I have to realize what just happened”. I believe that she was very shocked about what fox did:)) then she told me that this is the best movie she’d seen in tha past yearor more. And she also told me something, the same thing that I felt after seeing wanted, that she doesn’t want to see any movie for a while, because anything else will seam very bad:))) She was sorry that that was the final representation for that day (we went in the evening) because she wanted to see it again. Somebody knows when it will be released on DVD?
About that blog, I accidentaly run into it quite some time ago and I had the same reaction. Mary Ann, Angie changed her ways of thinking about what was important in her life during the second tomb raider when she addopted maddox. This travel log was recorded some time after. Have you seen beyond borders? I strongly recommend it. Whwn she read the script, a few years before tomb raider was when she began to wonder and to try to find out everything she couldabout the refugees, when she plyed in the first tomb raider and visited cambodgia was when she began to see it for herself and during the second TR she addopted mad and began to work with UNHCR. Even though she read the script for beyond borders several years before the tomb raider series, the film was shot after those two. That’s why it is even more realisticbecause angelina was beginning to work with the UN at that time and you can relate even more to her character. It is one of my favourite movies.
i don’t know why but i just couldn’t get the “cheeseburger-eating scene” in WANTED out of my mind. LOL! it fascinates me!:)
‘beyond borders’ is one of my favorites too. it’s close to my heart coz i want to volunteer for UN or MSF someday. i hope it happens next year.:)
timi, I also want to do that soon. because it’s what angelina said, we are citizens of the world and if we were in their places (the refugees), with no home, no place of our own and with all our loved ones gone, it would be nice to know that there is someone out there who cares. I hope angelina knows that she really brings awareness. At least she brought it to me.
Is it my imagination, or the lights, or have they blonded Angelina’s hair?
@BlessBrangelina
I should have gotten a Kung Fu Panda ticket instead. >_< It was hard to think when the cashier was demanding an ID.
Yeah Wall-E was almost completely dialogueless. But it was one of those awwwww that was cute movies while Wanted is one of those DAMN that was Amazing movies.
[...] been eagerly reading everyone’s reviews of Wanted and I’m glad so many of you enjoyed it. Some of you mentioned that you had trouble [...]
Seemed sort of mindless and souless to me. McAvoy is a great actor. I thought she looked hot but seemed more like she was posing rather than acting. The plot was really kind of silly. Some of the action was cool, but the plot left a lot to be desired. Liked the music. I would say overall it was not her best.
Did anyone hear one of McAvoys interview where he was asked about the kissing scene if he was nervous, one interview, he stated that he was uncomfortable due to bad breath, not Angie, but him. Then the other interview, can’t recall if it was access or extra, McAvoy made a comment that he felt like he was kissing a grandmother, now that’s way out of line. Angie is far from being his grandmother and that was not a nice thing to say about a co-star. I can honestly say that, if Angie was not in the movie, I don’t think it would make that much. I’ll try to check which interview that was…
i think it was an interview for BBC radio. angie’s interview was already posted here (i couldn’t remember which topic). she replied to the ‘like kissing his grandmother’ comment. she didn’t take it badly. in fact, she found it so funny! she knew that james mcavoy was just kidding. so i don’t see any problem.:)
jhoey27, I would disagree. I think McAvoy is very very much the star of this film, and it is very much his talent and range that is on display here. I think the Fox role could have gone to any number of beautiful actresses who have action talent. That said, I think a lot of people will see it because of her… I did… but he’s going to be a very big actor because he is very talented.
Carrie, his talent has nothing to do with it, I guess, due to his young age, he’s quite tackless in his interviews. I just did not like his choice of words referring to kissing Angie like kissing a grandma. That is not a nice comment, Angie is not that old.
Carrie,
Could you name the beautiful actresses who have action talent you have in mind?
How young is he really? as a grandmother myself I know kissing Angie can’t be like kissing a grandmother (I wish) Angie is very young herself. Sometimes it is hard to express yourself across cultures even when the language is the same. So perhaps he meant something else and couldn’t quite express it in American english
I do hope 33 is not considered old these days geez.
Jhoey
He was joking, trying to downplay the nosiness of the press. I think tha’t the only quetsion they ALL prepared to ask him. Ridiculous people.
@Carrie
LOL really, any beautiful actress? Where did she pose? You do realise posing requires deliberate stance(s). Don’t agree mate! At all! Angie’s talent was very evident, James was fabulous and so was Angie.
@ carrie just for discussion who among the beautiful actresses in hollywood could play FOX as good as angelina! fyi angelina is the only female star in hollywood who does 80% of her stunts when doing an action film! also if angie would just pose in a movie she will not get an oscar or will not be able to command $15 mil per film!
i don’t think james meant anything bad by the grandma kissing comment. i believe he just meant that for filming purposes the kiss was so strategic that any passion or, for lack of a better term, juiciness was drained out. i’m having a hard time explaining things right now … but just to get on point, i think it just wasn’t a comfortable situation because they were snogging in front of a film crew, and while they were kissing, the director was probably telling them to move their heads a certain way so the camera can get a good shot from interesting angles. so yeah, it would be hardly romantic. i’m sure under different circumstances, james would have enjoyed angie’s lips. but they made the kiss look very good, despite james’ discomfort about his breath. hehe.