2012 in Film: Good Films You Probably Missed in Theaters.

And so begins my annual 'films of 2012' list round-up, where I try to do more than merely compile the '10 best and 10 worst' of the year.  It's often just as much fun to talk about films somewhere in the middle, the underrated gems, the hidden gems, and the overrated would-be critical darlings.  This time I'm starting it off with a list of ten very good or great films that you probably didn't see.  This is often among my favorite lists to compile, as it allows me to shine a spotlight on films that perhaps didn't get the attention they deserved.  These are not "underrated" per say.  Most who did see them in fact enjoyed them, but the audience was too small in number for all of the films mentioned below.  As always, the following are in alphabetical order.  So, without further ado...

Detention:
Joseph Kahn's genre-twisting and post-modern horror freak-out had the bad luck to open in limited release on the same weekend as the wide release of another somewhat more mainstream self-aware horror exercise.  Of course, opening a youth-skewing genre film in limited release is pretty much box office death anyway, since those who might see it won't know to seek out an art-house and those who frequent art-houses aren't going to see a movie like Detention.  This future cult classic is a completely whacked-out little film, basically playing the conventions of horror films against the hyper-connected constant-communication age that is today's youth.  That's somewhat of a simplistic reading of this film, which blends 90s-era nostalgia with modern-day apathy in a way that comments on both, but I don't want to give away too much.  Let's just say the film goes in completely unexpected places in its final half and it's a hell of a ride.  Does it all work?  Not entirely, but the effort and ambition deserves notice and I can't wait to see what the director of the slightly underrated Torque does next.

Weekend Box Office (04/15/12): Hunger Games fends off Three Stooges, Cabin in the Woods, and Lockout.

In the third-to-last weekend before summer, The Hunger Games fended off a trio of "B-movies" to retain the top spot this weekend for the fourth time in a row.  But the ranking is arbitrary and the real news is (as always) the numbers themselves. There were three new wide releases this weekend and none of them were expected to set the box office on fire.  None of them did, although Fox had a surprisingly solid debut for the Farrelly Bros' The Three Stooges.  Despite painful trailers and an initial batch of lousy reviews, the film played well to family audiences and reviews seemed to improve as reluctant critics took in a matinee show and came out surprised.  The picture opened with $17 million, which is good for the third-biggest debut for the Farrelly Bros, behind the $22 million debut of Shallow Hal in 2001 and the $24 million debut of Me, Myself, and Irene in 2000.  Since Shallow Hal, the comedic directing duo have not had a film gross over $45 million in the US, so this spry opening should help them pass that particular benchmark even if it collapses next weekend.  Although it scored a rare 3x weekend multiplier, so it's not hard to imagine the film having token legs until summer arrives.   The film earned a B- from Cinemascore, with a 'C' from audiences over 25 but an 'A' from audiences under 18.  This $30 million production should be quite profitable especially when you factor in the seemingly invincible 20th Century Fox foreign marketing machine (this could easily be another Fox film that earns $60 million here but $120 million overseas).  While the Farrelly Bros have probably peaked critically and commercially, as long as they can bring in comedies at $30-40 million, they can probably do what they want for the rest of their careers.

Weekend Box Office (04/08/12): Hunger Games tops $300m, American Reunion and Titanic 3D open slightly soft.

Whatever my issues with The Hunger Games in terms of its quality as a film, its continued box office might can only be a good thing.  Considering the current trend of studios basically remaking/rebooting/rehashing every remotely popular property over the last thirty years, the fact that this NEW adaptation from a NEW novel is going to be among the top three grossing films of the year by a healthy margin can only be a good lesson.  Anyway, The Hunger Games topped the box office for the third time in a row this weekend, dropping a perfectly reasonable 43% in weekend three, for a weekend haul of $33.5 million.  This gives the film a massive $302 million in seventeen days, which is the second-largest such haul for a film outside of summer in history.  That's the fifth-biggest seventeen-day total in history, and 11 days ahead of Alice In Wonderland, the closest non-summer competitor and just two days behind Avatar.  Forget Twilight comparisons, it's already passed Eclipse, which is the highest-grossing entry in the series.  And forget the majority of the Harry Potter series, as it's $14 million away from surpassing Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone and it's already tied with the $303 million 17-day total of  Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows part II with significantly larger second and third weekends to boot.  At this point, it's playing like Spider-Man 2 and the last Harry Potter film, with stronger weekends but lighter weekday grosses.  The second Spidey pick ended its third weekend with $302 million and ended its domestic haul with $373 million, while Harry Potter 7.2 ended with $381 million.  Factoring a rather busy April and the coming summer onslaught, that's as good a place to predict as to where the first The Hunger Games ends up.

Review: The Raid: Redemption (2012) plays both sides, crafting non-stop action while creating sympathy through unrelenting fear.

The Raid: Redemption

2012
100 minutes
rated R

by Scott Mendelson

It would be easy to write off The Raid: Redemption as merely a coldly mechanical genre exercise.  Much of the film is basically one brutally violent action sequence after another, with only a bare minimum of plot and character to keep our rooting interest.  That the action sequences are generally superb may not negate the fact that the film comes close to feeling less like a feature and more like a glorified demo reel for second-unit choreography.  But writer/director Gareth Evans's film elicits a most unexpected reaction from the audience, one that allows us to take a rooting interest in those doing the killing and those being killed.  Put simply, The Raid: Redemption is a genuinely scary film.  The characters may be thin, and the majority of the plot is explained in the first ten minutes.  But the film so viciously establishes the stakes that it is often more terrifying than exciting.