What would movies be without Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson? Honestly, we don’t want to know.
The man can do it all! Action, comedy, voices, badass stunts — you name it. He’ll nail it. Here are nine times he was pretty much the greatest thing to ever happen to modern cinema.
At a loss for what to watch this week? From new DVDs and Blu-rays, to what’s streaming on Netflix, we’ve got you covered.
New Video on Demand, Rental Streaming, and Digital Only
“Inside Out”
No Fear, Anger, Disgust or Sadness required — only Joy is needed for the arrival of Disney Pixar’s blockbuster “Inside Out.” Catch the Digital HD release on October 13; you’ll have to wait until November 3 for the DVD and Blu-Ray. The list of “Inside Out” extras and special features is too long to post here — it’s as expansive as the credits of the movie! — but here’s the roundup for reference.
“Southpaw”
Jake Gyllenhaal is one of those actors who goes through extreme transformations for nearly every role and he does it again in this boxing movie that’s about a lot more than boxing. “Southpaw,” which also stars Rachel McAdams, Forest Whitaker, Naomie Harris, and 50 Cent, has its digital release on October 16, before it drops on DVD/Blu-ray on October 27.
“Vacation”
Ed Helms plays a grown up Rusty Griswold, who takes his family on a road trip to Walley World in this raunchy, star-studded return to the classic comedy franchise. Catch it on digital October 13, before it hits DVD/Blu-ray November 3.
New on DVD and Blu-ray
“San Andreas”
It’s the big one! When the San Andreas Fault rocks our world with a massive earthquake, a search and rescue helicopter pilot (Dwayne Johnson) and his estranged wife (Carla Gugino) make their way from L.A. to San Francisco to try and save their only daughter. Just suspend disbelief and go with it. Special features include audio commentary, a gag reel, a stunt reel, deleted scenes and the featurettes “San Andreas: The Real Fault Line,” “Dwayne Johnson To The Rescue,” and “Scoring The Quake.”
“Dope”
This coming-of-age high school comedy, set in L.A., was a hit with critics and Sundance audiences. Watch Shameik Moore’s breakout performance when “Dope” hits the streets October 13. Extras include “Dope Is Different,” with the cast and crew discussing the film’s central characters and themes of being unique and authentic; and “Dope Music,” with Pharrell Williams, A$AP Rocky, Rick Fumuyiwa and others delving into the essential role old-school rap and punk rock tracks play in the film.
“Tomorrowland”
Brad Bird’s sci-fi adventure, starring George Clooney, Britt Robertson and Hugh Laurie, has its Blu-ray, DVD, and Digital release on October 13. The Digital HD and Blu-ray combo back come with an insane number of special features, including eight deleted scenes, four Easter eggs, and about six featurettes.
New on Netflix
“Beasts of No Nation”
Netflix starts streaming its first original feature film on October 16, which is also the same day it hits theaters. The amazing Idris Elba leads a cast directed by “True Detective” Season 1’s Cary Fukunaga. The story follows Agu (Abraham Attah), a young boy growing up in a West African country on the brink of civil war. When the fighting reaches Agu’s village, his family is torn apart and he is forced to flee. He crosses paths with a group of guerilla soldiers led by a fierce commandant (Idris Elba). Agu is indoctrinated into their ranks as the commandant trains him to cope with his pain through violence.
“Anthony Jeselnik: Thoughts and Prayers”
Netflix is premiering two originals on October 16, and the second is this comedy special from Anthony Jeselnik. As Netflix noted (and the title suggests), “There’s no subject too dark as the comedian skewers taboos and riffs on national tragedies before pulling back the curtain on his provocative style.”
“Jane the Virgin”
On the same day that The CW is premiering “Jane the Virgin” Season 2, Netflix wants to help you catch up on Season 1. It’s all going down on Monday, October 12, so why not make it a Virgin marathon day?
TV Worth Watching
“Fargo” (Monday on FX at 10 p.m.)
The second season of FX’s breakout show is set in 1979, starring Patrick Wilson as State Trooper Lou Solverson, a recently returned Vietnam vet who investigates a crime involving a local gang and syndicate. His father-in-law, Sheriff Hank Larsson (Ted Danson), helps him put the puzzle pieces together. Jean Smart, Kirsten Dunst, and Jesse Plemons co-star, with Nick Offerman, Jeffrey Donovan, and Bruce Campbell (as Reagan!) in recurring roles.
“Saturday Night Live” (Saturday on NBC at 11:30 p.m.)
Tracy Morgan is the host on October 17, marking his big return not only to SNL and NBC, but comedy in general after his near-fatal car accident. Demi Lovato will back him up as the musical guest.
“The Great British Baking Show” (Sunday on PBS at 7 p.m.)
There are a lot of new and returning TV shows premiering this fall, but it’s worth getting yourself addicted to PBS’s baking competition show, brought to the U.S. from the U.K. Right now, PBS is airing Season 2, which is actually the fourth series of the U.K. show. Apparently we’ll be getting these things in random order. No matter. Each episode is scrumptious to watch and the “drama” is never mean-spirited or over-bearing, it’s just good clean delicious fun. The trick is finding when it airs in your area, since it’s not one set time for everyone. Some of us get it Sunday nights at 7 p.m. but head to PBS’s site and check your local listings to see when it’s on for you.
Want more stuff like this? Like us on Facebook.
%Slideshow-326726%
%Slideshow-299636%
“Furious 7” star Dwayne Johnson is going from fast cars to the Porkchop Express.
With the recent announcement that Mr. Movie Franchise Viagra is set to take over for Kurt Russell in the role of truck driver Jack Burton in the “Big Trouble in Little China” remake, we turned to our DVD shelves to find more ’80s classics deserving of The Rock treatment.
From “Beastmaster” to effin’ “Road House,” here are six remakes that need release dates ASAP.
Everyone complains that Hollywood doesn’t make original movies anymore, but when the studios actually do, they don’t always know how to sell them. That was the lesson of “Tomorrowland” last weekend, and it’s the source of this weekend’s cautionary box office tale involving two more original wide-release movies, “San Andreas” and “Aloha.”
Neither movie got very good reviews, but “San Andreas” was generally considered a sure thing, while “Aloha” was expected to disappoint. In fact, “San Andreas” opened on top with an estimated $53.0 million, well above the $35-to-$40 million pundits had predicted. Conversely, “Aloha” debuted in sixth place with an estimated $10.0 million, at the bottom end of its meager $10-$13 million expectations.
Though one is a big-budget disaster movie and the other a mid-budget romantic dramedy, the two films had a lot more in common than you might think. And yet, those elements proved an asset to one and a detriment to the other. Turns out these things matter — except when they suddenly don’t. No wonder predictions for both films were so far off.
Here’s what each movie had going for it — or against it.
Star power. “San Andreas” and “Aloha” both feature A-list male leads coming off the biggest hits of their careers — “Furious 7” for Dwayne Johnson and “American Sniper” for Bradley Cooper. Of course, the disaster movie is a perfect fit for Johnson’s action-hero résumé. Three-time Oscar nominee Cooper is a more versatile actor, but maybe his strong identification with “Sniper” hurt him with audiences who have a hard time seeing such an intense dramatic actor play a low-key romantic lead. (He hasn’t really played this sort of part too often, and even in “Silver Linings Playbook,” he was more intense than charming or funny.) That’s not a knock on Cooper’s performance, just an observation that The Rock has made a career out of satisfying audience expectations, while Cooper routinely defies them.
The fact that “Aloha” also has Emma Stone and Rachel McAdams — and that neither of them helped sell tickets — seems further proof that stardom doesn’t matter that much at the box office. Paradoxically, “San Andreas” shouldn’t have needed any star power at all; disaster movies are all about the spectacle of destruction, not the actors dwarfed by the spectacle. And yet, if Johnson weren’t the star, “San Andreas” probably would have made just the $35 to $40 million that observers had predicted.
Female appeal. “Aloha” was thought to be strong counterprogramming to “San Andreas.” After all, it’s a romance with a handsome leading man and a spunky-everygirl leading lady (Emma Stone). Indeed, Sony exit polling showed an audience for “Aloha” that was 64 percent women. But “San Andreas” wasn’t the macho action fest that Sony might have wanted as competition. Exit polling by Warner Bros. revealed an audience that was 51 percent female. Indeed, Johnson seems to appeal to women as much as he does to men, which is one reason for the success of his “Fast and Furious” installments. Plus, “Aloha” had to go up against several other recent releases with strong appeal to women, including “Pitch Perfect 2” (No. 2 this week with an estimated $14.8 million), feminist action epic “Mad Max: Fury Road” (No. 4 with an estimated $13.6 million), and even “The Avengers: Age of Ultron” (at No. 5 in its fifth weekend, still pulling in an estimated $10.9 million, for a slight edge over “Aloha” that may vanish when final figures are released on Monday).
Older audience appeal. “Aloha” is certainly a movie for grown-ups, and Sony polling found 57 percent of its audience to be over the age of 30. But “San Andreas” pulled in older moviegoers in even bigger numbers, with 70 percent of its audience over age 25. With both films competing for the same ticketbuyers, “Aloha” didn’t really stand a chance.
Director with a track record. Not that “San Andreas” shooter Brad Peyton has much of one. It’s only his third major release, after the “Cats & Dogs” sequel and the “Journey to the Center of the Earth” sequel. Still, the latter movie proved that he and Johnson can make hits together. Plus, all three of his wide releases have been in 3D, which turned out to be a huge plus this time. “San Andreas” made 44 percent of its earnings from 3D screenings, which is a high fraction these days for a 3D movie.
“Aloha” writer/director Cameron Crowe has a track record, too, but it’s a lot more mixed. He specializes in thoughtful romances, though it’s been a long time since his biggest hits. “Jerry Maguire” was 19 years ago and “Vanilla Sky” 14 years ago. (Yes, “Say Anything” and “Almost Famous” are modern classics, but they weren’t box office hits.) A decade ago, he flopped with “Elizabethtown” (a film with a similar plot to that of “Aloha”), and while he had a modest hit four years ago with family dramedy “We Bought a Zoo,” it was anyone’s guess whether or not he’d be able to return to the good graces of audiences and critics this time out.
At any rate, he’s no longer a name that sells tickets. Neither is the obscure Peyton. So all that mattered was whether they could deliver on screen. Which brings us to…
Disregard for critics. Disaster movies seldom appeal to critics. The stories tend to be thin and the characters even thinner. But they’re also critic-proof; audiences find them escapist and cathartic. That was certainly true this time with “San Andreas,” which got mixed reviews but received an A- grade at CinemaScore, indicating very good word-of-mouth among ticketbuyers.
Reviews do matter, however, for grown-up, character-driven movies like “Aloha,” and unfortunately, they were almost uniformly terrible. It didn’t help that Sony didn’t screen the film for critics until Tuesday, three days before it opened, a tactic that critics often see as a sign that the studio isn’t expecting positive reviews. Given the late screenings and Crowe’s lackluster recent track record, it’s possible that there was some reflexive groupthink going on here. But audiences haven’t responded well either, giving the movie a B- grade at CinemaScore, a sign of weak word-of-mouth.
Setting. Moviegoers have shelled out to see Los Angeles destroyed by earthquakes, aliens, even volcanoes for at least the last four decades (since Charlton Heston, the Rock of 1974, saved Angelenos from Sensurround vibrations in “Earthquake”). Maybe there’s some schadenfreude involved. Maybe it’s just Hollywood externalizing its own self-loathing. Or maybe, with all the real tremors, mudslides, wildfires, droughts, and other catastrophes inflicted upon southern California, waiting for the Big One isn’t that far-fetched a disaster-movie premise. In any case, “San Andreas” is just the latest film in a successful pattern.
You’d think Hawaii would make a scenic enough setting to ensure the success of “Aloha,” but here, the setting backfired, earning the movie a wave of bad press from Asian-American activists who decried the movie for whitewashing the island state with a predominantly caucasian cast. (Why there weren’t similar complaints a few years ago for “The Descendants” is a mystery, but at least some of those characters were fully aware of their status as relative carpetbaggers and colonialists.) True, there were probably few potential moviegoers who were aware of the controversy and fewer still who let it dissuade them from buying tickets. But it couldn’t have helped.
Simple title. At least the title “San Andreas” tells you exactly what you’re getting: an earthquake disaster movie set in California. The title “Aloha” tells you you’re getting a movie set in Hawaii, but beyond that, what it promises is ambiguous. Again, it all comes down to marketing. Looks like both films delivered on the promise of their titles.
%Slideshow-290985%
%Slideshow-290985%
If you can’t see “San Andreas” this weekend, Netflix has plenty of disaster movies to tide you over. Sadly, there’s no “Towering Inferno” or other classic ’70s disaster films available at the moment, so why not watch Lloyd Bridges have a disaster-induced meltdown (pre-“Airplane!”) while William Shatner saves the day in 1979’s “Disaster on the Coastliner”?
You can also root for Brad Pitt to stay one step ahead of zombies in “World War Z,” or watch LL Cool J get this close to being shark bait in “Deep Blue Sea.”
But disaster isn’t just the realm of fiction: Acclaimed documentaries revisit the tragedies on Mount Everest, conspiracy theories about a famous plane disaster and the devastating aftermath of China’s Great Earthquake of 2008.
And if it’s So Bad It’s Good cheesiness you’re after, we have one word for you: “Sharknado.”
Movie availability on Netflix is subject to change without notice.
%Slideshow-292463%
Ballers,” this June. Let’s go back and revisit this charismatic entertainer’s Hollywood career in photos for this week’s edition of #TBT. Just look at that smile. (And that sweet vest-with-no-shirt ensemble.) What’s not to love?
Who doesn’t love a disaster movie? The best ones make us laugh, cry, and cheer for the hero — who we hope is wearing a t-shirt that gets ripped or drenched in the course of his heroism. But sometimes the scariest part about a disaster movie isn’t a semi-plausible plot, it’s the horrible tagline.
Test your knowledge of the genre as we revisit some of the best, worst and WTF-iest disaster movie taglines. Spoiler alert: we’re pretty sure whoever came up with the tagline for “Titanic” has never seen the movie.
Too soon?
You know how we all feel like California might fall off the rest of the country and into the ocean if a really huge earthquake hits? Well, now we can see what that might look like in the new trailer for disaster flick “San Andreas.”
A quake of such magnitude hits that Paul Giamatti ominously warns, “The Earth will literally crack open. And you will feel it on the East Coast.” Whoa!
Skyscrapers crumble, infrastructure collapses, and a tidal wave threatens to take out the Golden Gate bridge. In the midst of that, Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson saves Carla Gugino, and the two go on the run to find a way out of the hellscape that California becomes. “San Andreas” looks like a pretty typical disaster movie, with jaw-dropping scenes of destruction and heart-tugging moments of tragedy.
“San Andreas” opens in theaters May 29.
%Slideshow-252069%