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Redneck America Verbally Bitch Slapped by a Gay Man. Fabulous!

The Weekend Box-Office Round Up / Dustin Rowles

Box Office Round-Ups | July 13, 2009 | Comments (33)

Bruno, unsurprisingly, debuted at number one over the weekend, although it does appear that, for a $30 million opening, it’s a soft one. It grossed nearly half of that on Friday ($14.4 million), and had a precipitous drop on Saturday ($8 million), not only suggesting that word of mouth was bad, but that the extended box-office outlook for Bruno (and the idea of these Gotcha! Squirm films) is bleak — my guess is that Bruno won’t make it past the $60 million mark. which should be just enough to cover the legal expenses for all the lawsuits that will be filed against the movie.

Personally, I am a little disappointed. I agreed with Dan’s review on the comedic merits of the film, but there was one aspect of Bruno that absolutely thrilled me. For all the gay stereotypes and the over-the-top, often stupid, flamboyant humor in Bruno, it wasn’t a movie that was mocking gays, it was one that vilified homophobes. And as a guy who grew up with a gay father in backwoods Arkansas (among many of the same people, no doubt, who were actually at the cage wrestling match at the end of Bruno hurling gay slurs), it was really satisfying to see a film that made homophobic America look like the evil, redneck twits they are. And while Bruno is a character, those assholes aren’t. So, despite the fact that Bruno was drinking champagne out of some guy’s ass, it was those hateful, bigoted fuckers that looked like the sorry sons of bitches they are and who were being laughed at in much the same way as they’ve been laughing at gays for decades. In a very small way, they got a little spiritual comeuppance. Bruno tore redneck homophobes a new assholes, and then he fucked them in it. Bravo.

Anyway, enough about Bruno, although it should be noted that it opened with $4 million more than Borat, but the $128 million that Borat made is way out of the reach of Bruno, especially up against Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince this week.

Meanwhile, Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs had a fairly small drop-off from its opening weekend (31 percent), to put up another $28.5 million (also of note, after the official numbers came in from last weekend, it had edged out Revenge of the Fallen for the top spot. Initial tallies had them tied). Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs has piled up $120 million after 10 days, while, Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen — which came in at third with $24.5 million — has now made $340 million. I hope you’re happy, America. It is now not only the top grossing film of the year, but the top grossing film adapted from a TV show and the number one robot film of all time. Happy, happy, joy, joy!

Rounding out the top five, Public Enemies had a 44 percent drop from its opening weekend; it put up $14 million to land at number four (it has totaled $66 million now), and The Proposal clung, for another week, to the top five, putting up another $10 million to bring its total to $113 million, threatening also to steal away the incorrectly applied term “sleeper hit” from The Hangover.

Noteworthy, also, was the tepid debut of I Love You, Beth Cooper, which opened at number 7, with a meager $5 million, which makes it the 4,226th biggest money-maker of all time. It hardly deserves the position. Chris Columbus hasn’t had a stinker this big since Hearbreak Hotel in 1988.

Here’s your top five:

1. Bruno ($30 million)

2. Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs ($28.5 million; $120 million)

3. Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen ($24.5 million; $339 million)

4. Public Enemies ($14 million; $66 million)

5. The Proposal ($10 million; $113 million)


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Comments

claire bear can SUCK IT!

Posted by: gp at July 12, 2009 11:37 PM

it was really satisfying to see a film that made homophobic America look like the evil, redneck twits they are.
---
Yes, I am shocked -- SHOCKED! -- to learn that there are bigots in America! Who knew? Thank you, thank you, SBC, for revealing the truth. The scales have fallen from my eyes thanks to you. Give that man a Nobel Prize!

Oh wait, sorry, I meant to say: So the fuck what?

Posted by: , (the commenter formerly known as bucdaddy) at July 13, 2009 12:01 AM

Don't worry buc...one day SBC will make a film that vilifies people who make fun of smartass commenters. One day...

Posted by: The Pink Hulk at July 13, 2009 12:58 AM

HARRY POTTER FUCKING FINALLY.

That is all. Goodnight.

Posted by: figgy at July 13, 2009 1:21 AM

Y'know, I always have said that the generational divide on gays is the Jack Tripper effect. At some point, watching Three's Company, we realized that Jack's faux gay was funny because it made Mr. Roper so uncomfortable. We were laughing at the idiotic homophobe, not at the gay guy. It was a cultural watershed.... 30+ years ago.

Posted by: Edith at July 13, 2009 1:30 AM

I agree with figgy. 11:55 Tuesday. Hope it doesn't suck.

Posted by: Ian at July 13, 2009 3:08 AM

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Posted by: Obama at July 13, 2009 3:43 AM

Yes, Figgy, yes. I'm already wearing my scarf.

Posted by: Lauren at July 13, 2009 6:21 AM

"it was really satisfying to see a film that made homophobic America look like the evil, redneck twits they are..."


Precisely.

Posted by: BarbadoSlim at July 13, 2009 7:19 AM

I'm with you Figgy. Whorish Mouth and I are going to the 12:05 show tomorrow night with her mom. (Whorish Mom?)

Posted by: PissBoy at July 13, 2009 7:53 AM

Bruno tore redneck homophobes a new assholes, and then he fucked them in it.

I can only guess your enthusiasm overrode your writing with that lovely sentence.

Posted by: Cindy at July 13, 2009 7:55 AM

Oh and add me to the HP train, figgy. I'm taking my daughter Wednesday evening - the midnight showing Tuesday is a bit too late.

Posted by: Cindy at July 13, 2009 7:57 AM

Yes, Pissboy, Whorish Mom and I are going to the midnight show tomorrow night, b/c we're all giant Harry Potter dorks. Can't wait!!!

Posted by: Whorish Mouth at July 13, 2009 8:02 AM

Cindy...I don't think running a train at Harry Potter, especially in front of your daughter, is anything a child needs to see.

...at least not until age 11.

Posted by: PissBoy at July 13, 2009 8:03 AM

Sweet!!! The president is Spam-botting our site!!!!

Posted by: PissBoy at July 13, 2009 8:10 AM

Aw come on Pissboy, it's too early for that stuff.

Posted by: Cindy at July 13, 2009 8:10 AM

Never! no such thing as too early when you've only had a total of about 4 hours intermittent sleep over the last 48 hours.

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Posted by: Obama at July 13, 2009 8:12 AM

Work it out with "Obama" then, why don't you?

Posted by: Cindy at July 13, 2009 8:17 AM

I would totally bang Obama. Especially if i could get it on tape. Cuz then I could be famous and popular and relevant to pop culture....like Paris Hilton and that Kim chick who banged the 2nd rate rapper. I guess I'll just click this little link to ___Tallconnect Co M___, so I can meet my special.

Posted by: PissBoy at July 13, 2009 8:30 AM

DR, I certainly hope nobody ever finds your spiritual weakness and exploits it for a movie, 'cause then you might appear to be an evil redneck twit. Everybody doesn't like something, and not liking something doesn't necessarily make a person evil. Good lord, just look at the comments on this site. SBC could make a movie out of how horrible we all are.

In America's cultural climate of 30 years ago, your RyRey man-crush would have made you the butt of a similar type of ridicule.

SBC's humor only succeeds because cultural changes take a long time to pervade all levels of society. There have always been (and always will be) jokes about yokels. But you know what? Those yokels grow your food. They make your clothes. They drive the trucks & trains that bring our precious culture to our doors.

And while Bruno might not be an effort to insult gay people, I know plenty of gay people who are mortified by that kind of behavior. So I think it is functionally insulting to both sides.

Posted by: ahamos at July 13, 2009 9:12 AM

I don't think $30 Million will be enough to cover Bruno's expenses.
I saw that commercial On TV, At the Movies, On Hulu, Within the Murky Depths of a Crystal Ball, Every Time I Closed my Eyes, Among the Entrails of a Freshly Slain Chicken, Burnt into a Tortilla, In the Soggy Leaves Left Behind after a Cup of Tea, and Carved Deep into An Ancient Tablet in Three Languages.
Plus I swear my psychiatrist was writing something about Bruno when I was telling him all this.

Posted by: Optimus Rhyme at July 13, 2009 9:23 AM

Everybody doesn't like something, and not liking something doesn't necessarily make a person evil.

I concede your point, ahamos, and I absolutely agree that Bruno could be, and probably is, considered offensive by a lot of gay people. But the Arkansans featured in this film -- they didn't just not like something. They hated someone. Because he was gay. Hated enough to be driven to violence. I felt a little bad for the "yokels" being mocked in Borat. But these weren't yokels -- they were a mob of evil bastards wearing t-shirts with homophobic slurs and screaming kill the fa**ot, and they probably would have if not for the large security presence. That, by my estimation, does make them evil. They are the same people who leave comments like this one, which I found on Newsweek, of all place:

Lets face it...we all hate fa*gots. Fa*gots are sinful little bugs who know what is right and what is wrong, but they defy god anyway. The fa*gots deserved to be thrown out of the the bar. They have no respect for the sensibilities of the other people, but they expect everybody to understand that they are gay? Please...I will not respect anybody who does not respect my beliefs. If we want to create a morally upright society, we have to get rid of fa*gots. Those perverts should be told in very clear terms that they are not welcome in our society, and that if they want to practice their sinful perversion, they should not come out of their houses and tell everybody how gay is a good thing. Cuz the next time a fa*got comes up to me and asks me to accept him as he is, I am gonna slap the taste out of his mouth. These fa*gots are waging war against god and have to be stopped.

And if someone is going to make a movie ridiculing people like the one who left that comment, I'm all for it.

Posted by: Dustin Rowles at July 13, 2009 9:54 AM

Well said, but I'm totally stealing "I am gonna slap the taste out of his mouth". And again, I haven't seen the movie, so I probably shouldn't defend the people portrayed in it. But I do know that, by and large, people are sheep. All it takes is one or two folks with a vision to lead, and whether they're selling rainbows & puppies or hatred & death, the hoi polloi jumps right on board. People like to belong. And that desire to be a part of a greater whole has led to some dark times in our history.

Here's a fun story:

I spent my first 5 years of school in an exclusive private school. We had one black student, but she moved in different social circles. Then we moved, and couldn't afford to keep me in that school. I went to public school, where I was (for a short while) the only white student. I was scared.to.death. I mean, these were black people. OMG. I cried like a little girl and refused to enter the classroom until another white person went in.

I got better, but it took a long time, and I was a child. These people are adults who've stayed in their insular environments their whole lives. Their ideas and ideals do not seem evil to them, they simply seem like moral imperatives.

And yes, I know I've just offered two divergent explanations where I said I shouldn't defend them at all. It's just part of how I roll.

Posted by: ahamos at July 13, 2009 10:25 AM

I saw The Proposal this weekend and enjoyed it. The theater was actually more than half full, which surprised me for a Friday matinee.

I can't wait for the Harry Potter film, but I refuse to fight crowds. I'll wait a few days and hit it at an off hour.

Posted by: BWeaves at July 13, 2009 10:47 AM

You know, I never put two and two together but... Obama is pretty tall and tech savvy.

Posted by: jM at July 13, 2009 11:31 AM

Pink Hulk,

I'm not 100 percent sure that was meant as a slam, but I'm guessing it was.

So just so we're straight (see what I did there): As a libertarian/conservative, I have no problem whatsoever with gay people. I really, really don't care what other people do out of my sight. It is none of my damn business. If I had problems with you and Jeremy and the other gay people here, I sure wouldn't hang around. But I do, because y'all are funny, and because I'm interested in learning and understanding a little better what your lives are like.

What I'm saying about "Bruno," which I won't see because it sounds exactly like "Borat," which I've already seen and thought was funny as hell, is the same argument that came up about "Religulous" and other movies that make fun of narrow-minded people: Who is this meant for? Is it intended to sway opinions? How? Are redneck bigots (and I like how some people who decry and deplore stereotypes are so eager to stereotype others) going to see this movie? Are the parking lots at the theaters filled with Ford and Chevy pickups with rebel flags and gun racks? Is it not just preaching to the choir?

If you go to Bruno just for the laughs, well, OK: Good on ya. But I'm not sure where anybody would get the idea it makes some kind of relevant statement. The people who would support gay rights, not to mention gay people themselves, I'm pretty sure are already aware there are bigots and homophobes among us everywhere. The people who are oblivious are going to continue to be oblivious (or are they going to wander into "Bruno" by accident and be persuaded?) and the haters are going to continue to be haters, though I believe just like the racial bigots their numbers will dwindle over time with assimilation.

Don't misunderstand me: I think I understand that gay people are going through now what black people went through in the '50s and '60s. This is your civil rights era, I get that.

What I guess I don't get is, what's the point of "Bruno"? To see in it some kind of triumphant shot against the forces of intolerance and hate I think must be a real stretch.

Posted by: , (the commenter formerly known as bucdaddy) at July 13, 2009 11:36 AM

buc...oh shit dude...I didn't mean it to be a slam...I thought we were all just being ascerbic as usual!!

My beef with Bruno wasn't that it was a failed attempt to bolster gay rights (I'm white. I'm male. I'm actually relatively masculine. I haven't faced just a ton of adversity in my short life.). My beef with Bruno was that it wasn't FUNNY. It was just dumb and juvenile. I LOVED Borat and enjoyed the hell out of the discomfort level that movie brought, but this one was just...meh.

Posted by: The Pink Hulk at July 13, 2009 11:58 AM

I have a friend who went to see Bruno in Waco, TX over the weekend, and came out traumatized. Because, the people in the theater were laughing at (and screaming insults at) the fag on the screen, not at the homophobes he was insulting.

Just so you know, the message DOESN'T come across to non-choir members.

Posted by: Drake at July 13, 2009 12:08 PM

"Everybody doesn't like something, and not liking something doesn't necessarily make a person evil..."

I hate, HATE, to come across as being on the same side as a degenerate like Mr. Dustin Rowles, but cousin if your "beliefs" or "likes" come from a place where you would deny, oppress, seek to negate, destroy or demean, any other human being based on their color, gender, religion sexual choice and/or nature then you are evil.

Additionally, if you base your evil behavior on some sort of mandate from an alleged deity then you are also full of shit.

Posted by: BarbadoSlim at July 13, 2009 12:48 PM

Pink Hulk,

Glad we're cool. I loves me some acerbicity.

Acerbidity?

Anyway, I grew up going to a fundamentalist church in the 1960s and '70s, where the people got preached at many Sundays about the evils of the Godless Communists and the homosexuals, and it wasn't always clear which was supposed to be the bigger threat.

They obviously did a lousy job promoting that doctrine to me (my presence here should affirm that, not to mention as a straight guy my fondness for lesbian porn), but many people would assume just from knowing this one thing that the people at my church were knuckle-dragging, fire-breathing Neanderthals, and that could not possibly be farther from the truth.

I know this sounds a lot like I would say, "Yeah, well, it's easy to ignore all the GOOD the Nazis did, isn't it?" But it becomes a lot more difficult (and I believe this is the point ahamos was making too) to hate the haters when you're forced to see them as people, when you sit next to them and dine with them and see them doing their jobs and helping people less fortunate.

I don't go to that church anymore (I attend a Catholic church, which I know in many eyes [I'm looking at YOU, Slim] isn't any better), but the few times I've gone back, they don't talk that way anymore. I think they've learned that kind of rhetoric is not exactly conducive to persuading the heathens that their God is all about love and forgiveness.

Anyway, the point is, defending one group of people by slandering another also isn't exactly conducive to persuading people that your point of view is the correct one, or even one worth listening to.

For my part, I should have been more sensitive to Dustin's feelings about this issue (I was shooting for acerbic too, and probably sounded more asshole). I just don't think the fact that he gets to feel good for five minutes about bigots getting bitchslapped in a movie accomplishes anything, and therefore the worst thing about "Bruno" is that it offers such a hollow victory.

Posted by: , (the commenter formerly known as bucdaddy) at July 13, 2009 2:12 PM

The best thing about humanity, in my experience, is the joy you can take in teaching and watching others grow. I grew up with a Dad who was the world's worst about making queer jokes, but once his son came out, became a flag-wavin', Barbra Streisand-toleratin' PFLAG president. I watched my Mom transform from occasionally intolerant Baptist into a charitable and open-minded Christian who takes the "judge not" suggestion to heart. I got to be witness to my hyper-masculine, undoubtedly-hetero high school best friend step inside a gay bar and have fun at a drag show with me the night I came out to him just because he loved me.

I don't look at these hillbillies and hunters and talk-show audience members in "Bruno" as subhumans. I just see them as folks who haven't yet had the opportunity to get to know a gay person and have a change of heart. Confronting them head-on with the worst of the worst isn't, in my opinion, going to do a damn bit of good, and for that, I think SBC's brand of humor can almost be a little dangerous.

But all that aside, what's important to remember is that, in the end, we gay people are just like everyone else. We're just prettier, smarter, and clearly more stylish.

Posted by: The Pink Hulk at July 13, 2009 6:12 PM

I'm rather sorry I missed this thread while it was unspooling. Always good to hear from Mr. Pink ahamos. There isn't anything else to add, really... except that I can't imagine the circumstance under which I would subject myself to Bruno. I found Borat to be painfully unfunny overall -- there were some good chuckles to be had, but the device wore thin for me very quickly and I spent most of the movie being bothered by the conceit of it (as well as wondering about the judgment of the people who said it was hysterical).

I'm with , on this one: there's simply no creative reason for Borat II Bruno.

Posted by: Che Grovera at July 13, 2009 6:32 PM