The Fast and Furious franchise is among the most curious in cinema history. Over a decade ago, when the first film came out, no one could have foreseen half a dozen films and hundreds of millions in total box office. Yet here we stand looking back at yet another weekend where the number 1 film is both speedy and a little irate.

The film brought in an estimated $34.5 Million in its second weekend, which was just good enough to take first place. The film followed suit with its predecessors and took a nasty dip in weekend number 2, but the lack of a big film releasing during the slow, post Memorial Day weekend left enough room for Vin Diesel to have another weekend with the penthouse view.

The big winner of the weekend, however, is second place finisher Now You See Me. The magician/heist film boasted a way-above-expectation $28 Million, which proves once again that putting Morgan Freeman in you trailers is a fast track to box office windfall. The film has a loaded cast, and provided enough of a change of pace to carve out a really nice audience in the middle of blockbuster season.

In our opinion at least, Will Smith can pretty much do no wrong. Even when he’s in a somewhat questionable movie, he still manages to come out looking good.

His latest, the sci-fi action movie After Earth, looks promising to continue that trend. The only real problem we can see so far is the director, M. Night Shyamalan.

Yeah, we used to think he was pretty great too. But now, not so much. What happened?

Anyway, a new trailer for After Earth has arrived and in it we see Smith and son Jaden, who also play father and son in the movie, crash-land on a hostile Earth a thousand years into the future. Needless to say (but we’ll go ahead anyway) things don’t go as they expect. To say the least.

Look for After Earth to arrive in theaters on June 7th. The trailer is after the break.

Will Smith is a movie star in the truest sence of the word. His charm and charisma are palpable in just about everything he does. Even the horrible films in his filmography have the faintest amount of watch-ability due to Smith. That track record is about to be put to the ultimate test.

Deadline is reporting that Will Smith and his son Jaden have signed on to star in M. Night Shyamalan’s currently untitled sci-fi epic. Here’s the scoop:

The story takes place far in the future where a young boy has to navigate an abandoned planet on a space ship that has crashed. On board is his estranged father.

In absentia of our diligent box office reporter Shannon Hood I’m stepping in to bring you up to speed this week. The top three spots were taken by two remakes and one sequel, the former making me feel like I’d gone through a time warp back to the ’80’s.  It was exciting and a little disconcerting all at the same time.

Taking the top spot was the remake of the 1984 classic The Karate Kid.  For the purists out there you can rest easy knowing the producers did not use the same characters from the original.  While the premise is basically the same Daniel Larusso (Ralph Macchio) and Mr. Miyagi (Pat Morita) have been replaced by Dre Parker (Jaden Smith) and Mr. Han (Jackie Chan). Personally, I thought Jaden Smith was too young to portray the character properly but the audience seemed to disagree with me.

The Karate Kidwent onto make $56 million in its opening weekend.  Given that the budget was $40 million this is certainly decent returns and I have no doubt will lead to a sequel, if not a trilogy.  Way to go Jaden!  Your superstar dad, Will Smith, must be very proud.

News broke a while back that there are plans to return to the Men in Black franchise with a third film and original stars Will Smith and Tommy Lee Jones would also return to reprise their roles. Smith was on board and ready to go, until another film of his got greenlit over at Fox. That film? The City That Sailed. From Variety:

Penned by Andrew Niccol, “City that Sailed” revolves around a New York street magician who is unhappily separated from his young daughter. The girl, who moves to London, finds magic candles that make her wishes comes true, with unintended consequences: The island of Manhattan separates from the continent and floats toward England, bringing her dad ever closer. There’s no director yet on the project.

Smith has been off-screen for some time and hasn’t had a hit since his 2008 film Hancock (which is also being talked about for a sequel). Smith has been wearing his producer pants more lately, with his company Overbrook Films. They’re currently producing the reboot of The Karate Kid, starring Smith’s son, Jaden.

With the deadline for casting coming up for both films pretty soon, Smith will inevitably have to make his decision, which could mean we won’t see a third Men In Black film for quite some time.

It may come as a suprise to some of you but in addition to kicking lots of butt and being a martial arts genius, Jackie Chan can actually act — at least judging from the new trailer for the upcoming reboot of Karate Kid. In the trailer, Chan instructs his student, played by Will and Jada Pinkett Smith’s progeny Jaden, in the ways of Kung-Fu and reminds him that “Everything is Kung-Fu.”

Watching Chan deliver his lines, and this one in particular, actually makes me believe his character and what he feels. In short, it’s just good acting. I’m not saying Chan is ready for an Oscar just yet, but if this trailer is any indication of his conviction and effort in this movie, I may have to rethink my stance on this whole remake. Well, maybe.

Click through to see the trailer in SD or head over to Yahoo for the HD vesion. Karate Kid sweeps the leg once again on June 11.

I defy you to find an 80’s child who doesn’t recognize it when someone poses for the “Crane Kick.” The move was made legendary when it was used to win the “All Valley Karate Championship” at the end of 1984’s The Karate Kid. The film was the beginning of a franchise that became an institution for tons of teens during that decade, and now they’ve gone and remade it.

The reboot stars Jackie Chan as “Mr. Han” and Jaden Smith (The Day the Earth Stood Still and Will Smith’s son), as “Dre Parker.” It’s an updated story that takes the setting from Southern California to Beijing. Mr. Han will be teaching Dre karate (or maybe it will be kung-fu – most American audiences don’t know the difference) and putting him through workouts that might strain Jean Claude van Damme.

The movie also features Taraji P. Henson (The Curious Case of Benjamin Button) as Dre’s mother and has Harald Zwart (The Pink Panther 2, One Night at McCool’s) in the director’s chair. I have to admit there are a couple of cute and funny moments in the trailer, all involving Chan’s interaction with Smith.

There’s even a nice nod to the fly-catching scene in the original film. The only problem I see so far is that the “Crane Kick” seems to have been replaced with a high-splits kick – which just isn’t as cool.

Check out the trailer and let us know what you think.