It’s always nice when a smaller, lesser known film that has the same release date as a comedy, horror, and a Live 3D concert ends up pulling in the most money for the weekend. Things like this need to happen more.

That’s exactly what happened this weekend as The Help beat out its competitors 30 Minutes or Less, Final Desintation 5, and Glee The 3D Concert Movie for the prized 2nd place spot in the domestic box office.

Of course, given the stunning word of mouth, Rise of the Planet of the Apes pulled through to be #1 again for the second week with an estimated $27.5 million here in the states. That rounds the film out at about $180 million worldwide since it first hit theaters last week.

Meanwhile, Buena Vista’s The Help ended up sliding in at #2 with $25 million. That beat out the other films opening this weekend, including Final Destination 5 which came in at #3 with $18.5 million, 30 Minutes or Less, which came in at number 5 with $13 million and Glee 3D which completely flopped at #11 with $5.7 million.

Next weekend, another barn burner as Conan the Barbarian and Fright Night open to 3,000 screens, while Robert Ridriguez makes his return to the family action flick with Spy Kids: All the Time in the World. Should be fun!

Every massive summer blockbuster season has to have a few surprises. Last year, a little animated film starring Steve Carrell and Jason Segal called Despicable Me surprised everyone and grossed $251 million to date. That may be what we have on our hands with Rise of the Planet of the Apes.

Apes managed to surprise everyone this weekend and pull in $54 million in the first three days here in the states with $77 million worldwide, and with 81% rating at RottenTomatoes you can expect the trend to continue through the workweek and possibly next weekend.

Coming in at #2, the true winner of last weekend’s bout, The Smurfs managed to pull another kid-friendly rabbit out with an estimated $21 million for the weekend, and a total $76 million.

Also hitting theaters this weekend, the body-switching comedy The Change-Up pulled in an estimated $13.5 for the weekend, which may not be such good news for Universal, who spent over $50 million for the production.

I’m by no means a fan of reality television. That being said, I have stuck with some of the traditional shows that gave birth (in a Rosemary’s Baby kind of way) to the current reality programming genre. Those shows are COPS and America’s Most Wanted. I even remember when both shows premiered on Fox, a newbie network at the time…and I probably just dated myself with that comment given they’ve been on for over twenty years respectively.

It was because of my loyalty to America’s Most Wanted that had me shiver a little when I saw the trailer for the upcoming Jesse Eisenberg film, 30 Minutes or Less.  Here’s the premise care of IMDB:

Two fledgling criminals kidnap a pizza delivery guy, strap a bomb to his chest, and inform him that he has mere hours to rob a bank or else…

Sounds pretty funny, right? Pizza delivery guy gets a bomb strapped to him and he’s forced to rob a bank.  I’d be laughing had this not unfolded in real life with far less comedic repercussions.

On August 28, 2003 Brian Wells arrived for work at 11:00 am.  His occupation: pizza delivery driver.  At 1:30 pm Brian was asked to deliver two cheese and pepperoni pizzas to a remote location near the woods.  About an hour after that Brian entered a bank with a bomb strapped to him (around his neck in this case) and handed the teller a note demanding money.

It’s an eerie tale to be sure and when I first saw the segment on America’s Most Wanted I thought, who’s going to be the first to make a movie about that.  At the time I imagined some type of Michael Mann crime drama in the same vein as Collateral. Apparently I couldn’t have been more wrong.

Instead, this real life, horrifying event has been wrapped in what I’m sure critics will call a “laugh-out-loud” buddy comedy.  I have no way to confirm if writers Matthew Sullivan and Michael Diliberti knew anything about what has been dubbed “the collar bomb” case, but according to Wikipedia (take it with a grain of salt) that was the basis for 30 Minutes or Less.

This has been a rather eclectic week in the world of theatrical trailers.  It seems that most of the big summer blockbusters have already been revealed, and now we’re getting a glimpse into the late summer indies that should save us from the mindless big-budget films of the next few months.

What do all these selected trailers have in common?  They all have surprisingly original concepts, which is getting rarer and rarer these days.

Another Earth

Click to see the trailer

This trailer alone is worth a few viewings.  One of the most exciting trailers to come out this year, it is refreshing to see something original finally being produced.  While the idea of a parallel or alternate world is nothing new, I have never seen it taken so literally.  Usually the other world is in an alternate universe, not on a physical planet visible in the sky that you can actually travel to.

Part science-fiction, part philosophical, and part indie-romance, it’s hard to say exactly what this film is going to be like expect that it is sure to be compelling and original.  Starring Brit Marling, who actually wrote the screenplay with the director Mike Cahill, and William Mapother, better known as Ethan from Lost, this film is full of talented people new to the feature film world.  This is Cahill’s first narrative feature, having directed only documentaries prior to this.  But if Blue Valentine is any indication of what a documentary director can bring into narrative storytelling, then this film is definitely not one to miss.

Personally, I am really excited to see what Ethan from Lost can do in a real role, as well as how the filmmakers execute this unbeatable concept.  If this film maintains the heart-wrentching vibe of the trailer while staying true to some real science-fiction, then this could be one of the most exciting films of the year.