We had a pretty neat opportunity over the weekend film going audience. Pacific Rim, a phenomenal summer block buster that didn’t rely on existing IP, was going up against the scourge of cinemadom, Grown Ups 2.  A win for the former could signal a turning point in the battle between lowest common denominator and inventiveness. Instead Grown Ups made more than it’s predecessor and Pacific Rim settles for 3rd place. We all screwed the pooch on this one people.

But before we get into that, lets give props where props are due. Despicable Me 2 continues its dominating run by coming in first place against both newcomers this weekend. The $44 Million dollar weekend represents a great 46.4% drop proving that the interest in Gru and his minions is not as front loaded as some had suspected. The movie is homing in on mega-hit territory and should finish it’s run well over $300 Million.

But that’s not why we are here people.

Coming in second place was Grown Ups 2 to a total of over $42 million. I think we might now have that pesky question to the life, the universe and everything Douglas Adams wrote a whole lot about. How many millions are people willing to fork over opening weekend to a lazy, low brow ‘family comedy’? 42!

FX has released a first teaser for Charlie Sheen’s upcoming comedy series Anger Management. The teaser doesn’t include any actual footage from the show, as it is just beginning production.

The series is a sitcom version of the 2003 feature film which starred Jack Nicholson and Adam Sandler. In the original. Sandler plays a businessman who can’t express his feelings properly. He is wrongly sentenced to an anger-management program, where he meets an overly aggressive instructor played by Nicholson. The television series is expected to follow a similar format.

The teaser shows Sheen in a coffin, which is a playful reference to Sheen’s turbulent last year, as well as the off screen death of his character on CBS’ Two And A Half Men, and symbolizes his rebirth. We’ll have to see if the show can resurrect the perpetual joke that has been Charlie “Winning” Sheen over the last year.

Check out the teaser after the jump.

In an unbelievable feat of suck, Adam Sandler has swept the annual Razzies awards, which showcase the worst films of the previous year.  Sandler’s Jack and Jill has accomplished something no film was able to in the Razzies 32 year history, winning all 10 categories. That includes both a worst actor and actress for win for the titular characters played by Sandler, which is also a Razzie first as it is not often those two categories would overlap.

Sandler wasn’t “honored” alone, as many of his supporting cast in the film went on to win as well. David Spade, Katie Holmes, and Al Pacino all received awards for the part they played in the travesty that is known as Jack and Jill.

The creative team behind the film weren’t free of the crap storm either, with director Dennis Dugan and the screenwriters all taking home awards in their respective categories.

It seems the popularity of vampires would be winding down with the over-saturation of the market, but Hollywood is moving away from your modern vampire, as seen in Twilight, True Blood, and The Vampire Diaries, and seems to be looking toward the past to keep the craze going. There has been a sudden explosion of projects based on the classic vampire, Dracula. Names ranging from Adam Sandler to Park Chan-Wook are involved in some kind of story about the classical bloodsucker.

According to Deadline, Sony has purchased a pitch from writer Jason Keller that will tell Dracula’s origin story, with Joe Roth and Palak Patel set to produce. Sony would only admit that they intend to start a period franchise, and with Keller credited for the upcoming Snow White re-imagining Mirror Mirror, that might put two franchises on his plate.

With the Academy Awards still fresh in our minds, we can think of all the great films 20111 brought us. It is easy to forget that year also had tons of stinkers and flops, but the Razzie Awards are here to remind us.

The Razzie Award nominees have been announced, and their aren’t too many surprises. Adam Sandler has a record 11 nominations, and that’s not including nominations that are tied to his Happy Madison productions. Three films by the production company, Buck Larsen: Born to be a Star, Just Go With It, and Jack & Jill, all have multiple nominations each.

The Razzies, or Golden Raspberry awards, were created in 1980 as an antidote to the Oscars. They are usually held on the eve of the Academy Awards, but this year are moving to 1 April. Traditionally, stars do not turn up to collect their awards, but good sports over the years have included Paul Verhoeven in 1996 (worst director and worst picture for Showgirls), Halle Berry for 2005’s Catwoman and Sandra Bullock for 2010’s All About Steve.

Check out the nominations after the jump, and be sure to keep an eye out for these “winners” when they are announced on April 1.

This is one of those weekends that proves the merit of the American moviegoer. Will people fill theaters to go see Adam Sandler get in a fistfight with himself dressed in drag? Or will they go see a biopic of one of the most important men in US history?

Looks like it was neither, as people would rather see the next Superman take out Mickey Rourke while a bunch of Greek gods watch from above (not to knock the movie, it was entertaining). Opening in just over 3,000 screens, Immortals made it to the #1 spot this weekend with a reach of $32 million in the domestic box office, and over $60 million worldwide.

Sadly, coming in at a (too) close second, Sandler’s Jack and Jill managed to pull in $26 million this weekend, averaging roughly $7,500 per screen. In second and third are last weekend’s top hits, Puss in Boots and Tower Heist, which are still making strong money.

It’s a great world we live in when talented people like YouTube’s Pbonanno can take two videos and combine them together to create something funny. In this case the two videos in question are footage from the 1979 George C. Scott film Hardcore, about a man searching for his daughter in the seedy underbelly of society, and the upcoming Adam Sandler “comedy” Jack and Jill where he plays himself and his wacky sister.

Adam Sandler playing both roles? I know, funny right? Um, no. Not. At. All.

To be honest, I pretty much felt the same way as Mr. C. Scott when watching the Sandler trailer. To see what I mean, take a look at the video after the break.

In it, you’ll see the exact reaction to the trailer I’m talking about. I would bet you’ll feel pretty much the same way after seeing it too.

As far as the movie goes, it’s pretty obvious someone lost a bet or something or Sandler has pictures of them with farm animals or children. That’s the only explanation for this kind of crap getting made.

Anyway, click on through for the video. If you care, Jack and Jill comes out later this year.

There aren’t nearly enough animated horror comedies out there these days. Burton managed to capitalize on not only Nightmare Before Christmas but Corpse Bride as well, Monster House may be one of the only ones to make it onto that list. After that, the list falls to mainly puerile comedies that only appeal to those under 20.

That may be changing with the cast announced for Sony’s upcoming Hotel Transylvania. Here’s the full breakdown from THR.

Adam Sandler leads off a voice cast that includes Kevin James and Andy Samberg for Hotel Transylvania, a 3D family comedy from Sony Pictures Animation. James is voicing Frank/Frankenstein while Fran Drescher is his in-your-face, over-the-top and larger-than-life bride.

David Spade plays Quasimodo, once the hunchback of Notre Dame and now a crazy, passionate gourmet chef. Steve Buscemi and Molly Shannon will play Wayne and Wanda, a pair of married, harried werewolves, parents to an ever-increasing litter of pups, who are looking forward to their family vacation at the hotel.

The film’s title, Just Go with It, may appear to be a description of the plot, but it could just as easily be applied as a message to the audience. If you plan on going to see this movie, don’t think about it too much and “just go with it”.  The film is the most recent product of “Happy Madison,” Sandler’s production company, whose reputation  is so abysmal that none of its 23 features have received a “fresh” rating from Rotten Tomatoes. I highly doubt that this film will alter that statistic. However, it is certainly not the foulest of the bunch.

While I can’t remember the opening shots of the movie, the first visuals that I do recall is that of a giant, poorly applied prosthetic nose. I bring this up, not because it is particularly funny or that it served any purpose to the plot, but because it is this kind of ridiculousness that drives a lot of the humor in the film. Adam Sandler plays Danny Maccabee and the nose was attached to him. In a flashback scene, he leaves his own wedding, brokenhearted, after learning about his fiancée’s unabashed infidelities.

He winds up in a bar with a faux wedding ring around his finger and learns something that changes his life. Apparently, being married helps men pick up chicks. He loses the nose, becomes a plastic surgeon and a libertine of sorts, all with the help of his wedding ring. The women he catches don’t appear to have a shred of intelligence, but they do all seem to be hot and this serves Danny’s relationship aspirations for roughly the next twenty years.

Grown Ups is anything but. You won’t find a shred of maturity here, but you will find the following in abundance: fart jokes, bunion jokes, breast-feeding jokes, Salma Hayek’s amazing rack (clothed, but still), physical pratfalls, teen aged girls in short-shorts, and five grown men acting like complete idiots. The laughs are cheap, but they are there for the taking.

I laughed at a lot of stuff I shouldn’t have, but I also laughed at Joe Dirt, if that is telling.  This is the same type of movie, and there is obviously a segment of the population who will seek it out this weekend.  This panders to the lowest common denominator of comedy appeal.

I think the filmmakers knew exactly what type of movie they wanted to make, and mission accomplished.  If you howl with laughter anytime a character farts in a movie, you are in for a real treat.

Five childhood friends who played on the same basketball team when they were younger are brought back together for their coach’s funeral. Adam Sandler is the successful one, with a hot headed trophy wife (Salma Hayek) and spoiled brat kids. Kevin James is the rotund family man married to Mario Bello, who still breast-feeds their four year old (hilarious!)

Chris Rock is an emasculated stay at home dad with a nagging mother-in-law and ungrateful wife (Maya Rudolph.) Rob Schneider is a new-age vegan married to a woman old enough to be his grandmother, and David Spade still fancies himself a ladies man (really?)