Scott Mendelson
- Location
- Woodland Hills, California, United States
- Birthday
- April 02
- Bio
- A ten-year Salon reader, Mendelson also has a film and politics blog/column at Mendelon's Memos: located at: http://scottalanmendelson.blogspot.com/.
He is also a free lance voice over artist and occasionally contributes film reviews for www.ValleySceneMagazine.com.
MY RECENT COMMENTS
- “Patience, patience...
I'm writing the weekend review
right
now!! :-) And yes,
th…”
November 22, 2009 05:45PM - “The first Twilight had a
terrible multiplier (weekend
total
divided by opening
da…”
November 21, 2009 09:10PM - “I'm with you on the $109
million prediction (the math
above
was mainly for
laughs…”
November 20, 2009 02:09PM - “I'm not sure why I typed
that wrong, Mistercomedy. But
much
obliged to the
corre…”
November 10, 2009 04:21PM - “There is a difference,
Chariot, between not going out
of your
way to
acknowledge…”
November 05, 2009 05:10PM
Scott Mendelson's Links
As
I've written before, whenever any movie not primarily involving
white males and/or geek-friendly genres becomes a big hit, the
moralizers come out in full force about how dangerous or unhealthy
said movie is for the target demo in question. Sex and the City: The Movie presents
adult w… Read full post »
Open Salon Weekend Box Office In Review (11/22/09)
If you're a Batman fan or a general guy-centric geek,
you're probably thinking "That was close... too close". If
you're a Twi-fanatic, you're thinking something along the lines of
"We'll get you next time Batman, next time!" (Eclipse comes out June 30th,
2010). Either way, Twilight… Read full post »
Based on my top-secret, patented box office estimation
formula, I hereby state that Twilight Saga: New Moon will gross $81
million over its first three days. No... wait, it will
actually gross $91 million! It will definitely gross $81
million and/or $91 million! How do I know… Read full post »
Roland Emmerich's
2012 almost made back
its $260 million budget in just
three days. The domestic opening weekend was a whopping $65.2
million and the global total was a mammoth $225 million. This is
the seventh-biggest domestic bow ever in November, and just shy of
the $67 million that… Read full post »
Open Salon review: 2012 (2009)
2012
2009
158 minutes
Rated PG-13
by Scott Mendelson
Shock of shocks, Roland Emmerich's 2012 is actually a relatively
satisfying genre picture. It avoids the over reliance on
family melodrama and romantic entanglements that plagued
The Day After
Tomorrow. Unlike that global warming epic… Read full post »
Precious
2009
109 minutes
Rated R
by Scott Mendelson
Precious, based on
Sapphire's novel Push, is a uniquely singular
story. Although it tells a tale of an abused and impoverished
inner-city sixteen-year old girl, it does not claim to represent
all who fall under that category. It… Read full post »
As expected, Disney's
A Christmas Carol
opened at number one
over the weekend. If the opening weekend number of $31
million feels disappointing, it's only because of the film's
excessive cost (about $200 million to make, probably another $100
million to market) and somewhat unreasonable… Read full post »
Open Salon Review: The Men Who Stare At Goats (2009)
The Men Who Stare At
Goats
2009
90 minutes
Rated R
by Scott Mendelson
The Men Who Stare at Goats
is a miserable misfire, completely draining any and all life from
the rather astounding narrative that it is trying to tell. I
have no idea if the stories contained are true, and that frankly
shou… Read full post »
Guy Lodge
and Jeff
Wells have remarked about the new poster for A Single Man, which seems to be going
out of its way to hide the fact that Colin Firth plays a (solitary)
gay man. This isn't a new thing. Marketing campaigns often go
out of their way to hide… Read full post »
A Christmas Carol: The
3D IMAX Experience
2009
96 minutes
Rated PG (for scary sequences and images)
by Scott Mendelson
A Christmas Carol is, above
all else, an astounding visual experience. Other studios
either use 3D to enhance already superior films or attempt to hide
mediocrity. Robe… Read full post »
First off,
the facts. Michael Jackson's
This Is It grossed
$34.4 million in five-days, which gives it a surprisingly high
4.64x multiplier on its $7.4 million opening Wednesday. Its
three-day weekend take was $21 million, more than enough to be
number 01 for the weekend. In j… Read full post »
This Is It:
The IMAX Experience
2009
112 minutes
Rated PG
by Scott Mendelson
There is no getting around the obvious exploitation factor at
play. Regardless of how tasteful and respectful this film is,
at the end of the day, Sony paid $60 million for the rights to this
otherwise private footag… Read full post »
Saw VI
2009
91 minutes
Rated R
by Scott Mendelson
With Saw VI, we see the
surprising sight of a long-running franchise trying to dig itself
out of its own grave. Clearly intended to either be the final
Saw film or at least a
finale to the second three-film arc, the picture goes out of
its… Read full post »
In a somewhat
shocking turn of events that played out like a season finale of
a television series, the long roll-out of Paranormal Activity peaked with a
wide-release debut that handily crushed the opening weekend of the
long-running Saw
franchise. This may not be the end of the fall box… Read full post »
Last Halloween, I took you on a tour of the worst horror films that my wife had forced me to watch over the years. This year, I'm staying positive. Even before the HD boom allowed pretty much everyone to become a filmmaker in their back yard, low-budget horror was always considered… Read full post »
It was good news for everyone at the box office
this weekend. Not only did every major new release open
within or above expectations, last weekend's wunderkind continued
to astonish while the holdovers held just fine. But here's
the odd and encouraging note... every single film in… Read full post »
Where the Wild Things Are: The IMAX
Experience
2009
100 minutes
Rated PG
by Scott Mendelson
It is often said that The
Adventures of Tom Sawyer is a children’s novel that
adults can enjoy, while The
Adventures of Huckleberry Finn is an adult novel that
children can enjoy. This statement in its… Read full post »
Paranormal
Activity
2009
86 minutes (wrongly listed as 99 minutes on most websites)
Rated R
by Scott Mendelson
It is a rare thing to walk into a movie by choice expecting to
dislike if not outright hate it. Yet off I went to a Saturday
evening showing of Paranormal
Activity, praying that it w… Read full post »
Open Salon weekend box office in review (10/11/09)
There are two major surprises
this weekend, both good news for those involved. After
weeks of four or more major releases opening over each weekend,
this weekend inexplicably left but a single wide-opener, which led
to bigger than expected numbers for the weekend's number 01 film
and a d… Read full post »
Whip It
2009
111 minutes
Rated PG-13
by Scott
Mendelson
Whip It is a textbook
example of how you do a formula picture. The plot isn't the
least bit original and you could chart the story using a Mad Libs
puzzle. But the film has style and intelligence to
spare. I wish it deviated… Read full post »
The most talked about movie is not the number one movie
of the weekend. The number one movie is (shocker...) a
well-reviewed 3D animated family adventure based on a classic
childrens' book. Anyone who didn't see that coming...
Anyway, Cloudy With a
Chance of Meatballs opened to $30… Read full post »
Open Salon weekend box office in review for 09/13/09
In this current decade, Steven Spielberg, Michael Bay,
Steven Soderbergh, Peter Jackson, and Brett Ratner have all had
four number one openings. Tim Burton, Bryan Singer, Sam
Raimi, and Christopher Nolan have had three. Counting his
first film on which he was the writer and produce… Read full post »
Before I get into the usual 'what movies grossed what and why', I'd like to take an opportunity to recount the best and the worst moments of summer 2009. It was not the best of summers, and more movies disappointed than not over the May-August season. But there were diamonds (The… Read full post »
Thoughts on the Disney/Marvel merger...
"First Disney/Marvel collaboration: Hannah
Montana refuses to reveal secret identity, she goes to war with
Iron Man. Iron Man wins easily." -- Brian Lynch
Some random, somewhat rambling thoughts about what may be the biggest film-related news story of the year...
Chud's Devin Faraci did a… Read full post »
As expected, The Final
Destination's franchise longevity, audience goodwill, and 3D
gimmick overpowered the grim, painful, and much-distrusted
Halloween II. Both
had rock-solid openings and both lost out on about $7 million
apiece by choosing to open on the same day. The Final Dest… Read full post »
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