Entertainment

The Nun II topped the North American box office for the third straight week with an estimated $8.4 million, barely edging out Expendables 4, which opened with a franchise low $8.3 million — far below its projected $15 million. Domestically, the ninth film in the Conjuring franchise has collected $69.2 million, and $204.2 million globally.

Expendables 4 — which saw franchise vets Sylvester Stallone, Jason Statham, Dolph Lundgren and Randy Couture joined by newcomers 50 Cent, Megan Fox, and Andy Garcia — had to settle for second place finish. Since launching in 2010, the Expendables franchise has grossed over $800 million worldwide, with 2012’s Expendables 2 ranking as the most successful of the series.

A Haunting in Venice took third place with an estimated $6.3 million, for a two-week total of $25.4 million domestically and $71.6 million worldwide.

Fourth place went to The Equalizer 3, which picked up an estimated $4.7 million in its fourth week of release. This brings its domestic tally to $81.26 million — just behind the first Equalizer‘s $101 million and The Equalizer 2’s $102 million. Overseas the third Equalizer has grabbed an estimated $67.4 million, bringing its worldwide total to $148.66 million.

Rounding out the top five was Barbie, which scooped up an estimated $3.2 million in its 10th week of release. That brings is North American tally to $632.7 and $1.4 billion globally. 

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The Writers Guild reached a tentative agreement with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers to end its historic 146-day strike.

“The WGA and AMPTP have reached a tentative agreement,” the parties announced in a joint statement Sunday evening, September 23.

Specific details of the agreement weren’t immediately released by the WGA, pending the negotiating committee’s vote. However, the guild touted the deal as “exceptional with meaningful gains and protections for writers in every sector of the membership.”

The WGA told its members that it’s still on strike, but all picketing is hereby suspended.

The Screen Actors Guild — American Federation of Television and Radio Artists [SAG-AFTRA] congratulated the WGA on reaching a tentative agreement with the AMPTP, praising the guild’s “146 days of incredible strength, resiliency and solidarity on the picket lines.”

“Since the day the WGA strike began, SAG-AFTRA members have stood alongside the writers on the picket lines. We remain on strike in our TV/Theatrical contract and continue to urge the studio and streamer CEOs and the AMPTP to return to the table and make the fair deal that our members deserve and demand,” the statement concluded.

It will take a few days for the strike to be officially over as the WGA West and WGA East proceed with their ratification process,” according to Deadline, which cites the WGA’s last strike in 2007-08, when a tentative agreement was reached on the 96th day and it wasn’t over until the 100th.

The late-night comedy shows and daytime talk shows will be the first to return since SAG-AFTRA’s ongoing strike doesn’t include them as struck productions, according to the outlet. Films and scripted TV shows that didn’t sign Interim Agreements with SAG-AFTRA will remain dark until that strike is settled.

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The Movie Emperor, the Chinese-language film featuring global star Andy Lau, had its well-received premiere at the 2023 Toronto International Film Festival in its Gala Presentations section on September 15. 

Ironically, Lau plays Lau Wai-chi, a famous star who badly wants some movie festival cred.

To that end, he’s willing to shed his vanity and go native, so to speak, going on location to lend authenticity to playing a poor villager in an art house film.

However, he soon realizes how accustomed he’s become to being a pampered star.

The comedy takes a satirical look at celebrity and the industry surrounding it, what with Andy’s character having to put up with interviews from decades-younger “influencers” whose fame he doesn’t understand — as well as your usual fizzy showbiz journalists.

“In real life I have encountered some that are much worse than in the film,” Lau says with a laugh, through a translator. 

The movie was directed by Ning Hao, who plays the driven but oblivious director of Lau’s movie-within-a-movie.

However, Hao explains playing a director, and actually directing at the same time, was “chaos” at times —especially during one of the movie-within-a-movie’s fight scenes.

He explains that at one point, after yelling “cut,” he found his crew hadn’t shot anything: They thought he yelled “action” while playing the part of the director.

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David S. Goyer knows a thing or two about the superhero genre: The Foundation writer and executive producer wrote Blade; co-wrote the Oscar-winning Batman movie The Dark Knight; and wrote Henry Cavill‘s hit 2013 Superman debut, Man of Steel, among others.

However, on the Happy Sad Confused podcast, he confirmed what many fans believed at the time — that Warner Bros. was so desperate to catch up to the Marvel Cinematic Universe that common sense started flying out the window, without Superman’s ability to actually take flight.

“I know the pressure we were getting from Warner Bros., which was, ‘We need our MCU! We need our MCU!’ And I was like, ‘Let’s not run before we walk,'” Goyer said.

“I remember at one point the person running Warner Bros. at the time had this release that pitched the next 20 movies over the next 10 years. But none of them had been written yet,” Goyer said with a laugh. “It was crazy how much architecture was being built on air.”

While none of those movies got made, he explained that the studio rushed 2015’s Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice as a team-up movie to try to compete with Marvel’s The Avengers.

The film was seemingly hastily announced at the 2013 San Diego Comic-Con, with DC movie actor Harry Lennix called to the stage to literally read a portion of Frank Miller‘s iconic The Dark Knight Returns — which saw the two heroes famously clash — from a piece of paper.

The Zack Snyder movie underperformed at the box office, and with fans, and the studio kept tripping on their heroes’ capes into 2017’s Justice League.

Marvel Studios is owned by Disney, the parent company of ABC News.

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A real-life version of the massively popular series Squid Game is coming — and from the looks of a new teaser, it will be wild.

Squid Game: The Challenge will feature 456 players competing in a series of games inspired by the Korean-language drama for a grand prize of $4.56 million, which Netflix touts as “the largest cash prize in reality television history.”

The final sum is a play on 45.6 billion won, the Korean currency jackpot in the original show that became a Netflix phenomenon. For the record, that translates to over $38 million.

Still, the jackpot here is nothing to sneeze at: “$4.56 million? People do a whole lot worse for a whole lot less,” one contestant says in the teaser.

A synopsis for the 10-episode show promises “surprising new additions” for fans of the original series and teases that players’ “strategies, alliances, and character will be put to the test while competitors are eliminated around them.”

Squid Game: The Challenge premieres November 22 on Netflix.

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The indie thriller From the Shadows had its Los Angeles premiere this week, and thanks to a waiver from SAG-AFTRA, its cast was in attendance, including veteran character Keith David and Oscar nominee Bruce Davison.

Davison plays the leader of a supernatural cult whose members perish in a mysterious blaze. A skeptical colleague of his, played by David, goes missing, and afterward, an expert in debunking paranormal activity (Selena Anduze) tries to find the truth from the cult’s survivors.

The movie was directed and co-written by Mike Sargent, who has gone from calling the shots on indie movies like Personals to working as a storyboard artist to a radio show host and movie critic. 

“François Truffaut and Rod Lurie — you know, they were film critics who became … filmmakers,” he joked to ABC Audio. 

“But I was actually the other way around. I was a filmmaker who became a film critic. And I will say, being a filmmaker and then becoming a film critic, it’s sort of like being undercover. You know, ‘Ahhh … these are the people who are judging my work.'” 

Sargent says he’s been a fan of X-Men alum Davison since the 1980 film The Lathe of Heaven. “Matter of fact, I used to play soundbites from that movie at the beginning of my radio show for, like, over a decade,” he recalls.

He adds, “Then like 10 years ago, I actually had him live on my radio show … And then 10 years later, now I got to direct him in the film,” Sargent says, calling the situation surreal.  

From the Shadows is in limited release, ahead of an exclusive on-demand run on Vudu September 29 through October 28, just in time for Halloween.

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Visitors can now step into the world of John Wick and its Peacock prequel series, The Continental, with The Continental: The Hotel Bar Experience.

Unlike similar themed pop-ups, the interactive experience takes place inside the actual onscreen setting for the hitman hotel: the Cocoa Exchange building on Beaver Street in Lower Manhattan.

Before visitors enter, they may encounter New York Herald Tribune beat reporter Maggie Lepps, who gives them the scoop: A big-wig has been murdered inside the building — against hotel policy.

Her business card has a tip line, 1-800-968-3005, if one has any clues.

Visitors then follow in the footsteps of Keanu Reeves‘ titular hitman up the “hallowed ground” of The Continental’s staircase.

You can’t get in without exchanging the only currency accepted there: those iconic gold coins; visitors can swap their boring old bills for some.

Inside, there are ample opportunities for Instagram bragging rights in the 1970s setting, from reprints of macabre paintings seen in the film to the mirrored gold chandelier made of rifles, and wallpaper decorated with revolvers.

However, as the reporter alluded to, the visit becomes a whodunit, complete with other actors mingling in with the patrons; they’re keen to spill some tea about the spilled blood.

There’s also food and beverages for sale, including Wick-themed drinks like the Gunpowder Gimlet, The High Table and The Excommunicado.

Good times aside, The Continental’s manager wants to get to the bottom of the murder, and doing so leads visitors into the creepy bottom levels of the building, where they’re quizzed as to what they know and whose side they’re on.

The Continental: The Hotel Bar Experience is open through September 24. It will also re-open from September 27 to October 1 and October 4 to October 8.

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In August, Camila Alves made headlines when she revealed her now-mother-in-law Mary McCabe put her through the ringer when she began dating Mary’s son Matthew McConaughey.

Now, “Mama Mac” is explaining why.

As reported, the Brazilian model and mom to the Oscar-winning actor’s kids, Levi, Vida and Livingston, told the Southern Living’s Biscuits & Jam podcast, “She would call me by all of Matthew’s ex-girlfriends’ names, she would start speaking Spanish with me in a very broken way, kind of putting [me] down a bit. I mean, all kinds of stuff.”

She later said she realized she was being tested, and they now have “the most amazing relationship.”

To ET Canada, Mary McCabe admitted she was trying to rattle Alves’ cage at first.

“My family is big on rites of passage and initiation, and you don’t get into the McConaughey family easily,” she explains. “We test you. Oh, my family, we humbly wait, we make you cry, and then we pick you up and make your favorite drink,” she continued.

“So there are initiations, rites of passage that my family’s always enjoyed,” McConaughey’s mom said.

For his part, actor and author McConaughey noted the moment that Alves broke through to his mom. “Camila goes, ‘I’m not asking your permission anymore.’ And basically, my mom was like, ‘There we go. That’s right.'”

That said, Matthew explained he’s not sure if he and Camila will carry on that thorny family tradition when their kids start dating. Their son Levi is 15, daughter Vida is 13 and their youngest, son Livingston, is 10.

“We’ll see,” he offers. “Talk to me in about three years, and I’ll have a better answer…”

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Rami Malek and Emma Corrin have seemingly confirmed their romance.

Photos obtained by The Daily Mail show the 42-year-old Bohemian Rhapsody actor and The Crown star, 27, kissing in London, while walking their dog.

Corrin wore a long taupe trench coat while sporting a new buzz-cut look. Malek chose a blue baseball cap and jeans.

Rami and Emma ignited dating rumors when they were spotted together at a Bruce Springsteen concert in July. They were also seen cozying up at the U.S. Open earlier in September.

Malek previously dated Lucy Boynton and they’re rumored to have split earlier this year after five years together.

Corrin, who identifies as non-binary and uses they/them pronouns, was previously linked to design and art director Ibrahim “Ibby” Njoya in 2021, according to the outlet.

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The true story of a lucha libre legend comes to life in the new film Cassandro, available to watch on Prime Video Friday.

Directed by Academy Award-winning filmmaker Roger Ross Williams, the film stars Gael García Bernal as gay amateur wrestler Sául Armendáriz, and follows his journey to become Cassandro, an exótico who upends the macho wrestling world.

It’s a story so inspiring that Bad Bunny reached out and asked to be part of the film.

“He’s a really good actor,” Williams said. “He contacted us. He loves wrestling, he wanted to be in the movie.”

Williams, known for his documentaries, knew instantly after meeting Armendáriz that he was someone special.

“The first time that I met Cassandro, I said, ‘You’re my first fiction film. I just know it,’” Williams said. “He’s an inspiration, a revelation. He’s so positive. What he’s done with his life and the way he’s handled himself and done it on his own terms, it’s so beautiful and inspiring to me.”

The film’s composer, Marcelo Zarvos, called Bernal’s portrayal of Armendáriz “infectious.”

“He eats up the screen whenever he’s there,” Zarvos said. “He’s done incredible performances – this definitely ranks among his top three, you know, if not the best. I think he’s so good in it, he really owns it. And you feel like he really understands the character. He went for it.”

And with the film releasing during Hispanic Heritage Month, Williams hopes it will help people feel seen.

“I hope that all of the LGBT+ little Hispanic kids in America, all over the world, are inspired by Cassandro. His story, it’s so important, because he basically conquered the Mexican world of lucha libre on his own terms as himself — authentic and beautiful.” 

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