We hope Mr. Willis has a more pleasurable stay at the El Dorado than he had at Nakatomi Plaza.

Last time Bruce Willis tangled with a tower, his Die Hard character escaped from the clutches of a German terrorist group with only his trusty Beretta sidearm. We hope his stay at El Dorado at 300 Central Park West, where he just picked up a co-op apartment, is less eventful.

The four-bedroom spread was rumored to be in contract for $8 million, according to New York Post, but as in The Sixth Sense, there's a twist at the end of this purchase: Mr. Willis and wife Emma ended up paying $8.85 million for the fourth-floor unit, according to city records—a bit over the asking price of $8.695 million. (Even celebrities, it seems, can't buy a co-op without listing their name on the need! Or maybe they just wanted the tax abatement?)

Speaking of the asking price, you know a celebrity buy has serious wattage when the seller, U2 bassist Adam Clayton, barely even gets mentioned. But Mr. Clayton is indeed the seller—perhaps he's following U2 frontman Bono down the street to the San Remo?

Meanwhile, back al Dorado, the Willises will be making their home in a fourth-floor unit, once broken up into two rental apartments but recombined to its former glory by Mr. Clayton in the '90s. Mr. Willis's new apartment apartment features a 38-foot formal gallery—"ideal for exhibiting art," according to the listing, held by Halstead brokers Emma and Michael Kerins. Or sitting in your underwear and getting into flamewars on the internet, as the case may be for Mr. Willis.

The original floor plan included four bedrooms, though as the unit is currently configured it features just three—but these are no ordinary bedrooms, with each containing a walk-in closet and en-suite bath. The master is situated in the corner, with both a view of the park (though the fourth-floor unit isn't quite above the tree line) and a south-facing view. Dying hard is exciting and all, but there's nothing like a good night's sleep.

Hayward and Gilman in Moonrise Kingdom.

Preceded by bewildering blogs and Tweets (and even a few genuine reviews) from Cannes (“A Tender Triumph!” “Glows in the Darkness!” “Ode to Arrested Development!”), Wes Anderson’s Moonrise Kingdom is juvenile gibberish about two 12-year-olds who get married in a Boy Scout camp that is too sexually outrageous for the preteen age group it portrays and too tween for grown-ups. Like all Wes Anderson movies, it is naïve, mannered, pretentious and incomprehensible. He co-wrote it with Roman Coppola (yikes! another Coppola!). Together they were responsible for The Darjeeling Limited, one of the worst movies of all time. This one is neither as contrived as The Royal Tenenbaums nor as moronic as The Darjeeling Limited, but its boredom quotient is still stuck in the same unbroken wave of dubious tedium Mr. Anderson is famous for. (It also features another Coppola, the creepy Jason Schwartzman.) What is it with this guy and his awful movies masquerading as “original ideas” that turns otherwise sensible critics into slobbering groupies?  

Set in 1965 at the dawn of the alleged sexual revolution, this frivolous, wafer-thin fable takes place on an island called Penzance with Gilbert and Sullivan overtones off the coast of New England, populated by troops of misfits called “Khaki Scouts” (fearing, I presume, that after one look at the script, the actual Boy Scouts of America might sue) run by idiotic scoutmasters (Edward Norton in his most embarrassing role since the ghastly Incredible Hulk and Harvey Keitel, for whom overacting is a way of life). The lovers are Sam Shakusky and Suzy Bishop (newcomers Jared Gilman and Kara Hayward), two kids who run away into the wilderness in a stolen canoe to eat jerky and play Francoise Hardy records. Well, it’s the 1960s. I guess anything is possible. Anyway, Sam is an unpopular, bespectacled, nearsighted orphan who is hated by the rest of the scouts, so nobody is looking for him. But Suzy’s parents are lawyers who, as played by Frances McDormand and Bill Murray, talk to each other on megaphones and demonstrate immediately and at all times the root cause of their child’s endless problems. Suzy drags along her little brother’s portable phonograph, two heavy suitcases filled with books and cat food, spies on everyone and everything with a pair of binoculars hanging from her neck and invites Sam to feel her breasts after skinny dipping. Together they pitch a tent on the Old Chickshaw Harvest Migration Trail. Soon they are set upon by the gnat-brained island sheriff (Bruce Willis) and the entire nine-member Khaki Scout Troop 55 from Camp Ivanhoe, all of whom fire deadly arrows and kill their pet doggie mascot by mistake. There is also a demented hag in a flaming orange wig from social services (Tilda Swinton, naturally) who wants to ship Sam off to a foster home (or worse). Before it all ends—not a moment too soon, if you ask me—prissy scoutmaster Ed Norton loses his pest control spray, his latrine-inspection detail and his short pants, while the runaway children land in another camp where the mentally challenged Jason Schwartzman enters. But wait. It’s not over yet. The insanity culminates in yet another outrageous visual.

The only thing worth mentioning about Moonrise Kingdom is the sound and art design. The sets and camerawork resemble colorful illustrations from children’s books and crayola drawings from a kindergarten art class. A red gingerbread house with ocean views abates a lighthouse that would be proud to appear in a Bette Davis movie. A field of Indian grass wafts its way in the breeze all the way to the sea. The soundtrack blares Benjamin Britten’s “Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra, Op. 34: Fugue: Allegro Motto,” Mozart’s “Cosi Fan Tutti,” Saint-Saens’ “Carnival of the Animals” and “Honky Tonkin’” by Hank Williams. What any of this overdose of whimsy actually means is anybody’s guess. Pity the kid who wanders in by mistake, thinking this is a movie for children.

In all of his eccentric films, instead of structuring his adolescent fantasies into one coherent narrative, Mr. Anderson throws together lunatic fragments of surrealism that consist mainly of actors making fools of themselves. The result, in the case of Moonrise Kingdom, is what I call transcendentally brainless—an after school special aimed at asinine adolescents over the age of 40.

rreed@observer.com

MOONRISE KINGDOM

Running Time 94 minutes

Written by Wes Anderson and Roman Coppola

Directed by Wes Anderson

Starring Jared Gilman, Kara Hayward and Bruce Willis

1/4

Aziz Ansari and Drake at The Bing Bar

Day 2 of the Sundance Film Festival found The Observer snowbound in the extreme. We're talking enough snow to give Mayor Bloomberg and the New York City transit system nightmares. Astronomic surcharges became the norm as Park City's anemic livery force struggled to even make the most ludicrous time frames: "Yeah I can have a guy up there in like 3 and a half hours?" deadpanned one audacious taxi dispatcher, who seemed to take pleasure in seeing so many city slickers squeal.

Despite the odds, The Observer met up with Ogilvy Entertainment's Creative Director Otto Bell to snag tickets for what would be our first activity of the day—a 3:30 screening of Escape Fire, an uplifting exposé on the pitfalls of the American healthcare system—which marked our event sans bottle service.

• While procuring popcorn, we overheard a cinema staffer: "Dude that's totally the president from 24, and those car insurance commercials..." And in typical Sundance fashion, it totally was.
• Dennis Haysbert found the film "Spectacular!" noting that everyone in America should see it. We had a hard time disagreeing.

Next stop: Back to the den of debauchery and Xbox game demos, the Bing Bar, for Lay The Favorite's cast dinner.

• Seconds in, we find ourselves in front of a freshly bandaged (just a little "don't worry I'm fine" melanoma) William H. Macy who revealed that he took "the Jitney!" to get to where he was at this very instant.
• As it turns out, a slightly more surly Corbin Bernsen "rented a fucking car."
• Mr. Bernsen could pass as a stunt double for co-star Bruce Willis.
• Chick-boner magnet Joshua Jackson claimed that it was in fact "the shuttle bus" that got him here today, which he conceded was "a bit of a smart ass response, but I'm gonna stick with it. Final answer."
• Cigarettes have not been kind to Laura Prepon, but man is her raspy voice awesome. Keep it up, Laura.

A quick stop to the Grey Goose Blue Door for the cast dinner of Arbitrage

• "Troubled hedge fund magnate" Richard Gere illustrated that no matter how many bespoke suits he may be forced to wear on screen, he's most comfortable in jeans and a baseball cap.
• Grey Goose employs a suspiciously attractive waitstaff. We were fine with this.

Sucked back in, we head to Bing Bar to see what Aziz Ansari and Drake have up their sleeves.

• A friendly (read: not so friendly) turf war erupted on the red carpet between film crews for VH1 and MTV after The Observer posited that VH1 clearly had the cooler microphone of the two.
• Mr. Ansari took the stage, promptly reminding everyone just how well he knows Kanye West.
• Drake's seemingly insulting observation that he knew way too many here right now that he didn't know last year ("Who the fuck are y'all?") was incredibly well received.
• Cuba Gooding Jr.

In it's last gasp of life, our phone lit up reminding us that Ryan Raddon aka. DJ Kaskade would be taking the stage shortly at our favorite petting zoo: Tao.

• Door girls at Tao Sundance did not find it amusing when we informed them that their balaclava and floor length parka outfits resembled North Face Burkas.
• Lil Jon somehow didn't smell like pot, an observation that was quickly rendered obsolete.
• Josh Hartnett had nailed down this look that said, "I'm Josh Hartnett."
• Mr. Ansari genuinely cares about the exposed legs of his nearly all-female posse.
• All bars should be open bars.

À demain.

Jane Krakowski of 30 Rock was the first to show, rushing through a covered tent in a powder-blue, knee-length dress and silver pumps with 4-inch heels, but O.C. star Adam Brody was feeling more chatty. We asked about his police record. "Man, I got busted shoplifting, stupidly, as a teenager," he said. "So it was the San Diego Police Department. Actually it was the Fry's Electronics undercover cop." What did you steal? we asked, expecting to hear something expensive. "A camcorder battery," he said.

Wearing a red leather tracksuit, Mr. Morgan zoomed past, creating a mass scramble that left his co-star (temporarily) unmolested by cameras and microphones. Mr. Willis was wearing a silver-tinted suit and tie. "I'm good friends with lots of New York cops and you should be, too," he advised us with an extended finger. "Well, just in a really general way. I play cops, they're cops ..."

Guillermo Diaz, who plays the Mexican gangster Poh Boy in the film, said he had two run-ins with the police but would only talk about being pulled over for a busted taillight when he was 17. "They were cool, they were fine, but I was scared shitless. I mean, I'm Spanish, I got a shaved head, c'mon, man." And the other incident? "It wasn't so good," was all he offered, adding how much he's enjoyed working with actress Michelle Trachtenberg on NBC's Mercy.

ZERO STARS

With so much junk littering the screen these days, the movie business looks like a garbage strike, and it’s beginning to smell, too. The latest pollution from the celluloid dumpster is sub-mental horror called Cop Out, starring Bruce Willis and a screeching, eye-rolling, potty-mouthed comic named Tracy Morgan as the newest team in a seemingly endless stream of mismatched NYPD cop-buddy flicks, on the trail of a stolen baseball card. You can’t make this stuff up. This pair of imbeciles—and the movie they’re in—are about as funny as the contents of a toilet bowl.

The hack responsible for this miserable dreck is director Kevin Smith, whose writing on other films is so filthy it cannot be quoted in the company of anyone who cares about their I.Q. status (this monstrosity was scripted by brother team Rob and Mark Cullen), and whose zero talent as a director of such cinematic brain lesions as Clerks, Mallrats, Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back and Zack and Miri Make a Porno has made significant contributions to the dumbing down of America in general and American movies in particular. It gets even dumber with Cop Out.

There isn’t much to say about a movie this stupid, involving a duo of aging stoners in uniform who patrol Brooklyn and Queens and call themselves White Lightning and Black Thunder, and who spend most of their time on suspension without pay for obvious reasons. One nitwit shoots, stabs, maims and wipes out a Mexican drug cartel that stole the priceless 1952 Pafko baseball card he needs to pay for his daughter’s wedding in order to prevent his ex-wife’s new husband from getting all the credit. Instead of protecting the citizens he’s paid to help, the other nitwit spends his time on duty beating up a teddy bear, spying on his wife with binoculars to see if she’s sleeping with the neighbor and screaming a relentless spew of fetid obscenities in a shameless imitation of Stepin Fetchit, dressed like a cell phone. Instead of a plot, the long and paralyzing vignettes the movie tosses into a Cuisinart of violence for padding feature a 10-year-old car thief; a Mexican Lupe Velez look-alike who holds the key to millions of dollars in offshore bank accounts; a numbing parade of car chases; a mass murderer named Poh Boy who collects memorabilia; and a masked home intruder who takes time out in the middle of robbing his victims to turn their living rooms into bathrooms. Kevin Smith has been quoted saying his goal in Cop Out was to emulate Abbott and Costello, but either times have changed more than I feared, or he’s never seen one of their movies. The Willis-Morgan team is about as on point as four legs with the ankles missing. The sequel will undoubtedly star Adam Sandler and Chris Tucker.

In the comic tradition of the Farrelly brothers, Judd Apatow, David O. Russell and Wes Anderson, this is the kind of critically bilious emetic I would ordinarily pass by, looking the other way. But at the screening for alleged critics I attended, one lady reviewer old enough to know better went into high-pitched squeals of shrieking hysterics every time the cops described in detail their excrement, flatulence and penis size. I don’t even want to think about what this says about the state of movie criticism today, but it’s pretty clear that we will always have moron movies as long as we have moron critics who praise them. Unfortunately, there’s no shortage of either.

I guess it could be worse. The sleep-inducing Cop Out was originally called A Couple of Dicks, so be grateful for small favors. An even bigger favor would have been burning the negative before it left the lab.

Who knew killing zombies was such a lucrative business? Zombieland squished the competition at the box office this weekend, placing first with an estimated $25 million. That gives the horror-zombie-comedy hybrid the second highest opening for a zombie-related film, behind only Zack Snyder’s Dawn of the Dead remake. Elsewhere on the charts, it was mostly disappointment: Ricky Gervais proved he still isn’t an American movie star, as The Invention of Lying landed in fourth with only $7.3 million; while Michael Moore’s Capitalism: A Love Story and Drew Barrymore’s Whip It tied for sixth, each grossing a shockingly low $4.8 million. Though, to be fair, Ms. Barrymore’s Whip It failed in nearly one thousand more theaters than Mr. Moore’s new polemic. Ouch. As we do each Monday, here’s a breakdown of the top five at the box office.

1. Zombieland: $25 million ($25 million total)

This start for Zombieland is very strong for sure—to wit: it grossed more over the weekend than Shaun of the Dead did in its entire theatrical run—but the question to watch going forward is whether or not it can spawn a sequel. (Because, as Scream taught us, it’s all about the sequel.) If word of mouth is great, Ruben Fleischer’s sharp debut could reach over $80 million and we’ll see Zombieland 2: More Zombies; if not, we won’t. Along those lines, how long before the Sony marketing team puts the top-secret-celebrity-cameo-that-wasn’t-top-secret-because-it-had-been-on-the-Internet-for-months into the trailers?

2. Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs: $16.7 million ($82.3 million total)

Even when faced with the 3-D challenge of Disney’s Toy Story franchise, Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs held up remarkably well, dipping just 33 percent and pushing its cume to over $82 million. As this sleeper smash marches its way towards triple-digits, remember that the next animated film coming to theaters is Astroboy on October 23. There are a lot more kiddie dollars for Meatballs to earn between now and then.

3. Toy Story / Toy Story 2: 3-D Double Feature: $12.5 million ($12.5 million total)

As if you needed further proof that the Pixar brand is bulletproof: Disney re-released 3-D versions of Toy Story and Toy Story 2—as an obvious money grab—and the two films still wound up grossing $12.5 million. The moral is simple: if you want your film to succeed, make sure it has an extra dimension.

4. The Invention of Lying: $7.3 million ($7.3 million total)

The good news for Ricky Gervais is that The Invention of Lying had a better start than Ghost Town did last fall. The bad news? That’s not saying much. As much as we love Mr. Gervais, he obviously isn’t capable of carrying a movie on his own shoulders. Clearly talent doesn’t translate to box office dollars.

5. Surrogates: $7.3 million ($26.3 million total)

Speaking of which: that the second weekend of Surrogates could top both Whip It and Capitalism: A Love Story feels decidedly unfair; the Bruce Willis bomb dropped 50 percent from last weekend and yet still easily handled the two films, which grossed $4.8 million each. For Whip It, there isn’t much to sugarcoat: Drew Barrymore can only hope her sparkling directorial debut can find an audience in college dorm rooms for the next decade. Meanwhile, Capitalism: A Love Story is fighting a battle against perception. A $4.8 million opening for a documentary about the financial industry has to be considered a huge win… unless, of course, Michael Moore is involved.

The sun is still shining on Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs! For a second straight week the animated film dominated what was a sluggish session at the multiplex, grossing an estimated $24.6 million and setting itself up as one of the sleeper hits of the fall (not to mention giving us the opportunity to make more weather related puns). Storm clouds did, however, circle around the latest batch of new releases (see?). The $80 million budgeted Surrogates landed in second place with only $15 million; Fame tripped into third with just $10 million; and Pandorum crashed into sixth, accumulating only $4.4 million in ticket sales. Thankfully, it wasn’t all bad news for the freshman class: Michael Moore’s Capitalism: A Love Story banked $240,000 from just four theaters, meaning it averaged a brawny $60,000 per screen. Numbers like that would make even Ben Bernanke jealous. As we do each Monday, here’s a breakdown of the top five at the box office.

1. Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs: $24.6 million ($60 million total)

Ladies and gentlemen: we have legs! The Sony 3-D hit dipped a ridiculously low 18 percent from last weekend and has now crossed $60 million in ticket sales to date. To put this into perspective, the only other number one film to have a smaller second weekend depreciation in 2009 was February’s Taken, and that went on to gross $145 million. With no other animated films on the horizon and obviously great word-of-mouth, the chances are good that Meatballs could follow a similar path.

2. Surrogates: $15 million ($15 million total)

If you take away Live Free or Die Hard, Bruce Willis hasn’t had a live action film gross over $100 million at the box office since The Sixth Sense in 1999, a streak that covers a whopping 17 films. Yikes! We hate to sound so negative, but the shoe fits: it appears the days of considering Bruno a movie star are really just about over.

3. Fame: $10 million ($10 million total)

Apparently learning to fly high means barely hitting $10 million at the box office. Not only did Fame pale in comparison to other dance movies like Save the Last Dance and Step Up, it also wound up doing worse than even the ill-fated Rent big screen adaptation. Why doesn’t Hollywood just make a movie out of Dancing with the Stars and get it over with already?

4. The Informant!: $6.9 million ($20.9 million total)

Despite having an ad campaign that falls decidedly into the bait and switch category—after all, the  movie the trailer sold does not exist on screen—The Informant! held up reasonably well over the weekend, dipping only 33 percent. At this rate, the Steven Soderbergh film could wind up grossing around $40 million overall, a number that is similar to that of Michael Clayton. Of course, Michael Clayton wound up with seven Oscar nominations. We're not sure if the The Informant! will even get one.

5. Tyler Perry’s I Can Do Bad All By Myself: $4.7 million ($44.5 million total)

The Tyler Perry Express continued to roll along over the weekend, holding off the opening of Pandorum ($4.4 million/$4.4 million total) to finish fifth at the box office. What else is there to say about Mr. Perry? By the time it’s done, Bad will probably wind up grossing what an average Tyler Perry movie grosses, almost to the dollar. If there is a more consistent filmmaker in Hollywood, we have yet to see them.

The final weekend of September is upon and dare we say: not a moment too soon. Once October hits, real movies will start opening, but in the meantime we’re left with the rest of these September dregs. As we do every Friday, here’s a handy guide to the new releases.

Fame

What’s the story: Maybe the denizens of Fame actually will live forever. Based on the seminal 1980 Broadway musical, this updated version finds a host of talented newcomers attending a prestigious New York City performing arts school with the hopes of making it big. It’s like High School Musical without Zac Efron!

Who should see it: Rachel from Glee.

Surrogates

What’s the story: We can’t be the only ones who think the posters for Surrogates look like leftovers from the Fox campaign for The Sarah Connor Chronicles, can we? That aside, Surrogates seems like your typically lame sci-fi actioner, with Bruce Willis donning a bad wig and bored scowl to play a cop investigating a series of murders. Futuristic murders! That Jonathan Mostow—the man who once directed the brilliant B-movie Breakdown with Kurt Russell—has been reduced to this is somewhat disheartening.

Who should see it: Summer Glau.

Pandorum

What’s the story: According to one user comment on its IMDb page, Pandorum is “better than Event Horizon and Ghost Ship combined!” Um. The trailer for this scary space film co-starring Dennis Quaid and Ben Foster strives to reach the lofty heights of Alien. But since it comes from producer Paul S.W. Anderson—the man behind the aforementioned Event Horizon plus Resident Evil and Alien Vs. Predator—makes us think this will be decidedly less iconic.

Who should see it: Ripley and Newt.

Capitalism: A Love Story

What’s the story: Have you heard that Michael Moore has a new film? Man, this guy has to get out and do more press, otherwise people aren’t even going to realize! Anyway, unless you’ve been living in a cave, you know the drill: Mr. Moore turns his left-leaning eye towards the financial meltdown and finds no good guys amongst Democrats or Republicans. Prepare to be outraged.

Who should see it: Paul Krugman.

Also opening this weekend: Clive Owen stars in The Boys Are Back, Audrey Tautou plays Coco Before Chanel, John Krasinski gets Brief Interviews with Hideous Men and Tucker Max’s odious I Hope They Serve Beer in Hell will hopefully be ignored.

Because the first thing that pops into your head when you hear the name Kevin Smith is "talented director," Warner Brothers has decided to let Silent Bob helm his first big studio picture. Mr. Smith will get behind the camera for A Couple of Cops (more on this title in a moment), a buddy comedy starring Bruce Willis and Tracy Morgan as a pair of police officers who have to track down a stolen baseball card and rescue a damsel in distress all while being chased by a bunch of gangsters. (Any similarities to the Tracy Jordan comedy Black Cop/White Cop is purely coincidental.) A Couple of Cops is noteworthy because it is the first film Mr. Smith will direct that he didn’t also have a hand in writing; this script was penned by Las Vegas co-writers Robb and Mark Cullen, and appeared on the 2008 Black List as one of the best unproduced screenplays in Hollywood.

At the risk of joining the cacophony of haters already loosening up their vocal chords, we'll say it: this movie could not sound worse. Seriously. Even if this were still the 1980s the premise would be considered overly generic. And while we’d probably see Mr. Morgan do anything, Mr. Willis has a bizarre track record with comedies. The man is undeniably funny, always livening up dramas or action spectacles with a sharp line reading (see Die Hard, Pulp Fiction), but when he’s actually asked to actually do comedy, he tries too hard and invariably fails (see The Whole Nine Yards, The Story of Us). The thought of Mr. Willis hamming his way through A Couple of Cops is already giving us the icks. And about that title: when rumors of this story were originally reported earlier in the week, the film was called A Couple of Dicks (get it?), but in the trades this morning it had already been changed to A Couple of Cops. We guess at least now Mr. Smith doesn’t have to worry about any problems when the DVD appearing on the shelves of Walmart.

All that aside, the biggest issue with A Couple of Cops is Mr. Smith himself. While we won’t deny his talents as a writer (though we’re tempted to), Mr. Smith is just not a good director. Some critics praised the look of Zack and Miri Make a Porno as a step forward in his craft, but maybe that was just because everything was framed properly and no boom mics were visible. And don’t even get us started on his prowess, or lack thereof, with actors; we doubt you’ve ever walked out of a Kevin Smith movie championing how good a performance was. Put it all together and the idea of Mr. Smith handling a moderately budgeted studio picture for Warner Brothers becomes almost laughable. And we thought hiring Zack Snyder for Watchmen was a bad idea…