Leap Year

What's the story: Normally, we're of the mind-set that Amy Adams can make anything better—witness Julie & Julia, where the "Julie" story line would have been completely worthless had it not been for her total investment—but even we have to draw the line with Leap Year. Ms. Adams stars as a woman who travels to Ireland so that she can propose to her boyfriend on Leap Day, because Irish tradition says he's not allowed to say no. Naturally, trouble occurs when she encounters a handsome pub owner (Matthew Goode, a long way from A Single Man), who may or may not be her one true love. Bored yet? The reviews for Leap Year have been so bad, even Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel has a higher rating on Rotten Tomatoes. Avert ye eyes, folks!

Who should see it: Manhola Dargis.

Daybreakers

What's the story: The year is 2019 and a viral outbreak has turned everyone on earth into a vampire. Fun, right? Except without any humans, there isn't any blood. Enter Ethan Hawke as a vampire hematologist (we swear), who must create a synthetic blood to save the vampire race. Or something. Think I Am Legend meets Twilight, except without any of the financial success.

Who should see it: Edward Cullen.

Youth in Revolt

What's the story: For those of you wondering when Michael Cera would play something other than "Michael Cera," we present Youth in Revolt. In Miguel Arteta's long-awaited adaptation of C.D. Payne's coming of age novel (seriously, this was supposed to come out in the fall), everybody's favorite hoodie-wearer plays not only the same lovelorn teen we're used to seeing, but also his alter-ego—a foul-mouthed, ne'er-do-well Frenchman (with a mustache!) named Francois Dillinger. The reviews have been solid and the trailers look fun, even if they can't be bothered with actually saying co-star Zack Galifianakis' name. At the very least, Youth in Revolt has to be better than Leap Year.

Who should see it: Snooki.

Thanks to Quentin Tarantino, business was a-boomin’ at the box office over the weekend. Inglourious Basterds scalped the rest of the field, pulling down a very impressive $37.6 million, good for not only first place, but also the biggest opening of the acclaimed director’s career. For Mr. Tarantino’s brother-in-arms, Robert Rodriguez, the news wasn’t as celebratory: His kids film, Shorts, landed in sixth place with just $6.6 million. It could have been worse for Mr. Rodriguez, though: The weekend’s other new release, Post Grad, opened in tenth place, with just $2.8 million. As we do each Monday, here’s a breakdown of the top five at the box office.

1. Inglourious Basterds: $37.6 million ($37.6 million total)

Call us Tarantino apologists—and we probably are—but this feels like one of the more impressive bows of the summer. How else to qualify Inglourious Basterds—a R-rated film with a running time north of two and a half hours, and featuring more subtitles than your average trip to Film Forum—grossing more than the openings of Funny People, Public Enemies, Bruno and The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3? Credit for this should probably go to the marketing campaign put together by the Weinstein Company, which sold audiences on a wham-bam revenge flick starring Brad Pitt. That Mr. Pitt only appears in roughly half the film should cause a precipitous drop next weekend, but by then it won’t matter. Basterds is already a winner.

2. District 9: $18.9 million ($73.4 million total)

Cloverfield, this is not. With a better-than-expected 49 percent decline from last weekend, District 9 has reached $73.4 million overall, meaning $100 million is within easy grasp. We wonder if the successes of this and Inglourious Basterds, two critical darlings, have forced certain film critics to rethink their notion that audiences are stupid. …

3. G.I. Joe: Rise of Cobra: $12.5 million ($120.5 million total)

Um, probably not. Would you believe that not only is Rise of Cobra still raking in the dough—a mere 44 percent depreciation from last weekend—but also that it crossed $120 million domestic and has an outside shot at reaching $200 million overall? Maybe there is something wrong with the viewing public.

4. The Time Traveler’s Wife: $10 million ($37.4 million total)

Fresh off the news that The Time Traveler’s Wife would go to series (thanks, ABC!), the feature film version dipped a reasonable 46 percent during its second weekend and continues to steamroll towards $60 million domestic. With a manageable $40 million budget, it looks like the bottom line of The Time Traveler’s Wife is going to make a lot of people happy, even if the film itself did not.

5. Julie & Julia: $9 million ($59 million total)

With the lowest decline in the top 10—a ridiculously slim 25 percent—Julie & Julia has officially become the leggy hit we envisioned it would be when it opened. The Meryl Streep–Amy Adams paean to cooking and female empowerment has grossed $59 million to date and could conceivably cross $90 million overall with some luck. Plus, the film helped Julia Child get her first New York Times No. 1 best seller over the weekend. Bon appétit, indeed!

1. District 9: $37 million ($37 million total)

Score one for the film critics? The critically acclaimed aliens-among-us treatise wound up opening only $3 million behind last year’s similarly viral Cloverfield. Neill Blomkamp’s film has already earned back its $30 million budget, but for Sony’s sake, hopefully the word of mouth holds up better than it did with Matt Reeves’s monster movie. In weekend two, Cloverfield tumbled an outrageously bad 68 percent. Stay tuned.

2. G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra: $22.5 million ($98.7 million total)

For all the talk of how terrible G.I. Joe is, that it “only” dropped 59 percent this weekend has to be considered a huge win. Think about it: Rise of Cobra held up better in its second weekend than other big ticket events like X-Men Origins: Wolverine, Terminator Salvation, Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince and Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen.

3. The Time Traveler’s Wife: $19.2 million ($19.2 million total)

If we’re to believe actress Mindy Kaling, there are a lot of happy gentlemen this morning. Despite being delayed for almost a year, The Time Traveler’s Wife scored a fairly impressive opening weekend, making it yet another female driven romance to perform admirably this summer. We’ve been waiting for Rachel McAdams to become the next Julia Roberts, but instead, it looks like she’s a female version of Ryan Reynolds. In the right vehicle, she can find a huge opening (see: Wedding Crashers), but mostly, she’s good for midrange box office receipts.

4. Julie & Julia: $12.4 million ($43.6 million total)

Slow and steady wins the race. Julie & Julia dipped a sturdy 38 percent this weekend, pushing its cume just under $44 million. With nothing on the horizon for adult women over the next few weeks and, presumably, better word of mouth than The Time Traveler’s Wife, Nora Ephron’s foodie flick could wind up grossing upwards of $80 million. We were expecting more, but this still has to go into the ledger as a late-summer win.

5. G-Force: $6.9 million ($99 million total)

Disney’s G-Force easily topped the opening weekend of the Will Ferrell–produced The Goods: Live Hard, Sell Hard ($5.4 million) to finish fifth over the weekend. In the process, G-Force came just short of crossing the $100 million barrier. Such is life for the Frat Pack in the summer of 2009: A bunch of talking guinea pigs have grossed more than Year One, Land of the Lost and now The Goods, combined.

It turns out that people in the flyover states like movies, too! At least that’ll be the meme running through the blogosphere today as G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra exploded into the No. 1 slot this weekend, grossing an estimated $56.2 million to pace the field. Landing in second was the cooking comedy Julie & Julia, which whipped up an estimated $20.1 million, meaning this could be the third summer in the last four that has seen Meryl Streep open a movie over $20 million. (Before you send Ms. Streep a card, though, keep in mind that when the final numbers are released later today, Julie & Julia might dip below $20 million.) Unfortunately, the weekend’s other wide release, A Perfect Getaway, was anything but: The Honeymoon thriller opened in seventh with just $5.7 million. As we do each Monday, here’s a breakdown of the top five at the box office.

1. G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra: $56.2 million ($56.2 million total)

Score one for the inner children in all of us. The Rise of Cobra still faces a tough slog on the path to breaking even—with a production and marketing budget nearing $300 million, the film will need to crack that number worldwide to have a chance—but this could have been a whole lot worse. As it stands, Rise of Cobra is the fourth biggest opening ever in the month of August, behind only The Bourne Ultimatum, Rush Hour 2 and Signs. We guess Paramount knew what they were doing after all.

2. Julie & Julia: $20.1 million ($20.1 million total)

Is it sacrilege to call this opening a bit of a disappointment? With The Great Meryl becoming a legitimate box office draw in the last five years, we were expecting something more from Julie & Julia. To wit: Not only is this opening lower than both The Devil Wears Prada ($27.5 million) and Mamma Mia! ($27.7 million), it’s also lower than other female-centric pictures this summer like The Ugly Truth. Nora Ephron’s comedy will definitely have legs—and, more important, it was cheap to produce—but this isn’t the smash we anticipated.

3. G-Force: $9.8 million ($86.1 million total)

With the exception of (500) Days of Summer, which expanded to 817 theaters and grossed 34 percent more than it did last week, G-Force and its 44 percent drop is the proud owner of the lowest decline in the top 10. At $86.1 million total domestically, the talking guinea pig comedy has to rank as one of the more surprising hits of the summer.

4. Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince: $8.8 million ($273.8 million total)

Everyone’s favorite boy wizard continues to rake in the cash, as The Half-Blood Prince is now up to an eye-popping $815 million worldwide after just 26 days of release. Domestically, David Yates’ film is now the fourth biggest hit in the franchise and could wind up behind only the first film, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone, before all is said and done.

5. Funny People: $7.8 million ($40.4 million total)

Last weekend’s No. 1, Funny People, slipped a Bruno-like 65 percent to fall into fifth place, and barely edged out weekend three of The Ugly Truth ($7 million/$69 million total) in the process. At this rate, Judd Apatow’s lengthy dramedy might have a tough time crossing $60 million, meaning it will be the lowest grossing movie of his directorial career by over $40 million. Ouch. We’re guessing next time he’ll stick with a more marketable premise.

After a week of slightly disappointing returns at the box office, Hollywood braces for a rebound with two major genre releases: One for the 10-year-old inside all of us and one for all of our mothers. Five movies hit theaters today, as August gets started in earnest. As we do every Friday, here’s a handy guide to the new releases.

Julie & Julia

What’s the story: If you’ve read the New York Times in the last month, chances are you’ve already seen plenty about Nora Ephron’s Julie & Julia. As gossipmonger Nikki Finke has reported, the Paper of Record mentioned Ms. Ephron 15 times over a recent 30-day period. For those of you without subscriptions, though: Julie & Julia chronicles Julie Powell (Amy Adams) and her quest to make every recipe in Julia Child’s seminal book, Mastering the Art of French Cooking, over the course of a year, while also charting the rise of Ms. Child (Meryl Streep) in postwar Paris. The buzz on Ms. Streep’s performance is deafening, so don’t be surprised when the Greatest Actress of Our Time™ garners her 16th Oscar nomination come 2010. As for the movie, the reviews have been very good, but almost all of them seem to agree that the parts centering on Ms. Adams’ Julie aren’t nearly as compelling as the Meryl stuff. Bon appétit!

Who should see it: Rachel Ray.

G.I. Joe: Rise of Cobra

What’s the story: Everything about G.I. Joe: Rise of Cobra is overblown, from the budget (which reportedly reached a hilarious $175 million) to the marketing campaign (which cost an also-hilarious $150 million) to the controversies about how Paramount has handled its release. Now that the film has finally arrived in theaters, here's what we do know: A cast of also-rans—among them Channing Tatum, Sienna Miller, Marlon Wayans and Dennis Quaid—and, inexplicably, Joseph Gordon-Levitt star in Stephen Sommers’ take on the “real American heroes.” Expect lots of explosions, corniness and a boatload of Razzie nominations.

Who should see it: Film critics.

A Perfect Getaway

What’s the story: From director David Twohy (Pitch Black, the writer of The Fugitive), A Perfect Getaway seems like an ideal late-summer thriller, especially in a summertime that has given us a decided lack of thrills. The Hitchcockian honeymoon-gone-wrong film finds Steve Zahn and Milla Jovovich playing a pair of newlyweds who encounter two other couples (Timothy Olyphant and Keile Sanchez & Chris Hemsworth and Marley Shelton) and soon realize that they might be murdering psychopaths. Or are they? Cue ominous music! The reviews for A Perfect Getaway haven’t been great, but our Rex Reed gives us hope, specifically citing the always-interesting Mr. Zahn in a rare leading man role. Who doesn’t love the Zahner?

Who should see it: Your newly betrothed friends.

Paper Heart

What’s the story: Bust out your best hoodie and enjoy Charlyne Yi (Knocked Up) and Michael Cera (everything else) in this mockumentary about the true nature of love. The hook here was that the two stars were reportedly dating in real life, but now that the film is complete, Ms. Yi has been saying that they were never actually a couple. And we thought those crazy kids were going to make it. Too bad.

Who should see it: Maeby Funke.

And! For some indie fun, check out the Charlie Kaufman–like Cold Souls, starring Paul Giamatti.

Nora Ephron loves to cook. Nothing fancy, like pheasant stuffed with pate and truffles in Champagne brandy, but you can order her meat loaf at the Monkey Bar. She also loves movies, and makes so many good ones that with a surfeit of junk polluting marquees everywhere, she’s become something of a treasure. In the kitchen or in the movies, she’s had her misses. At the stove, I imagine she’s no stranger to a fallen soufflé or an over-salted stew, and on the screen, it takes work to forgive a pair of catastrophes like Michael and Mixed Nuts (even she couldn’t make Adam Sandler funny). But when she’s on her game, she is perfect. Just to prove it, I suggest—nay, insist—you drop everything and race to see Julie & Julia as fast as your feet, pedals, wheels and walkers can carry you. This movie is an emerald of enchantment in the current sewer of cinematic trap rock.

Julie & Julia is a journey into the heart of transcendental gastronomy based on a pair of books by two women who never met, but who both found their identities and unlocked their souls through the joy of cooking. In 1949 Julia Child, a bovine 6-foot-2 oddball from Pasadena, Calif., shaped like a side of mutton, with a voice that sounded like her tongue had been trussed with cotton twine for tying pork roasts, moved to Paris with her husband, Paul, a diplomat in the American Embassy. Bored and looking for something creative to do during her husband’s assignment, she tried bridge and hat-designing before she signed up as the only woman in a class at the Cordon Bleu school. When she enrolled, she didn’t know how to fry an egg or say “bonjour,” but in the decade that followed, she devoted her life to every culinary detail of French cuisine, and in 1961, with co-authors Simone Beck and Louisette Bertholle, she published the first of two volumes of Mastering the Art of French Cooking, a revolutionary kitchen Bible that taught American housewives to sharpen their knives and tackle beef bourguignon like it was no more daunting than a tuna casserole. Beyond teaching and publishing, she became the first celebrity chef on television (even though she was the butt of many stand-up comic lampoons for sounding too much like a drag queen), famous for dropping food on the floor, scooping it up again and plopping it back into the bouillabaisse. In 2006, her memoir My Life in France was published; it’s been reissued and repackaged for Nora Ephron’s movie. Though 8 feet shorter than her subject and hardly built like linebacker for the Green Bay Packers, Meryl Streep channels Julia Child so magnificently that mere descriptions are rendered impossible.

Cut to 2002, when a mid-level cubicle worker named Julie Powell (played with delicate, undeterred passion by Amy Adams) moves into a cramped little flat above a pizza parlor in Queens and, like her mentor, escapes reality (a stressful job as an administrative assistant listening to the telephone calls of woeful victims of 9/11) in the kitchen. Her goal: to cook her way through the first volume of Mastering the Art of French Cooking, one recipe at a time, and write a blog about it. Her deadline: 524 recipes in 365 days, perfecting everything from A (spics of cold quail) to Z (zucchini in Mornay sauce). The results were published as Julie & Julia: 365 Days, 524 Recipes, 1 Tiny Apartment Kitchen in 2005. The movie catalogs the frustrations and triumphs of both women and their long-suffering, well-fed husbands (Stanley Tucci as Paul Child, and Chris Messina as Eric Powell, both splendid). The stories waffle back and forth, 50 years apart, complementing each other while requiring constant fashion shifts in the styles of shoes, wigs and saucepans. (No Cuisinarts for the original Julia; her first assignment as a Cordon Bleu student reduces Ms. Streep to red-eyed weeping over a mountain of chopped onions. Hilarious!) The imposing narrative trajectory of combining two separate memoirs makes it impossible for writer-director Ephron to avoid fragmentation, but it couldn’t matter less. I was hypnotized from start to finish.

When Julia Child died in 2004, the two chefs had never met (informed of Julie’s project, Julia was not only unimpressed, but curtly refused to include her on the guest list for her 90th birthday party), but the impact left on the younger woman by her mentor has been profound. It’s an awfully good story, well researched, beautifully photographed, hugely entertaining, and oh, baby, the food! Every scene is enhanced by it and the people eating it. Chicken smothered in truffles and cream; gorgeous, towering chocolate layer cakes with fudge frosting that never slides sideways; lobsters swimming in saffron-colored hollandaise—all photographed like Cezannes. You’re shown a raspberry Bavarian cream that looks like a brand-new Ralph Lauren designer paint. What you’re not shown is how hard and time-consuming it is—or what a mess it makes. Ms. Powell’s aspic does slide down the drain, and there are chicken livers all over the floor, but nobody is ever seen doing the dishes or blasting burned caramel off a copper saucepan.

Let’s be honest. Despite the popularity of the Food Network and everybody’s indispensable love affair with eating (to many with hearty appetites, a greater priority than sex), nobody is enough of a purist to really cook like this at home anymore. I don’t know anyone who poaches an egg by dropping it into a pan of boiling water. As Michael Pollan pointed out so eloquently (and verbosely) in last week’s New York Times Magazine, everything has changed. Who has the time, after eight hours at the office, to come home and de-bone six ducks in a reduced orange-pomegranate glaze for dinner guests? Who has the space for Julia’s army of double boilers and earthenware crocks for rillettes of rabbit, the correct cutlery for cutting artichokes on the bias, scraping lemon zest, filleting trout or making paper ring covers for a bourbon apricot savarin? Most regrettably, who can boast the cholesterol levels to accommodate a pound of salted butter for every sautéed chicken liver? When was the last time you turned out flambéed apricot crepes with pear marmalade humming in Cointreau? If this describes you, then I’m coming for dinner.

Never mind. You will have a fabulous time drooling. The cast is a revelation. As Julie and Julia, Amy Adams and Meryl Streep, last seen together as nuns in Doubt, are perfect counterparts and sisters under the skin. They are as different as two women tending their stoves can be, but you still learn a lot about their similarities: Both worked in menial government jobs before they discovered the magic of a salad fork; both married wonderful, supportive husbands; both were lost and found themselves saved by food. Julia’s eight years of globe-trotting while waiting for her masterpiece to be published and Julie’s kitchen heroics in Queens are skillfully intercut. Myriad cooks substituted in the kitchen before each take, and the budget for every dish exceeded the entire cost of Who is Killing the Great Chefs of Europe? and Tom Jones combined. Still, it’s worth the acid reflux. Julie and Julia is the best food flick since Babette’s Feast. Meryl Streep is so versatile that nothing she does surprises me, but one is not exactly prepared to see her hand surgically attached to a wire whisk dripping with beaten egg whites. Diligent, observant and fastidious, she is amazing in the ways she channels Julia Child’s big bones, impossible ’60s hair, bulldog jaw and Cambridge lockjaw voice. I loved them both, but nobody ever tells you what they did with the leftovers.

Ms. Streep looked years younger than her character in a chic blazer over a white blouse, with her hair tied back in a simple ponytail. Ms. Adams was glam in a floor-length gray and white halter dress.

Director Nora Ephron said, “Unlike most romantic comedies, which are about people falling in love, this is about people who are already in love.” When asked who she thought should take over Frank Bruni’s spot as food critic at The Times, Ms. Ephron replied, “Maybe Meryl should do it!”

“If anyone can look like they know how to cook, it’s Meryl Streep,” said chef Anthony Bourdain.

“I am so excited about Meryl Streep, I can’t even think!” said guidebook mogul Tim Zagat. “I was once working for a company that owned Paramount, and Meryl was in a movie, and they said, ‘You’ve got to come down.’ I didn’t know she was there, and I sat down and I realized I was sitting next to her. I couldn’t remember anything after.”

Patrick Martin, executive chef of the Cordon Bleu, mused about how Ms. Child would fare in today’s competitive kitchens: “At the Cordon Bleu, Julia learned a lot of things in terms of techniques—if she was here today, she would have the same talent! Things change, food changes, but not Julia!”

The Transom also caught up with Top Chef Masters host Kelli Choi, who said the celebrity she’d most like to see in a kitchen is “President Obama! If he was cooking up a burger or something—I think he’s really into food.”

“You’re on the wrong side!” someone shouted at Martha Stewart, who stood behind the press to get a picture of her friends strolling down the carpet. “I know! I’m blogging!” she shouted back, snapping pictures of Atlantic Monthly food writer Corby Kummer.

Actor and comic genius Bob Balaban, meanwhile, discussed the perils of eating on film. “In a movie, they show you taking one bite, but you ended up taking 150 bites!” he said. “You have rehearsal, there are 15 angles, you have to eat a lot!” Mr. Balaban, who has a few dietary restrictions (“I don’t eat meat, I don’t eat dessert, particularly—I don’t eat butter, cream or cheese. It’s impossible to feed me!”), said cooking at home can be difficult.

Luckily, he added, “My wife is a really, really good cook!”