<i>American Sniper</i> Shatters January Box Office Records. What Other Films Were January Darlings?

Clint Eastwood-directed American Sniper has generated a lot of hype, including six Oscar nominations. While being nominated for an Academy Award doesn’t guarantee box office success–the other seven 2014 Best Picture nominees combined have grossed less than Transformers: Age of Extinction–American Sniper has had the best January of any American film, ever. Expected to pull in about $40 million in its opening weekend, Sniper grossed closer to $100 million, more than doubling up the next highest-grossing January film, Ride Along. (A side note: through some sort of sorcery, American Sniper is considered a “2014” film but has had its opening in January. Check out its IMDb entry.) http://youtu.be/99k3u9ay1gs This is big news in the film industry because January is typically a slow month for movies. You get a lot of late Oscar-bait pics that don’t exactly burn up the box office. If you want proof, the sixth highest January opening was 1997’s Star Wars (Special Edition). That’s right, a Star Wars rerelease with a bunch of glossed up effects and useless additions. There have been some January bright spots, though. Here are my favorites: --Cloverfield (2008): one of my favorite horror/monster movies of the last 10 years. Although by 2008 the shaky cam thing had been done to death, it worked as a narrative device for this film even if a little jarring. The emotional engine of the movie was cliché but still well done for a monster flick. The creature, though, was what really sold it for me: lumpy, asymmetrical, gross. My wife and I disagree vehemently about whether or not the monster should have been revealed. I say yes. It was so well designed, so repulsive, that it would have been a shame not to show it in full. She says no. The movie was scarier with fleeting glimpses of the creature or parts of it. And never the twain shall meet. --Black Hawk Down (2002): this movie is gritty and real. Yes, I know it’s a movie and lots of parts have been dramatized, but damn, some of those scenes: Tom Sizemore barely flinching as bullets are hitting the building right behind him, the medic doing his work, the American soldiers trapped in the downed helicopter–these are some heart-stopping moments. To think that people actually went through things even approximating what was on screen… --Along Came Polly (2004): I wanted to hate this movie for some reason. I’m not even sure why I watched it in the first place. Like I Love You, Man, though, I was pleasantly. Ben Stiller at his best can carry a comedy (There’s Something About Mary), and Jennifer Aniston was an able romantic interest, if almost unbelievably flighty. ACP also introduced me to Ethiopian food, which is wonderful. Lexington has no Ethiopian restaurants (try Sav’s on S. Limestone for West African, but Ethiopian is east), so you’ll have to drive to Louisville’s Queen of Sheba. Totally worth the trip. --Taken (2009): this is the first movie we get to see Liam Neeson as a complete modern badass. (I say “modern” because he was gnarly in Rob Roy, what with hiding in cow corpses and sort of losing but really winning sword fights with Tim Roth.  Video may be a little NSFW) Unbelievable and ridiculous? Sure! But so enjoyable that I just didn’t care. In fact, Neeson played such a convincing ass-whooper in Taken that studios brought him back for Taken 2 and Taken 3. Taken 4 is slated for 2016, in which Neeson exacts revenge on Comcast execs for their company’s shitty customer service. http://youtu.be/27M5KWI_q50 --I haven’t yet seen Gran Torino or Zero Dark Thirty, but I hear both are amazing. I will never see Paul Blart: Mall Cop. I’m still not sure exactly why WB decided to premiere American Sniper in January, but it seems to be working. We’ll see in a few weeks if the Academy agrees.