The remake of The Birth of a Nation and Middle School opened at a pathetic 6th and 7th place respectively.
Well....
Birth of a Nation
isn't so much a remake of the original so much that it's not anything like the original outside of the name. And that's by design, taking the name and power away from the pro-KKK propaganda piece by making a movie against the subject. Which I can respect and admire. Problem is, from what I've garnered outside the controversy, it's basically a film that 12 Years a Slave did better. And paring this with Free State of Jones, we're bound to get a similar boom of WWII/Holocaust movies like in the 90's. One
good movie that does its job and a bunch of similar films, and a bunch of lesser quality films made on various levels of quality merits vs emotional manipulation. Free state of Jones especially, as it's that movie about Slavery that focused on the
white main character that
oh so happened to be played by a certain obnoxious, egotistical celebrity. The consensus with The Birth of a Nation is it's
meh, but we've seen a lot of anti-slavery films lately, so it doesn't stand out the way 12 Years or even Django (for being historical revenge fiction) did.
And the Middle School movie is just garbage. I thought Walden Media went under after the dozenth unremarkable adaption of a forgettable book. Seems to have lived on.