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Tuesday, October 30, 2018
Awards buzz for ‘A Quiet Place’
Photos by JONNY COURNOYER I Associated Press
This image released by Paramount Pictures shows Noah Jupe, from left, Millicent Simmonds and John Krasinski in a scene from “A
Quiet Place.” The film is a mostly silent horror film about a family trying to live among creatures that attack and kill at the smallest
sound.
John Krasinski movie a surprise phenomenon with sequel in the works
This image released by Paramount Pictures shows John Krasinski, left, and Noah Jupe in a scene
from “A Quiet Place.” It became a surprise box office phenomenon when it was released in theaters
in April.
BY LINDSEY BAHR
Associated Press
LOS ANGELES - John Kra
sinski is still pinching himself
over the critical and financial
success of his experimental
thriller “A Quiet Place, ” but the
Cinderella year is not over yet.
With awards season heating
up, “A Quiet Place,” has found
its own spot in the conversa
tion. Krasinski who co-wrote,
directed and starred in the film
opposite his wife, Emily Blunt,
is only humbled.
“It’s nothing short of over
whelming,” Krasinski said by
phone recently. “Emily and
I really are still digesting the
fact that we made this small
little special movie that some
people really connected to.
This was literally a meditation
on parenting!”
“A Quiet Place” is a mostly
silent horror film about a fam
ily (Krasinski, Blunt, Noah
Jupe and Millicent Simmonds)
trying to live among creatures
that attack and kill at the small
est sound. It became a surprise
box-office phenomenon when
it was released in April, gross
ing $338.6 million in worldwide
ticket sales off a production
budget of only $17 million. It is
now available on home video
and streaming, and a sequel is
already in the works.
Critics loved its high concept
thrills, too, and while many
have offered their praise, a
certain phone call stands out
for Krasinski — the one he got
from his favorite director, and
friend, Paul Thomas Anderson.
“It was probably 30 min
utes long about how much
he loved the movie and how
much it meant to him and how
much he wished movies like
this happened every Friday. I
genuinely blacked out on that
phone call,” Krasinski said.
“He said, ‘I’ll tell you the best
compliment I can give you: As
I was walking back to my car I
thought, OK, I need to get back
to work.’”
Anderson actually provided
some inspiration for “A Quiet
Place.” Krasinski said he stud
ied the opening of “There Will
Be Blood” and other modern
films that employ silence to fig
ure out how he would approach
it in his film. He also looked at
“Jaws,” ’’Rosemary’s Baby”
the films of Alfred Hitchcock
for ideas in tension-building.
“Jaws” was one of Krasin-
ski’s biggest touchstones, and,
oddly enough, the first movie
he and Blunt watched together
when they had just started
dating.
“It’s a perfect film,” he
said. “It’s not about a shark,
it’s about these characters
trying to overcome fears that
they’re running away from and
at some point those fears are
going to manifest themselves
in the most bizarre ways. ”
In that same way, “A Quiet
Place,” to him, is about parent
ing. He had been sent a script
to look at and had an idea to re
write and refocus around those
anxieties.
“I was actually holding my
three-week-old daughter. We
had just had our second daugh
ter,” he said. “Reading a story
about parents doing whatever
it took to protect their kids
was exactly what I was living
through.”
Krasinski wasn’t even sup
posed to direct the film at the
outset. The actor and writer,
probably best known as Jim
on the American version of
“The Office,” had previously
directed two films — a David
Foster Wallace adaptation
(“Brief Interviews with Hid
eous Men”) and an indie fam
ily drama (“The Hollars”).
Not exactly the kind of call
ing cards that would prove he
could handle a VFX-heavy, big
studio genre film. It was Blunt
who encouraged him to put his
name in for it.
“She said, ‘I’ve never seen
you so lit up like this, I’ve
never seen you so passionate
about something,”’ Krasinski
recalled. “And it’s true, she
knew that it was a very per
sonal story. I was basically writ
ing a love letter to my kids.”
And to his shock, executives
at Paramount and Platinum
Dunes were behind him.
Blunt also was the driving
force behind her own involve
ment. Krasinski was too scared
to even let her read the script
while he was working on it,
let alone ask her to be in it.
She went so far as to suggest a
friend for the role of Evelyn.
But then on one cross country
flight, she finally read it, and
decided to speak up.
“She legitimately looked sick
at the end of it. I thought she
was plane sick, so I reached for
a barf bag at the same time she
said, ‘You can’t let anyone do
this movie.’ And I said, ‘What?’
And it was like a romantic com
edy where she was proposing to
me,” Krasinski recalled. “She
said, ‘You have to let me do this
part, you HAVE to let me do it.’
I think I screamed ‘YES’ on a
flight from New York to LA.”
The film has been in the
Oscar conversation since it
came out and has continued
to pop up on prognosticator
lists in Hollywood trades like
Variety and awards columns in
Vulture and Gold Derby, with
special mentions of Blunt’s per
formance, the effects and the
screenplay.
Krasinski is currently writ
ing the sequel, which he teased
only with his wife’s response to
his pitch.
“She said, ‘Oh that’s really
cool, but it’s not a sequel, it’s
like another book in the same
world, it feels like another part
in the same story,”’ he said.
As for whether Krasinski is
ready for the marathon that is
awards season?
“Everything is better when
Emily is there and the fact
that she’s in the conversation
for this and for ‘Mary Poppins
Returns’? There’s no better
person to have by my side
for this,” he said. “I’ll be just
fine.”
Tink and a
story of two
good dogs
It started out as the neighborly thing to do.
Up the road from the Rondarosa lives
Doug and his family. We have known each
other since childhood and now, in the years
of our maturity, he is a wonderful neighbor,
proving his helpfulness time after time. A few
of those times, when I’ve had to call him for
help, involved barbed wire wrapped around
the blades of the mower. Once, we rescued
what we thought was an injured puppy that
actually turned out to be a coyote, the very
animal we try to protect our farms from. And
another time — this was almost downright
historic and did wind up making the front
page of the newspaper — we teamed to help
lower the boom on a band of crooks that had
long plagued several counties.
One Saturday in mid-February, Doug
called. “I hate to bother y’all but we’re out of
town and my mother-in-law is house-sitting.
Our little dog has gotten loose so if you’d keep
an eye out for her, I’d appreciate it.”
When the call ended, I turned to Tink. “We
have to go and look for that dog right now.
Doug has been too good a neighbor. And I
know from experience, it’s a terrible feel
ing to be gone and have something like this
happen.”
On a cut-through road, about a mile away,
we found the little dog that had already been
discovered by a nice woman who, seeing that
the dog was wearing a collar, knew something
was wrong and stopped to put the dog on a
spare leash she had. In the middle of the
country, the nice woman was going door to
door to find the dog’s home. We stopped and
pointed her in the right direction and then
headed back home ourselves.
Before we’d seen Doug’s dog, however, we
had discovered the cutest black and white
puppy, about three months old, standing
guard outside a gutter pipe on vacant prop
erty. The moment I saw what looked to be a
beagle, I said impulsively, “That dog is going
home to the Rondarosa.”
If memory serves correctly, Tink rolled
his eyes. For two days, I tried to entice the
dog out of the drainpipe where she retreated
whenever she saw our car. She scampered in,
stayed firm, and barked defensively. Every
time my efforts failed, I left food at the mouth
of the pipe and promised to return. One
morning, I grabbed a couple of biscuits from
a fresh-baked batch and headed out to try
once again. An ice storm was coming in a few
hours and I did not want that baby shivering
in water and ice.
The moment that dog smelled the Southern
buttermilk biscuits, her barking ceased and
she scrambled quickly out of her bunker, tail
wagging, toward fresh food. I scooped her up,
carried her to the truck and said, “Well, Bis
cuit, you’re going to have a happy home.”
Boy, does she. The plan was for Biscuit
to live outside but ice was coming and since
Tink had gone to Los Angeles, I brought her
in the house — where she never left. She now
weighs 28 pounds and is a beautiful example
of God’s hand as an artist. She is white with
a black mask across her face, freckles on
her nose, and polka dots and spots perfectly
spaced and painted on her body.
She’s become Tink’s best friend. Wherever
he goes, she intends to follow. When he is on
the tractor or mower, she is nearby watching
him, ever faithful. She often rides with him to
the hardware store, feed store, or just across
the Rondarosa. He rolls down her window,
she puts her nose to the wind, and there they
go: two best buddies riding down highways
and backroads.
It is a sight to behold, one that never fails
to bring a smile or a laugh to me. One lost dog
led us to another and, thankfully, both had a
happy ending.
Ronda Rich is the best-selling author of
several books, including “Mark My Words: A
Memoir of Mama.” Sign up for her newsletter
at www.rondarich.com. Her column appears
Tuesdays and on www.gainesvilletimes.com.
‘Halloween’ sequel scares up most sales at the box office
BY SONAIYA KELLEY
Los Angeles Times
LOS ANGELES — Despite soft
landings for the weekend’s new
wide releases, there’s a new all-
time record for October grosses
buoyed by the stellar perfor
mances of “Halloween,” “Venom”
and “A Star Is Born.”
October has seen a record-set-
ting monthly total of $789.9 mil
lion in ticket sales, beating the
$757.1 million earned in October
2014.
Universal’s “Halloween”
sequel, now in its second weekend,
added $32 million in the U.S. and
Canada for a cumulative $126.7
million, according to figures from
measurement firm ComScore.
In second place, Warner Bros.’
“A Star Is Born” added $14.1 mil
lion in its fourth weekend for a
cumulative $148.7 million.
At No. 3, Sony’s “Venom,” also
in its fourth weekend, added $10.8
million for a cumulative $187.3
million in ticket sales.
The studio’s “Goosebumps 2:
Haunted Halloween” came in
fourth, adding $7.5 million in its
third weekend for a cumulative
$38.3 million.
Rounding out the top five, Lion-
sgate’s “Hunter Killer” opened
with $6.6 million, in line with ana
lysts’ predictions of $6 million to
$9 million.
The military thriller stars
Gerard Butler as a U.S. submarine
captain leading a team of Navy
SEALs to rescue the Russian presi
dent as the threat of an interna
tional catastrophe looms. Directed
by Donovan Marsh, the film also
stars Common and Gary Oldman.
The film earned mixed reviews
from audiences and critics with an
A-minus on CinemaScore and a 36
percent “rotten” rating on review
aggregation site Rotten Tomatoes.
Also new this week, Working
Title and Universal Pictures’ Brit
ish spy comedy “Johnny English
Strikes Again” opened at No. 12
with $1.6 million, well below ana
lyst predictions of $4 million. The
film has done the lion’s share of its
business overseas with an interna
tional gross of $107.7 million. It
earned a 32 percent “rotten” rat
ing on Rotten Tomatoes.
The final new release of the
weekend, PureFlix’s “Indivis
ible,” opened on 830 screens with
$1.6 million, in range with ana
lysts’ predictions of the low single
digit millions. The faith-based
drama follows an Army chaplain,
his wife and the effect war has on
their marriage.
In limited release, Amazon Stu
dio’s horror remake “Suspiria”
opened in two locations with
$179,806, for a per-screen average
of $89,903, the highest average of
the year, topping “Free Solo’s”
$75,201. The film was directed
by Luca Guadagnino, who also
received last year’s highest per-
screen average for the Academy
Award-winning “Call Me by Your
Name.”
A24’s “Mid90s” had a respect
able nationwide expansion, add
ing 1,202 locations (for a total of
1,206) and $3 million in ticket
sales for a cumulative $3.3 mil
lion. The result puts it on par
with the studio’s “Eighth Grade,”
which opened earlier this year.
Amazon Studio’s “Beautiful
Boy” had a ho-hum expansion,
adding 200 locations in its third
weekend and $592,897 (a per-
screen average of $3,121) for
a cumulative $1.4 million. The
result is not a good sign as the film
eyes a wide release next weekend.
