The first major theatrical release by writer and director Cary Joji Fukunaga, No Time To Die, took the No. 1 spot at the U.S. box office over its first weekend of release, selling a decent $56 million.

The flick, which stars Daniel Craig in his last appearance as James Bond, currently has a score of 69/100 on Metacritic and 7.6/10 on IMDb. Not bad.

I’ve been hearing that it’s fun and really well shot and has a lot of weird story and character issues. I believe it. Bond flicks almost always demand that we suspend belief and forgive a lot of silliness.

I’ll see it, eventually, because I like a lot of the people involved with the film. But I’m not exactly running to the theater. It’ll be interesting to see how this one does in the coming weeks. I’m going to guess that word-of-mouth has been so soft that it’s probably not going to set the world on fire. That being said, as expected, the film is doing well worldwide, and has already made over $300 million. People sure do love the familiar.

As expected, Andy Serkis’ Venom: Let There Be Carnage took the No. 2 spot at the domestic box office with another $32 million in sales, upping the flick’s domestic sales total to $142 million in 10 days ($186 million worldwide).

Does this mean that Tom Hardy is the biggest movie star in the world right now? I hope so! He’s a good one, that Bronson.

The Addams Family 2 (not to be confused with Addams Family Values) continued to roll, selling another $10 million over the weekend, taking the No. 3 spot at the domestic box while bringing the film’s 10-day U.S. sales total to $31 million.

And then of course, at No. 4, we have Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings, which sold another $4 million, bringing the film’s six-week worldwide sales total to just over $400 million. So far Shang-Chi is the highest grossing domestic film of 2021, followed by Black Widow, F9, A Quiet Place 2, Venom 2, and Free Guy. Not the best batch of flicks I’ve ever seen but it’s almost starting to look like the movies could possibly be coming back. Possibly never like before, but we’ll see.

And, finally, at No. 5 at last weekend’s box office we have Sopranos prequel The Many Saints of Newark, which sold a sad $1.4 million over the weekend. This one, sadly, will be written up as a bomb. It’s a massive bummer for us Sopranos heads.

Also of note: A24’s latest, Lamb, had an OK opening weekend, breaking the $1 million mark despite not exactly being the type of film that thrives in the post-Covid market. Good for you, little Lamb.

This weekend features two wide releases, both of which are made by great filmmakers and look promising.

First up is The Last Duel, written by Ben Affleck and Matt Damon and directed by someone named Ridley Scott. The flick, which also stars Indiana’s own Adam Driver, is so far getting a mixed bag of reviews.

Also out everywhere is David Gordon Green’s Halloween Kills, DGG’s second Halloween flick. Reviews don’t matter for this one; people will absolutely go see it.

Not because of the great David Gordon Green, but because of Michael Myers.

Will is be good? Doesn’t matter. There have been 12 of these films now and most of them are bad. That being said, DGG and his co-writer, Danny McBride, are talented and, for some reason, really care about Michael Myers. It baffles me.

In the spirit of celebrating DGG, here’s my ranking of the 46-year-old’s busy career:

1. Pineapple Express

2. George Washington

3. All the Real Girls

4. Snow Angels

5. Prince Avalanche

6. Joe

7. Undertow

8. Manglehorn

9. Your Highness

10. Stronger

11. Halloween

12. Our Brand Is Crisis

13. The Sitter