‘Superman' Takes Top Spot at Sluggish U.K., Ireland Box Office
The James Gunn-directed reboot, starring David Corenswet and Rachel Brosnahan, was below the $15 million opening enjoyed by predecessor 'Man of Steel.' The ongoing heatwave conditions in the region appear to be keeping audiences outdoors, choosing sun over cinema, as evidenced by the drop in blockbuster collections, which experienced a decline of 35% week-on-week. The massive popularity of Wimbledon, which concluded Sunday evening, could also be a contributing factor.
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Universal's 'Jurassic World Rebirth' dropped to second place with $4.4 million in its second frame, pushing its cumulative total to $26 million. Warner Bros.' F1' remained in the top three, adding $1.5 million in its third outing for a running total of $21.4 million.
Rounding out the top five were Universal's 'How To Train Your Dragon,' which banked $782,759 in its fifth week for a total of $25.9 million, and Sony's post-apocalyptic thriller '28 Years Later,' which earned $669,347 to bring its cume to $18.5 million.
Elsewhere in the top 10, Disney's 'Elio' collected $323,086 in its fourth week for a total of $4.6 million, while stablemate 'Lilo & Stitch' continued its summer run with $214,479, taking its total to $48.5 million. Punjabi-language hit 'Sardaar Ji 3' added $97,610 for a three-week total of $913,000.
Paramount's 'Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning' earned $64,949 in its eighth week, pushing its haul to $35 million, while Universal's 'The Ballad Of Wallis Island' rounded out the top 10 with $59,158, bringing its total to $2.5 million.
Leading the charge among upcoming releases is Paramount's animated film 'Smurfs,' directed by Chris Miller, featuring an all-star voice cast that includes Rihanna, James Corden, Octavia Spencer, John Goodman and Kurt Russell, which opens wide across the U.K. and Ireland.
Sony's 'I Know What You Did Last Summer' marks the return of the 1997 horror franchise that helped define post-'Scream' teen slashers.
Vertigo Releasing is launching 'Four Letters of Love,' based on Niall Williams' best-selling novel and starring Pierce Brosnan, Helena Bonham Carter and Gabriel Byrne, into more than 300 cinemas. Mubi is opening Athina Rachel Tsangari's Venice title 'Harvest,' while Stanley Kubrick's 'Barry Lyndon' receives a 50th anniversary 4K reissue through Park Circus.
BFI Distribution presents a newly restored 4K version of 'Human Traffic,' Justin Kerrigan's cult 1999 snapshot of British club culture.
Other releases include SXSW and Toronto title 'Friendship,' a comedic drama from Paramount directed by Andrew DeYoung and starring Paul Rudd, Kate Mara and Tim Robinson; Punjabi-language comedy 'Sarbala Ji' from Bakrania Media; Telugu-language father-son relationship drama 'Junior' from Dreamz Entertainment; Rotterdam title 'The Ballad of Suzanne Césaire' from TAPE Collective; and Ico Costa's IndieLisboa winner 'Gold Songs.'
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Yahoo
29 minutes ago
- Yahoo
Oleksandr Usyk, Daniel Dubois and the danger of being young, free and fearless
After knocking out Anthony Joshua in the fifth round of a fight at Wembley Stadium last September, Daniel Dubois knew the hard part was still to come, so could not afford to relax. All around him, in a ring once empty, were people, cameras and microphones, each a reminder that his next task was to describe what he had just done. Think boy on the naughty step. Think suspect in the interrogation room. (Think, Daniel, think.) He had found the punches — crucially, a short right hand — but would now have to find words, typically more elusive. Now he would be asked how he did it. Now he would be asked how he felt. To pass the test, Dubois required words and emotions, two things prohibited during the fight. For some fighters, these things come back quickly, overwhelmingly so, whereas for others, like Dubois, the wait tends to be a long one. He is, when wearing gloves, unthinking and unfeeling and it can be no other way. It is how he likes and prefers it. It is how he has been programmed. Chances are, despite the danger of being alone in the ring with Joshua, he felt safe there, comfortable. There was only the referee to interrupt them and only Joshua's hands, his left and right, capable of either hurting or embarrassing him. He was, to some extent, in control of both the situation and himself. Then, when the fight ended, so did Dubois' control. Now he was back among the living, back among those with whom it was tougher to communicate and feel comfortable. Punches, in that world, no longer counted. They had all been thrown. They could no longer command respect, nor speak on his behalf and express his emotions. He instead had to find words. The right ones. 'Erm, I've only got a few things to say, man,' said Dubois, to the surprise of nobody. He then smiled and addressed the 90,000 fans in the stadium: 'Are you not entertained?!' Even louder: 'ARE YOU NOT ENTERTAINED?!' As familiar to the crowd as they were to Dubois, those four words may have started with Maximus Decimus Meridius, but had more recently been uttered by Tyson Fury and others in the aftermath of prizefights. For that reason, the words stuck with Dubois and he turned to them, automatically, when expected to speak, despite having been asked a question pertaining to the fight he had just won. It was, in a sense, no more than mimicry; a childlike mimicry. It required no introspection. It required no thought. The same, too, could be said of the way Dubois went after Joshua at Wembley that night. For even if there was thought and method behind what Dubois had plotted and executed — and there was — the important thing from his perspective was that he remained detached, cold, clear-headed at all times. Such clarity allowed him to shake from his mind the underdog tag and the reputation of his opponent, and it gave him the freedom to then attack Joshua from the outset. It also explained why Joshua, the thinker of the two, suddenly looked so overawed when confronted by a man able to clear his mind in a way Joshua, the former champion, no longer can. Why that is, one can only speculate, but we know this much: Damage and defeat lead to overthinking, and overthinking will often stifle a fighter's ability to act on instinct. That certainly seems true of Joshua, whose four professional defeats have all given him pause for thought. His first defeat, against Andy Ruiz back in 2019, revealed to him and to the world his fragility, while his next two, both against Usyk, highlighted his technical deficiencies. All three wounded Joshua and left him in a kind of no man's land, stuck between styles and a stranger to himself. If Ruiz reminded him of the need to be cautious and try to think and box a bit more, Usyk then cruelly reminded him of his limitations as a boxer before asking him: 'Who told you to think?' By the time Joshua suffered his fourth loss, against Dubois, he was a furrowed brow of a man; a knot of scar tissue and mixed signals. The last thing he wanted, in that state of mind, was an expressionless, one-track terminator looking back at him — staring not at him, but through him. Yet that is exactly what he got in the shape of Dubois. He got someone whose ignorance was a weapon and whose simplicity and spotless mind was preferable, in a fight, to a mind bloated by bad memories and associations. He got a man with no nerves and only the slightest hint of a pulse. A man empty, fearless, with whom Joshua could neither hang nor connect. Whether Joshua himself was an ignorant man trying to be a thinking man, or a thinking man trying to be an ignorant man, he wasn't up to playing either role. In Dubois, he had lost to an ignorant man, and against Usyk, to whom he lost in 2021 and 2022, he was bested by a thinking man. Both losses, aside from being painful, had indicated how far Joshua was from using either ignorance or wisdom as weapons, and both were reminders that being 'normal' — that is, neither simple nor smart — is sometimes the worst thing for a professional fighter. Against Usyk, for instance, that's all Joshua was: Normal. He was not clever enough to compete on the same level as Usyk technically, nor ignorant enough to risk everything and go for it the way Derek Chisora did, if only for four rounds, against the Ukrainian in 2020. As a result, Joshua suffered the same fate as every other Usyk opponent at either heavyweight or cruiserweight. He was tamed, he was controlled, and he was taken apart, psychologically as much as physically. Afterward, Joshua then grabbed the mic and demonstrated the extent of his confusion with a muddled monologue linguists are still attempting to translate to this day. It was in English, yet it made no sense. Usyk, it appeared, hadn't just beaten him. He had robbed Joshua of language. Usyk, meanwhile, was far more coherent. He simply said, 'I am feel,' as is his custom, and flashed that gap-toothed smile of his. He is, like Dubois, a man of few words, at least English ones, but that is fine, for nobody is counting. In fact, far from being stunted by the language barrier, Usyk has found comfort in a catchphrase and other eccentricities, seeming at times like a mime artist content to use their face to convey whatever is on their mind. By doing so, he not only defuses opponents by lulling them into a false sense of security, but he retains an element of mystery, which in turn makes him hard to read. His personality might be that of the court jester, but his actions in the ring are those of a genius — and yes, always hard to read. In the ring, Usyk shows that intelligence is not the ability to put words together in someone else's language. It is instead a different kind of fluency; a different kind of expression. With a language all of his own, Usyk makes right left, left right, and everything you do wrong. Of course, it's worth noting that Usyk is not the first Ukrainian heavyweight champion whose in-ring intelligence seems out of place in boxing. His predecessors, Vitali and Wladimir Klitschko, were every bit as smart and even had PhDs — both in sport science — to prove it. Vitali, now the mayor of Kyiv, was the older of the two brothers and the one less inclined to smile, whereas Wladimir had the friendlier exterior, a better grasp of English, and a greater interest in America and all it could offer. On fight night, there were other differences between the pair, and stark ones at that. In fact, often it was said that the best heavyweight in the world would be a combination of the two. From Wladimir you would take the left jab and the right cross, and from Vitali you would take the chin and the stamina. You might also look at their minds and combine those as well. For although these were both highly intelligent men, there was a subtle shift in mentality whenever they slipped on boxing gloves and entered the ring. In the case of Wladimir, this sometimes meant a period of overthinking and too much caution for fear of what could go wrong. In the case of Vitali, however, this meant a period of bring-it-on ignorance during which he would become liberated by the permission to hurt and relish the opportunity to give and take punches. It was quite the switch for Vitali, and one made only more jarring by how reticent Wladimir was by comparison, especially as his career progressed. One day Wladimir was the intrepid kid queuing up to ride the roller coaster with his big brother, and the next he was the old man standing back, cognizant of both how the roller coaster is made and how it can all go wrong. Early on, though, it's true: Wladimir had been as ignorant and oblivious as any heavyweight prospect starting out. He, like them all, fired his right hand with reckless abandon, and he too could see no way that either an opponent could take it or that they would have the temerity to fire back at him. But then, in 1998, Wladimir imploded against Ross Puritty, and with that first loss came a dose of reality and a degree of insight he could have done without. The excavation of self duly began, and everything Wladimir questioned, or doubted, was then compounded when Corrie Sanders and Lamon Brewster added supporting material to Puritty's initial findings. For a fighter like Wladimir, an awareness of pain, physical or of defeat, is in itself damaging. After all, an active, high-functioning brain like his tends to struggle to remove memories and associations and has difficulty considering anything, let alone defeat, as 'just one of those things.' Moving on, therefore, becomes a little more challenging. It can be done — and Wladimir eventually did it — but often what is required is a complete overhaul, of either style or attitude, and rarely, for better or worse, will the fighter ever be the same. In terms of Wladimir, some will say he improved for having lost multiple times, but cleverness and caution could never harmoniously coexist and seldom was he given the credit he deserved. His brother, on the other hand, received plenty. He was considered the warrior of the two, if only because he was less cerebral in style than Wladimir and fought with an ignorance easier to understand and enjoy. Vitali, you see, though beaten twice, had never been beaten like Wladimir. He had lost once by injury stoppage (against Chris Byrd in 2000) and once due to cuts (against Lennox Lewis in 2003), but on neither occasion did Vitali come away doubting himself or internalizing the events and associated trauma. Even if his body was damaged and his face cut up, his mind, in a boxing sense, remained spotless. Good as new. That ability to not belabor is key to any boxer's success and has clearly fueled Dubois' recent form. He, too, is no stranger to defeat, but rather than linger on it, or find himself blunted by it, sallies forth undeterred: Head down, keep going. His first loss, against Joe Joyce back in 2020, saw the Brit outworked and hurt — he suffered a fractured eye socket — before staying down on one knee to be counted out in Round 10. He was then just as hurt by the reaction to the loss, with many accusing Dubois of 'quitting' and suggesting that the nature of the defeat was more worrying than the defeat itself. The nature of the defeat, they said, had exposed a certain softness in Dubois, something impossible to remove by lifting weights or hitting bags. But he has, to his credit, since allayed this concern. His next defeat, in 2023, was inflicted by Usyk, the man he fights this Saturday at Wembley Stadium. In the presence of Usyk, Dubois' ignorance, so often a tool, was not only magnified but led to him being stopped in Round 9, having had very little success in the previous eight. The only question now, ahead of the pair's rematch, is how Dubois will react to that second loss and whether he opts to forget it completely or takes from it what he needs. Dwell too much on it and it might cloud an otherwise free and ignorant mind. However, complete ignorance and a disregard for the truth tends to only entice a repeat performance and the same result, with no lessons learned. It is, and always has been, a hard thing to balance and get right. Ask Dubois and perhaps even he won't know what he plans to do on Saturday night. Perhaps that's a good thing, too. Perhaps that's the point. As for Usyk, expect no more thorough explanation ahead of fight two. He also believes in the maxim 'show, don't tell' and has smiles, dance moves, and a catchphrase if ever he wants to deflect, or keep them all guessing. He will accept that fight two is likely to be different, but how different? That is the question. Dubois, once a challenger, now has a belt — the IBF title stripped from Usyk — and Usyk, who claims the other belts, is smart enough to acknowledge that his opponent, at age 27, is a different fighter from the one he disciplined two years ago. In a word, Dubois has matured. He is filling out hand-me-down suits and inside them feels grown and powerful. 'Tell this little boy he can't disrespect me,' said Joshua ahead of their fight last year. Yet Dubois, in the end, did more than just disrespect him: He reminded him how it felt to be young, free and fearless. Now, having come of age, Dubois is encouraged to make himself heard and has both a platform and an audience for whenever he finds his voice. He also has experience, as both a boxer and a man. No longer a boy, and no longer home-schooled by his dad, Dubois has, in his 20s, been busy learning other lessons — some painful, some harsh — and has even been lucky enough to have been schooled by the greatest teacher of them all: Oleksandr Usyk. The problem now, of course, is that Dubois must try to use everything he learned from that teacher against him, something only the bravest student would ever attempt. Either that or the most ignorant.
Condé Nast Traveler
30 minutes ago
- Condé Nast Traveler
Where the Chefs Eat: Nuno Mendes's favourite restaurants in Lisbon
Welcome to Where the Chefs Eat a column in which chefs share their go-to restaurants in their favorite cities. The Lisbon that Nuno Mendes grew up in during the 1980s was nothing like the city we know and love today. The City of Light was 'a very tough city,' Mendes says. 'Back then, there was no sense of national pride.' Mendes then traveled the world, exploring different ingredients and innovative global cooking techniques under the likes of Wolfgang Puck and Rocco di Spirito, before settling in East London where he has now lived for 20 years. While Hackney is home, the Lisbon that Mendes knows and loves today is thriving—so, he finally decided to open a restaurant there. Following the success of his highly acclaimed London restaurants Lisboeta, The Loft Project, Bacchus, and Viajante, Santa Joana opened in Lisbon last October to rave reviews, allowing him to split his time between London and his childhood home. 'It's a stunning, one-of-a-kind space,' Mendes says about Santa Joana. 'It's in an old convent with beautiful high ceilings, the kind of space you don't really find, so this is a dream come true for me. And what's critical is you can really feel the heartbeat of the city in that restaurant." He acknowledges that he's in good company cooking in the city, given the incredible chefs in Lisbon today: "The food culture is now much broader than it was when I was younger. The food we're cooking is traditional yet also reflects the current and contemporary aspects of Lisbon's culinary culture.' Part of the energy in kitchens and restaurants comes from the people in the city itself, he says. 'Lisbon is now a city full of vibrant, excited people, a lot of young people, a lot of Portuguese people who have traveled the world and then come back home again. And I love that I can use products, 99 per cent of which have come from only 300 meters away.' So, we asked Mendes to share his favorite restaurants in Lisbon—where he goes the minute he touches down in the city. 'I wanted to highlight the places that are my personal favorites, that have such an amazing atmosphere. [Where] you really feel like you're being welcomed into somebody's home.' And when you walk in, you'll know where you are: "Every single one of my recommendations could only exist in Lisbon.' Prado Tv. das Pedras Negras 2 (Baixa) 'The menu changes regularly at Prado, one of my favorite restaurants. The team works with a lot of excellent small producers, and there is a fantastic wine list. It's hyper-seasonal, but it's perfectly inspired by Portuguese products and by classic Portuguese cooking. It's a very different restaurant to St John in London, but it's got a similar approach and ethos of using the entire fish from nose to tail; not wasting anything. The people who visit Prado seek it out, so the clientele seems alive and on board with what they're doing. There's also a great little wine bar. The food is incredible in there if you want something quick and light.'
UPI
31 minutes ago
- UPI
Watch: Rachel Brosnahan's 'travel curse' nearly cost her 'Superman' audition
1 of 5 | Cast member Rachel Brosnahan attends the premiere of the sci-fi motion picture "Superman" at the TCL Chinese Theatre in the Hollywood section of Los Angeles on July 7. She talked about her travel curse on "Tonight" Wednesday. Photo by Jim Ruymen/UPI | License Photo July 17 (UPI) -- Superman actress Rachel Brosnahan says she had a "travel curse" that nearly caused her to miss the audition to portray the iconic Lois Lane. The former Marvelous Mrs. Maisel star, 35, discussed the curse, and how she broke it, when she stopped by The Tonight Show starring Jimmy Fallon Wednesday. "This is a good example of the curse," she said, referring to her Superman audition. Brosnahan was in New York City doing a show on Broadway and was attempting to make it to Los Angeles for the audition. "We got offstage at like 11:00 p.m. The only flight that would get me there in time was at 6 a.m. So, I got to the airport. I got there early, and the flight starts getting delayed and I just had a bad feeling about it, because curse," she explained. The flight was ultimately canceled and she ran back and forth across the airport trying to book another flight. "I got there and honestly I feel like the chaos that came with me after what I'd been through that morning must have felt so Lois Lane-coded or something because it worked out just fine," she said. She added that her curse is so bad she hired a witch to break it ahead of the Superman promotional tour. "I got really desperate and I started asking people if anyone knew like an energy healer or like a past-life reader... And so I called a witch and brought her to my house," she said. "...She brought a wishing well and a wand and she signed an NDA." Brosnahan reports her travel curse has since been lifted. Superman raked in some $122 million at the box office over the weekend. The film stars David Corenswet as the titular hero. David Corenswet, Rachel Brosnahan attend 'Superman' premiere Cast members David Corenswet (L) and Rachel Brosnahan attend the premiere of "Superman" at the TCL Chinese Theatre in Los Angeles on July 7, 2025. Corenswet portrays Superman, with Brosnahan as Lois Lane. Photo by Jim Ruymen/UPI | License Photo
