1. The Croods (Dreamworks/Fox, 4,046 Theaters, 98 Minutes, Rated PG): So, like the Flintstones, only with a bigger family and as a road picture? Okay then.

Dreamworks has always been a step or two behind Pixar when it comes to their animated films. It’s not as though they haven’t had successes. Heck, at the box office, they might be way ahead when it comes to grosses. But in the quality of what they put upon the screen, they are definitely second to Pixar.

Although, I doubt even Pixar would have been able to do much with this subject. The film focuses on a prehistoric family that has to travel to new lands when their home is destroyed.

The film is co-directed by the director of Lilo & Stitch and How to Train Your Dragon, which is a good sign. . But the other co-director worked on Space Chimps, which isn’t.

2. Olympus Has Fallen (FilmDistrict, 3,098 Theaters, 120 Minutes, Rated R): And now, we come to the Die Hard knock-off. Not only that, but it’s the first of two “Die Hard in the White House” films coming this year (the other, White House Down, starring Channing Tatum and Jamie Foxx, will be along in June).

They both have similar plots too: terrorists take over the White House and it’s up to one man to save the president. What separates this one is that the one man is Gerard Butler, the president is Aaron Eckhart, and Butler’s character is a disgraced former Secret Service Agent instead of a current one.

I always find it interesting when two movies make it so far into production with such a similar premise. Of course, based on the trailers, this one seems to really be working from the Die Hard template. It will be interesting to see how different White House Down turns out to be.

3. Admission (Focus Features, 2,160 Theaters, 117 Minutes, Rated PG-13): Tina Fey is now at a crossroads of her career. 30 Rock is done, and now the question is what she will do next.

It’s not like she doesn’t have options. She is a successful author, a great comedian, and has the makings of a good film career. But will she be a movie star? Can she be a movie star?

In this film Fey plays a strict Princeton admissions officer whose world is turned upside down when she is introduced to a potential student who might be the son she gave up for adoption years earlier. The things she does might cost her job, but might garner her so much more.

This year we will see the release of two competing films that feature a terrorist attack on the White House as the main plot point. Over the summer we’re getting White House Down, but before that we get director Antoine Fuqua’s take on the idea – Olympus Has Fallen – on March 22. Having had the opportunity to read the scripts to both projects, I can say that this is the more serious of the two action pieces, while White House Down very much lives up to the description “Die Hard in the White House” (see my script review here).

We don’t know yet how director Roland Emmerich’s White House Down will look, but today we get our first glimpse at Olympus Has Fallen thanks to the film’s just released first trailer.

That’s Gerard Butler as the disgraced Secret service agent in the White House at the time of the terrorist attack and Aaron Eckhardt as the President. Ashley Judd, Morgan Freeman, Dylan McDermott and Angela Bassett round out the cast.

And as an extra bonus, here’s the film’s poster -

1. Playing For Keeps (FilmDistrict, 2,837 Theaters, 106 Minutes, Rated PG-13): Okay, here’s a film I know absolutely nothing about. I have seen no ads, read no articles, hear nothing about this film.

So, I am going to try an experiment. I am going to try and figure out what the plot of the film is from the poster alone. This should be fun because it is one of the blandest posters I have ever seen.

Okay, Gerard Butler is in it and he name is above the titles. Soooo, romantic comedy? Okay, we do have a tagline. That helps. “This holiday season, what do you really want?”

Now, on to the pictures of the other actors. Judging by the fact that Butler’s picture is the largest, we can assume that the size of the picture on the poster mirrors the impact of the actor in the picture. Dennis Quaid and Jessica Biel’s are rather large, Uma Thurman is small, Catherine Zeta-Jones is tiny.

Okay, here we go. Here’s my shot at the plot: Butler plays a roguish bachelor who plays the field and dates much younger women. However, he feels like he should settle down like his best friend (or possibly older brother), Dennis Quaid, who has left the bachelor life behind and found matrimonial happiness with Uma Thurman. Armed with a new set of priorities. Butler thinks he has his life plan set. Unfortunately, life throws a curveball at him in the form of Zeta-Jones, an age appropriate woman who he feels he should go for, and Biel, a much younger woman who he has a lot in common with but someone Butler is hesitant to pursue because he feels it would be backtracking into his old life. Before the end of the movie, the obvious choice becomes clear to Butler (and the audience) and they live happily ever after.

Let’s see how close I came. Here is the plot synopsis from IMDB:

A former sports star who’s fallen on hard times starts coaching his son’s soccer team as a way to get his life together. His attempts to become an adult are met with challenges from the attractive soccer moms who pursue him at every turn.

Quaid apparently plays a jealous husband. And Biel his ex-wife. Nice. Well, at least I came close with the whole “getting his life together part.”

1. Fun Size (Paramount, 3,014 Theaters, 90 Minutes, Rated PG-13): On one hand, this film is a starring vehicle for Victoria Justice, star of such Nickelodeon shows as Victorius, iCarly and Zoey 101 (Nickelodeon is also a producer of this film) and certainly an attempt to transfer her small screen success to the big screen.

On the other hand, it has a plot that harkens back to such 1980′s classics such as Adventures in Babysitting. Justice plays Wren, a girl who is forced to spend Halloween night babysitting her little brother. However, when her brother gets lost in a sea of trick or treaters, Wren has to get him back before her parents know that he is gone.

We’ll see if this film works and what effect it has on Justice’s career. But Elisabeth Shue garnered an Oscar nod in her post  Adventures in Babysitting career.

2. Silent Hill: Revelation 3D (Open Road Films, 2,933 Theaters, 94 Minutes, Rated R): It wouldn’t be the weekend before Halloween without a horror film, typically a sequel, to get us in the mood. This year, it’s this one.

This film is a sequel to 2006′s Silent Hill and adapts another installment of the successful Konami video game.

Heather Mason is drawn into an evil alternate reality when her father is kidnapped. She is drawn to the evil town called Silent Hill, and must figure out the macabre secrets of the town in order to bring her father back home alive. Of course, the town, and Heather’s connection to it, is not what it seems.

3. Cloud Atlas (Warner Brothers, 2,008 Theaters, 172 Minutes, Rated R): It’s rare that the most talked about film of any given week would be the one appearing in the third most number of theaters, but here we go.

This the first film the Wachowski siblings have wrote and directed since 2008′s noble failure Speed Racer. And for their first movie back, they aren’t shying away from a challenge, joined on both fronts by Tom Twyker, they are adapting David Mitchell’s ambitious novel to the big screen.

The story travels from the far flung past to the distant future, as the narrative passes from one era to the next in the form of journals, letters, and other forms of entertainment. Much of the cast, which includes Oscar winners such as Tom Hanks, Halle Berry, Susan Sarandon and Jim Broadbent, play multiple characters over the span of the six stories the film portrays.

It’s a risky venture. It has a rock solid cast that could make the most of even the worst story work. If they pull this off, there could be talk of the film around Oscar time (most likely about how it was hideously snubbed), and if the don’t, well, it will be another noble failure.

4. Chasing Mavericks (Fox, 2,002 Theaters, 115 Minutes, Rated PG): Finally, we get this one. It’s a surfing movie that applies some of the plot points from the Karate Kid to it. And, of course, it was based on a true story.

This is based on the life of surfer Jay Moriarty(Jonny Weston),  who has a dream of surfing the biggest, most dangerous wave in America. To accomplish this task, he enlists surfing legend Frosty Hesson (Gerard Butler) to teach him to not just surf the wave, but also to survive it. The mentor/student relationship morphs into a surrogate father/son dynamic, which cause problems with both men.

I’m impressed by how the trailer shows that surfing is far more difficult than I originally thought. But whether or not it will make a mark for itself in a busy weekend for films is anybody’s guess.

1. Diary Of A Wimpy Kid (FOX, 3,077 Theaters, 120 Minutes, Rated PG): When I looked towards 2010 as a fan of the comic book movie, I thought it would be a rather light year. Too my surprise, it will be a pretty full year for graphic novel adaptations. And it all starts off this week.

Granted, Diary of a Wimpy Kid isn’t a normal comic books. It exists only as a series of hardcover, kid-friendly graphic novels. But it follows the same rules as the comic book and is enormously popular. So I’m going to count it.

The story focuses on the adventures of a middle school-aged kid who must deal with the torment of not being as popular as he’d like to be. He deals with his station in life by trying to rise above it and by writing sarcastic missives in his diary—er—journal.

If everything goes right, this might be the film that unseats Alice in Wonderland at the box office.

2. The Bounty Hunter (Sony/Columbia, 3,074 Theaters, 110 Minutes, Rated PG-13): Witness the strange case of Gerard Butler. He broke on the scene in the movie musical Phantom of the Opera. He became a star in the ultra-macho 300. Now he seems to be spending his career trying to appeal to audiences for both those films by playing a series of growling, manly action-ready characters in a series of rote and formulaic chick flicks.

Has it been working? Last year’s The Ugly Truth, in which he followed the same formula, was  lambasted by the critics (only 14% fresh at Rotten Tomatoes) but qualifies as a hit, especially overseas where it tripled its production budget.

This film, where Butler plays a bounty hunter hired to track down his ex-wife only to become embroiled in a plot against her life, seems to be just as awful as The Ugly Truth. He’s with Jennifer Aniston this time instead of Kathrine Heigl. Will that make a difference? We’ll see.

3. Repo Men (Universal, 2,522 Theaters, 111 Minutes, Rated R): This film can’t help but bring up memories of the 1984 film Repo Man. But one wishes that this film has some of the subversive satire of the other.

This film takes place in a future where human life is extended through artificial organs bought on credit. People who fall behind on payments can soon find their life-saving mechanical organs be repossessed.

Jude Law plays one of the best organ repo men around. He unfortunately has a cardiac incident and becomes a client of the corporation he works for. When he falls behind on payments, he has to fight for his life against other repo men like himself.

This film could have a lot of commentary about the current health care crisis gripping this country today. But it seem like the film devolves into a mindless actioner by the third act. Maybe I’m wrong, but that’s how the ads make it seem. 

1. Where The Wild Things Are (Warner Brothers, 3,735 Theaters, 94 Minutes, Rated PG): There are certain stories that touch the hearts of a generation. Maurice Sendak’s book that this film was adapted from is one of them. It is so beloved that there are some that might say that book is so sacrosanct that any to adapt it would be akin to blasphemy.

Spike Jonze seem to realize this. He took his time making this film. Filming began in 2005 on the movie, and it missed both a May 2008 and October 2008 release date.

Jonze and co-writer Dave Eggers were in constant contact with Sendak, which would lead you to be the adaptation will be a successful one. But it remains to be seen how the creators were able to expand a 10-page storybook into a 94 minute film. Because if they falter along the way, there will be a whole generation that will hold them responsible. 

2. Law Abiding Citizen (Overture Films, 2,889 Theaters, 108 Minutes, Rated R): A plea bargain sets a group of killers free. The man who lost his family to the murderers decides to take the law into his own hands. But his revenge isn’t meted out solely on the killers but on the members of the legal system itself. Vengeance shall be his, and not even jail can stop him.

What you have here is a a basic Hollywood formula–the revenge flick. Sure some twists and turns are thrown in, but that’s what it is.

What I want to know is, are we supposed to root for Gerard Butler’s character or not? There are ads that present him as a hero of sorts, others as a crazed terrorist. Or maybe they want the film to be a think piece where morality is put to the test.

And you’ve got to be impressed with Gerard Butler. He is quickly becoming a modern day Michael Caine, at least as it comes to film per year ratio. What is this, his 20 picture this year? 

3. The Stepfather (Sony/Screen Gems, 2,734 Theaters, 101 Minutes, Rated PG-13): I would use this time to state my wish that they would finally come to the end of 1980s horror films to adapt, buy I really know its of no use. If they ran out of films to remake, they’d just go back to the top of the list and start all over again.

This film is a remake of the 1987 movie of the same name, which starred a pre-Lost Terry O’Quinn. That film was in turn loosely taken from the true life story of John List, a man who killed his family and got away with it for over a decade and a half. It was one of the TV show America’s Most Wanted most famous success stories as it led to his capture.

The basic premise is that a young man comes back from military school and find his mother remarried to almost the perfect man. Almost except for his pronounced homicidal tendencies. 

Of course, the question we have to as is, did the original really need to be remade? It was a cut above the rest of the psychological horror of the day, and Dylan Walsh will have to go a long way to match up with O’Quinn’s performance. And something is bound to be lost in going from an R rating to a PG-13.

1. Gamer (Lionsgate, 2,502 Theaters, 95 Minutes, Rated R): With the intense popularity of video games and the repeated attempts to adapt video games for the screen, it was only a matter of time before someone made a movie like this one. Of course, the fact this one isn’t the most original one to begin with makes me wonder why it didn’t come sooner.

This tells the tale of a futuristic society where prisoners are able to fight for their freedom by competing in sort of a live action video game. Prisoners are controlled by outside “gamers” and if they win 30 of their fights, they can go free.

Replace “video game” with “game show,” forget the puppet like control aspect, and replace Gerard Butler with Arnold Schwarzenegger and you come pretty close to 1987′s The Running Man. Well, if you haven’t seen it before, then it’s new to you.

2. All About Steve (FOX, 2,251 Theaters, 98 Minutes, Rated PG-13): Wow. You’ve got to hand it to Sandra Bullock. She has built a long and successful career playing strong and intelligent female protagonists. Now, when many other female stars of her age are either fading into obscurity or moving onto Oscar fare, Bullock is trying to go the goofy comedy route playing a woman who would embarrass every other character Bullock ever played.

Maybe it’s the fact that the film sat on a shelf for nearly two years or the poorly photoshopped poster to the left, but I’m not sure this film is going to be all that funny. I could be wrong, but judging by the ads I’ve seen, I’m probably not.

Whether this film does well at the box office or not (and it might, Bradley Cooper is hot of the smash, The Hangover, and could carry some of that success over), you have to feel sorry for Thomas Hayden Church. He’s only four years removed from an Oscar nomination and two years removed from starring in the biggest block buster of that summer and now he’s doing stuff like this. Lo, how the might have fallen.

3. Extract (Miramax, 1,611 Theaters, 91 Minutes, Rated R): Mike Judge might have the realm of television under his domination, with Beavis and Butthead still considered cultural icons to this very day and King of the Hill set to end its 13 season run, but his road in feature films has been a rough one.

It started out well. Not a box office success by any means, Office Space became a quotable cult hit on DVD and cable. But his follow up to that, Idiocracy was left for dead by its studio and made no impact at all.

It appears that Judge is going back to basics, movie away from the obtuse satire of Idiocracy and going back to the problems of an everyday man wrestling with problem outside of his realm of control that made Office Space so popular. Will this give the writer/director a career if film like the one he enjoys in TV? Time will tell.

1. G-Force (Disney, 3,697 Theaters, 89 Minutes, Rated PG): On paper, this could be one of the stupidest films ever made. After all, it is about a team of highly trained gerbils that the Government has used as secret, paramilitary unit. If that premise doesn’t scream idiocy I don’t know what does.

But, in looking at the adds, I an feeling fairly positive about this film. Yes, the premise is supergoofy, but it seems like the filmmakers know this and are running with it.

And any film with Will Arnett and Zach Galifianakis can’t be all bad. And you know you have been waiting for someone to say “Poop in his hand! Poop in his hand!” in a movie for a long time!

2. Orphan (Warner Brothers, 2, 750 Theaters, 123 Minutes, Rated R): Adoption rates for children older than infants is very low, and the chances of adoption gets lower the older the kid gets. This film could possibly kill those chances altogether.

The film focuses on a preteen named Esther who is adopted by a yuppie couple. The couple soon finds out that they made a dangerous bargain as Esther actively tries to kill the couple’s other children. I’m sure that behavior is not caused by Esther being a ghost of a child who had her throat cut in the 1920s or anything like that (That’s just a guess. But come on. Always wearing a choker? Outdated wardrobe? No record of her at the orphanage?)

If you like evil kid movies, well, here’s another one. But with the twist of “how can my judgement be so bad as to let this monster into my house”. The cast is great, so it’s got that going for it, which is nice.

3. The Awful Truth (Sony/Columbia, 2,882, Theaters, 97 Minutes, Rated R): If killer children of crime fighting gerbils are not your style, here’s a romantic comedy for you as a change of pace. And it’s rated R, too. Not really expected from a rom com.

The plot is a modern take on Cyrano as a pig dog man played by Gerard Butler has to train stressed out television producer Katherine Heigl how to get the man of her dreams. In the process, Butler finds himself falling for her, which sucks because she considers him, well, a pig dog man.

Heigl better be careful. She in danger of being typecast. This is,what, the 20th television producer she’s played?

Also, I have one major problem with Heigl in the brand of romantic comedy she decides to put herself in. She always plays a woman who never can seem to get a date. This is a major hurdle for me, and a lot of people, because there is no conceivable way that Katherine Heigl could ever go dateless.

One upcoming film whose development I have been following closely has been the thriller Law Abiding Citizen. Set to be directed by Frank Darabont and starring Gerard Butler and Jamie Foxx, it was scheduled top begin filming next month in Philadelphia.

That plan may be changing, however, as AintItCoolNews is reporting that Darabont left the film at some point last week and that it “apparently ended ugly.”

While, yes, I was interested and excited about this project filming close to where I live, I have also been interested in this due to Darabont being at the helm. I am finding myself more drawn to his work as both a writer and director the more I explore it. I had high hopes that he would inject some interesting things into the film’s story of a man (Foxx) who sets out to extract revenge on the man who killed his wife and daughter as well as the ambitious assistant district attorney (Butler) who set up the plea bargain that let him go free.

What effect Darabont’s departure from the project will have is as yet unknown. I, myself, was on the phone with the Greater Philadelphia Film Office in the middle of last week attempting to get some details on when location shooting was scheduled to begin, and they were still working under the assumption that everything was set for a mid-November start. If the film’s production company, the newly launched Film Department, want to make that schedule, they will have to bring someone on board quickly.

But what challenges does a new director face in trying to meet that deadline? Obviously, they already have their two leads cast, so unless either Foxx or Butler decide to walk with Darabont, that part is taken care of. However, if the production is committed to filming in Philadelphia, it seems that some of their work regarding location scouting and such, might have already been done for them. With such factors narrowing down their own creative input, I don’t see a director being able to imprint a strong personal vision on the story. I would not be surprised if Film Department were on the look out for somebody competent enough to point the cameras in the right direction and just get the film made as expediently as possible. Anyone know if Brett Ratner has some free time?

Frank Darabont’s next film, Law Abiding Citizen, will be shot entirely on location this fall in Philadelphia.

The story centers on a string of murders taking place across the city being masterminded by psycopathic genius who is locked behind bars. Gerard Butler will star as the prosecutor responsible for the psychopath’s incarceration who is racing against time to stop him.

Exciting news for those of anyone who is a follower of Darabont’s work and for any film fan living in the Philadelphia area. And if you’re like me, someone who lives in the Philadelphia area and is a fan of Darabont’s movies, it is a double win!

Philadelphia and the surrounding region has certainly seen its fair share of film and television production recently, with numerous smaller projects as well as bigger productions like M. Night Shyamalan’s The Happening, which was released this past summer, and the upcoming Marley And Me, Peter Jackson’s The Lovely Bones and Transformers: Revenge Of The Fallen all having used the area for location shooting. Looking towards the future, Shyamalan is currently planning on shooting his next film, Avatar: The Last Airbender, in the area and talk continues to circulate about a full-fledged production studio being built in the near future.

We’ll keep you posted on the production as the fall rolls on.