Sony Pictures Home Entertainment has announced that Battle: Los Angeles will be released on DVD and Blu-ray on June 14, 2011.

To date the movie has made $200 million worldwide on a budget of $70 million, so there’s the possibility of Sony moving forward with a sequel if the DVD/Blu-ray sales are strong. Actor Aaron Eckhart previous said he’d be interested in returning, and he’s already thought of potential locations where the sequel could be set.

The Battle: Los Angeles DVD special features include 6 behind the scenes featurettes:

• Acting with Aliens
• Behind The Battle
• Building the Aliens
• Creating L.A. in LA
• Preparing for Battle
• Shooting the Aliens

The Blu-ray will contain all the above featurettes plus:

• Boot Camp
• Directing the Battle
• The Freeway Battle
• Staff Sergeant Nantz
• Marines Behind The Scenes
• Aliens Ambush The Marines
• Battling Unknown Forces
• Technical Sargent Santos
• Alien Autopsy
• Gas Station Explosion
• Visual FX on the Freeway
• Do You Believe in Aliens?
• Alien Command & Control

Battle: Los Angeles is now available to pre-order from Amazon on:

DVD | Blu-ray | Two-Disc Blu-ray/DVD Combo

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Battle: Los Angeles remained number one after a photo finish with Rango, a movie that passed a certain mark last weekend worldwide. On the other end Sucker Punch was abysmal even compared to its North American performance, more of this and others after the break.

Battle: Los Angeles scored $16.3 million compared to the $16.2 million that Rango had. Worldwide Battle now stands at $153.4 million on a $70 million budget while Rango passed the $200 million mark worldwide thanks to a new international total of $95.2 million. Unfortunately Rango cost about twice as much as Battle: Los Angeles so it still has a bit more to gross before it can be called a financial success.

Just Go With It found its way to 3rd place thanks to the $9 million it made last weekend, $62.6 million internationally and with the $100.5 million it has made so far in North America, this stinker has now grossed $163.2 million worldwide on an $80 million budget. On what the hell did they spend $80 million?

Gnomeo and Juliet was 4th with $8.2 million for $70.2 million and a worldwide total of $166.3 million. Depending on how much this cost (my gut says no more then $60 million, Wiki says $10 million but I don’t buy that) we might not be to far from Gnomeo and Juliet 2.

Limitless is slowly gaining ground, $6.6 million for $14.3 million in just 13 markets and a worldwide total (that will at least double in a month or so) of $58.1 million, all on a $27 million budget.

Sucker Punch, oh Sucker Punch, you were supposed to be this big blockbuster and instead you turned into a big disappointment. In 23 markets (including Spain, Italy, Mexico and Brazil) Sucker Punch only made $6.5 million and now it is looking at a worst case scenario final performance of $90 million worldwide while the best case scenario is $150 million and only if the movie makes a killing in the strong Asian markets (China, South Korea and Japan). Considering the $82 million budget, Sucker Punch won’t make Warner Bros money in its box office run, sorry Zack.

In 7th place The King’s Speech seems to still be going with $6 million and a mind blowing $373.4 million worldwide gross. This is a historical drama people, an R rated historical drama, $15 million budget, no flashy visuals, no 3D, yet it now stands as the 14th highest grossing movie of 2010 and will probably finish 13th above Tron Legacy.

In 8th place The Adjustment Bureau is strong with $5.5 million for $39.6 million and $95.2 million worldwide, $50 million budget on this one, looking good.

The Rite was surprisingly 9th $4.1 million while Red Riding Hood was 10th with a tiny bit less then that. Finally Yogi Bear somehow managed to pass the $200 million mark worldwide so probably based on how well DVD and Blue-Ray sales are, they might be looking at the prospect of a sequel, oh boy.

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Another week, another bad box office weekend and this is really starting to become a trend. We had 3 movies opening wide last week, all of them ranking in the top 5 but none really performing above even the already low expectations, more after the break.

Limitless was rather limited with only $18.9 million over the weekend but considering the $27 million budget it should turn somewhat of a profit for the parties involved (Relativity Media producing and distributing, the same guys that bought Take Me Home Tonight for $10 million from Universal, a movie that only made $6.7 million so far and won’t finish above $7 million when all is said and done).

Rango was 2nd with $15 million and a 19 day total of $94.5 million. The Gore Verbinski western animated 3Dless flick isn’t breaking any records but considering the hard to sell genre I’d say they should be very proud of it. Not going to lie, I was rooting for this to turn into How to Train Your Dragon but unfortunately it didn’t happen. That being said, I believe this is just as entertaining as that one was, so if you haven’t seen it already, do yourself a favor and give Rango a chance.

Battle: Los Angeles is 3rd with $14.5 million and $62.9 million so far for what was essentially (in my opinion, so don’t take this the wrong way) one of the most boring alien invasion flicks I have ever seen (I did NOT watch Skyline and I don’t intend on doing that anytime soon, or ever for that matter). What makes it even worse is this had so much potential to be really good and instead it turned out mediocre at best.

In 4th place we have the 2nd release of last week, The Lincoln Lawyer or how I like to call it, The Shirtless Lincoln Lawyer. You know Matthew McConaughey can’t keep a shirt on him to save his life so obviously he does it again. $13.2 million debut for the $40 million flick.

Finally in 5th place (and honestly, deserved more) we got the 3rd release of last week, Paul, starring British comedy geniuses Nick Frost and Simon Pegg. Only $13 million for this but that is higher then previous Frost-Pegg movie openings in North America (Shawn of the Dead with $3.3 million and Hot Fuzz with $5.8 million). Hopefully Paul will finish with $40 million or so to at least match the budget they spent on production (but it will need at least twice that much worldwide).

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Aliens versus a lizard and the lizard, the lizard will die. Actually no, the lizard did not die, he took the number 1 spot at the international box office last weekend while Battle: Los Angeles was a not so close 2nd on its debut but more about this and the rest after the break.

Rango (the lizard) made $24.1 million last weekend for a new total of $47.2 million and worldwide it stands at $122.3 million on a $135 million budget. After two weekends Rango ain’t looking bad but I was expecting better then just this. It will probably finish around $300+ million worldwide, considering this is a western themed animated movie without 3D in the year 2011, you can guess if $300 million is good or back.

Battle: Los Angeles was rather disappointing in the 32 markets it opened in with just $16.7 million for a worldwide total of $60.6 million (international plus North America) after almost a week.

The King’s Speech is starting to slow down so it made only $13.1 million for a total of $208.2 million and a worldwide of $338.4 million. Next week it will pass $350 million.

Torrente 4 is number 4 and this new Spanish entry in the (it seems) popular Torrente series grossed $11.7 million, $8.7 million out of that coming from Spain.

Black Swan was 5th with $10.6 million and thanks to a worldwide total of $271.6 million it is now the 2nd highest grossing News Corp (Fox) release of 2010 (Avatar was released in 2009 but it made a lot more money in 2010 for News Corp) only behind The Chronicles of Narnia The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, a movie that just passed the $400 million mark last weekend and is now expecting news of a 4th entry getting the green light.

The Adjustment Bureau was 6th with $8.6 million ($23.8 million), The Rite starring Sir. Anthony Hopkins was 7th with $8.3 million ($35.9 million) while I am Number Four was 8th with $7.5 million ($57.3 million). This now has grossed $108.6 million worldwide on a $60 million budget so a sequel is not out of the question but certainly not a priority either for Buena Vista (Disney).

Finishing the top 10 are Unknown at number 9 with $6.5 million ($35.5 million), $94.9 million worldwide (a far cry from Taken that grossed $226.8 million) and at number 10 the ever so stupid Adam Sandler comedy Just Go With It with $6.2 million ($45.6 million for $140.8 million worldwide on a $80 million budget and I can’t stop wondering who exactly payed $80 million for this garbage I ask).

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Aliens strike again in this latest invasion flick, Battle: Los Angeles, the number 1 of last weekend. Among alien movies Battle: Los Angeles opened softer than District 9 ($37.3 million), Independence Day ($50.2 million) and War of the Worlds ($64.8 million) to name just a few. So in other words this one got the short end of the stick and probably for good reasons, more after the break.

Battle: Los Angeles grossed $35.5 million over the weekend, about as much as was expected of it. Now Sony says this only cost $70 million, I haven’t seen it yet so I won’t judge yet but I’ve heard some conflicting reports. If $70 million is the real budget then Sony should be really happy because this will make them some green ones.

In 2nd place was Rango with $22.6 million for a new total of $70.5 million in 11 days. The quirky and highly rated (89% on Rotten Tomatoes) western animated flick is doing well but I was hoping for a softer drop, 40.6% is not bad but it could have been a lot better. Rango cost $135 million so covering that won’t be easy, it will need better holds over the upcoming weekends.

Red Riding Hood was 3rd with a soft (but not as soft as I was expecting) $14 million. Obviously nowhere near Twilight (money wise) even if it offered similar ingredients, Red Riding Hood is pretty much a miss for Warner.

The Adjustment Bureau finished 4th with $11.6 million for a total of $39.6 million in 11 days. This flick starring General Zod (Terence Stamp) among others, cost $60 million to make and should finish the North American run at the box office with about $65-70 million.

The ultimate bomb of the week (and probably year) was Mars Needs Moms in 5th place, a movie I actually overestimated (while thinking I was going to underestimate it), grossing only $6.9 million on a budget of $150 million. Disney movies usually don’t bomb but this is just something to behold. Imagine people, this has the higher 3D tickets (Rango doesn’t have 3D), big production budget and probably a similarly big marketing budget and all you get in exchange is a tiny $6.9 million from 3117 theaters. This is going to be up there with the all time biggest bombs, no doubt.

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Battle: Los Angeles claimed the #1 spot at the weekend, taking $36 million in the US. With a production budget of around $70 million and international numbers still rolling in the movie looks set to make a profit for Columbia, which can only mean one thing.

In a recent interview Aaron Eckhart was questioned on whether he’d be interested in returning for a sequel, and it turns out not only is the actor ready, he’s already thinking of potential locations.

From Hero Complex:

“I very much enjoyed wearing the uniform of Staff Sgt. Nantz and I’m very proud of this film,” Eckhart told me this morning when he called from Paris. “It wouldn’t be the worst thing to do, that’s for sure. I’m ready to wear the uniform again. Filming this movie was a great experience and I’d be happy to see that experience continue.”

“To me this movie, I put my heart and soul into it. It was the hardest movie I ever made in my life, by far. It was hard not only physically but mentally, psychologically, and it was all real blood, sweat and tears on the screen. It’s not makeup and it’s not made up.”

And what of that sequel? Should we expect ”Battle: Fresno” or ”Battle: Poughkeepsie“? Eckhart laughed. “No, no I’m thinking something more like ‘Battle: St Croix.’ Or maybe ‘Battle: Paris,’ I’ve been looking around while I’m here. It’s funny you have to make it real but you do hate to destroy a nice town. But Paris would be good.”

The spin-off potential from this movie is quite huge. I imagine if Battle: Los Angeles makes a tidy sum the bigwigs at Columbia will be scanning Google Maps for the next possible location.

I haven’t had the chance to see the movie yet so I can’t comment on whether it deserves a sequel. Is anyone who saw Battle: LA this weekend interested in seeing more? If so, which city should be invaded next?

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Following their collaborations on The Killing Room, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Beginning and Darkness Falls director Jonathan Liebesman and composer Brian Tyler re-teamed for their biggest challenge yet; a movie about a marine platoon facing off against an alien invasion in Los Angeles.

Brian Tyler is one of the busiest action composers working at the moment, having scored The Expendables, Battle: Los Angeles and Fast Five over the past year. His soundtrack for Battle: Los Angeles is easily one of his best scores, containing a mix of calmer cues and heavy, big scale action tracks, with small hints of Kick-Ass and Transformers.

Here’s the album tracklisting:

1. Battle Los Angeles Hymn (2:32)
2. Battle Los Angeles Main Titles (4:18)
3. Arrival (2:13)
4. Marines Don’t Quit (2:48)
5. Command and Control Center (3:44)
6. Elegy (4:59)
7. Redemption (8:27)
8. For Home, Country, and Family (4:02)
9. War Hymn (2:28)
10. Evac (3:12)
11. To Hell and Back (6:26)
12. Mobilized (5:07)
13. The Freeway (1:56)
14. The Drone (3:07)
15. Casualty of War (1:37)
16. Rebalance (1:26)
17. Regret (1:28)
18. Shelf Life (2:32)
19. The World Is at War (1:40)
20. Abandoning Los Angeles (5:11)
21. Battle Los Angeles (5:28)
22. We Are Still Here (3:15)

And you can listen to previews in the widget below:

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I smell a bunch of turkeys headed our way (not real turkeys, I mean bad movies with mediocre box office), yeah sure, Battle: Los Angeles will get action junkies to pay for a ticket (or two) but come April this will already be forgotten just like everything else that came out this year, minus Rango (hopefully). More after the break.

Battle: Los Angeles comes into 3417 theaters from Sony hoping to be that next alien invasion movie that can make Independence Day proud or at least match District 9 (talking box office here, quality wise it would be the other way). My gut says it will fail at both with only $32 million this weekend and no more then $80-90 million total. I expect international numbers to be higher so in the end, if this really did cost only $70 million to produce, it will make some money back.

Rango should be 2nd with about $26 million for a 10-day total of $71 million or more.

The other new opener, Mars Needs Moms, an animated flick distributed by Disney into 3117 theaters is not getting a lot of buzz around it and of the two, Rango (already in theaters) is looking like a much better offering for families. So I say $15 million but don’t take my word for this since this would not be the first animated movie I underestimated this year (read Gnomeo and Juliet).

4th place belongs to The Adjustment Bureau with $13 million because this has showed decent legs during weekdays so I’m not expecting a big drop.

Finally all the way down to 5th place we might find Red Riding Hood coming from Warner Bros. in 3030 theaters and presenting the classic story in a different and darker way (so they say). Right now this is at 8% on Rotten Tomatoes so it is almost universally panned by critics (and probably for good reasons). So without much more in the way of words I will just say $12 million.

Next week Relativity goes all out with Bradley Copper in Limitless, Lionsgate offers us The Lincoln Lawyer with Matthew McConaughey (shirtless lawyer maybe) while Universal sends us on a road trip with Paul (hint: he is an alien) starring British comedy duo Nick Frost and Simon Pegg.

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Roger Ebert just gave Battle: Los Angeles a 0.5 out of 4 star review. I happened to enjoy the movie a considerable amount more than the old curmudgeon, especially when you take my low expectations into account. This is not a movie for the intellectual crowd: the dialogue is atrocious, most of the characters are under-developed, and the motivations behind the alien invasion are murky at best. But if you’re looking for some solid action and passable special effects, Battle: LA fits the bill.

This is one of the best summer movies that didn’t actually come out during the summer. It’s a broadly painted action flick, complete with the requisite explosions and action one would come to expect from summer fare. That may carry a negative connotation to some (depending on your tastes, of course), but I thought the film was actually pretty well executed. There isn’t much of a story – aliens invade, no one really knows why – but we’re given just enough of a basic outline to start pulling for the characters by the end. My roommate says it’s Independence Day meets Cloverfield, and I think that’s a really apt description.

It’s hard to tell whether the concept for this movie is lazy or brilliant. By not providing any legitimate exploration of the alien culture and concentrating on a small group of soldiers in the wake of a global event, it positions the film as the first of a franchise; the interesting part is not the straight sequels that will surely follow, but the potential of stories told at the same point on the timeline as this one. There was talk of a Cloverfield sequel in which the monster attack on New York City is told from the perspective of different characters, a similar idea that ended up not coming to fruition. The odds are no better for this happening with this franchise, but it’s not far-fetched to assume that we could see a Battle: Miami (or its equivalent) in the next few years.

Director Jonathan Liebesman has been making the rounds in the trades over the past year, at one point in contention for Christopher Nolan’s upcoming Superman film (a job which ultimately went to Zack Snyder) and actually securing the director’s chair for the sequel to Clash of the Titans. His tactic here was to attempt to replicate the dramatic documentary style used to such great success in the 10-part HBO masterpiece Band of Brothers: the handheld, snap-zoom happy, shaky cam feel most widely associated with Paul Greengrass and the Bourne films. To some degree, Liebesman succeeds; the style works best when we’re pulled into the action with the squad and following them through the charred streets of L.A. in search of a way out. But this style of camerawork really isn’t needed in the post-title sequence of the movie in which we’re introduced to all the characters. Snap-zooms and bouncing framing aren’t needed when two characters are having a conversation in a florist shop. Aside from this minor quibble, I like the look of the movie and think the cinematography has an immersive quality to it.

The first act of the film has a strong horror vibe. We don’t get a good look at the aliens until later, so we’re left wondering what they look like and when our heroes go searching through a dangerous zone on the way to rescue some civilians, we jump as they turn every hazy corner, waiting for something to jump out at us. There’s some legitimate suspense here, and it works well for the most part. When we finally get a look at the aliens, I wished we hadn’t. They’re terribly designed and awfully rendered, a jerky CG army that seems cobbled together by ideas from other films: biologically controlled guns (ahem, District 9), snaky tentacles (Independence Day, Predator), and the upright posture of your typical movie extraterrestrial.

The special effects need to be really special to kick a movie like this to the next level, but the same derivative design work we see with the aliens is replicated with their ships (smaller ones resembling Serenity and larger ones straight out of District 9). There are a lot of visual effects in this movie – especially in the final act – but if you’re looking for a stunning presentation, I imagine you’ll be disappointed. I thought the film’s biggest accomplishment was its depiction of the city of Los Angeles, since it was shot on location in Shreveport and Baton Rouge, Louisiana. (The Santa Monica scenes were particularly evocative of their true-to-life locales.)

The dialogue is terse and bland, not allowing any character to step out of the shadow of his or her stereotype. Michelle Rodriguez and Michael Pena give supporting performances exactly in line with your expectations, but hip-hop star Ne-Yo rose far above the eye-rolling I’m sure you did when you read his name in the cast list. Aaron Eckhart carries the film, not because of his character (or the cheesy speeches he’s prone to give), but because of the actor’s charisma and screen presence. Eckhart commands the screen every second he’s on it and his defined jaw seems tailor made for action hero roles. To be clear, he’s way better than this film would indicate and if you’re unfamiliar with his work, check him out in Thank You For Smoking. (I also happen to think he’s one of the best parts of The Dark Knight.)

I’ve highlighted a lot of the things that I didn’t particularly care for here, but Battle: Los Angeles knows how to entertain an audience. The action (lacking in effects as it may be) is intense enough to make it worth a watch, and the sound design is effective and very well done. Though this movie takes cues from other films and doesn’t manage to equal any of them, this is passable entertainment and a good precursor to Summer 2011. Until next time…

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Here’s the Super Bowl TV spot for Battle: Los Angeles. The movie stars Aaron Eckhart, Michelle Rodriguez, Ramon Rodriguez, Bridget Moynahan, Ne-Yo and Michael Peña, and in this spot we get whole bunch of money shots.

Watch bellow:

For years, there have been documented cases of UFO sightings around the world – Buenos Aires, Seoul, France, Germany, China. But in 2011, what were once just sightings will become a terrifying reality when Earth is attacked by unknown forces. As people everywhere watch the world’s great cities fall, Los Angeles becomes the last stand for mankind in a battle no one expected. It’s up to a Marine staff sergeant (Aaron Eckhart) and his new platoon to draw a line in the sand as they take on an enemy unlike any they’ve ever encountered before.

Battle: Los Angeles hits on March 11th 2011.

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