“MEN IN BLACK 3” GROSSES P68.73-M, OPENS AT NO. 1 IN PHILS.

MANILA, May 28 – Alien-hunting black-suited secret agents have invaded the top of the box office.

Smith, Jones, Sonnenfield and Brolin

             Columbia Pictures' sci-fi action comedy “Men In Black 3” starring Will Smith opened at No. 1 in the Philippines, amassing a nationwide gross of an out-of-this-world P68.73-million for the five-day opening weekend May 23-27 frame. This was announced today by Victor R. Cabrera, managing director of Columbia Pictures Philippines.

             “Men In Black 3's” first weekend haul in the Philippines is the second best opening of 2012 for a foreign movie, behind only “Marvel’s The Avengers” and beating the bows of “Wrath of the Titans” (P62.5-million), “The Hunger Games” (P62.3- million) and “Battleship” (P46.3-million).

             In the U.S., the sequel which reunited Smith with co-star Tommy Lee Jones and director Barry Sonnenfeld, effectively wrestled away the box-office crown from “Marvel's The Avengers” which has dominated the North American tills for the past weeks. "Men in Black 3" debuted as the No. 1 movie over the Memorial Day holiday weekend with $55 million. Distributor Sony estimates that by the end of the four-day holiday weekend Monday, "Men in Black 3" will have pulled in $202 million worldwide.

             Back in the Philippines, “MIB 3” rolled out on 260 screens, with SM Mall of Asia getting the lion's share of sales with P3.95-M, followed closely by SM North EDSA (P3.86-M) and Trinoma (P3.55-M). 

             Other top performing cinemas are Power Plant (P2.64-M), Greenbelt 3 (P2.41-M), SM Megamall (P2.40-M), Newport (P2.12-M), Glorietta 4 (P2.05-M), SM Cebu (P1.95-M) and Alabang Town Center (P1.93-M).

             Rounding out the Top 20 cinemas are Eastwood (P1.79-M), Greenhills (P1.429-M), Gateway (P1.42-M), Robinsons Ermita (P1.36-M), Shang Cineplex (P1.33-M), Robinsons Galleria (P1.11-M), SM Southmall (P1.08-M), Ayala Cebu (P1.05-M), SM Fairview (P1.03-M) and Festival Mall (P978,423).

             In “Men In Black 3,” Agents J (Smith) and K (Jones) are back... in time. J has seen some inexplicable things in his 15 years with the Men in Black, but nothing, not even aliens, perplexes him as much as his wry, reticent partner. But when K's life and the fate of the planet are put at stake, Agent J will have to travel back in time to put things right. J discovers that there are secrets to the universe that K never told him -- secrets that will reveal themselves as he teams up with the young Agent K (Brolin) to save his partner, the agency, and the future of humankind.

             Audiences who watch “Men in Black 3” in Digital 3D also get to screen an extended 6-minute sneak peek of Columbia Pictures’ next super-blockbuster “The Amazing Spider-Man” as an added attraction. 2D screenings of “MIB 3” will play a new trailer of “The Amazing Spider-Man,” opening in Philippine cinemas June 29. 

             “Men In Black 3” is distributed by Columbia Pictures, local office of Sony Pictures Releasing International. Visit http://www.columbiapictures.com.ph for trailers, exclusive content and free downloads. Like us at www.Facebook.com/ColumbiaPicturesPH and join our fan contests.

“MEN IN BLACK 3” TIME-TRAVELS IN IMAX 3D!

IMAX Corporation and Sony Pictures Entertainment announced that the sci-fi, action comedy Men In Black 3 will be released to IMAX 3D theatres in the Philippines. 

             Directed by Barry Sonnenfeld, Men In Black 3 is the first in the franchise to be released in IMAX. Will Smith and Tommy Lee Jones reunite as the title characters. The film also stars Josh Brolin, Jemaine Clement, and Emma Thompson.

             In Men In Black 3, Agents J (Smith) and K (Jones) are back... in time. J has seen some inexplicable things in his 15 years with the Men in Black, but nothing, not even aliens, perplexes him as much as his wry, reticent partner. But when K's life and the fate of the planet are put at stake, Agent J will have to travel back in time to put things right. J discovers that there are secrets to the universe that K never told him -- secrets that will reveal themselves as he teams up with the young Agent K (Brolin) to save his partner, the agency, and the future of humankind.

             “Releasing a film in IMAX 3D signals an event release, and Men In Black 3 on Memorial Day weekend certainly qualifies in a big way. We couldn't be more excited about how MIB 3 will look and sound in IMAX theatres," said Rory Bruer, president of Worldwide Distribution for Sony Pictures Releasing. 

             "Will Smith, Tommy Lee Jones and Barry Sonnenfeld have made the Men In Black franchise a fan favorite and we're excited to feature the return of this iconic title in IMAX," said Greg Foster, Chairman and President, IMAX Filmed Entertainment. "Men In Black 3 is another strong addition to our 2012 film slate and we're looking forward to continuing to work with the talented team at Sony Pictures." 

             The IMAX release of Men In Black 3 will be digitally re-mastered into the image and sound quality of The IMAX 3D Experience(R) with proprietary IMAX DMR(R) (Digital Re-mastering) technology. The crystal-clear images coupled with IMAX's customized theatre geometry and powerful digital audio create a unique environment that will make audiences feel as if they are in the movie. 

             Men In Black 3 is distributed by Columbia Pictures, local office of Sony Pictures Releasing International. Visit http://www.columbiapictures.com.ph for trailers, exclusive content and free downloads. Like us at www.Facebook.com/ColumbiaPicturesPH and join our fan contests.

BARRY SONNENFELD TALKS ABOUT “MEN IN BLACK 3”

(L-R)Sonnenfield, Brolin, and Smith.

Fifty-nine-year-old filmmaker Barry Sonnenfeld returns this week with the eagerly anticipated third instalment in the billion-dollar Men In Black franchise, bringing back the original tandem of Will Smith and Tommy Lee Jones.

In the film, Agents J (Smith) and K (Jones) are back... in time. J has seen some inexplicable things in his 15 years with the Men in Black, but nothing, not even aliens, perplexes him as much as his wry, reticent partner. But when K’s life and the fate of the planet are put at stake, Agent J will have to travel back in time to put things right. J discovers that there are secrets to the universe that K never told him -- secrets that will reveal themselves as he teams up with the young Agent K (Josh Brolin) to save his partner, the agency, and the future of humankind.

             Question: When did you settle on time travel as the backdrop for the movie?

             Barry Sonnenfeld: It was Will Smith’s idea on the set of Men In Black 2. One night Will Smith came up to me and said – he calls me ‘Baz’ he said, ‘You know, Baz, I’ve got an idea for Men In Black 3. I think that I should go back in the past and do something that has to do with saving Agent K. And by doing that we learn secrets that we didn’t know and J learns secrets about K. It would be great to do a time travel version.’ And I said, ‘Let’s get through 2!’ Then we all went off and did our own thing for many, many years but when Sony decided to do Men In Black 3, we all decided it shouldn’t be another episode of some villain on the loose, so the idea of time travelling came up again. It is such an exciting idea. They called me to ask me what era we wanted, and 1969 seemed perfect, especially as that was the advent of space travel, the start of our own adventure visiting planets in our own solar system. Also the music was great and the era was great. What I personally did not want to do was a movie that took place in ’69 with hippies and drugs.

             Q: Scripting a time travel movie must be very difficult…

             Sonnenfeld: Yes, to begin with only the first act was really good. With the second and third acts, especially with a time travel movie, we were constantly thinking that we had it all done and then one of us would wake up in the middle of the night and go, ‘Wait a minute, if we kill this guy then that guy is dead’. We watched Back To The Future dozens of times because that was our Bible for how a movie set the rules of time travel and succeeded. Also, we all felt that it was really important that we had Will Smith’s next movie after him having several years off as a producer. He was circling a bunch of movies but we wanted the next Will Smith movie and I knew that we’d get there. Will and I always said that the only way we could screw up is if we didn’t, in the past, have someone that was so good that you didn’t miss watching Will and Tommy, because the movie is about that great relationship.

             Q: You obviously work terrifically with Will Smith, but what’s it like directing Tommy Lee Jones?

             Sonnenfeld: It is funny because it was a little bit difficult directing Tommy Lee Jones on the first movie. We had a difference of opinion about his performance but the second and third movies were joyful. Tommy was always happy. He loves working with Will. He totally trusts me. I have photos of Tommy Lee Jones and me laughing! Miracles can happen! It wasn’t fake, because Tommy won’t fake anything. He loves the role, because the reaction shot is always funnier than the action shot. I was the cinematographer on When Harry Met Sally and as funny as Meg Ryan is faking an orgasm, every time you cut to Billy Crystal doing nothing it becomes funnier.

             Q: Was Tommy upset that he’s not in all of Men In Black 3?

             Sonnenfeld: I think Tommy wished he was in the whole movie but I think a) Tommy respected the script, b) he respected Josh [Brolin] as an actor and c) he loves the final result, has seen the movie and thinks it is really good. He wishes he was in the whole movie but understands the plot did not allow for that. It worked great because I think the audience does not view it as Tommy or Josh. I think they just view Agent K and it’s not like ‘I didn’t like Tommy but I liked Josh’, or ‘I didn’t like Josh but did like Tommy’. We were saying that Josh might not get the praise he deserves because some people will think that they saw the one same guy play the whole movie! 

             Q: Was it difficult convincing Josh Brolin to take on Tommy’s character?

             Sonnenfeld: It was easy to convince him to play the character. I always knew that I wanted Josh as soon as I read the script. I saw him in W and thought he was extraordinary. He played George Bush and he wasn’t doing an impersonation. He really created a version of George Bush. That wasn’t exactly his accent. He created this amazing tension by eating in every scene in W. If you see it again, there’s this tension of him eating French Fries and talking or eating a tuna sandwich. It was extraordinary. I said, please let’s hire Josh Brolin.

             Q: Men In Black 3 has great emotional depth. Do you worry about where you might take the franchise afterwards?

             Sonnenfeld: I don’t worry about where we are going afterwards. It does feel like the end of a trilogy and it is kind of fun to go back and watch the first movie with the knowledge of what we now know at the end of the third movie. In fact, it is kind of fun to watch this movie again with the knowledge of what is going to come! I think the second movie didn’t have enough emotional depth so maybe this one makes up for the previous one. And Brolin is pretty great.

             Q: Is it true that shooting the first scene on Men In Black 3 made you cry?

             Sonnenfeld: The truth is, I did break into tears, tears of joy when I watched the first scene of Will and Josh together, which is the scene where Will is being interrogated at HQ by Josh. I was weeping because it had worked. I was weeping saying, ‘Oh, my God, we’ve got a movie!’

             (,Men in Black 3 is distributed in 3D and regular theaters by Columbia Pictures, local office of Sony Pictures Releasing International. Visit http://www.columbiapictures.com.ph for trailers, exclusive content and free downloads. Like us at www.Facebook.com/ColumbiaPicturesPH and join our fan contests.)

TOMMY LEE JONES HARBORS A DEEP SECRET IN “MEN IN BLACK 3”

Will Smith and Tommy Lee Jones in MIB 3

One of the most acclaimed and accomplished actors ever in Hollywood, Academy Award® winner Tommy Lee Jones brings a distinct character to his every film. Now, he returns to the big screen as the stern Agent K in Columbia Pictures' 3D sci-fi adventure comedy “Men In Black 3.”

In the film, Agents J (Will Smith) and K are back... in time. J has seen some inexplicable things in his 15 years with the Men in Black, but nothing, not even aliens, perplexes him as much as his wry, reticent partner. But when K’s life and the fate of the planet are put at stake, Agent J will have to travel back in time to put things right. J discovers that there are secrets to the universe that K never told him -- secrets that will reveal themselves as he teams up with the young Agent K (Josh Brolin) to save his partner, the agency, and the future of humankind.

             “The relationship between J and K has been both contentious and affectionate at the same time throughout the movies,” says Tommy Lee Jones, who again dons the suit and shades. 

             Jones was enthusiastic about playing the gruff Agent K. He says, “Any time you go to work with Will Smith is going to be a happy day, and Will and director Barry Sonnenfeld together make it an even happier day. They are wonderful people to work with.”

 

             The story of “Men In Black 3” takes the filmmakers back – back to the characters’ origins, back to the key moments of their relationship, to focus on the key elements that have kept them at arms’ length from each other for 15 years – and looked for ways to resolve the conflict. The answer came in sending Agent J back – back in time. 

 

             “At the beginning of the movie, J and K are still partners – but they haven’t learned much about each other in all their time together,” says producer Walter F. Parkes. “In fact, at the very beginning of the story, the character of Men In Black chief, Zed, has recently died and K gives a eulogy that provides no information whatsoever about him. This despite the fact that Zed was supposedly his best friend for 45 years. It makes J think, after all these years, what do I really know about the guy sitting next to me? That is the foundation for our story, and it coincides with the escape of an alien, Boris the Animal, that K put away 40 years earlier, in 1969 – and he’s coming back for some kind of payback on K.”

             Some kind of payback, indeed: Boris jumps back in time to 1969 and kills K. No one in 2012 has any memory that K wasn’t murdered 40 years earlier – no one except J, who is wondering what happened to his partner. To save K, J follows Boris back into the past – and as he does, he sees an opportunity to learn more about his partner. “J sees saving K as a great opportunity to learn secrets about K – he thinks he’ll find out why K is so grumpy and reserved,” concludes Sonnenfeld.

 “Men in Black 3” is distributed in 3D and regular theaters by Columbia Pictures, local office of Sony Pictures Releasing International. Visit http://www.columbiapictures.com.ph for trailers, exclusive content and free downloads. Like us at www.Facebook.com/ColumbiaPicturesPH and join our fan contests.

WILL SMITH REPRISES HIS FAVORITE ROLE IN “MEN IN BLACK 3”

Will Smith as Agent J in MIB 3

             “The `Men in Black’ movies are about the relationship between Agents J and K,” says Will Smith, who returns to one of his signature and favorite roles, Agent J, in Columbia Pictures’ eagerly anticipated adventured comedy, “Men in Black 3.” 

“This movie brings that home – it’s about the power and origin of their relationship. It’s actually an idea we’ve had for years – we had the concept before the second movie – but it needed time to mature. What we had to do was elevate the story, and the only way to do that is to go deeper, deeper into the characters, deeper into the revelations that the movie would reveal.”

In the film, Agents J and K (Tommy Lee Jones) are back... in time. J has seen some inexplicable things in his 15 years with the Men in Black, but nothing, not even aliens, perplexes him as much as his wry, reticent partner. But when K’s life and the fate of the planet are put at stake, Agent J will have to travel back in time to put things right. J discovers that there are secrets to the universe that K never told him -- secrets that will reveal themselves as he teams up with the young Agent K (Josh Brolin) to save his partner, the agency, and the future of humankind.

It has been ten years since the Men in Black were last seen protecting the Earth from the scum of the universe, and since then, there has been rampant speculation about a third film – but Smith says that it was always a given that there would be a third film. “We came to a point where we all felt that we had a fresh and compelling story that took the audience to a time and place they had not seen in this franchise,” says Smith. 

For his part, Will Smith was excited to put the black suit and shades on again. Agent J is one of his favorite characters and as he made his long-awaited return to the role there was nothing quite like getting into costume. “You can’t beat the black suit,” he says. “It’s such powerful, iconic imagery. You put on the suit and the shades and it throws you into the mental space of the Men in Black. It’s like a childhood fantasy – you know things that the other people don’t know and you’ve got the most important job in the world. The seven-year-old boy in me comes running out when I put the black suit on.”

             “Men in Black 3” is distributed in 3D and regular theaters by Columbia Pictures, local office of Sony Pictures Releasing International. Visit http://www.columbiapictures.com.ph for trailers, exclusive content and free downloads. Like us at www.Facebook.com/ColumbiaPicturesPH and join our fan contests.

JOSH BROLIN PLAYS THE YOUNG AGENT K IN “MEN IN BLACK”

Josh Brolin and Will Smith in MIB 3

When Agent J (Will Smith) jumps back in time to 1969, he almost immediately comes into contact with the man who will become his partner in 25 or 30 years – Agent K. The filmmakers of Columbia Pictures' action adventure comedy “Men in Black 3” turned to Oscar-nominee Josh Brolin to build on Tommy Lee Jones’ performance as the older K to interpret and channel the character as a young man.

             “You’ll hear all the time a producer say, ‘Well, if we didn’t find this particular actor, we could never have cast the role’ – but that was never more true than with Josh playing this part,” says producer Walter F. Parkes. “You can find a picture of Tommy Lee Jones as a lineman for Harvard and compare to a picture of Josh Brolin in `Milk,' with his hair cut in an early-1970s style. It’s amazing – they’re dead ringers for each other. But it’s not just about how he looks. He had to deliver Tommy, but he couldn’t do an impersonation – he had to do an interpretation. I think his performance is one of the delights of the movie.”

             “Will and Tommy are an iconic duo,” says Brolin. “It wouldn’t work if another actor came in as a third wheel. But when they explained to me the plot of the film and my role – that J goes back in time to 1969 and I would play the young K – well, I’m in. I’m in without even thinking about it, because there’s a character I want to play.”

             “Being a part of this movie is crazy for me,” Brolin continues. “When you go see a great movie, like `Men In Black,' you’re in the audience thinking, ‘Wow, I want to be those guys.’ You want to be that cool, to have that chemistry with someone. And then you’re asked to do it – it’s like winning the lottery. When I put on the suit, it was the most surreal feeling in the world – I felt like Superman.”

             In approaching his role, Brolin says he relied on a careful mix of actors’ tools. “I started with a caricature and whittled away from there,” Brolin explains. “But we really created our own thing. It was less about ‘How am I going to do Tommy?’ than finding a rendition of Tommy and then making it our own.”

             “There’s a certain rapport or repartee that you’ll develop with an actor, and that becomes your timing, how you create,” co-star Will Smith says. “Josh had studied Tommy so well that there wasn’t a single missed beat when Josh came in. It was almost the identical chemistry, which is very difficult to come by.”

             In the highly anticipated sequel “Men in Black 3,” Agents J and K are back... in time. J has seen some inexplicable things in his 15 years with the Men in Black, but nothing, not even aliens, perplexes him as much as his wry, reticent partner. But when K’s life and the fate of the planet are put at stake, Agent J will have to travel back in time to put things right. J discovers that there are secrets to the universe that K never told him -- secrets that will reveal themselves as he teams up with the young Agent K (Josh Brolin) to save his partner, the agency, and the future of humankind. 

             “Men in Black 3” will be distributed in 3D and regular theaters by Columbia Pictures, local office of Sony Pictures Releasing International. Visit http://www.columbiapictures.com.ph for trailers, exclusive content and free downloads. Like us at www.Facebook.com/ColumbiaPicturesPH and join our fan contests.