Bridesmaids

http://www.bridesmaidsmovie.com/

http://insidemovies.ew.com/2011/05/16/bridesmaids-catapults-kristen-wiig/

Talk about getting the story wrong! I’m always gratified when a movie that I love kills at the box office, and I can even deal with a little endzone-dancing studio spin, but really — the notion that Bridesmaids, the terrific new matrimonial comedy of cracked sisterhood, somehow “exceeded expectations” by taking in $24.5 million at the box office this weekend (representative headline on TheWrap: “‘Bridesmaids Over-Performs”) is actually a little insulting. Sure, it sounds like a compliment (people dug the movie so much they went even more than the marketers were predicting!). But why would a major comedy produced by Judd Apatow, heralded by enthusiastic reviews, featuring a breakout performance by a venerable Saturday Night Live star, the whole thing pitched as a funny, soulful date movie to an audience that regularly turns the worst sort of pandering chick-flick crapola into major hits…why would that movie surprise anyone by making as much on its opening weekend as The Bounty Hunter or Failure to Launch?