There is no serenity now for Serenity. Oscar winners Matthew McConaughey and Anne Hathaway teamed up for writer/director Steven Knight's thriller, which has not been well received.
Sometimes critics and audiences are not on the same page, but there was general agreement about Serenity. The film currently has a 21% rating from Rotten Tomatoes critics and a 26% Audience Score. Also, the ever-telling CinemaScore is now in, after moviegoers were polled on Friday night, and the result is a D+.
A D+ is not an F, but an F would almost be better. There's an intrigue to hating something so much it gets an F. Instead, there's a backhanded quality to a D+, like the plus is a patronizing pat on the head.
Serenity's D+ is the lowest CinemaScore since Holmes and Watson also got a D+ -- and got itself some walkouts. That comedy also had a high-profile, promising cast, including Will Ferrell, John C. Reilly, Kelly Macdonald, Ralph Fiennes, and Rebecca Hall. Serenity not only has the Interstellar pair of Matthew McConaughey and Anne Hathaway, it also stars Diane Lane, Jason Clarke, Djimon Hounsou, and Jeremy Strong.
Sometimes you can have all the right players on the board and still things just don't work out.
Critics, including here at CinemaBlend, were not impressed with Serenity. Anne Hathaway addressed the negative reviews, saying she still endorsed the movie. Matthew McConaughey apparently doesn't remember parts of it, including when he got full frontal naked.
Trying to average out critical/audience review numbers can be tricky, but the CinemaScore is always worth chewing over because it represents the knee-jerk reactions of regular people who just watched the movie on opening night.
It's possible Serenity got some F grades that were balanced out by a few Cs or even higher. This thing has the potential to be a cult classic. It is ambitious, at the very least, and there are still moviegoers who appreciate taking a risk.
CinemaScore polls movies that open on 1,500 screens or more, including this weekend's newbies, Serenity and The Kid Who Would Be King, which earned a B+.
CinemaScore polls only occasionally produce low grades, which is why it's eyebrow-raising when something scores as low as a D+. Lately, almost everything that has been polled has gotten a B or higher. Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse is the most recent film to earn an A+ score, which is also rare. Creed II, Instant Family, The Upside, and On the Basis of Sex all got an A. Aquaman, Bumblebee, Mary Poppins Returns, The Grinch, The Mule, Ralph Breaks the Internet, and A Dog's Way Home all got an A-. The most recent scores below a B include a C+ for Vice and a C for Replicas.
Many of those films are still playing in theaters. Here's what's out there now and still to come in 2019.
