Blacks Star In Summer's Top Money-Making Movies

Jet, Sept 18, 2000

Hollywood treated summer moviegoers to a slew of cinematic delights and audiences responded, shelling out millions on the season's hottest offerings.

Most notable about the box-office bonanza is that films featuring predominantly Black casts or Blacks in main roles are among USA Today's list of top 20 money-making films of the summer.

Leading the pack at No. 1 with ticket sales of $213 million is Paramount's spy thriller Mission: Impossible 2, starring Tom Cruise as international super-agent Ethan Hunt and Thandie Newton (Beloved) as Cruise's leading lady and love interest, sexy thief Nyah Hall.

Ving Rhames (Rosewood) reprises his role from the 1996 Mission: Impossible as Luther Stickell, the computer genius who helps Hunt to stop a villain from unleashing a deadly virus. The action sequel was the only film this summer to gross more than $200 million.

The No. 2-grossing movie of the season, DreamWorks' Roman epic Gladiator, brought in an impressive $182.7 million, thanks to the sword-wielding skills of Djimon Hounsou (Amistad), who, as the slave Juba, aids actor Russell Crowe (Roman General Maximus) in bringing down an evil emperor.

The Perfect Storm (Warner Bros.), the No. 3 top movie at the box office at $175.6 million, features a star-studded cast that includes Allen Payne (Jason's Lyric), George Clooney and Mark Wahlberg. Payne co-stars as Alfred Pierre, a Jamaican crewman on the ill-fated voyage of the Andrea Gail, a fishing ship that sails into a violent storm.

The beautiful Halle Berry once again dons a platinum wig for a movie, but instead of playing a ghetto hairdresser as she did in B.A.P.S., Berry is a member of an elite squad of superheroes in X-Men, the No. 4 box-office money-maker this summer. As the mutant Storm, Berry battles the bad guys by controlling the weather in the 20th Century Fox film, which grossed $151.2 million.

The past few years have seen a resurgence of teen horror flicks and comedy duo Shawn and Marlon Wayans capitalized on the genre with their horror spoof, aptly titled Scary Movie (Miramax), which netted an impressive $148.5 million and came in at the No. 5 spot among the top-earners. The film, which the Wayans brothers co-wrote and also star, became Miramax's highest-grossing movie of all time, USA Today reported.

At No. 6 at the box office is the visually striking film Dinosaur (Buena Vista), which grossed $133.9 million. Ossie Davis, Della Reese, Alfre Woodard and Samuel E. Wright (The Little Mermaid, Bird) are among the actors who lend their voices to this computer-animated tale of an orphaned dinosaur raised by lemurs who searches for sanctuary after a meteorite shower destroys his family home.

Comedy titans Eddie Murphy and Martin Lawrence made their mark at the box office with their cross-dressing antics in two of summer's funniest and top-earning films. Lawrence's Big Momma's House (20th Century Fox) and Murphy's Nutty Professor II: The Klumps (Universal) took the No. 8 and No. 10 spots respectively with $115.7 million and $110 million in earnings.

In Big Momma's House, Lawrence stars as an FBI agent who goes undercover as a Southern grandma known as Big Momma to protect actress Nia Long (Best Man, Love Jones) from an escaped convict. Nutty Professor II: The Klumps stars Eddie Murphy as the entire Klump family and features Janet Jackson as the love interest of one of Murphy's characters, Professor Sherman Klump.

The coolest movie of the summer, Shaft, starring Samuel L. Jackson as Detective John Shaft in the remake of the popular 1971 version, topped the box office at No. 14 with $69.5 million. Co-starring with Jackson are actress Vanessa L. Williams, rapper Busta Rhymes and the original Shaft, Richard Roundtree.

Other top-earners that showcased Black talent are the Nicolas Cage film Gone In 60 Seconds with Delroy Lindo and Chi McBride; Jim Carrey's Me, Myself & Irene with Anthony Anderson, Jerod Mixon, Mongo Brownlee; the raunchy comedy Road Trip with newcomer Mia Amber Davis; the Bruce Willis film Disney's The Kid, which also features Chi McBride; Clint Eastwood's Space Cowboys with Courtney Vance; and Coyote Ugly starring supermodel Tyra Banks.

Top 20 Grossing Movies Of The Summer According To USA Today:

1. Mission: Impossible 2 (Paramount), $213 million

2. Gladiator (DreamWorks), $182.7 million

3. The Perfect Storm (Warner Bros.), $175.6 million

4.. X-Men (20th Century Fox), $151.2 million

5. Scary Movie (Miramax), $148.5 million

6. Dinosaur (Buena Vista), $133.9 million

7. What Lies Beneath (DreamWorks), $130.9 million

8. Big Momma's House (20th Century Fox), $115.7 million

9. The Patriot (Sony), $111 million

10. Nutty Professor II: The Klumps (Universal), $110 million

11. Chicken Run (DreamWorks), $102.9 million

12. Gone In 60 Seconds (Buena Vista), $96.9 million

13. Me, Myself & Irene (20th Century Fox), $89.2 million

14. Shaft (Paramount), $69.5 million

15. Road Trip (DreamWorks), $68.4 million

16. Hollow Man (Sony), $66.6 million

17. Disney's The Kid (Buena Vista) $65.8 million

18. Space Cowboys (Warner Bros.), $63.7 million