As expected, Kingsman: The Golden Circle easily took the top spot last weekend with $39 million. Other new releases The LEGO Ninjago Movie and Friend Request disappointed, one much more severely than the other- Box Office Mojo

Sliding to no. 2, It overtook The Exorcist to become the highest-grossing R rated horror film of all time last week- Variety

Riding the spike It is creating in Stephen King’s popularity, Netflix will release two critically acclaimed King adaptations Gerald’s Game and 1922 later this year- Indiewire

But the talk of the week was Darren Aronofsky’s mother! The film opened last week to a piss-poor $7.5 million, but became the most talked about film of the year for its inflammatory subject matter. Aronofsky, who rarely explains his projects and held this one particularly close to the chest, sat down with stars Jennifer Lawrence and Javier Bardem to discuss the film- The New York Times

The week’s biggest story was the continuing implosion of the Alamo Drafthouse under the weight of two sexual assault scandals. After being founded in Austin in 1997, the popular theater chain has spread to 28 locations in seven states and established its own distribution arm and become key to the city’s film scene. The Drafthouse’s rise in popularity coincided with Austin’s rise in importance nationally as a film destination.

The first controversy started two weeks ago when Devin Faraci, former editor of the drafthouse’s blog birth.movies.death, was rehired and then let go again within a couple of days. Faraci had stepped down almost a year to the day beforehand after a Twitter user accused him of assaulting her, prompting other women to step forward. Faraci said in 2016 that he had no memory of the incident, but that stepping down was his only honorable course of action. Alamo CEO Tim League said two weeks ago that Faraci had been sober since stepping down, and deserved a second chance- Variety

League had rehired Faraci very quietly, and there were rumors that he’d done it weeks ago — even that Faraci hadn’t really left the company in the first place. Dana Harris examines all the ways this opens League and the company up to scrutiny- Indiewire

Then, two days ago, Harry Knowles, founder of Ain’t it Cool News, was accused of opportunistically groping a former Drafthouse employee on several occasions. Knowles co-founded the popular film festivals Fantastic Fest, which is ongoing, and the annual Butt-Numb-A-Thon, which was held every year since 1999 for his Dec. 11 birthday- AV Club

The accusation set of a firestorm of resignations from the website- The Hollywood Reporter

League said that the Alamo has cut all ties with Kowles- The Hollywood Reporter

Eight years later, production has finally started on Avatar’s four sequels, which will be shot in succession and cost more than $1 billion combined. The production is completely unprecedented in both size and scope. The first sequel is scheduled for December 2020, more than 10 years after the original came out. The next three are scheduled for 2021, 2024 and 2025- Deadline

Famed Chinese filmmaker Feng Xioagang’s Youth was pulled Sunday by government censors less than a week before its planned Oct. 1 release. The film concerned the Third Indochina War, which remains a delicate subject in the country- The Hollywood Reporter

All-time classic The Princess Bride turned 30 on Monday. Some of its creators look back- Variety

The International Film Festival of the Art of Cinematography, known as Camerimage, will be held for the 25th year in Poland in November. For its silver anniversary, the festival will open the largest ever collection of David Lynch’s artwork, with more than 400 pieces from American, French and German galleries- Indiewire

Wisecracked continues its exploration of Christopher Nolan’s work, this time going into the Dark Knight Trilogy’s reflections on society- Youtube

And finally, Lindsay Ellis continues her critical exploration of the Transformers franchise. In episode seven of The Whole Plate, the third straight episode dedicated to feminist theory, she finally directly addresses how Mikaela Banes is written and framed in the first two movies- Youtube

Leopold Knopp is a UNT graduate. If you liked this post, you can donate to Reel Entropy here. Like Reel Entropy on Facebook and reach out to me at reelentropy@gmail.com.