In the 2009 American action comedy Paul Blart: Mall Cop, Kevin James plays the title role of Paul Blart. James and Nick Bakay wrote the screenplay, while Steve Carr directed the movie. In the film, Blart, a single father and clumsy mall security guard finds himself caught up in a robbery and is the only one in a position to free the hostages. The first days of filming in February 2008 were spent primarily at the Burlington Mall in Burlington, Massachusetts. The American premiere of Paul Blart: Mall Cop took place on January 16, 2009, and Sony Pictures Releasing handled distribution. On a $26 million production budget, the movie generated $183.3 million worldwide despite earning unfavorable reviews from critics.
LET’S HAVE A LOOK AT THE STARCAST OF MALL COP
This movie has a running time of 1 hour and 31 minutes, and it is in English. Kevin James, Keir O’Donnell, Jayma Mays, Shirley Knight, Bobby Cannavale, Raini Rodriguez, Stephen Rannazzisi, Peter Gerety, Adam Ferrara, Jamal Mixon, Adhir Kalyan, Erick Avari, Gary Valentine, Allen Covert, Mike Vallely, Mike Escamilla, Jason Ellis, Jason Packham, Rick Thorne, Victor T. Lopez, Natasha Hopkins, Jackie Sandler, Mookie Barker, Jackie Fly. Hannah Depew, Vincent J. Earnshaw, Suzanne England, Susan Farese, Keith Fluker, Andy Forgit, Victor Franko, Sari Gagnon, David J. Appel, Joel Arsenault, Stephanie Atkinson, Amber Baldinelli, William Bornkessel, Mike Burton, Katelyn Cahill, Patrick Canty, Gio Castellano, Jeffrey Corazzini, D.W. Cormier, Benjamin Crocker, Nicholas Davis, Kevin DeCoste, Michael De.
DIVING INTO THE PLOT OF MALL COP
Maya, Paul Blart’s adolescent daughter, and his mother reside in West Orange, New Jersey. He attends the police academy to join the New Jersey State Police, but his hypoglycemia forces him to pass out before finishing the test. Blart keeps watching as a security guard at the West Orange Pavilion Mall. Veck Simms, a recent hire who displays little interest in the position, is being trained by Blart while he Segway patrols the mall. Amy Anderson, a seller at a new kiosk, gets to know Blart in the meanwhile. One evening, Paul and several mall employees meet her for dinner. When Blart competes in a nacho-eating competition with his pal Leon, things start well, but the jalapenos are too hot for him, so he chugs two glasses of margarita, mistaking it for lemonade. After drinking too much, he makes a dramatic escape by tumbling out of a window.
REACTION OF AUDIENCE TO THE SERIES MALL COP
Paul Blart: Mall Cop has 117 reviews on Rotten Tomatoes, with an average rating of 4.60/10 and a 34% approval rating. Paul Blart: Mall Cop offers some laughs, but its plot is weak and devoid of any continuous comic drive, according to the website’s critical consensus. Based on 24 reviews, the movie scored 39 out of 100 on Metacritic, which means “generally poor reviews.” From a to F on a scale of 1 to 10, the film received a B from the audience surveyed by CinemaScore. Rolling Stone’s Peter Travers criticized the idea and childish comedy and scored the movie one star out of four. Brian Lowry of Variety referred to it as “An almost shockingly amateurish one-note-joke comedy” in his article. James Berardinelli agreed that the film’s tone was too childish but commended Paul Blart’s character and the refreshing departure from Adam Sandler’s usual fare, “a good choice for watching at home when viewers tend to be less picky,” they said.
HOW WELL WAS MALL COP MOVIE BOX OFFICE COLLECTION
The movie earned $9,791,368 from 3,144 theatres, for an opening day average of $3,105, and topped the box office in the US. The film maintained the top spot for the duration of its three-day opening weekend, earning a total of $31,832,636, with an average of $10,125 per screen, surpassing its $26 million budget. Throughout the four-day Martin Luther King Jr. weekend, it made $39,234,238 in revenue, or $12,479 each day. The movie had the second-best MLK weekend opening of all time, after only 2008’s Cloverfield. The film earned $21,623,182 in its second weekend, dropping only 32%, and maintaining its top spot, bringing the ten-day earnings to $64,923,380. With $13,872,751 in its third weekend, a 36% dip from the previous weekend, and an average ticket price of $4,327 from 3,206 theatres, it fell to second place, bringing the seventeen-day total to $83,247,655.