Conservative blog Breitbart.com's film critic John Nolte claimed on Sunday that the final film of the Hunger Games franchise is suffering at the box office because of actress Jennifer Lawrence's recent remarks in the media about politics and religion.
And while Mockingjay, Pt. 2 may have had the weakest debut of the four films in the franchise with a $101 million box office take on its opening weekend, it was still the top-grossing film of the weekend. Also, the Hunger Games franchise has made box office history in that each of the four films has grossed more than $100 million on its opening weekend.
Nonetheless, Nolte sees the film's numbers as a reason for liberal celebrities to keep their mouths shut and stay out of politics.
"Arrogant, big-mouthed, divisive Hollywood blowhards took a massive hit at the American box office this weekend," Nolte crowed. "The highly-anticipated fourth and final chapter of “The Hunger Games” should have been bullet-proof. But after star Jennifer Lawrence used the film’s publicity tour to trash Christians and Republican frontrunner Donald Trump, 'Mockingjay – Part 2' is under-performing in a way no box office analyst had predicted."
The rest of Nolte's article is peppered with sparkling gems of film critique like, "Julia Roberts just sucks, and has for more than a decade" and "Jennifer Lawrence spent the better part of the summer making an ass of herself."
In truth, Lawrence spoke her mind about lawbreaking Kentucky county clerk Kim Davis, who refused to grant same-sex marriage licenses in spite of the historic U.S. Supreme Court ruling legalizing such marriages in all 50 states.
Davis, said Lawrence, makes me "embarrassed to be from Kentucky."
The Oscar-winning actress also said that a Donald Trump presidency would be "the end of the world," a statement that must have stung at Breitbart, considering that the site's fawning, overwrought Trump boosterism has raised questions of a pay-for-play relationship the blog and the campaign.
Nolte is convinced that Lawrence's decision to speak her mind has torpedoed her career, calling this weekend's box office numbers a "bubble-diva implosion." However, one has to wonder what the stars of the rest of the weekend's films must have said if none of their projects could defeat Mockingjay, Pt. 2.
