Steve Carell

The Chiodo brothers — Stephen, Edward and Charles — recently crafted more than 100 model mice for the new Steve Carell-starring comedy "Dinner for Schmucks," but it was a great ape that initially set them on a path to filmmaking: The New York natives as children made 8-millimeter stop-motion animated movies in their parents' basement, inspired by the work of special effects legends Ray Harryhausen and Willis O'Brien. "When we went to one of our first trips to New York City after seeing 1933's 'King Kong,' we were at the Empire State Building looking for the cracks in the sidewalk where he might have fallen," said Charles.

It isn't easy being despicable. Just ask the creators of "Despicable Me," who started out trying to make a movie about a villain from the villain's perspective and ended up with a 3-D animated feature so saccharine that sappy sentimentality is more of a danger than exposure to evil. As that exercise in false advertising indicates, watching "Despicable Me" can be something of a chore, especially when you factor in a penchant for what the MPAA ratings board characterizes as "rude humor."

This date has gone on a lot longer than expected. Five weeks after a solid but far-from-spectacular $25-million opening, the Steve Carell-Tina Fey vehicle "Date Night" is showing remarkable resiliency. Released by 20th Century Fox and co-financed by Dune Entertainment at a cost of $55 million, the comedy has now grossed a total of $86.7 million. This past weekend, its sixth, the movie's ticket sales declined just 27% to $4 million. A combination of strong word-of-mouth and appeal to older moviegoers, who often don't come out on a movie's first weekend, appears to have driven a much slower-than-average decline in box office for "Date Night."

Steve Carell 's latest romantic comedy was originally set in a nondescript suburb in New York or New Jersey. But the actor's tight schedule and starring role in NBC 's locally shot sitcom "The Office," combined with California's film tax credit, made Los Angeles more attractive. So the setting was changed. The star of the current release "Date Night" and "The 40 Year Old Virgin" recently began shooting the movie about a harried father and his marital woes in various locations in the L.A. area.

Steve Carell and Paul Rudd want to make one thing clear: They're not the second-coming of Laurel and Hardy. "For one thing, I look horrible in a top hat," Rudd deadpanned. "I'm so glad you said something," Carell joined in. "I didn't want to tell you." Be that as it may, there's no denying that anything this modern-day tag-team touches turns to slapstick gold. After they helped propel such films as "Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy" and "The 40-Year-Old Virgin" into box-office hits, Carell and Rudd are teaming up again in Paramount's "Dinner for Schmucks," which hits theaters July 23. A loose remake of the 1998 French comedy "Le dîner de Cons," the film is about a group of colleagues vying for a career boost who gather for a monthly dinner hosted by their ruthless boss and compete to see who can bring the most pathetic and idiotic guest.

Steve Carell and Tina Fey fought the "Titans" to a virtual dead heat atop the box office this weekend, but "How to Train Your Dragon" came out the biggest winner. Demonstrating that the latest release from DreamWorks Animation is benefiting more from strong word of mouth than the ad campaign at launch, ticket sales for "Dragon" declined a mere 13% on the film's third weekend, putting it on the way to success despite a tepid opening. "Date Night," which stars "The Office's" Carell and "30 Rock's" Fey, opened to a solid $27.1 million.

"Clash of the Titans" could be toppled on its second weekend by a couple of TV comedy stars looking to spice up their marriage. "Date Night," which stars Steve Carell of "The Office" and Tina Fey of "30 Rock" as a bored married couple who find more excitement than they were looking for on a night out, opens Friday and should sell $20 million to $25 million worth of tickets in the U.S. and Canada by Sunday, according to people who have seen pre-release...

The new comedy "Date Night" stars Tina Fey and Steve Carell as Claire and Phil Foster, a tired, overworked, married couple with kids. In one of the film's many painfully funny-because-it's-true scenes, they go on a routine date at a no-frills family restaurant -- the kind that serves potato skins -- and afterward Phil suggests that maybe the evening could end with some intimacy. Getting ready for bed, Claire removes her mouth guard as she considers the proposition. "The discussion about having sex on a weeknight?