'Zero Dark Thirty' is number one at the nation's box office

The highly controversial motion picture “Zero Dark Thirty” directed by highly-acclaimed Academy Award winning director Kathryn Bigelow opened to nationwide release last Friday after being available at a handful of theaters in Los Angeles and New York for several weeks – to qualify it for Academy Award consideration. In its first week of wide release, the movie released by Sony Pictures is number one at the nation’s box offices by grossing $24 million over the weekend, according to Box Office Mojo.

The film is described as a CIA thriller, detailing the search for and killing of former al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden who was responsible for the horrific 9-11 attacks on the United States in 2001.

Besides being an obviously interesting topic to movie-goers, the movie has been the most-publicly and media discussed motion picture to come along in a long time due to its extremely controversial depiction of torture. A Senate Intelligence Committee in the United States Congress has even discussed the movie and its messages to the public.

“Zero Dark Thirty”, directed by Kathryn Bigelow who is the first female director to have won a director’s Oscar for “The Hurt Locker”, was written by Mark Boal. The team of actors includes Jessica Chastain who won 2013’s Golden Globe award for best actress in a dramatic film, Jason Clarke, Joel Edgerton, Jennifer Ehle, Mark Strong, Kyle Chandler, Edgar Ramirez, James Gandolfini, and Chris Pratt. The producers are Kathryn Bigelow, Mark Boal, Megan Ellison, and executive producer Greg Shapiro. The music for the film was composed by Alexandre Desplat.

'Lincoln' is still number 8 at box officers in its 9th week at theaters

The other historic, political movie currently at the box offices throughout the nation is "Lincoln" distributed by DreamWorks. Both movies - "Zero Dark Thirty" and "Lincoln" have been nominated for Best Picture Oscar awards.

The film is released by Sony/Columbia.

The other films behind ‘Zero Dark Thirty’ on the nation’s top ten movie list this past weekend are the new release ‘A Haunted House’ at number two, the new release ‘Gansger Squad’ at number 3, ‘Django Unchained’ at number 4, ‘Les Miserables (2012)’ which won best musical at the Golden Globes at number 5, ‘The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey’ at number 6, ‘Lincoln’ back up to number 7 from last week’s number 8, ‘Parental Guidance’ number 8, last week’s number 1 movie ‘Texas Chainsaw 3D’ at number 9, and ‘Silver Linings Playbook’ at number 10.

‘Argo’, the movie that won the best drama film at the Golden Globes rebounded to number 19 from number 22 in its 14th week on the chart. The movie’s director, Ben Affleck, also won the best director award at the Golden Globes.

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