The best out of all the Stephen King adaptations, The Shining, was famously denounced by the author for its changes to his story, while other excellent takes from the likes of John Carpenter (Christine), George Romero (The Dark Half), Brian De Palma (Carrie), and David Cronenberg (The Dead Zone) were also a bit more liberal in choosing what to keep from King's work. On the flip side, there are outright catastrophes like Dreamcatcher, Secret Window, and Thinner that are a bit more careful to follow along closely to what is in King's books, and a long range of mediocrities ranging from Silver Bullet and Pet Semetary to Sleepwalkers and Needful Things that were similarly envisioned. This is to say that even with a name-brand author like Mr. King, having a great, inventive director at the helm of an adaptation is more important than fidelity to the source material.

You get neither of these things with the inexplicable adaptation of The Dark Tower that currently sits at the top of the box office with $7.7 million. As a moviegoing experience, Nicolaj Arcel's take on arguably King's most beloved tomes is without a single merit aside from its two leads, neither of which prove capable of elevating a script without imagination or charisma and direction that is completely devoid of passion for ideas or even the story. There are sequels and TV shows waiting in the wings for this to be successful and give the go ahead that all these productions are worth the time and money. Arcel might just pull that off, but fans of the books will almost certainly want all of this to end right here.

Indeed, The Dark Tower looks primed to take the rest of the weekend over Dunkirk, which brought in $5 million to land in second place on Friday, and The Emoji Movie, which is in third place with $3.8 million. Another new release, Kidnap, which has little more than a lead turn from Halle Berry to hang its hat on, is in fourth place with $3.6 million. Finally, there is Malcolm D. Lee's Girls Trip, which was made for $19 million and has currently grossed $77 million, which means that it will likely cross the $80 million mark before the end of the weekend. On Friday, it brought in $3.6 million as well to land in fifth, but its likely that it will overtake Kidnap by the time the sun sets on Sunday. Powered largely by word of mouth, Girls Trip may not have as imaginative a storyline as The Dark Tower boasts but as a movie, its got ten times more ideas bouncing around and has the benefit of being entertaining, something Arcel's movie very simply is not.

Here's your top five for Friday: