Do Not Open 'The Box' Until November 6th

Whether he deserved it or not, Richard Kelly inhereted major expectations from moviegoers after Donnie Darko. Tough to throw all of that on a guy who had to work outside the system to get his rookie film made, no matter how good it is and even if he is 26 years old. But Kelly kept people waiting about five years for his follow-up, and I'm of the opinion that Southland Tales was a major, major disappointment. His third film is the upcoming The Box, based on an 80's Twilight Zone episode written by I Am Legend writer and sci-fi dignitary Richard Matheson. It stars Cameron Diaz and recent Oscar nominee Frank Langella, and it's essentially a morality play: Press this button and somebody you know dies. For your trouble, you'll get enough cash to choke a camel. Then, we'll take the box away and someone else gets to press the button. Could be you on the wrong end of the deal next time. The Box was set for a Halloween release, but Bloody Disgusting reports that Warner Bros. is moving that date to November 6th. Big deal? Well, kinda, yeah. For one thing, how easy is it to market your movie with the phrase, "This Halloween"? There are very few physical dates on the calendar that mean things to people, and they're primarily significant for personal reasons. Major holidays need no such accounting. Even though this film would have opened on the 30th, you could say "Halloween weekend" and it's still in the ballpark. November 6th? Is that a Friday? Without looking, I couldn't have told you. The second factor is that there was no major competition on Halloween, because the thought is people are doing other stuff. Saw comes out on the 23rd, but we know the second weekend totals for those movies sink pretty drastically. Only the first two have held on to more than 50% of their opening weekend crowds. Instead, The Box will now face four other new releases - A Christmas carol, the new George Clooney movie, a Milla Jovovich thriller that is sure to rip some audience away from Kelly's film, and the comedy Pirate Radio, which won't. In addition to the amount of competition, Warner Bros. will now be less inclined to advertise The Box, because it's road is that much tougher on November 6th than October 30th, when it would open against only the Michael Cera comedy, Youth in Revolt. Translation: The studio is willing to take a hit on this one. Weirdly, this dovetails into something else I've been screaming about for months, namely the curious timing of two franchised horror movies coming out on the same date. Halloween 2 and The Final Destination are both due out on August 28th, so wouldn't it make sense for Rob Zombie's movie to jump to Halloween now that it's open and more appropriate? Please tell me I'm not crazy.

Comments

[mdamien13]

You're not crazy, Colin - Rob Zombie's Halloween needed to open on 10/30/09 -- no other horror competion plus the obvious name and holiday association!!! I think it's going to get crushed by Final Destination this month (escapist splatter flick > white trash exploitation wannabe flick). Dumb, dumb, dumb move by the studio.

Did you see that Cameron Diaz accidentally gave away a plot point of this at the Comic Con? I wonder if that affected this decision at all.