Movie Preview: October 2017

Thanks to the shockingly huge run of Stephen's King's "IT," September 2017 reversed course from the summer by easily becoming the highest grossing September on record with $696.1 million record, besting the 2015 record of $626.4 million. The $123.4 million opening weekend of "IT" shattered the September opening weekend record, previously set by "Hotel Transylvania 2" with $48.5 million. "IT" wound up making a total of $286.6 million in September, which represented 41.2 percent of the entire month's overall grosses. The next highest grossing movie in September was "Kingsman: The Golden Circle," which wound up with $62.2 million in the final two weeks of September. This goes to show that highly anticipated, high quality movies with good marketing campaigns can make money in any month of the year, which could help future Septembers perform even better. Now we move onto October, which should see "IT" continue to do well given the Halloween season. The rest of the new movies? Well, let's just say most people will be saving their money for what should be a busy holiday season in November and December. But there's still a lot of movies on the schedule that will attempt to change people's minds, so let's dive in.

October 6th - 8th- 

The first weekend of October is officially in the rear view mirror as of the posting of this blog. This is because of a short vacation that put this blogger a bit behind schedule. Nevertheless, the weekend was won by the surprisingly underwhelming performance of Blade Runner 2049. Heading into the weekend, the studio's expectations for the long-awaited sequel to the 1982 cult classic were around $45-50 million, with many sites predicting it could go as high as $55-60 million. Thus its total of just $32.7 million was shocking to many, given how strong the reviews were from critics and general audiences alike. It appears that general audiences simply weren't quite as excited for the sequel as long time fans were. The audience breakdown ended up being 86 percent above the age of 25 and 71 percent male. Thus many may have overestimated the power of the "Blade Runner" brand, which itself was an initial box office failure as well. Like "Blade Runner," "Blade Runner 2049" is a futuristic, neo-noir, sci-fi film that heavily explores themes of advanced technology and the potential dangers of artificial intelligence. The movie is set 30 years after the events of the first film as sees Harrison Ford reprising his role while teaming up this time with Ryan Gosling.

Coming in second place was the even more disappointing debut of The Mountain Between Us, which tallied just $10.6 million as it suffered from mixed to poor reviews from critics with its 44 percent score on Rotten Tomatoes. The movie stars Idris Elba and Kate Winslet as two strangers who survive a plane crash in the high Uintas and have to learn to trust each other so that both of them can survive. The movie is based on the novel of the same name written by Charles Martin and is the type of movie that Fox was probably hoping would be an awards contender. Having Idris Elba and Kate Winslet in the lead roles is a great start for that. They also premiered the movie at TIFF last month before giving it a wide release this past weekend. Given that October is the month where awards season starts to kick into full gear, Fox played all of their cards right. The problem here is that having a quality movie on your hands is the most important factor here and mixed reviews won't cut it. Thus this ends up being the type of film that shot for the stars, but instead fell flat on its face.

Coming in at the tail end of this past weekend's wide releases was My Little Pony: The Movie, which ended up in fourth place at the box office with $8.9 million, just behind the $9.9 million that "IT" made in third place and barely ahead of the $8.7 million of "Kingsman: The Golden Circle" in fifth place. While $8.9 million might not seem like much, this is actually an improvement for Lionsgate when it comes to their attempts to distribute animated films. Lionsgate most recently saw "Rock Dog" open to $3.7 million, "The Wild Life" open to $3.3 million and "Norm of the North" open to $6.8 million. "My Little Pony" obviously had its built in audience that it was targeting, which mostly includes young girls. But also includes plenty of older girls as well as a section of fandom called "bronies," which are adult males who love "My Little Pony." In order to please its fans, "My Little Pony: The Movie" brought back a lot of the original voice cast and characters from the TV show while adding a whole host of new characters to attempt to bring in more audiences. Its $8.9 million is a decent opening for a movie adaptation like this, so no tears shed here.

October 13th - 15th- 

And now we dive into the actual future releases. This October sees the arrival of the infamous date of Friday the 13th. Hoping to take advantage of the haunted date is the horror movie Happy Death Day. Any horror movie this Halloween season will have the disadvantage of following up "IT," which will still be having great legs throughout the season. "Happy Death Day" will hope to differentiate itself by being a more teenage-friendly horror film with its PG-13 rating. Not that teenagers didn't go see "IT" despite the adult-rating, but "Happy Death Day" is specifically targeting them, hoping they show up in droves. "Happy Death Day" is the latest film to try to take advantage of the "Groundhog Day" trope of being stuck in a time loop that was popularized recently by "Edge of Tomorrow." This time around, a girl keeps getting killed by a mysterious person in a mask and has to re-live the day of her death over and over until she presumably figures out who this person is and how to stop him or her. Despite being a very common premise, it went over remarkably well in "Edge of Tomorrow," meaning if "Happy Death Day" plays its cards right in terms of character and plot, then it might end up being a very popular movie this Halloween season.

Hoping to challenge "Happy Death Day" for that top spot will be Jackie Chan's The Foreigner. This will be the latest in a string of R-rated action films that have dominated the box office of late. "The Hitman's Bodyguard" ruled for three weeks starting in late August. "American Assassin" was the runner up during the second weekend of "IT," then "Kingsman: The Golden Circle" ruled for two weeks in late September. In fact, if we throw genre aside, if "The Foreigner" can manage to pull the upset, this will be the 10th straight weekend where an R-rated movie has been No. 1. The big draw for "The Foreigner" will be lead star Jackie Chan back in an American action movie doing his popular fighting style once again. Now Jackie Chan hasn't really left the film industry. In the last 5-10 years he's done quite a few handful of live action films, but most of them have been Chinese films that didn't cross over to America. This is probably because he's able to have more freedom to do things his way over in China as opposed to here in the United States. The premise is very much like "Taken" in that it's a revenge film after someone killed his daughter. Early reviews are positive, though, meaning this could have breakout potential if it connects with general audiences as well.

In around 1,200 theaters, Annapurna will be releasing the very relevant drama Professor Marston and the Wonder Women. Director and write Angela Robinson must be very happy that "Wonder Woman" was such a smash hit this summer, because now this biopic of the creator of "Wonder Woman" has the potential to make a lot more money than it otherwise may have. William Moulton Marston, who went by the pen name Charles Marston, had a polyamorous relationship with his wife and his mistress, with all three of them being very happy with the situation, despite that not exactly being accepted in the day. This movie tells the story of their relationship, how it inspired the "Wonder Woman" comics and how those comics were very controversial at the time. Those who loved "Wonder Woman" this summer may very well be curious as to the story behind her creation, if Annapurna plays their cards right, which they didn't with the movie "Detroit," back in August. In a very crowded month, this could either become a sleeper hit or it could get lost.

The final wide release of the weekend is the latest biopic that Chadwick Boseman will be starring in and that is Marshall. Boseman gained popularity by playing Jackie Robinson in "42" in 2013 as well as James Brown in "Get on Up" in 2014. Those breakout roles led him to be cast as Black Panther in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. After being introduced in "Captain America: Civil War," Black Panther will be getting his movie this February. Thus Chadwick Boseman definitely has the star power to help propel this forward as "Marshall" will see him play the role of Thurgood Marshall, the first African-American Supreme Court Justice. Open Roads Films will be hoping for some positive reviews on this one so that they can give it a good Oscar push. Those reviews will be critical here as Open Roads has also made the decision to scale back the theater count. Initially scheduled for a wider release, they have decided to instead play this in just over 800 theaters, thus playing the word of mouth game to hopefully push it forward through a crowded marketplace.

October 20th - 22nd-

The third weekend of October has five new releases, which means something has to give because they can't all make a ton of money. The most likely candidate of the bunch to lead the way will be Tyler Perry's Boo 2! A Madea Halloween. Tyler Perry has been churning out his movies pretty consistently since 2006, with his Madea series being most popular. Madea being a fictional character of Tyler Perry dressing up as a older black woman. Despite Tyler Perry having a pretty faithful fan base that show up to all his movies, regardless of what critics, he was trending downward before last year until his Halloween themed Madea movie, "Boo! A Madea Halloween" surprised and became his second highest grossing film with $73.2 million total, behind only "Madea Goes to Jail." The holiday theme combined with the Madea character got Madea fans to come out of their closets and swarm the theaters. So Perry acted very quick and threw together this sequel for this year. More Madea with more Halloween. Comedy sequels are very hit and miss, with a lot more siding on the miss portion of that lately. But the Madea films from Perry have thus far had a pretty safe floor as all of them have made over $50 million, so it feels safe to bet on this one.

The next three movies have the potential to all be neck and neck, so at this point it's hard to predict which one will rise to the top, but lately the movie that has been trending upwards is The Snowman. No, this is not your typical happy snowman that sits in your front yard and it's certainly not a Frosty the Snowman movie, this is a movie about a serial killer whose signature includes leaving a snowman at every murder scene. It's based off the book of the same name by Norwegian crime writer Jo Nesbø.  The movie stars Michael Fassbender as the detective hunting down this serial killer and co-stars Rebecca Fergusen, Val Kilmer, J.K. Simmons and others. With this being a thriller released in October, "The Snowman" hopes to be this year's "Gone Girl" while hoping to avoid becoming the next "The Girl on the Train." That being in terms of quality, of course. "The Snowman" would love to make similar money as either film, but perhaps a more realistic comparison financially might be 2007's "Zodiac," which opened to $13.4 million while ending with $33.1 million total.

Next up we have a movie in a similar situation as the aforementioned "The Mountain Between Us," but will be hoping for better results and that is Only the Brave. Unlike "The Mountain Between Us," this is a survival movie that's based on a true story, whereas "The Mountain Between Us" is fictional. "Only the Brave" tells the story of the Granite Mountain Hotshots, a group of elite firefighters who sacrificed their lives fighting the Yarnell Hill Fire near Yarnell, Arizona in June 2013. At the time, the fire was the deadliest U.S. wildfire since 1991 and the deadliest for U.S. firefighters since 1933. It's the sixth deadliest firefighter disaster in U.S. history and the deadliest wildfire ever in Arizona. The movie is directed by Joseph Kosinski, director of "Tron Legacy" and "Oblivion," and stars Josh Brolin, Miles Teller, Jeff Bridges, Jennifer Connelly and Taylor Kitsch. Again, the success of this type of movie is dependent on reviews. Strong reviews could mean Oscar buzz and/or strong box office. Negative reviews could mean the movie is forgotten after a few weeks. With this specific event fresh on the minds of many, proper execution of the story will be necessary to please audiences, much like Peter Berg has had with "Deepwater Horizon" and "Patriot's Day."

While "The Snowman" is trending upwards and "Only the Brave" will await critical reviews, a movie trending the wrong direction this weekend is Geostorm, which looks like a disaster movie taken straight out of the 90's with special effects from 2017. The 90's loved their big, silly disaster movies that may have made no sense, but audiences have seemingly grown out of that phase, with a lot of recent disaster movies being completely rejected by audiences. The most notable recent example was that of "Independence Day: Resurgence," which may have been more accepted had it come out two or three years after the original was released in 1996, but was probably 15-18 years too late by coming out in 2016. Same story here for "Geostorm"? The plot is the monster of all disaster movies with the satellites designed to control the global climate having gone completely skiwampus, causing crazy national disasters to happen across the globe. In addition to audiences having overgrown this genre, it might be possible that this movie has poor timing with a lot of actual natural disasters devastating millions across the globe this year. The movie is directed by Dean Devil, producer of "Independence Day" and stars Gerard Butler, Ed Harris and Abbie Cornish.

The final movie of the month is the latest Christian film from Pure Flix, that of Same Kind of Different as Me. Pure Flix recently delivered "A Question of Faith" into 661 theaters on the final weekend of September to decent results of $1.03 million in opening weekend, a decent total for a smaller Christian film. If the theater count is the same for "Same Kind of Different as Me," that's probably a good range to look at. Or it could play like Pure Flix's "A Case for Christ," which opened to $3.97 million in 1,174 theaters this past April on its way to $14.7 million total. "Same Kind of Different as Me" stars Greg Kinnear from "Heaven is for Real" as a man who is struggling with his marriage and is forced by his wife, played by Renee Zellwegger, to befriend a homeless man, played by Djimon Hounsou. The story will presumably be teaching the principle that if you are in the service of your fellow beings, you are only in the service of your God. This type of Christian movie about the power of service could go over quite well with Christian audiences, but a breakout performance on the lines of "The Shack" ($57.3 million) or "Miracles from Heaven" ($61.7 million) is probably not in the cards.

October 27th - 29th-

With Halloween coming on a Tuesday this year, if moviegoers are looking for a good theatrical scare the weekend before, they'll have the chance to see "IT" or "Happy Death Day" if they haven't already. Or they can venture out to see Jigsaw, the latest addition in the long-going "Saw" franchise. "Saw" was first released around Halloween in 2004 and did well enough for them to decide to do another sequel each year until 2010. The franchise revolves around John Kramer, known as the Jigsaw Killer, or just Jigsaw. He captures his victims and puts them through certain "games" or "tests" to see how much psychological or physical torture they can endure. For example, in the first "Saw," two men are chained into a room and one of them is told to kill the other one or his wife and kids are going to be murdered, followed by him being left for dead. Not surprisingly, critical and audience reaction both went down with each ensuing film, but because the budget was so small that they made great profits, anyways. The seventh installment in 2010, titled "Saw 3D" was supposed to be the last one. But it's often never good to believe Hollywood when they say they're done. So we'll see if audiences are actually interested in this eighth film seven years later.

The next movie sees George Clooney return to the directing chair with his latest film Suburbicon. Clooney has quite the decorated history with the Oscars in all sorts of categories, having been nominated as an actor, producer, writer and director, winning an acting nomination for "Syriana" as well as a best picture for "Argo" as a producer. As a director, he's had various levels of success. "Good Night, and Good Luck" got six Oscar nominations, including best picture, while "The Ides of March" was also given high critical praise. But other movies, such as his latest 2014 film, "The Monuments Men," were a completely different story. Written by the Coen Brothers and starring Matt Damon, Julianne Moore and Oscar Isaac, "Suburbicon" was supposed to be Clooney's return to form as a director, but reviews out of Venice and TIFF were shockingly bad as the movie currently sits at a 41 percent on Rotten Tomatoes with 49 reviews counted. Many have cited too much tonal inconsistencies with this movie being a dark comedy about a supposedly peaceful community hiding a very violent underbelly. Clooney probably hopes that general audiences react better than the festival crowds, otherwise this might be dead on arrival and disappear quickly.

The final significant release of the weekend is the war drama Thank You for Your Service. This is the second appearance this month by Miles Teller in a movie based on a true story, with the first being "Only the Brave." The movie is directed by Jason Hall in his directorial debut following his Oscar nomination as the writer of "American Sniper." It's based on the book of the same name by David Finkel and tells the story of soldiers from Iraq who are trying to reintegrate back into society, but are having troubles doing so due to PTSD and other issues. This movie doesn't have a whole lot of buzz heading into its release and didn't make any festival rounds, so it has a big uphill battle to fight in order to gain recognition, but if it can manage to stand out of the crowd with how many war films have tackled similar subjects, then this could be a sleeper. But at the moment it's not looking super positive.

Last month I covered the movie All I See is You, but it managed to avoid release and moved into the last week of this month instead. I don't have any idea if Open Roads is committed to this date either, or how many theaters they are planning for this one, but this is the thriller directed by Marc Forster ("Word War Z," "Quantum of Solace") where a woman played by Blake Lively receives her sight and learns that her husband, played by Jason Clarke, is not quite the man she thought he was. For a few more details, head over to my September preview.