Movie Preview: October 2019

The second lowest grossing month of 2019 is officially in the books. Historically speaking, September is more often than not the lowest grossing month of the year at the domestic box office, but in 2019 that still belongs to February with $624 million. September shot a bit higher than that with $685 million, which is the second highest September on record. Not coincidentally, this September was also the second September to have an "IT" movie opening. But because "IT: Chapter Two" didn't quite reach the heights of its predecessor, September 2017, which is when "IT" opened, retains the September record with $697 million. "IT: Chapter Two" is certainly not a disappointment, though, as it made $194 million in the month of September and currently has a worldwide total of over $400 million. Together the two "IT" movies have made over $1.1 billion worldwide. Outside "IT: Chapter Two," September was also helped by "Hustlers" and "Downton Abbey" becoming surprise box office hits. Now as we look forward to October, this is again historically not the best month, but there's another clown that will lead the way in a month that has the potential of hitting last October's record of $833 million, wherein Sony's "Venom" led the way. So let's dive in and see what's in store!

October 4th - 6th-

While it was Pennywise dominating September, the other clown dominating October will of course be Joker. This is a movie that's certainly getting quite the unique buzz when compared to other DC films. It's also the first movie that marks DC completely ditching the idea of a cinematic universe by creating a standalone Joker film that has nothing to do with the rest of the DCEU. Rumor has it that Jared Leto's Joker still might exist in said cinematic universe, which exemplifies the idea that this is just a one-off thing. It's also the first DC film in the recent DC phase to get the R-rating as director Todd Phillips has decided to go the disturbingly psychological route in telling this iconic villain's backstory. The movie debuted at the Venice Film Festival, surprisingly winning the top prize there, then went onto play at the Toronto International Film Festival, so Warner Bros. has been pretty confident in this and that has resulted in mostly positive results as the movie has been hovering in the 70 percent range on Rotten Tomatoes. Even the negative reactions might work in the movie's benefit in terms of the movie's box office as there's a lot of conversation surrounding the violent nature of the film. Many people might show up solely to be a part of the conversation moving forward.

We're going to find out what "Joker" ends up doing at the box office here rather soon, but there's a broad range of potential comparisons here. First off, DC themselves have had quite the wide range of openings. The highest of the DCEU belongs to "Batman v. Superman" with $166 million, with "Suicide Squad" in second with $133 million. Yet earlier this year, "Shazam!" could only manage a $53 million opening. Given the unique nature of this film, DC's own filmography might be the wrong place to look. If we look at recent R-rated comic book movies, "Deadpool" and "Deadpool 2" opened to $132 million and $125 million respectively. Said $132 million for "Deadpool" also represents the highest grossing opening weekend ever for an R-rated movie. Also on the X-Men side of things, "Logan" opened to $88.4 million. Although not R-rated, last October's "Venom" opened to $80.2 million, which is currently the October opening weekend record. So there's a broad range of potential comparisons. A variable worth nothing that perhaps none of these movies have faced is the news of potential terrorist threats, which have resulted in warnings from the military and FBI. Are said warnings widespread enough to keep some people home on opening weekend?

While "Joker" is the only wide release, there is a major wide expansion and that is Judy. This is the biopic of legendary actress Judy Garland and has been met with largely positive reviews as it stands at 83 percent on Rotten Tomatoes after premiering at Telluride on August 30 followed by a showing at Toronto International Film Festival. And while that score suggests some mixed reaction, making it a bit of a fence-sitter when it comes to the upcoming awards season, one element of the film that does seem unanimous is the praise regarding Renee Zellweger's performance as Judy Gardland, thus making her seemingly a strong contender for a best actress nomination. The movie is set 30 years after Judy's "Wizard of Oz" performance in the latter portion of her life when things weren't exactly rainbows and butterflies. She unfortunately passed away at the age of 47 after a drug overdose. Last weekend "Judy" opened in 461 theaters and managed to crack the top 10 at No. 7 with an opening weekend of $2.9 million for a solid per theater average of $6,313. This weekend Roadside Attractions will be expanding it into about 1,400 theaters. If that per theater average holds up well enough, the movie could at least sniff the top five. At the least, it should have a solid hold in the top 10.

October 11th - 13th-

If "Joker" does end up playing like "Logan" or "Venom," that means its second weekend total might be in the $35-40 million range as both of those movies fell 56 percent. That's probably enough to keep it at No. 1 for a second weekend. However, there's going to be a strong competition for that runner-up spot, which should be led by Ang Lee's Gemini Man. This is a movie that sees Will Smith pitted against... Will Smith. Specifically Will Smith plays an aging government assassin who comes upon a younger clone of himself who is trying to "retire" him. Younger Will Smith is de-aged to look like he did back in the 90's, which is something that is also being done in Martin Scorsese's upcoming film "The Irishman," which is set to debut on Netflix at some point before the year ends. After being one of Hollywood's most bankable stars, Will Smith has had a bit of a rough go of it in the last few years, although 2019 has so far turned out very well for him as he starred as Genie in Disney's major hit "Aladdin." So he'll bring some positive buzz from that. As far as an opening goes, 2012's "Looper" might be a good comparison given very similar premise. That opened to $20.8 million. Ang Lee's last major film was "Life of Pi," also in 2012, and that one opened to $22.5 million.

Going toe-to-toe with "Gemini Man" in the fight for the runner-up spot will be the new animated film The Addams Family. While this comes only two weeks after DreamWorks' "Abominable," which could be experiencing good holds due to positive word of mouth, it does have the benefit of that opening to a softer $20.6 million. Prior to "Abominable," the previous animated film was "The Angry Birds 2" back in August, and that also opened very soft. So "The Addams Family" is positioned rather well, especially since the next big animated movie isn't until "Frozen 2" right before Thanksgiving. Plus there's the obvious Halloween tie-in. Now even though the timing is excellent, the bigger questions surrounds the actual demand for another adaptation of "The Addams Family." These characters originate all the way back to cartoons published in The New Yorker starting in 1938. A live-action TV series premiered in 1964, followed by an animated TV series in 1973. The franchise was then revived with the 1991 hit film, which was followed by a sequel in 1993 and a second animated TV series in 1992. Is it time for another revival? Do audiences care? Best case scenario is a "Hotel Transylvania" comparison, but perhaps opening closer to $20 million might be right.

Looking for a spot somewhere in the top five, most likely in fourth place, will be the comedy Jexi. This is a comedy directed by Jon Lucas and Scott Moore, the comedy duo behind "Bad Moms" and "Bad Moms Christmas," and is about a really smart phone that has gone rogue. The phone is extremely honest and starts insulting people and being raunchy if the guy doesn't give it the attention it wants. Imagine a super smart and super crazy version of Siri. The guy that owns the phone is played by Adam Devine and the phone is voiced by Rose Byrne. Justin Hartley, Alexandra Shipp, Michael Pena and Wanda Skykes also co-star. Now comedies have had a bit of rough go of it this year, with August's "Good Boys" being the lone exception. And although comedies are a bit tough to predict, "Jexi" seems like the type of movie that will follow more in line with the other disappointments of the year rather than being another hit like "Good Boys." Some of the major examples of comedic disappointments have been "Long Shot" ($9.7 million), "Stuber" ($8.2 million) and "Booksmart" ($6.9 million). That seems like an appropriate range for "Jexi," especially considering the competition from "Joker" and "Gemini Man," which will also be attracting adult audiences.

The final movie that Box Office Mojo, which I've always used for this monthly post, has listed as a wide release is High Strung Free Dance, which is being distributed by Atlas Distributions. Although I'm personally not convinced that this is an actual wide release. This appears to be a sequel or follow-up of sorts to the 2016 film "High Strung," which is a film I didn't know existed until researching this post. It opened in just 100 theaters to $40,708 for a pretty pathetic per theater average of just $407. It finished with only a few dollars more, totaling $53,447. "High Strung Free Dance" is done by the same director as "High Strung" and from the looks of the trailers, it appears to be some sort of "Step Up" musical/dance movie. Outside a lot of dance sequences, the trailers advertise a movie about a girl who is an aspiring dancer and is just looking for a shot to prove herself. It appears that said chance of a lifetime comes here way, with a possible romance with the boy showcased in the trailers. Atlas Distributions is a different distribution company than the first movie. Looking at their releases, the widest release they've had is "Atlas Shrugged: Part II" in 1,012 theaters. The four other movies they've released in more than 100 theaters have been between 158 and 425 theaters.

October 18th - 20th- 

It's been quite the year for Disney to say the least as they've released five movies that have earned at least $1 billion at the worldwide box office and are sure to add to that with "Frozen 2" and "Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker" right around the corner. But before we get to those, Disney's year continues with Maleficent: Mistress of Evil, a movie that was initially scheduled for May 29, 2020 before Disney pulled an audible and moved it up to this spot. "Maleficent: Mistress of Evil" is the follow-up to the 2014 film "Maleficent," which told the story of "Sleeping Beauty" from the perspective of the iconic villain Maleficent, giving her a bit of a redemption arc at the end. "Maleficent" performed quite well at the box office, earning $241 million domestically after a $69 million opening weekend, but it wasn't necessarily received with wide praise. That combined with long gap between movies makes it hard to believe that "Mistress of Evil" is going to match its predecessor. "Alice Through the Looking Glass," another belated Disney sequel that no one asked for, opened to just $26.8 million after its predecessor opened to $116 million. The other movie to look at is this year's misstep in "Dumbo," which opened to $45.9 million back in March, then scrounged its way to $114.8 million total.

While "Maleficent: Mistress of Evil" is expected to take the weekend, it will have a major challenger that could play spoiler if it falls short and that is Zombieland 2: Double Tap. "Zombieland" was a horror comedy that came out in 2009. Even though it was a modest success, opening to $24.7 million on its way to $75.6 million domestically, demand for a sequel has been rather loud for quite some time, especially since "Zombieland" has continued to build up its fan base in the years since its release. And now that demand has been met. Woody Harrelson, Jesse Eisenberg, Emma Stone and Abigail Breslin are all returning, as is director Ruben Fleischer. Notably, in the 10 years since "Zombieland," Jesse Eisenberg and Emma Stone have become Oscar-nominated actors. Woody Harrelson, who already had one under his belt, has gone onto receive two more in addition to receiving renewed fame from "The Hunger Games" franchise. Abigail Breslin's most notable work came before "Zombieland," which included an Oscar nomination for the 2006 film "Little Miss Sunshine," but has still had a decent career. So this reunion is pretty significant. Belated comedy sequels have had a rocky history, but this looks to at least match the original's opening.

October 25th - 27th-

The final weekend of October looks to be the weakest of the month as the country braces for what should be a wild November, but there still are three wide releases that look to earn a spot somewhere in the top 10 and they should be led by the police drama Black and Blue. Specifically this is about a woman who is trying to reconcile the fact that she is black and a cop as the two communities often have a hard time coexisting. In the midst of this, she learns that some of the white male cops are rogue cops and she captures some of what they do on her body cam, which causes them to try to chase her down and kill her. Or at least attempt to stop her and get rid of the footage on the body cam. That leads the movie into being an action thriller. Starring in the lead role is Naomi Harris as this woman, with Tyrese Gibson, Mike Colter and Frank Grillo as co-stars. The director here is Deon Taylor, who directed "Meet the Blacks" in 2016 and "Traffik" in 2018. Both of those movies opened around $4 million, making around $9 million total. Last October the movie "The Hate U Give" earned $7.6 million in its nationwide expansion. Even though the two movies are completely different in terms of plot, there are some similar these that could make it a decent comparison.

Hoping to tap into the teen horror crowd prior to Halloween will be the horror film Countdown. Given that there's no new true horror films this month outside this movie, this could be a solid strategy. The movie is about an app that tells you how long you have to live. When our main girl downloads it, she is rather horrified to find out that it says she has two days to live. Then some sort of demon thing starts to haunt her, so she turns to her friends to help her survive this thing. There's no notable cast members here and the director is Justin Dec in his feature length directorial debut. Previously he's written and directed a bunch of short films while mainly working as a production assistant on various films. So the signs don't point towards a strong level of quality with this one, but it also looks like a cheaply made horror film that only requires to make a few million in order to get a profit. If it can have a good enough marketing campaign to draw in enough of a teenage crowd, that could do the trick. If successfully, it could potential play like the horror film "Truth or Dare," which used a popular teenage premise to earn $18.7 million in its opening weekend in April 2018. If that's the case, it could easily top "Black or Blue" to be the top new release of the weekend.

The final film of the month is one that will be limping into theaters and that is The Current War: Director's Cut. That title change, adding the subtitle of "Director's Cut" is a recent change in the last few weeks that potentially infers that this movie that audiences are going to see might be different than the one that was initially seen by audiences at the 2017 Toronto International Film Festival. The history behind this one is interesting as it was initially going to come out in December 2017, but got shelved as it was one of the movies being released by The Weinstein Company during the Harvey Weinstein sexual abuse scandal. The Weinstein Company then died while "The Current War" got passed around a bit, eventually landing in the hands of 101 Studios, a studio launched by David Glasser who was COO at The Weinstein Company before it collapsed. All that drama aside, "The Current War" tells the story of the battle between Thomas Edison and George Westinghouse in their battle to determine whose electrical system would power the modern world. The movie stars Benedict Cumberbatch as Edison, Michael Shannon as Westinghouse, Nicholas Hoult as Nikola Tesla, and Tom Holland as Samuel Insull. Alfonso Gomez-Rejon is the film's director.