Movie Preview: February 2020

The first month of the new decade is in the books and it was a bit of a doozie. At least for most of the new arrivals. "Bad Boys for Life" was the one exception as it broke out in a big way with the second largest January weekend ever, behind only "American Sniper." It totaled $135.6 million in January alone and will end up with a lot more than that before its run is over. Outside that, there were four horror releases that were all almost dead on arrival, "Dolittle" earned just $50 million domestically in January despite a reported $175 million production budget, while "The Rhythm Section" set the record for worst opening weekend ever for a movie to open in at least 3,000 theaters. Although as is often the case for Januaries, holdovers from the previous year dominated, with "1917," "Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker" and "Jumanji: The Next Level" being main contributors in that category, leading the month to a respectable $897 million total. And now as we turn the corner to February, 2020 looks like it's going to finally kick into gear with a few notable titles hitting theaters this month before things really take off starting in March and moving consistently big throughout the summer. But before we get too far ahead of ourselves, let's stop here and take a close look at February.

February 7th - 9th-

First up is what's most likely going to be the biggest hit of the month with DC's Birds of Prey (And the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn). After a bit of a rocky start to DC's attempted cinematic universe, which culminated in the glorious failure of the "Justice League" movie, DC has actually had a solid run of late when they decided to give up on this idea of copying Marvel and instead focus on simply making good, individual movies. What they've sacrificed in the process is an overarching timeline that now makes no sense, especially with Jared Leto's Joker making a big offscreen presence in "Birds of Prey" as the movie sees Harley Quinn dealing with her separation from him. This coming only a few months after Joaquin Phoenix's new Joker was introduced in October. So DC has two Jokers running around somewhere. But if the quality of the movies is strong, does the consistency across the timeline really matter? For "Birds of Prey," Margot Robbie returns as Harley Quinn, while notable additions include Mary Elizabeth Winstead as The Huntress and Jurnee Smollett-Ball as Black Canary, with Ewan McGregor playing the villainous Black Mask. The movie is expected to open around $50 million, which is about on par with last year's "Shazam!"

February 14th - 17th-

After only one new wide release during the fist weekend of February, the second weekend of February will have three new wide releases all hoping to take advantage of the double holiday weekend with Valentine’s Day on Friday and President’s Day on Monday. Leading the way will be the arrival of the live-action adaptation of Sonic the Hedgehog. It’s been quite the unique production for this movie as it was originally on the calendar for November 2019. However, after the initial trailer was released in May 2019 and met with widespread hatred, director Jeff Fowler announced that they have listened to the response and postponed the movie in order to completely redesign Sonic. Upon the release of the redesigned trailer a few months later, fans generally speaking seemed to be impressed with the new design. All of this might ultimately help Sonic at the box office. Not only does the movie get avoid competing with the likes of “Frozen 2” at the November box office, but the market is currently wide open for the family market in part due to the underperformance of “Dolittle” in January. At about this exact time two years ago, “Peter Rabbit” debuted to $25 million, which seems like a fair mark for Sonic. Although some reports say this could pop as high as $40+ million.

As previously mentioned, January was a rough month for the horror genre as it was overstuffed with four horror movies, all of which failed miserably, partially due to the lack of quality and partially due to them cannibalizing each other. However, despite this, 2020 is not done trying as the fifth horror movie of the year, that of Fantasy Island, will look to buck this trend. Despite the recently sour trend being a bad omen for “Fantasy Island, there are a few things in this movie’s favor that could help it out. First off, there is some brand name recognition as this is based off of the 1970s TV series of the same name that had a similar concept. People would be brought to a mysterious island where they would granted a wish of their choice, which seems all fine and dandy until they realize all their wishes are being twisted into becoming more of a nightmare than a dream come true. In addition to said brand name recognition, this is also a horror movie produced by Blumhouse, which is a studio that has a habit of releasing a lot of low-budget horror movies to a good profit. Said budget of “Fantasy Island” is only $7 million, meaning the bar here for success is quite low. Finally, the movie stars Michael Pena as the mysterious Mr. Roarke, which adds some star power.

And finally, hoping to specifically cash in on date night for Valentine’s Day on Friday will be The Photograph. The plot of this movie is pretty straightforward. It follows the estranged daughter of a famous photographer who falls in love with the journalist assigned to cover her late mother. Those wanting to watch two people fall in love on Valentine’s Day have the potential to swarm in and see this romance drama, especially the teenage girl crowd. The two lovers are played by Issa Rae (“Little,” “The Hate U Give”) and Lakeith Stanfield (“Straight Outta Compton,” “Sorry to Bother You”), two fairly well known up-and-coming stars. Now despite this being a well-timed movie with two likable lead stars, the marketing of the movie hasn’t necessarily been through the roof, nor does the excitement level seem to be too high. There’s been plenty of examples of huge Valentine’s Day romance films. This does not look to be one of them. Instead, one might look to director Stella Meghie’s 2017 film “Everything, Everything,” which opened to $11. 7 million. Granted, that movie opened in May and not on Valentine’s Day,” but that still might be around the same mark that “The Photograph” is look at. Best case scenario might be an opening close to $15 million for the three-day.

February 21st - 23rd-

After what could be a busy double holiday weekend in the second weekend of February, the third weekend of February should be a bit more quiet, giving whatever wins the previous weekend a chance to repeat. But of our two newcomers, Disney and Fox's The Call of the Wild should comfortably come out on top, landing somewhere in the top five. We've had a lot of dog movies in the past few years, but this one does seem a bit different as it's not a movie narrated by a dog. It's just simply a movie about a man and his dog, with Harrison Ford being said man. "The Call of the Wild" is, of course, based on the book written by Jack London, which was published in 1903 and is considered classic literature. The book has been adapted numerous times, with film adaptations coming in 1923, 1935, 1972 and 1997. The original novel follows a dog named Buck who is stolen from his California home and sold into service as a sled dog in Alaska. This takes place in the 1890s during the Klondike Gold Rush where sled dogs were in high demand. How closely this specific adaptation follows the novel remains to be seen, but we are showcased plenty of scenes with Harrison Ford and the dog out in the wild trying to survive. It's expected to open to about $10-15 million.

The other movie of the weekend is horror movie No. 6 of the year with Brahms: The Boy II. Unlike horror movie No. 5 and the upcoming horror movie No. 7 that we'll get to in a bit, "The Boy II" doesn't look to be quite as promising. Its predecessor was the 2016 movie "The Boy," which opened in January of that year to just $10.8 million. It wound up making $35.8 million domestically and $64.1 million worldwide on a budget of just $10 million, so it pulled a decent profit. However, that wasn't the type of profit that screams sequel, so it's a bit curious that they came up with one anyways and took four years to get it released. That's not a good formula for success when it comes to horror sequels. To add to the trouble, "The Boy II" has been pushed around the schedule quite a bit before finally settling here in February 2020. What's worse is that STX didn't release the trailer until early January. Based on the commentary in the trailer, there also seems to be a bit of confusion as to why the trailer seems to be leaning so heavily on a supernatural doll when, SPOILER ALERT, "The Boy" was a movie where a man in the wall was secretly moving the doll around. Said man was named Brahms, hence the title here. Needless to say, this is probably not going to do super well.

February 28th - March 1st-

Yes. Horror movie No. 7 on the year. At least in terms of wide releases. This latest horror movie is The Invisible Man and it is also the only wide release of the final weekend of February, which dips into March a bit. Despite being the seventh horror movie of the year, "The Invisible Man" could arguably be called the first high profile horror movie as the story behind this movie stems all the way back to 1933. Although perhaps not quite as popular as titles like "Dracula" or "Frankenstein," "The Invisible Man" was nevertheless one of Universal's original monster movies. The reason why a modern remake currently exists is partially due to Universal's recent attempt to set up their new Dark Universe. They had all sorts of plans to remake old monster movies, but all of that got thrown in the trash when Tom Cruise's "The Mummy" failed spectacularly. However, Jason Blum stepped in and said he wanted to do this one, so here we are. This 2020 remake is a modern take on the story with Leigh Whannell, director of 2018's "Upgrade," helming the project. Trailer reaction has led to strong buzz that suggests this could be a breakout hit that opens with at least $20 million. Considering the production budget is just $9 million, that would be great news for Universal.