Movie Preview: September 2021

We made it through the 2021 summer box office season. On a personal note, it was great that we actually had a summer box office season again, despite the pandemic being far from over. The Delta Variant of COVID-19 certainly made the second half of the summer a bit precarious and many have understandably chosen to stay away from theaters yet again. But theaters remained open, movies have stayed on the schedule, and enough people have been willing to venture out to justify studios continuing to release movies. That’s a positive sign for movie fans who are tired of the constant studios delays and also a positive sign for studios and theaters that rely on movies being released to maintain their business. While I quickly go find some wood to knock on so that I didn’t just curse things, let’s look forward to September, which, outside a major Marvel release, is looking quite empty. But that’s no surprise. September is historically one of the weakest months at the box office, pandemic or no pandemic.

Data for the release dates talked about in this post come courtesy of the-numbers.com and boxofficepro.com. Release dates subject to change. The movies mentioned are mostly movies that are scheduled for a wide theatrical release in the United States and Canada. Movies coming out in limited release or streaming exclusively are typically not included, mostly due to it being difficult to forecast what will actually be released in those mediums.

 

September 3 – 5

Marvel's "Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings"

Set to blow away the Labor Day weekend record at the box office is Marvel’s Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings. Quickly on that record, before we dive into the movie itself, Labor Day weekend has always been a bit of an enigma at the box office. It’s often seen as a cursed weekend where no movie can succeed. But that’s a bit of a self-fulfilling prophesy as Hollywood has been so scared of that weekend that they never schedule anything major to be released. You can’t test to see if that curse is real if you never actually release anything that has the potential to make any money. That’s why the record is currently held by Rob Zombie’s 2007 “Halloween” remake with $26.4 million. Warner Bros. is the one that actually figured out that early September can be fruitful when “IT” exploded in 2017 with an opening of $123 million. Warner Bros. found further success the next two years with “The Nun” and “IT: Chapter Two,” but that was all in the second weekend of September.

Back to “Shang-Chi” itself, this is the movie that finally introduces the Ten Rings properly in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, an organization referenced as early as Marvel’s first movie with “Iron Man” in 2008. In the comics, the Mandarin is Iron Man’s arch nemesis and is the leader of the terrorist group known as the Ten Rings, which give him his power. After building up to that in the MCU, they famously pulled a major bait-and-switch in “Iron Man 3” as Ben Kingsley’s Mandarin turned out to be a fake, which angered a large portion of fans of the Iron Man comics. “Shang-Chi” sees Marvel essentially making an attempt to redeem themselves by bringing the real Mandarin into their universe and his Ten Rings organization. Although obviously not as Iron Man’s foe, but as Shang-Chi’s foe. How deep they dive into all of that is something that I’m waiting to find out by seeing the movie, so we’ll find out together. There’s also a very heavy martial arts focus here as the filmmakers have talked about this being the Marvel movie with the most hand-to-hand combat.

What the box office potential for “Shang-Chi” is will also be something we find out together. I’m assuming it’ll beat the $26.4 million of 2007’s “Halloween,” but by how much? The lowest opening for an MCU film is 2008’s “The Incredible Hulk” with $55.4 million. “Ant-Man” in 2015 barely topped that with $57.2 million. The typical range for origin stories and lesser solo outings for the MCU are between that and $80 million. But is the Labor Day curse real? And how much will COVID impact that total? “Black Widow” opened to $80 million in July, but she’s also a character people have known and loved for a whole decade. It’s worth noting that “The Suicide Squad” bombed in August with $26.2 million, mostly due to a lack of interest. Early critic reviews are really high for “Shang-Chi” at 91 percent, but what’s the interest level from general audiences here? I think the Marvel brand, combined with the theatrical exclusive (no Disney+ hybrid release this time), gives “Shang-Chi” an advantage over the likes of “The Suicide Squad,” but this remains a mostly obscure character released during a pandemic. Although I would tend to believe that a $50 million opening seems most likely, an opening as low as $30 million wouldn’t be too terribly surprising, all things considered.

While “Shang-Chi” is the only theatrical release this weekend, hence me giving it more time (especially since it’s the biggest release of the month), I would feel slightly irresponsible if I didn’t at least quickly mention the opening of Cinderella on Amazon Prime. No, I don’t often talking about streaming releases. There’s too many of them and they’re hard to predict, but “Cinderella” was *supposed* to be a theatrical release, before Sony sold it to Amazon. This is the umpteenth version of this story, so I don’t need to tell you much about it. But this time it’s pop singer Camila Cabello that steps into the role of Cinderella. Joining her in the cast is Nicholas Galitzine as the Prince, with Billy Porter as the “Fabulous” Godmother and Idina Menzel as the Stepmother, with a whole host of others in supporting roles. The trailer promises lots of singing and dancing here, something that Disney’s 2015 adaptation had almost none of. And it appears to be at least mostly original numbers, as well.

 

September 10 – 12

Warner Bros.' "Malignant"

As I mentioned in talking about Labor Day, Warner Bros. has recently hit a gold mine with the second weekend of September. And if you didn’t notice, all three films were horror films. So their motto here is that if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. They’ve got another horror film to release on the second weekend of September and this one is Malignant. The big draw here is that this is directed by James Wan, a modern master of the horror genre who can draw audiences simply by having his name attached to a movie, especially if he’s the one directing. The most recent trailer features James Wan himself talking about how he wanted to do something different with “Malignant,” while also going back to his roots. The premise is described as a woman whose visions of grisly murders torment her as she realizes those dreams are actually a reality. Although the trailer suggests that there might be a whole lot more going on than that. There’s been a lot of horror movies released the last few months, but the chance of seeing a James Wan horror film might be enough to bring horror fans back yet again.

The other wide release is the crime comedy Queenpins from STX Entertainment, the studio that released “Bad Moms” and “Hustlers,” as the advertising points out. The movie stars Kristen Bell and Kirby Howell-Baptiste, co-stars from “The Good Place,” as two housewives that create a $40 million coupon scam. Paul Walter Houser, Vince Vaughn, and Bebe Rexha also co-star. And as I look through the major films released this year, there really haven’t been a whole lot of straight-up comedies that have hit the big screen. Sure, “The Suicide Squad” and “Free Guy” both came out last months, but I would classify both as more action comedies rather than straight-up comedies. Maybe that’s because comedies like “Queenpins” have found a good home on streaming, with the likes of Adam Sandler and Melissa McCarthy finding great success on Netflix and other services. What that means for “Queenpins” is uncertain to me. Could it break out due to their not being many theatrical comedies in the market? Or will it be a dud because people have decided they’d rather watch this genre at home?

Two other quick releases to mention as I’m not sure what the theatrical count for both of these will be. They could be more limited releases as opposed to wide releases. But nevertheless, Focus Features will be releasing The Card Counter, which is an awards-hopeful that is currently playing at the Venice Film Festival. The movie is directed by Paul Schrader, screenwriter of Taxi Driver and Raging Bull, and is a thriller about an ex-military interrogator turned gambler who is haunted by the ghosts of his past. The movie stars Oscar Isaac and Willem Dafoe. Also being released by Sony Pictures is Show Me the Father, part documentary, part drama, featuring stories of faith about the fatherhood of God. This is produced, but not directed, by the Kendrick Brothers, who directed the likes of “War Room” and “Courageous,” so the obvious target is the Christian communities who have been known to turn up in droves for Kendrick Brothers films, even when the movies aren’t on the radar for the rest of the country.

 

September 17 – 19

Warner Bros.' "Cry Macho"

The third weekend of September has a bit of a hole in it. NOT being released here is “Clifford the Big Red Dog,” which was slated for this weekend until Paramount pulled it from the schedule in August. They don’t have a new release date for it. They’ve just said “during 2021.” So it might show up at some point. Also NOT being released this weekend is “Venom: Let There Be Carnage.” Sony pushed that to October, which kinda makes sense, anyways, since the first “Venom” was a huge hit in the month of October.

Speaking of shuffled release dates, while typing this, Paramount announced that they are moving “Top Gun: Maverick” from November of this year to May of next year. So I guess I didn’t knock on wood hard enough. That doesn’t effect this month, but it shows the release schedule is still volatile. Studios could continue to push their major releases. Or they could do what Sony did with “Hotel Transylvania 4” and remove it from the schedule altogether and put it on streaming. That’s another movie that was supposed to come in either late September or early October. That one was a surprising move because family films have done really well in theaters recently and the “Hotel Transylvania” franchise has been quite consistent theatrically.

What IS coming out is a handful of smaller releases, one of which could take the weekend, depending on how “Shang-Chi” and “Malignant” perform. The biggest one of these is Cry Macho, the latest movie from Clint Eastwood, who both directs and stars in the movie. The last time he was a star and director was “The Mule” from 2018, which opened to $17.5 million and was incredibly leggy, finishing with just over $100 million domestically. If the Clint Eastwood faithful show up, this could have potential. The other comparison is “Richard Jewell” from 2019, his most recent directorial effort, which he did not star in. That opened to $4.7 million and finished with $22 million domestically. So there’s your high and low for “Cry Macho.” This movie has Eastwood star as a former rodeo-star and horse breeder who takes a job helping getting a young man away from his alcoholic mother.

It should be noted that both “Cry Macho” and last week’s “Malignant” are Warner Bros., which means they’ll also be available on HBO Max. If either don’t get strong buzz, that could cause people to simply watch at home. That led “Reminiscence” in August to open to just $2 million.

The other three releases I will knock out in one paragraph. Again, I don’t know how wide they actually are, even though the-numbers.com currently has them as wide releases. They could end up in 500-1,000 theaters or they could be actual wide releases. The most likely to be a wide release is CopShop, an action film from Open Road, starring Gerard Butler. Butler has had decent mid-range success with a string of throwaway action films, most notably with the “Fallen” trilogy, but also “Greenland,” “Den of Thieves” and “Geostorm.” Open Roads themselves has also found success in the pandemic with such as “Honest Thief” and “The Marksman.” So this could open anywhere from $5-15 million if it’s lucky. This weekend also has Blue Bayou from Focus Features and The Eyes of Tammy Faye from Searchlight. Those are two more awards hopefuls whose success will be based on how strong the word is on them. As such, their box office success will be reliant on having strong legs rather than a big opening weekend. So I would put money on them opening closer to the 500 theaters range.

 

September 24 – 26  

Universal's "Dear Evan Hansen"

If “Hotel Transylvania 4” had chosen to stay in theaters, this would’ve been a perfect time to open. This final weekend of September has historically been a great one for animated films. The first two “Hotel Transylvania” movies both opened above $40 million on this exact weekend. I would’ve pegged “Hotel Transylvania 4” to at least $20 million, maybe $30 million.

But alas that’s not the case. Instead, the lone wide release to end September will be the movie adaptation of Dear Evan Hansen. The original Broadway musical opened in 2016 and went on to win the Tony Award for best musical in 2017, as well as a whole bunch of other awards. Ben Platt won best lead actor while Pasek and Paul won best score. Ben Platt will be reprising his rle in this movie adaptation. Pasek and Paul are also on board for the music. They’re most notably responsible for “La La Land” and “The Greatest Showman.” Ben Platt will be joined in the movie by the likes of Amy Adams and Juliane Moore, and many others. And the director here is Stephen Chbosky, who directed “The Perks of Being a Wallflower” and “Wonder,” both of which received high critical praise. So on paper this has everything going for it.

But will it translate from the stage to the big screen? “In the Heights” from this year also seemingly had everything going for it, but was a massive financial disappointment in early June, despite even getting strong critical and audience praise. It’s also of note that audiences for a stage production and audiences for a movie often have two different sets of expectation. And the reaction to the “Dear Evan Hansen” trailer by Film Twitter was extremely toxic. Many were appalled at learning of the premise of the musical, while others felt that Ben Platt, now 27, looks way too old to be reprising his role as a high school student. How “Dear Evan Hansen” plays out will depend on which crowd ultimately wins out. This could be a late September hit that plays well through the fall. Or it could be a dud like “In the Heights.”