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‘A Quiet Place’ Makes Some Noise at the Box Office with $50 Million Opening

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When it comes to box office returns for horror films this year, the releases have been relatively “quiet” at the box office, until Paramount’s A Quiet Place was released this weekend.  According to preliminary reports, A Quiet Place will win this weekend’s box office with $50.4 million, making it the second highest opening so far this year, behind only Black Panther.

Unlike last year, which saw Split and Get Out dominate the winter box office frame, no horror film has been able to capture the attention of audiences in a similar fashion.  Although profitable, many of the horror films (most notably Winchester, Strangers: Prey at Night, and Unsane with $25, $24, and $8 million respectively) under performed, with the exception of Insidious: The Last Key surprising everyone with a $67 million dollar take and an additional $100 million overseas.  A Quite Place is poised to do much better however, taking in almost 75% of Insidious’ domestic gross in its first weekend alone. read more

Fox Cancels M. Night Shyamalan’s ‘Wayward Pines’ After 2 Seasons

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Now there’s a twist you didn’t see coming! Executive producer M. Night Shyamalan’s Wayward Pines will not be returning for Season Three. TV Line reports that Fox has pulled the plug on the supernatural drama after mulling the decision over since this past summer.

Fans of the show haven’t particularly been holding their collective breath for more episodes, as Season Two’s finale last aired in late July of 2016- before the January 2017 release of Split– back when Shyamalan was known as a former director of satisfactory thrillers with twist endings and big budget disasters/education reform extraordinaire. Even if Fox wished to continue with the series, Shyamalan may have found it difficult to split his time between the television series and his successful new work on the big screen. Split was a box office surprise and it earned critical praise like Shyamalan hadn’t seen since 2002, and it’s follow-up, Glass, is currently in post-production. read more

Shyamalan Announces Unbreakable Sequel Has Finished Filming

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Following up on his triumphant return to the ranks of the Hollywood directorial elite with the 2017 box office smash Split, M. Night Shyamalan is finally ready to give us the full-length sequel that we’ve waited 17 years for.  According to the director’s official Twitter account, principal photography for Glass, the sequel to 2000’s Unbreakable, just finished wrapping up on Monday, December 4th.  The tweet can be seen below.

Announced in September of this year, Glass will center on Samuel L. Jackson’s character Elijah Price (referred to as “Mr. Glass”) and his involvement in the pursuit of criminal schizophrenic Crumb by David Dunn (Bruce Willis.)  Shyamalan has contended for years that Unbreakable was the first part of an envisioned trilogy, and in a surprise twist (which the director is known for) Willis showed up at the end of Split and revised his role as the hero Dunn. read more

Blumhouse Announces April 2018 Release for ‘Truth or Dare’

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Back in March of this year, it was announced by Blumhouse Productions that a supernatural horror movie called Truth or Dare would be given the green light.  With Lucy Hale (Scream 4) set to star, Truth or Dare would continue to add to its impressive young cast over the next few months to include Aurora Perrineau (Jem and the Holograms) and Tyler Posey (Teen Wolf) among others.  All that was missing was a release date…..until now.  Blumhouse has formerly announced that Truth or Dare will be released in theaters and VOD (presumably) on April 27th, 2018.  Deadline was the first to break the news. read more

2017 is Officially the Highest Grossing Year Ever for Horror Movies

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In January of this year, I wrote that Horror movies are secretly saving Hollywood’s major film studios. Ten months later it turns out that it’s no longer a secret! The New York Times just crunched the numbers and reports that 2017 is “the biggest year in horror history,” citing the runaway success of such hits as Get Out, It, and Split.

As of this Friday, the combined box office earnings of all of the horror films of 2017 sits at $733.5 million. With two months left to sell tickets, that number will undoubtedly climb even higher. The current figure is already $100 million higher than the previous box office champ: the horror movies of 2000. Then, the release of Scream 3, Scary Movie, and What Lies Beneath earned a combined $617.7 million at the multiplex. read more

Anya Taylor-Joy Looking to Sign on for Robert Eggers ‘Nosferatu’ Remake

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Variety is reporting that star of The Witch and Split, Anya Taylor-Joy, will “re-team with director Robert Eggers on his new take on a cinematic classic”, the quintessential vampire film, Nosferatu. 

Eggers directed the young star in his horrifying debut The Witch, and “… wanted to re-team with Taylor-Joy on the film early in the process, but after she became a bona fide movie star in M. Night Shyamalan’s hit Split, the young actress’ schedule has filled up. She is currently filming Josh Boone’s X-Men film New Mutants and is also signed on for the Split and Unbreakable sequel Glass, which also stars James McAvoy, Bruce Willis, and Samuel L. Jackson.” read more

M. Night Shyamalan Announces Sequel to Split and Unbreakable

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M. Night Shyamalan’s career has had more twists than the endings to his movies! He scored bigtime early in his career with hits like The Sixth Sense, Unbreakable, and Signs before slipping into mediocrity with flops like The Happening, The Last Airbender, and After Earth. He began to win back fans with 2015’s The Visit, but his real second chance came with this January’s Split. Made on a budget of just $9 million, the movie earned nearly $275 million worldwide! While this may not be enough to wash the taste of After Earth‘s $60 million domestic gross against a budget of $130 million, it’s certainly enough to show that Shyamalan can still make likable and financially successful movies when given a small budget. read more

Lucy Hale Cast as Lead in Blumhouse’s Truth or Dare

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According to Variety, star of Pretty Little Liars Lucy Hale has been cast in the lead role of Blumhouse Pictures Truth or Dare (not to be confused with Madonna’s 1991 documentary of the same name).  The film is being directed by Jeff Wadlow who is best known for Kick-Ass 2 and Cry_Wolf.

The film will, “… follow(s) a college student in Mexico who is conned into playing a supernatural version of Truth or Dare. The game doesn’t stop and follows her back home. The screenplay was written by Wadlow, Chris Roach (Non-Stop), and Jillian Jacobs from a story by Michael Reisz and Wadlow, Roach, and Jacobs.” read more

Life Stumbles Out of the Gate, Get Out Continues to Add to Box Office Totals

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Although Life received positive reviews and benefited from a recognizable cast, the film had trouble finding any “life” at an incredibly competitive March box office and only returned an estimated $12,600,000 during its opening weekend.

Even though Life earned a 67% fresh score on Rotten Tomatoes, fans chose other options at the cinema, or stayed home waiting for the next installment in the Aliens series (Alien:Covenant), from which it appears Life borrows heavily from.  Fans gave the film a very low “C+” Cinemascore rating, which is particularly low for a film that scored much better with critics (Life’s score also happens to be one of the lowest of 2017 so far).  With a production budget close to 60 million dollars, the film will have to do markedly better at the foreign box office to turn a profit, no small feat for an R-rated sci-fi/horror film. read more

Jordan Peele’s Get Out Continues to Impress at the Box Office

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Although Logan easily beat out all competition at the box office with a $85 million dollar debut due to stellar reviews and Hugh Jackman’s farewell performance as everyone’s favorite Canadian mutant, Get Out continued to rack up impressive box office numbers in second place.

Get Out made $28 million at the box office this weekend, bringing the film’s total to a robust $78 million dollars.  Aside from its profitable debut last weekend ($33 million), the film also performed very well over the week, taking in an average of $4 million from Monday to Thursday. read more