Exclusive: Angel Gomez (Arachnid) has been set to direct Dangerous Games To Play, a supernatural horror movie for former Sony exec Scott Strauss and Thunder Road’s genre label Badlands.

Written by Evan Spiliotopoulos (The Pope’s Exorcist), pic is based on Lucia Peters’ novel Dangerous Games To Play In The Dark. The producers said of the novel: “The source material is a collection of spine-chilling games based on urban legends from around the world. While these games might seem like simple dares or tests of bravery, the book warns those who risk playing should remember: What they summon may not want the games to end…”

Altitude Film Sales will introduce the project to buyers next week at the American Film Market, with CAA Media Finance handling domestic rights. The team is eyeing a spring 2025 production start. Casting discussions are underway.

As we revealed earlier this year, Badlands is a...

Before USA Network became series-focused, the cable channel delivered a steady stream of weekly original movies. Many of which were produced by McA (now NBCUniversal). And during this era — between the late 1980s and early 2000s — USA offered a variety of genres; action and suspense were the most common, but horror also came up from time to time.

Especially around Halloween.

USA Network is no longer in the business of airing these “World Premiere Movies,” horror or otherwise, and there haven’t been great strides to bring all of them to streaming or modern home video. However, the horror entries certainly have their merits as well as fans.

See if you can remember these original movies from USA Network’s horror history.

Trapped (1989)

Image: Kathleen Quinlan in Trapped (1989).

Directed by Fred Walton, Trapped was one of USA’s first World Premiere Movies. Here Kathleen Quinlan starred in what feels like a blueprint for P2.

Exclusive: Luber Roklin Entertainment has expanded its team with the addition of Joe Bello and Mike Griffin as managers, Deadline has learned. Both will be based out of the company’s Los Angeles office.

Bello joins from Anonymous Content, where he worked as a manager for more than four and a half years. Clients he brings with him to Luber Roklin include actors Joseph Mawle (The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power), Tamzin Merchant (Carnival Row), Kai Luke Brummer (Moffie), Kit Clarke (Hellraiser), Whoopie van Raam (The Meg 2), Terique Jarrett (Daddy) and Paris and Dylan Brosnan (The Unholy Trinity), among others.

Griffin joins after a six-year stint at boutique management and production firm Make Good Content. His clients include writers such as Emmy winner Dennis McNicholas (SNL), and on-camera talent such as Creed Bratton (The Office), Bobby Naderi (The Beekeeper), Mikaela Hoover (Superman), Wil Coban (The Boys in the Boat...

Exclusive: Duplass Brothers Production recently wrapped production on the Katie Aselton-directed feature Magic Hour, starring Daveed Diggs. Aselton stars alongside Diggs in the project which she co-wrote with Mark Duplass.

Details regarding the project’s plot and character descriptions are under wraps. Magic Hour is executive produced by Duplass, Mel Eslyn and Jay Duplass. Emily Neumann produced.

Aselton is a multi-hyphenate with directing credits including The Freebie (2010), Black Rock (2012) and most recently, Mack & Rita (2022) and acting credits that span both TV and film. On TV, she starred in FX’s Legion and Apple TV+’s The Morning Show; and on the big screen, in Old Dads (2023), The Unholy (2021), Bombshell (2019) and the John Lithgow and Blythe Danner feature The Tomorrow Man. She is repped by CAA and Untitled Entertainment.

Up next for Diggs, he will star as Josh in the indie film A Tree...

The episode of Best Horror Movie You Never Saw covering The Possession was Written by Andrew Hatfield, Narrated by Jason Hewlett, Edited by Paul Bookstaber, Produced by John Fallon and Tyler Nichols, and Executive Produced by Berge Garabedian.

While every decade has movies that fly under the radar, the addition of multiple streaming services in the 2010s gives us quite the list to work off of. While everyone’s favorite decade for horror is usually the ’80s or ’90s, there are far more hidden gems to find now than ever before. How a movie with a great cast, good production value, and the vaunted “based on a true story angle” was somehow successful at the box office and entirely forgotten just a little over a decade after release is just bizarre. It’s one of the more interesting demon takeover movies we’ve seen and definitely earns its title of...

Stars: Karen Black, Kevin Lloyd, Christine Burke, Robyn Hussa, Roger Galloway, Toni Covington, Joseph Campanella, David Burnell Smith, Jim Flynn | Written by Philip Yordan | Directed by John Carr

Jack is a young wanderer with a turbulent past who arrives at La Paloma, the cinema of his Aunt Ruth, the closest relative he has since the death of his mother, in the hope of a bed for a few nights. But in the city there is a serial killer who dances tango with his victims before strangling them and police start to suspect that Jack is in some way involved with the murders. His aunt and Julie, a girl who got a job in the cinema thanks to him, also begin to doubt his innocence…

Do you know what I like about the current state of physical media? All the boutique labels that have emerged, all fighting for the attention of...

On the face of it, “The Pope’s Exorcist” would have you believe that it’s rooted in the real-life experiences of the late Father Gabriele Amorth, the Catholic priest who served for 30 years as the head exorcist of the Diocese of Rome. Its screenwriting credits proclaim as much, for starters, while a surfeit of onscreen dates and locations in the early going lend proceedings the faintest of docudrama veneers; moreover, the film is backed by the non-profit production arm of the Jesuit research university Loyola Marymount, with Loyola rector Father Edward J. Siebert among its executive producers.

Even Catholics in high places, it turns out, have a sense of humor: You needn’t wait for the “work of fiction” disclaimer in the closing credits to discern that “The Pope’s Exorcist” is ripely fantastical trash, inspired by Amorth’s work in much the same way that SunnyD is inspired by Florida oranges,...

March is yet another packed month for Netflix.

There’s a live stand-up show from Chris Rock and a film based on BBC series Luther, which marks Idris Eba’s return as the detective. Then there’s an animated series depicting Elvis Presley as a secret agent voiced by Matthew McConaughey.

Meanwhile, Adam Sandeler and Jennifer Aniston are up to mischief once again in a sequel to 2017 comedy Murder Mystery.

There’s also a host of licenced titles being added to the service in March. Find the full list below.

Nb: The Independent compiled this list with help from What’s on Netflix.

UK – Original

Interactive

21 March

We Lost Our Human

TV

1 March

Cheat

Wrong Side of the Tracks season two

The full list of every movie and TV show being removed from Netflix in March 2023

2 March

County Masameer season two

Framed! A Sicilian Murder Mystery season two

Sex/Life...

March is yet another packed month for Netflix.

There’s a live stand-up show from Chris Rock and a film based on BBC series Luther, which marks Idris Eba’s return as the detective. Then there’s an animated series depicting Elvis Presley as a secret agent voiced by Matthew McConaughey.

Meanwhile, Adam Sandeler and Jennifer Aniston are up to mischief once again in a sequel to 2017 comedy Murder Mystery.

There’s also a host of licenced titles being added to the service in March. Find the full list below.

Nb: The Independent compiled this list with help from What’s on Netflix.

UK – Original

Interactive

21 March

We Lost Our Human

TV

1 March

Cheat

Wrong Side of the Tracks season two

The full list of every movie and TV show being removed from Netflix in March 2023

2 March

County Masameer season two

Framed! A Sicilian Murder Mystery season two

Sex/Life...

March is yet another packed month for Netflix.

There’s a live stand-up show from Chris Rock and a film based on BBC series Luther, which marks Idris Eba’s return as the detective. Then there’s an animated series depicting Elvis Presley as a secret agent voiced by Matthew McConaughey.

Meanwhile, Adam Sandeler and Jennifer Aniston are up to mischief once again in a sequel to 2017 comedy Murder Mystery.

There’s also a host of licenced titles being added to the service in March. Find the full list below.

Nb: The Independent compiled this list with help from What’s on Netflix.

UK – Original

Interactive

21 March

We Lost Our Human

TV

1 March

Cheat

Wrong Side of the Tracks season two

The full list of every movie and TV show being removed from Netflix in March 2023

2 March

County Masameer season two

Framed! A Sicilian Murder Mystery season two

Sex/Life...

March is yet another packed month for Netflix.

There’s a live stand-up show from Chris Rock and a film based on BBC series Luther, which marks Idris Eba’s return as the detective. Then there’s an animated series depicting Elvis Presley as a secret agent voiced by Matthew McConaughey.

Meanwhile, Adam Sandeler and Jennifer Aniston are up to mischief once again in a sequel to 2017 comedy Murder Mystery.

There’s also a host of licenced titles being added to the service in March. Find the full list below.

Nb: The Independent compiled this list with help from What’s on Netflix.

UK – Original

Interactive

21 March

We Lost Our Human

TV

1 March

Cheat

Wrong Side of the Tracks season two

The full list of every movie and TV show being removed from Netflix in March 2023

2 March

County Masameer season two

Framed! A Sicilian Murder Mystery season two

Sex/Life...

The Unholy is a horror movie directed by Evan Spiliotopoulos starring Jeffrey Dean Morgan. It is based on the novel written by James Herbert.

A supernatural horror film about miracles and apparitions, with a lot of religion (Catholic this time) and some clichés that work in lightweight horror films that work in a film that treads a firm ground without any risks…

Plot of The Unholy

A journalist with no scruples on the hunt for a scoop runs into the miracle of an apparition… and something else.

Movie Review The Unholy (2021)

If you like religion themed films, then this one is just about okay, it has its film touch (a little too much if you have watched movies for some time). It has touches of The Exorcist, apparitions like in The Ring and many others. Here and there, reputed screenwriter Evan Spiliotopoulos directs his first feature film cleverly but staying...

Exclusive: Actor and producer Jeffrey Dean Morgan, best known for his roles on AMC’s The Walking Dead, CW’s Supernatural, and ABC’s Grey’s Anatomy, has signed with Anonymous Content.

Morgan can be seen in the recently concluded 11th and final season of the hit AMC series, The Walking Dead, portraying the infamous antagonist, “Negan.” He joined the series in Season 6.

Up next, Morgan will reprise the role in the upcoming spin-off series Dead City. Along with Lauren Cohan reprising her role as “Maggie,” Dead City will follow the pair through post-apocalyptic Manhattan. Morgan and Cohan also serve as Executive Producers on the series that is set to premiere in April 2023 on AMC.

Morgan will also be joining the cast of the highly anticipated upcoming fourth season of Amazon’s hit series The Boys.

On the film side, recent credits include Warner Brother’s Rampage directed by Brad Peyton,...

Killer Collectibles highlights five of the most exciting new horror products released each and every week, from toys and apparel to artwork, records, and much more.

Here are the coolest horror collectibles unveiled this week!

The Return of Swamp Thing 4K Uhd from Lightyear Entertainment

I don’t think anyone was expecting to see The Return of Swamp Thing on 4K Ultra HD, especially before Wes Craven’s 1982 original, but it’s coming February 7 from Lightyear Entertainment.

Based on the DC Comics character, the 1989 sequel is directed by Jim Wynorski and written by Neil Cuthbert and Grant Morris. Louis Jourdan, Heather Locklear, Sarah Douglas, and Dick Durock star.

The film been newly restored in 4K from the original interpositive with Dolby Vision Hdr and original 2.0 and 5.1 stereo audio. Special features include two audio commentaries, interviews with Wynorski, Cirino, Rosenthal, and producer Michael Uslan, promotional videos, and more.

Creature from the...

After being revealed way back in 2018, Duality Games’ stealth horror title The Unholy (not to be confused with Evan Spiliotopoulos‘ 2021 film of the same name) has reappeared with 16 minutes of gameplay footage, courtesy of IGN.

Created by former Painkiller, Bulletstorm and Gears of War developers, The Unholy is now aiming for release next year (according to the game’s Steam page) for PC and current-gen consoles. We also now have story details: you’re on the search for your young child after they disappear from a run-down, post-Soviet town. To do so, you’ll need to explore the aforementioned town, as well as the creepy and twisted world of Unholy, a grotesque society ruled by a relentless priest caste.

The Unholy will feature a unique gameplay mechanic of using four different emotions – anger, fear, sadness and desire – to interact with the environment in order to destroy obstacles, trigger mechanisms, overload circuits,...

Jeffrey Dean Morgan has joined the cast of Amazon’s The Boys for Season 4 as a recurring guest star. Details regarding the character he will play remain under wraps.

His work on the series will reunite Morgan with Supernatural creator Eric Kripke who serves as showrunner of The Boys. During his time on the CW series he portrayed John Winchester in a recurring capacity.

Kripke recently spoke about his attempts to secure Morgan’s participation in the new season, telling E! News, “Jeffrey Dean Morgan is a superfan of the show, so he and I are talking. We’re trying to figure out something for season four. Nothing finalized yet, but he and I are chatting and e-mailing and seeing it we can make it work with his busy schedule. So, stay tuned on that.”

Morgan can be seen in AMC’s The Walking Dead, which...

Exclusive: Pete Gardner (Crazy Ex-Girlfriend) will star alongside Zachary Levi, Zooey Deschanel, Lil Rel Howery, Ravi Patel, Camille Guaty and Tanya Reynolds in Sony Pictures’ live-action adaptation of Harold and the Purple Crayon, which has wrapped production.

The film from Oscar-nominated director Carlos Saldanha (Ferdinand) is based on the 1955 children’s book by Crockett Johnson, which follows Harold—a curious four-year-old who, with his purple crayon, has the power to create a world of his own. David Guion and Michael Handelman (Night at the Museum: Secret of the Tomb) adapted the screenplay, with John Davis (Dolemite Is My Name) producing through Davis Entertainment. The film is currently in post-production and is slated for release in theaters on January 27, 2023.

Gardner is perhaps best known for his turn as Darryl Whitefeather—the overly-friendly boss of Rachel Bloom’s Rebecca—on The CW’s Emmy-winning musical comedy series, Crazy Ex-Girlfriend. The actor has...

Exclusive: Katie Aselton (The Morning Show) has signed on to star alongside Bill Burr, Bobby Cannavale and Bokeem Woodbine in the comedy Old Dads, which Burr wrote and is directing for Miramax and his company All Things Comedy.

The comedian’s feature directorial debut centers on a middle-aged father, Jack (Burr), and his two best friends (Cannavale and Woodbine), who after selling their company to a millennial, find themselves out of step and behind the times as they hilariously struggle to navigate a changing world of culture, career and fatherhood.

Aselton is playing Jack’s wife, Leah. Burr and Ben Tishler penned the script and are producing alongside Bill Block, Monica Levinson and Mike Bertolina, with production underway in Los Angeles.

Aselton is an actor and filmmaker perhaps best known for her starring role as Jenny on FX’s comedy The League. She...

Exclusive: Katie McGrath (Supergirl), Ray McKinnon (Rectify) Adam Shapiro (Never Have I Ever), Mark Musashi (Fear of the Walking Dead) and Marina Mazepa (Malignant) have been cast opposite Colin Woodell and Mel Gibson in Starz’s The Continental, the prequel to the Keanu Reeves film series John Wick. The Continental will be presented as a three-night special-event TV series, produced for Starz by Lionsgate Television.

In addition to Woodell and Gibson, the five join previously announced cast members Hubert Point-Du Jour, Jessica Allain, Mishel Prada, Nhung Kate and Ben Robson.

McGrath will play The Adjudicator; McKinnon portrays Jenkins; Shapiro is Lemmy; and Musahi and Mazepa will play High Table assassins Hansel & Gretel.

Executive producers Greg Coolidge and Kirk Ward (Wayne) are writing the event series and serve as showrunners. Thunder Road Pictures’ Basil Iwanyk and Erica Lee, Chad Stahelski, Derek Kolstad, David Leitch, Shawn Simmons, Paul Wernick...

If your household isn’t wall-to-wall Elf for the entirety of this month, then a) that must be nice and quiet. Can I come and stay? and b) you must be on the look-out for some alternative film options. Find them below in our handy guide to what’s premiering daily on Sky Cinema in the UK in December. Yes, there’s Christmas fare, including something about an animated cow, Mel Gibson playing a gun-toting Santa Claus, and two Sky Original festive films Last Train to Christmas and A Christmas Number One, but there’s much more besides.

Our highlights include monster mash-up Godzilla vs. Kong, Lin-Manuel Miranda musical In the Heights, excellent Thomas Vinterberg drinking drama Another Round (Mads Mikkelsen’s closing scene is worth the price of admission alone), and The Suicide Squad, which needs no introduction round these parts. There’s also the Peter Rabbit sequel for...

Exclusive: Deadline has learned that David Gordon Green is set to direct a movie at Disney Studios for Disney+ about Walt Disney’s journey to building Disneyland, the “Happiest Place on Earth.”

The news comes days before Gordon’s Halloween Kills opens, the sequel to the highest-grossing Halloween movie of all time It was released in 2018 and racked up $255.6 million.

Evan Spiliotopoulos, who has a history writing on such Disney projects as The Jungle Book 2, Pooh’s Heffalump Movie, Tinker Bell and the Lost Treasure and the $1.26 billion-grossing live-action reboot of Beauty and the Beast, is set to write. Cavalry Media and producer Jason Reed spent a year developing the pitch before bringing it to Disney.

Spiliotopoulos’ credits also include the 2012’s Snow White and the Huntsmen, which grossed nearly $400M worldwide; the $245M WW-grossing Hercules; and this year’s Snake Eyes and The Unholy.

Allison Erlikhman will oversee for Disney Studios.

As theaters await “Venom: Let There Be Carnage” (Paramount) and “No Time to Die” (United Artists) over the next two weeks, home viewing options are similarly on the rise. “Free Guy” (Disney), honoring a 45-day window, debuts on Premium VOD September 28. Friday sees two theatrical openers: “Addams Family 2” (United Artists) and “The Many Saints of Newark” (Warner Bros.), also available at home.

That left a more routine week on the charts we follow, although some recent releases got attention as they made their first appearances. But price reductions, led by “F9” (Universal), were also important.

The latest entry in the “Fast” series, which opened in domestic theaters in early June, and then at $19.99 on PVOD in late July, just had its price cut to $5.99 (consistent with the timing of past Universal moves). The just-released director’s cut remains at the higher price. The result is a return to #1 at...

Exclusive: Black Lightning alumna Christine Adams and Joe Carroll (Pose) are set for recurring roles on Ordinary Joe, NBC’s upcoming drama series starring Jimmy Wolk from House veterans Russel Friend and Garrett Lerner and The Batman writer/director Matt Reeves and his 6th & Idaho banner. The project, which co-stars Natalie Martinez, Charlie Barnett and Elizabeth Lail, is a co-production of 20th Television, Universal Television, a division of Universal Studio Group, 6th & Idaho and 3 Arts.

Written by Friend and Lerner, Ordinary Joe explores the three parallel lives of the show’s main character (Wolk) after he makes a pivotal choice at a crossroads in his life. The series asks the question of how different life might look if you made your decision based on love, loyalty or passion.

Adams will play Regina Diaz, supportive wife and mother who is smart, ambitious and can be formidable. She might’ve had a different path before her husband,...

Gravitas Ventures has acquired U.S. rights to The Gig Is Up, Shannon Walsh’s feature documentary that explores the real costs of the controversial gig economy through the lives of workers from around the world for companies including Uber, Amazon and Deliveroo. The deal comes after London-based sales outfit Dogwoof acquired world rights at the European Film Market. Gravitas will now release the film October 8 in theaters and on-demand.

From delivering food and driving ride shares to tagging images for AI, millions of people are finding work task by task online, with the gig economy worth more than $5 trillion and growing worldwide. The pic tells the stories of the workers behind this tech revolution who have gone largely neglected amid often dangerous work conditions, inconsistent pay and the threat of being effectively fired through deactivation or a bad rating.

“We are thrilled to be releasing The Gig Is Up...

Keep track of when films are coming out in the territory.

Cinemas in the UK and Ireland are set to reopen this spring, following months of closures due to the Covid-19 pandemic.

Screen is listing the release dates for films in the territory in the calendar below. For distributors who wish to add/amend a date on the calendar, please get in touch with Screen here.

Indoor cinemas in England and Scotland will be allowed to reopen from May 17; with dates yet to be confirmed for Wales, Northern Ireland and Ireland.

Screen is also tracking reopening dates of cinemas in...

Hello, everyone! We have a relatively quiet week of home media releases ahead of us, featuring recent supernatural shocker The Unholy as well as Severin Films’ impressive-looking The Eurocrypt of Christopher Lee Collection. Indie horrors Sweet River and Feed the Gods are both coming home this Tuesday on multiple formats, and other Blu-ray and DVD releases for June 22nd include Grim Woods, Evil Nun, Conjuring Curse, House of Pain, and a 2-Disc Collector’s Edition of Hangar from Unearthed Films.

The Eurocrypt of Christopher Lee Collection

He remains one of the most beloved horror/fantasy icons in US/UK pop culture history, but Christopher Lee delivered several of the most compelling, acclaimed and bizarre performances of his entire career in 1960s Europe. The Eurocrypt Of Christopher Lee brings together five of these Lee classics: the 1964 gothic shocker Crypt Of The Vampire; the 1964 cult hit Castle Of The Living Dead co-starring...

Several titles got just past the £1m mark across the weekend.

Rank Film (Distributor) Three-day gross (Jun 18-20) Total gross to date Week 1 Peter Rabbit 2: The Runaway (Sony) £1.1m £15.3m 5 2 In The Heights (Warner Bros) £1.1m £1.1m 1 3 The Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard (Lionsgate) £1m £1.6m 1 4 A Quiet Place Part II (Paramount) £1m £8.3m 3 5 Cruella (Disney) £731,639 £7m 4

Gbp to Usd conversion rate: 1.39

Warner Bros’ musical In The Heights reached second place on its opening weekend at the UK-Ireland box office, as Peter Rabbit 2: The Runaway surged back to the top spot with a 38% weekend-on-weekend rise.

The family sequel added...

In a week of mostly static VOD charts, something peculiar happened: “Spiral: From the Book of Saw,” the only major new premium VOD release, failed to dislodge “Wrath of Man” from its top overall position.

Both are genre thrillers, each released for $19.99 after their third weekend in theaters. “Spiral” is the more recent, has a 40 percent higher theatrical gross ($21.8 million to $15.6 million), and is part of a lucrative and long-running franchise. However, it’s “Wrath” that was #1 at three of the four lists below (#2 at Apple/iTunes), while “Spiral” lagged at #2 in the two charts that track by revenues and lower (#4 and #6) at Apple/iTunes and Google TV, both of which chart by number of rentals.

Why? “Wrath” had a much better Cinemascore, while the B- for “Spiral” was at the lower end for the franchise. “Wrath” has a proven action star in Statham at a time when a known star can create impulse buys.

Further new releases included Warner Bros’ ‘Dream Horse’ and Universal’s ‘Land’.

Rank Film (Distributor) Three-day gross (May 28-30) Total gross to date Week 1 A Quiet Place Part II (Paramount) £2.24m £3.56m 1 2 Peter Rabbit 2: The Runaway (Sony) £2m £12.6m 3 3 Cruella (Disney) £1.28m £4.45m 2 4 The Conjuring: The Devil Made Me Do It (Warner Bros) £1.03m £5.31m 2 5 Dream Horse (Warner Bros) £198,285 £209,364 1

Gbp to Usd conversion rate: 1.42

Paramount’s A Quiet Place Part II led the UK box office on its opening weekend, topping the initial performance of the first film.

The sequel thriller, directed by John Krasinski and starring Emily Blunt,...

“Wrath of Man” (United Artists), starring Jason Statham as an armored truck company employee with mob connections, topped all Video on Demand charts its first week out. The Premium $19.99 offering led on both FandangoNow and Vudu (which calculate by revenue brought in), and Apple TV/iTunes and GooglePlay (listed by number of transactions).

The film, which has grossed about $23 million in theaters, received a PVOD release just after its third weekend in theaters. That’s the Universal/Focus model. This quick transition came against the backdrop of a Memorial Day weekend in which “A Quiet Place Part II” (Paramount) and “Cruella” (Disney) led theaters to their strongest weekend in over a year.

Both “Wrath” and “Spiral” (Lionsgate) have chosen to cash in on at-home potential, even as theaters rebound, rather than wait and continue to add to their theatrical take. For “Wrath,” we have no sense other than relative position of its success.

Sunny weather didn’t adversely affect box office takings too much.

RankFilm (Distributor)Three-day gross (May 28-30)Total gross to dateWeek 1 Peter Rabbit 2: The Runaway (Sony) £2m £8.2m 2 2 The Conjuring: The Devil Made Me Do It (Warner Bros) £1.9m £3m 1 3 Cruella (Disney) £1.5m £1.9m 1 4 Demon Slayer: Mugen Train (Sony) £302,928 £693,081 1 5 Godzilla Vs. Kong (Warner Bros) £254,000 £1.8m 2

Gbp to Usd conversion rate: 1.42

Peter Rabbit 2: The Runaway held top spot at the UK box office for a second weekend, as results held firm from last week’s good start despite sunny weather across much of the territory.

The Sony animation-live action...

The Disney title will aim to shift ‘Peter Rabbit 2’ from the top spot.

Disney’s Cruella becomes the first title to debut in over 500 locations since UK cinemas reopened, as the number of releases grows following last weekend’s strong box office showing.

There are 10 new films debuting in UK cinemas today, plus an additional one which opened on Wednesday. This is up on the five that opened last Friday; at least 11 films did come out on Monday 17 when cinemas reopened, although several of these had previously been released on VoD during the shutdown.

Cruella will be available on...

Sony family favorite “Peter Rabbit 2” and Disney’s Oscar champion “Nomadland” topped the charts as the U.K. enjoyed its first full week of box office in months.

The vast majority of cinemas in the U.K. are now open. Some 80% of movie theaters across England, Scotland and Wales opened doors on May 17, with Northern Ireland due to reopen this week. However, cinemas in the Scottish city of Glasgow remain closed, as do all cinemas in the Republic of Ireland, a territory traditionally counted alongside the U.K. for box office collections.

“Peter Rabbit 2” and “Nomadland” led the charts on the first two days of reopening, and the films held their positions for the rest of the week.

“Peter Rabbit 2” collected £4,605,673, while “Nomadland” made £874,785 in second place, according to numbers provided by Comscore. In third place was Warner Bros.’ creature face-off epic “Godzilla vs Kong” with £783,879, while...

Takings were significantly up on the reopening in July 2020.

Rank Film (Distributor) Three-day gross (May 21-23) Total gross to date Week 1 Peter Rabbit 2: The Runaway (Sony) £3.8m £4.6m 1 2 Nomadland (Disney) £496,375 £874,784 1 3 Godzilla Vs. Kong (Warner Bros) Tbc £1.2m 1 4 Spiral: From The Book Of Saw (Lionsgate) £478,682 £776,107 1 5 The Unholy (Sony) £250,391 £455,391 1

Gbp to Usd conversion rate: 1.42

UK box office results for the first weekend post-lockdown in 2021 were positive, as Peter Rabbit 2: The Runaway topped the chart with a £3.8m weekend.

The Sony family adventure has taken £4.6m since its release on Monday May 17, at a location average of £9,285 – a hugely impressive figure...

Some 80% of indoor cinemas across England, Scotland and Wales reopened on Monday (May 17) after months of being shuttered due to the Covid-19 pandemic. Judging by the first two days of box office collections, U.K. audiences are eagerly quenching their thirst for cinema.

Box office collections were £633,758 on Monday and £474,055 on Tuesday, totalling £1.1 million ($1.6 million).

As many as 14 films opened on Monday, though it was the modern take of the fuzzy-tailed children’s classic that dominated. Sony’s family-oriented title “Peter Rabbit 2” opened across 334 sites to collect a strong £393,841 over Monday and Tuesday, according to figures released by Comscore.

Disney’s Oscar champion “Nomadland,” already available to Disney Plus subscribers in the region from April 30, bowed in second place with £173,085 from 259 locations.

Warner Bros.’ creature face-off epic “Godzilla vs Kong” collected £164,726 from 296 sites in third place, while Lionsgate’s horror franchise addition, “Spiral: From The Book Of Saw,” took £144,317 from 198 locations in fourth place.

Warner Bros released six of the top 15 titles.

RankFilm (Distributor)Single-day gross (May 17)Week 1 Peter Rabbit 2: The Runaway (Sony) £226,840 1 2 Nomadland (Disney) £96,567 1 3 Godzilla Vs. Kong (Warner Bros) £93,868 1 4 Spiral: From The Book Of Saw (Lionsgate) £73,184 1 5 The Unholy (Sony) £37,967 1

Gbp to Usd conversion rate: 1.42; figures provided by ComScore

Sony’s family sequel Peter Rabbit 2: The Runaway topped the UK box office on the first day that cinemas were allowed to reopen in the territory, with more than 400 cinemas reporting takings on Monday, May 17.

Will Gluck’s mix of live-action and CGI comedy, which sees Peter become bored of life in the...

There’s excitement in the air — and a whole lot of movies lined up — across the UK and France as cinemas are set to reopen in both markets this week after roughly seven months of darkened screens. Below we take a look at how the situation is shaping up in these majors.

In the UK, England/Scotland/Wales will be back up and running from Monday (May 17), while French cinemas resume operations on Wednesday (May 19).

One of the key new releases to hit the UK is Peter Rabbit 2: The Runaway, and the sequel should have the market hopping after the original did over $54M in 2018.

Capacity restrictions in England will be 50%, but that’s not providing much pause. Vue International boss Tim Richards tells Deadline he’s “comfortable with that level of occupancy restriction because, as an industry, we tend to operate at around 20% occupancy and with customers time-shifting...

Refresh for latest…: A significant week is ahead at the international box office as Universal’s F9 starts its engines in a handful of major markets including China, Russia and Korea — and as the UK and France will reopen cinemas after a roughly seven-month shutdown. In the meantime, Fast & Furious franchise alum Jason Statham’s Wrath Of Man was the main overseas Hollywood title this session, lifting its offshore cume to $41.4M for $56M global. After opening on a non-traditional Monday in China last week, the Miramax title from director Guy Ritchie rolled up an $18.5M take there through Sunday, landing in 3rd place for the Fss weekend.

Wrath Of Man is carrying an 8.6 on Maoyan with a lower 7 from critics at Douban. Statham is a big draw in the Middle Kingdom — his last two pics there (Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs & Shaw and The Meg), grossed $201M and $153M,...

Apple TV has debuted the first trailer for the limited series ‘Lisey’s Story, based on the best-selling novel, and adapted and written by author Stephen King.

The eight-episode Apple Original limited series is from creator and executive producer Stephen King, executive producer J.J. Abrams, director and executive producer Pablo Larraín and stars and is executive produced by Academy Award-winner Julianne Moore. It will make its global debut this summer on Apple TV+.

Based on the best-selling novel by Stephen King, and adapted by the author himself, ‘Lisey’s Story’ is a deeply personal thriller that follows Lisey Landon (played by Moore) two years after the death of her husband, famous novelist Scott Landon (played by Clive Owen). A series of unsettling events causes Lisey to face memories of her marriage to Scott that she has deliberately blocked out of her mind. Joan Allen, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Dane DeHaan and Ron Cephas Jones...

Amazon Prime Video has debuted a new trailer for anthology series ‘Solos’ featuring an all-star cast.

Created by David Weil, the series stars Anthony Mackie, Constance Wu, Helen Mirren, Uzo Aduba, Nicole Beharie, Morgan Freeman, Anne Hathaway.

The series is focused on seven unique character-driven stories. Each character will set off on a thrilling adventure in an uncertain future and they’ll come to reckon that even during our most isolated moments, we are all connected through the human experience.

Also in trailers – Jeffrey Dean Morgan stars in trailer for ‘The Unholy’

The series premieres May 21, 2021 in the US and select territories and June 25, 2021 worldwide on Prime Video.

The post Anthony Mackie, Constance Wu & Morgan Freeman star in trailer for ‘Solos’ appeared first on HeyUGuys.

Top international market for Wrath Of Man is Russia/Cis, with confirmed $10.2m after three weekends of play.

Jason Statham actioner ‘Wrath Of Man’ strong in Russia, Australia

Updated: With Guy Ritchie’s Wrath Of Man now playing in nine international territories, Miramax has started to release figures for the title: $17.5m so far. The Jason Statham actioner gtossed $4.4m internationally over the weekend and also opened in North America at the weekend via United Artists Releasing, topping the box office with $8.1m, taking the global tally to $25.8m including $794,000 in previews in China, where the film opened wide on...

Top international market for Wrath Of Man is Russia/Cis, with an estimated $10m after three weekends of play.

Jason Statham actioner ‘Wrath Of Man’ strong in Russia, Australia

With Guy Ritchie’s Wrath Of Man now playing in nine international territories, Miramax has started to release figures for the title: $17.6m so far. The Jason Statham actioner also opened in North America at the weekend via United Artists Releasing, topping the box office with an estimated $8.1m, taking the global tally to $25.7m.

Top international market for Wrath Of Man is Russia/Cis, with an estimated $10m. Russia was...

Update: Yet another international box office frame was led by Chinese movies in their home market as local May Day holdovers continued play coming off a record holiday session. While a handful of studio titles are doing business in other pockets of the world, we are in something of a holding pattern until majors like the UK and France begin opening in the coming weeks, and as Universal’s F9 is expected to rev up overseas turnstiles for Hollywood starting on May 19.

Notably this session in China, Zhang Yimou’s Cliff Walkers climbed ahead of May Day holiday winner My Love. The former now has an estimated cume of $118.2M versus the poorly-reviewed romantic drama’s $114M.

At the same time, Miramax has finally begun sharing numbers on the Guy Ritchie-directed Wrath Of Man which, as we have previously noted, has been performing strongly in Russia since late April.

So far, we know that the post-pandemic theatrical audiences likes testosterone action movies and animated family films. This weekend, Guy Ritchie’s “Wrath of Man” became the latest R-rated action-based film to see credible results with $8.1 million against little in the way of competition. Only in a year like this one would it reach theaters in early May, traditionally the starting gun for summer-movie blockbusters.

While that’s not a breakout hit, what’s encouraging is it surpassed the $6.8 million that “Nobody” grossed six weeks ago. That genre peer grossed about $25 million to date, and now thrives on Premium VOD. The gross improvement testifies to the increase in open theaters and shows that films with core appeal can reach their audience. In turn, this encourages distributors that it’s safe to return. Regal added around 200 more sites this weekend, with many more planned for May 28 when “A Quiet Place Part II” debuts.

Sunday Am Update: By the calendar’s measure of recent box office years, it is the first weekend of summer. But because movie theaters are still closed in most of Europe and Brazil because of the pandemic, Disney decided to move Marvel’s Black Widow to July 9.

The good news is that we will finally have a semblance of a summer box office season, unlike last year, and United Artists Releasing is filling the vacancy left by Disney this weekend with the Miramax/MGM production of Guy Ritchie’s R-rated Jason Statham action title, Wrath of Man, which had a solid Friday at the B.O. during the pandemic with $3M (including $500K Thursday previews), then continued on to make the same amount of cash yesterday, and will see a 3-day opening of $8M at 2,875 theaters.

That’s a bit more than what Universal’s gritty R-rated Bob Odenkirk shoot-...

Three of Europe’s major film markets — France, Italy and the U.K. — are reopening doors for theatrical releases after an erratic year of high hopes and false starts. But the pipeline of new movies will enter a landscape forever altered by the pandemic.

If you ask Tim Richards, CEO of European cinema giant Vue, about the greatest sea change in exhibition over the last 12 months, he points to the theatrical release window. Variety can reveal that the company, which has already begun re-opening cinemas in Denmark and Lithuania, is getting ready to deploy the 45-day release window trialled by Cineworld Group in a deal with Warner Bros.

“We have a new model that we’re very close to signing up to with the studios, and I think it’s a very exciting model, based around a 45-day window. It’s for the U.K. and most likely most markets in Europe,...

Sony Pictures Releasing UK has debuted a new trailer for the horror film ‘The Unholy’ starring Jeffrey Dean Morgan.

Gerry Fenn (Jeffrey Dean Morgan), a disgraced journalist turned stringer-for-hire, of supernatural tabloid fodder, is sent to investigate a strange occurrence in a small farming community. A born sceptic, Fenn quickly dismisses the incident as just another benign story. But, before he writes it off as a hoax; Fenn witnesses a deaf, teenaged girl, Alice (Cricket Brown), whispering next to a petrified oak tree in the middle of a field. What follows, to his disbelief, is a series of inexplicable events that has the locals convinced Alice can perform miracles.

When word spreads that Alice’s power to heal is attributed to the Virgin Mary, it fans the flames of curiosity from those near and far to witness the miraculous occur firsthand. As the hopeful masses descend upon this off-the-beaten-path town,...

Man In Love becomes Taiwan’s sixth highest-grossing local language film of all time via Sony.

‘Mortal Kombat’ drops in fourth international session

Updated: A lack of major new openings for New Line/Warner Bros’ Mortal Kombat saw the franchise reboot slide to a confirmed $3m weekend takings in international markets for its fourth session, a fall of 54%. International total is $32.8m.

Top international territory remained Australia, with estimated takings of $1.3m. Next best markets Russia and Spain were far behind.

In North America, the videogame spin-off was toppled from the top of the box office by Japanese anime Demon Slayer: Mugen Train,...

In a clash of the actioners, Guy Ritchie’s Wrath of Man narrowly defeated Mortal Kombat at the box office last weekend, with the two titles driving almost half of all ticket sales.

Distributed by Studiocanal, Ritchie’s latest Jason Statham-starrer opened on $1.7 million from 389 screens, an average of $4,444. With previews, it sits on $1.8 million.

Co-written by Ritchie with Ivan Atkinson and Marn Davies, the film is based on the 2004 French feature Cash Truck by Nicolas Boukhrief.

Statham plays H, hired by a cash truck company. During one job, the truck gets held up at gunpoint and he single-handedly deals with the robbers. Secretly, H is hunting for the people who murdered his son during a similar robbery, and plans to use his new position to set traps for every would-be robber in the city until he finds his son’s killers.

The film is yet to be released in the US and UK,...

Update: After a couple of relatively slow sessions, China turned up the heat again this weekend as the five-day May Day/Labor Day holiday dawned. At least 10 new local titles released across Friday and Saturday with romance drama My Love in the lead through Sunday at an estimated Rmb 424M ($65M). It was followed by Zhang Yimou’s better-reviewed Cliff Walkers with Rmb 260M ($40M) and Leste Chen’s crime thriller Home Sweet Home Rmb 126M ($19.5M). Those three films, plus others in the pack of new offerings from the Middle Kingdom, were the top grossers globally this session. Overall, IMAX had a solid China weekend with Cliff Walkers at $2.3M, and gaining $1M from Home Sweet Home.

The China May Day holiday this year sits in stark contrast to 2019 when Avengers: Endgame was in its second frame and maintained a massive lead over everything else in its wake. Indeed,...