If you read the script for “Shutter Island,” by Laeta Kalogridis which starts out awesome and then…. well follows the book and then ends up being a little silly… you could easily tell that it was going to be a Marty Scorsese B-movie, or lesser work like, “Bringing Out The Dead.”
Still, some insisted on keeping the picture and it’s actors in their Oscar bubble predictions, to which we thought, “no friggin’ way.”
And it seems our posit was right. “Shutter Island” has now been bumped off its October 2nd release date and shuffled into the not-so-Oscar-worthy month of February. Ooof, no really, February 19, which means it’ll go head-to-head with ” From Paris with Love” which makes it feel like the special Olympics of box-office weekends. Guess Paramount isn’t having a great year and they can probably thank Michael Bay’s back end deal that probably sucked up all the profits made from “Transformers 2,” which has grossed an astonishing, $825 million worldwide so far this year.
Or it’s more likely that “Shutter Island” was simply just never an Oscar-quality film as many assumed and Paramount wants to focus on other Oscar contenders this fall (uhh, what films these are, we’re not sure…) and let the Leonardo Dicaprio-starring film kill at the box-office in February. After all, it’s all about filling holes in certain quarters these days and perhaps Q1 is empty over at Paramount.
But Nikki Finke says a source told her, ” ‘It tested in the high 80s/low 90s and Scorsese even brought it down to 2 hours.’ So what’s the problem? I hear that Paramount told the filmmakers it doesn’t have the financing in 2009 to spend the $50M to $60M necessary to market a big awards pic like this.”
Money is killing everyone these days, but we’re still willing to bet “Shutter Island” isn’t the Oscar pic everyone thought it was, regardless of $$$. After all, we did write a piece back in February, titled: Martin Scorsese’s ‘Shutter Island’ Not Quality Quite Oscar-Bait For 2009? [Deadline Hollywood]
Ouch.
I agree that it didn't really look like an Oscar movie from the get-go, anyway.
It's not really Oscar material…although one probably would have thought the same thing about Silence of the Lambs. But it seems pretty much a genre picture from everything I've seen.
I really didn't expect this to happen, despite not looking like Oscar potential, it was still one of the major movies of the fall season. Maybe not Harry Potter major, but still big. I will say after the Wolfman shift and now this, Jan/Feb for 2010 is looking pretty good for jan/Feb standards 😉
And btw, The Inception teaser is AWESOME!
Like i said, i called this one ages ago. You saw the inception teaser?
YES…it was truely great imo. Chris Nolan is now my favorite director working today!
I agree that this helps the Jan/Feb movie season. An improved dumping-ground film season could hurt the films that are campaigning for awards and expanding during January though?
This also doesn't help us avoid a potential Star Trek nomination. Please just ignore any campaigns for Star Trek if and when they do come around. Please.
i say burn down the oscars if Star Trek gets a nomination. It'll never happen, don't worry.
Well so far we have Daywalkers, The Book of Eli, Wolf Man, Shutter Island, and I heard Mel Gibson's Edge of Darkness has been pushed into Jan.
Feb is the new money-making month after the january lull/dumping ground. Doesn't mean they'll actually be good films, but it's the month where the studios hope to replicate big surprise wins like Taken and Paul Bart.
But those are a bit lightning in a bottle and hard to replicate. Even the studios were surprised at their success.
People were ready for something half-decent after the January lull i guess. Plus Blart likely connected with, wait for it… the HEARTLAND.
I remember being devastated after hearing Zodiac was pushed back to March 2 (closer to Feb. than I like), luckily it was still a good movie.
I guess one of the Wahlbergs wasn't available yet to dub DiCaprio.
I would rather Star Trek sweep the Oscars than Slumdog Millionaire.
I'm an extra in this movie. This will make it nearly 2 years from shooting to screen. I still hope it turns out decent, the source material is a lot of fun.