Leonard Part 6 came out in December 1987 (I know this, sadly, b/c I actually did see it in theaters at age 9). Double-checked it online, too. It was a Christmas season wide release.
Some of my favorite films to debut in theaters in January: Tremors, Matinee, Alive, Haywire.
This is primarily a NYC, Chicago, LA problem. For a lot of America, January is a month of Christmas season holdovers and award season expansions. It's when things like American Sniper go wide after their tiny awards qualifying releases.
I don't know if it will be a hit or not, but A Man Called Otto has box office and maybe some awards hope and is essentially a new release for much of the country.
1. When did the NFL become an all encompassing juggernaut?
2. When did Awards season become something that was set aside? When the Oscars were just handing awards to big films, I don't think any special consideration was made.
It's funny you mentioned Cabin Boy, because the first time I thought about this phenomenon was an early 1995 interview where David Letterman asked how award season was treating it, and Chris Elliott answered that "Mother Oscar often forgets her children of January."
I think the release decisions influenced by awards season are partly to blame for January woes and lower overall box office, especially on a regional basis. Working in a movie theatres in Wichita, Kansas from 1997-2003, January tended to be a time when movies that had done well at festivals and in award competitions from the previous year would expand enough to make it to the midwest and plains states. Some of those art house titles would stretch back to Cannes. They had been in the culture for a long time, played major markets and were not necessarily being marketed the way a normal new release would be. Then there are people who would wait for the Academy Awards nominations or even the results to determine where to spend their dollars. That created a wait and see period that was not helped by releases like Eddie Murphy's Metro or comedies like Beverly Hills Ninja.
Consider me in the group of people who's spending January catching up on December releases that I didn't get to in December or didn't open here until January. As such, the dumping ground reputation of January doesn't have the imprint in my mind beyond the abstract understanding that a movie with an official in January is one they aren't making an awards push for.
Jan 12, 2023·edited Jan 12, 2023Liked by Scott Tobias
A revival Shoot the Moon would be amazing (though, of course, highly improbable). It's as honest a relationship movie to come out of Hollywood in the 80s, and it features astonishing turns from Finney and especially Keaton, one of the greatest actors of that era. Go see Shoot the Moon!
Has there ever been a more closed circle than the January 1989 release of The January Man- a misbegotten combination of Kevin Kline, Alan Rickman, Mary Elizabeth Mastriantonio, and a terrible John Patrick Shanley script? It is the platonic ideal of the January dump movie.
I think MEGAN and the like are brilliant uses of January. I mainly love the month (apart from it being my birthday month) because it gives us time to catch up on the awards bait. But the smarties who deliver something like a solid killer doll movie in the middle of all of that makes a lot of sense. (See also SCANNERS.)
Leonard Part 6 came out in December 1987 (I know this, sadly, b/c I actually did see it in theaters at age 9). Double-checked it online, too. It was a Christmas season wide release.
Some of my favorite films to debut in theaters in January: Tremors, Matinee, Alive, Haywire.
Darn. I got some bad information. Going to find another example.
This is primarily a NYC, Chicago, LA problem. For a lot of America, January is a month of Christmas season holdovers and award season expansions. It's when things like American Sniper go wide after their tiny awards qualifying releases.
I don't know if it will be a hit or not, but A Man Called Otto has box office and maybe some awards hope and is essentially a new release for much of the country.
Are there any movies that have opened in January according to Academy rules and gone on to win or be nominated for an Oscar?
Two final thoughts.
1. When did the NFL become an all encompassing juggernaut?
2. When did Awards season become something that was set aside? When the Oscars were just handing awards to big films, I don't think any special consideration was made.
It's funny you mentioned Cabin Boy, because the first time I thought about this phenomenon was an early 1995 interview where David Letterman asked how award season was treating it, and Chris Elliott answered that "Mother Oscar often forgets her children of January."
I think the release decisions influenced by awards season are partly to blame for January woes and lower overall box office, especially on a regional basis. Working in a movie theatres in Wichita, Kansas from 1997-2003, January tended to be a time when movies that had done well at festivals and in award competitions from the previous year would expand enough to make it to the midwest and plains states. Some of those art house titles would stretch back to Cannes. They had been in the culture for a long time, played major markets and were not necessarily being marketed the way a normal new release would be. Then there are people who would wait for the Academy Awards nominations or even the results to determine where to spend their dollars. That created a wait and see period that was not helped by releases like Eddie Murphy's Metro or comedies like Beverly Hills Ninja.
I appreciate this Creech representation.
Consider me in the group of people who's spending January catching up on December releases that I didn't get to in December or didn't open here until January. As such, the dumping ground reputation of January doesn't have the imprint in my mind beyond the abstract understanding that a movie with an official in January is one they aren't making an awards push for.
That was, of course, no accident.
A revival Shoot the Moon would be amazing (though, of course, highly improbable). It's as honest a relationship movie to come out of Hollywood in the 80s, and it features astonishing turns from Finney and especially Keaton, one of the greatest actors of that era. Go see Shoot the Moon!
Has there ever been a more closed circle than the January 1989 release of The January Man- a misbegotten combination of Kevin Kline, Alan Rickman, Mary Elizabeth Mastriantonio, and a terrible John Patrick Shanley script? It is the platonic ideal of the January dump movie.
I think MEGAN and the like are brilliant uses of January. I mainly love the month (apart from it being my birthday month) because it gives us time to catch up on the awards bait. But the smarties who deliver something like a solid killer doll movie in the middle of all of that makes a lot of sense. (See also SCANNERS.)