In the wake of the opening weekend of “Halloween Ends” coming in under expectations, the finger is being pointed at the film’s day-and-date release on Peacock as being partly to blame.
“Freaky” filmmaker Christopher Landon certainly thinks so, the helmer took to Twitter recently to blast studios adopting the day-and-date release strategy for films and citing ‘Ends’ as an example:
“I feel another rant coming on: Today it’s the Day & Date release strategy for Halloween Ends. Stop doing this. Please. It doesn’t work… Studios: stop gambling with filmmakers and their movies to try and prop up your fledgling streaming services.”
Landon says the same thing happened to his Vince Vaughn-led horror comedy “Freaky” in late 2020. The well-received film, released right in the midst of the pandemic, made only $9 million dollars at the domestic box office and so was quickly made available to stream just three weeks after its release in theatres. Landon is still unhappy about that:
“This happened to me on Freaky, and it destroyed us. We worked SO HARD to make a fun movie. Blood, sweat and tears. Months away from our families. And for what? They love to use the term: ‘two bites of the apple,’ but that’s just another way of saying ‘we’re gonna use your movie as a Guinea pig’ for our streaming service. I begged the studio not to do this. Either circle the wagons and protect it for theatrical or just go all in on streaming. Don’t split hairs.”
He closes out his posting by saying studios should “honor the sanctity of the theatrical experience”. Reaction to the post has been divided, and the issue of Landon’s film hitting right in the middle of the pandemic – before the vaccines were in wide distribution and when plenty of cinemas were closed – has understandably come up in multiple responses.
Despite the soft opening for “Halloween Ends,” also driven in part by the divisive reviews, the film still managed to have the biggest box-office opening in months. It is currently playing in cinemas and is available on Peacock Premium now.
Source: Twitter
