News: This Week's Releases

Labor Day weekend marks the end of the summer movie season and introduces us to Fall 2009’s lineup. This week has the premiere of three wide releases, as well as one limited release. Leading us off is Gamer, a futuristic thriller starring Gerard Butler. Opening on 2,502 screens, it is looking to pump into audiences who are still not tired of testosterone-soaked action films, despite just sitting through three whole months of them. Playing to a completely different demographic is All About Steve, starring Sandra Bullock and Bradley Cooper. It opens on 2,251 screens. Sandra Bullock, coming off one of her career’s biggest hits with The Proposal, is hoping to continue the success started by that film with this more bombastic and noticeably quirkier one. Whether it lives up to The Proposal has yet to be seen. Finally, we have Extract, a comedy looking to snag audiences in the mood for something a little different and less mainstream. It stars Jason Bateman and Kristen Wiig and is premiering on 1,611 screens. The problem I would suspect is that most audiences are not looking for something different and will be more likely to flock to star-studded films like Gamer and All About Steve this weekend. These three films will go head-to-head at the box-office, each hoping to win the top spot and become the first success of the fall season. My reviews of them will appear by Friday of next week. This week’s lone limited release is the horror film Carriers, banking on its star Chris Pine’s recent success in Star Trek. It opens on 100 screens and with very little marketing push. That is strange, considering Pine became a full-fledged star over the summer and the online buzz for this film started in 2006. That being said, here is a fact that is even stranger: despite opening on 100 screens, it will not be shown in Los Angeles, the typical starting ground for limited releases. This could be a bad sign for the film’s quality…or possibly just a unique approach to releasing a film. Only time will tell if this film will live up to all of the chatter surrounding its release or if it will buckle under itself, and become a blemish on Chris Pine’s steadily-growing resume. My review of this film will arrive soon in the form of Late Reviews.