Fresh off the Academy Awards triumph of the first foreign language Best Picture winner – the lush and labyrinthine Parasite – there was a sense for cinephiles that now nearly anything was possible. But the emergence of the COVID-19 pandemic on American soil, complete with new concepts such as “shelter in place” and “physical distance,” put America’s hot Hollywood product on deep freeze with promising animated movies, blockbuster action films and low-key dramas all put on ice until vacated movie houses could once again be inhabitable.
As we stand on the threshold of Memorial Day weekend, usually time for a clarion call of summer box office glory, we look back at the movies that could have been big theatrical hits (and instead debuted at home) and the anticipated films slated on the horizon. Fast-forward past quarantined spring, and we have witnessed a number of pivots:
- Universal Pictures delighted audiences but angered movie distributors by making February’s hit thriller The Invisible Man, politically prickly and long-shelved The Hunt and frothy art house fare Emma available immediately at home on digital video-on-demand (VOD) platforms, soon followed by the world premiere of Trolls: World Tour on VOD, breaking a time-honored tradition of giving theaters first rights to first-run pictures
- Warner Bros. also sent well-regarded Ben Affleck basketball drama The Way Back to VOD after a brief March 6 weekend run in theatres and debuted animated family film Scoob (as in Scooby-Doo) on iTunes and Amazon Prime last week
- Disney pushed CGI action fable Onward homeward as well, with a quick move to digital VOD platforms after its original March 6 debut in theaters; by April 3, it was available on Disney+
- Despite debuting in UK theatres, Dave Bautista’s soldier-turned-CIA agent-turned-babysitter action comedy My Spy went straight to Amazon Prime here in The States
- Studios immediately shuffled planned release dates of big films ranging from Disney/Marvel’s Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson’s first stand-alone film in the franchise) to Paramount’s anticipated sequel Maverick: Top Gun into new dates across late summer and fall as prestige pictures such as Steven Spielberg’s West Side Story have maintained original release dates (December 18 for the tragic tuner)
- Other promising fare pushed to 2021 are films such as the Ghostbusters reboot and suspense thriller A Quiet Place 2
- While indie theatres display agility to keep audiences entertained with crafty set-ups like Plaza Atlanta’s makeshift drive-ins, major movie theatre chains face uncertainty including financially troubled AMC, rumored to be an acquisition target by Amazon
Now for the next move!
Will audiences return to movie theatres in their current form? Will we really see Yankee Stadium as a giant drive-in? Will multiplexes open with social distanced tentpole movies in multiple auditoriums? Imagine Disney’s live-action Mulan across six screens and Christopher Nolan’s espionage thriller Tenet starring John David Washington (Warner Bros.) across six more. Those big pictures are slated for July. Warner Bros. is also preserving Wonder Woman 1984 for the big screen in August and willing to push it to late fall if necessary to lasso some boffo box office when maximum crowds have re-congregated. Indie fans are hoping for Wes Anderson’s quirky, star-studded The French Dispatch to get its cinematic due on some specialty screens as well.
Meanwhile the straight-to-home line-up for the month ahead includes crime dramedy The Lovebirds starring Kumail Nanjiani and Issa Rae, streaming May 22 on Netflix. We know we’re getting some small screen action with Spike Lee’s Vietnam drama Da 5 Bloods coming to Netflix June 12. That day Disney young adult adventure Artemis Fowl is debuting on Disney+ and Universal’s Judd Apatow helmed Pete Davidson dramedy The King of Staten Island bows on streaming sites. While Broadway’s biggest music theatre maestro waits for his delayed In the Heights to hit theatres in summer 2021 instead of this year, Lin-Manuel Miranda’s filmed version of megamusical Hamilton will rap its revolutionary way to the room where it happens in your house this year instead of next on Disney+ July 3, 2020.
Other familiar fare ranging from Bill & Ted Face the Music to The Spongebob Movie is expected ahead in movie theatres. It could be a few months before the prestige pictures find their usual place in the fall line-up.
It’s a mixed-up movie year for sure when Sonic the Hedgehog is one of the few theatrical releases to have even graced the silver screen, but hopefully soon everything will fall into its right place.