Disney Announces 2009 Release Schedule
Last weekParamountandFoxannounced major post-writers strike schedule shuffles. I speculated that because of ‘the rule of threes’, that one more studio would announce a reshuffled calendar by Friday. And here we are on Wednesday, with a bunch of new dates from Disney. Let’s take a look at the new Disney schedule:
The big screen adaptation of the popular video gamePrince of Persia: The Sands of Time, has been moved forward from mid-June to July 10th 2009. Michael Bay’sTransformers 2hits theaters two weeks earlier on June 26th. Disney believes they will make more at the box office with the head start.
The sci-fi adventure comedy sequel/remakeRace to Witch Mountainstarring The Rock will hit theaters on March 13th 2009, up against Peter Jackson’s adaptation ofThe Lovely Bones.
Tim Burton’sAlice in Wonderland 3-Dwill hit theaters a week later on March 19th 2010.
The Jonathan Mostow Sci-fi action adaptationThe Surrogatesstarring Bruce Willis has been given a holiday release: November 20th 2009. The film with counter DreamWorks Animation’sHow to Train Your Dragon. Set in a future world where humans live in isolation and interact through surrogate robot avatars, a cop (Willis) is forced to leave his home for the first time in years to investigate a murder mystery.
TheWild Hogssequel titledOld Dogsstarring John Travolta, Robin Williams and Seth Green, has been pushed back from a 2008 TBA to April 10th 2009. The original film was released in March, so it’s likely that Disney didn’t want to deviate from the marketing formula.Dogswill go up against Paramount’s Renée Zellweger horror/thrillerCase 39.
The Hannah Montana Moviewill now counter Fox’s comic book prequelX-Men Origins: Wolverineon May 1st 2009. This means that Disney’s animated 3D movie G-Force had to be moved to July 24th. Not a great date considering that it will now go head to head with New Line’s animatedPlanet 51and The Weinstein Co’s horror remakePiranha 3D.
The big screen adaptation ofConfessions of a Shopaholicstarring Isla Fisher has been bumped from it’s October 9th 2008 date to a prime 2009 Valentine’s Day release. In effect, the Sandra Bullock/Ryan Reynolds romantic comedyThe Proposalwill now get a September 25th release.
source:Variety
