Right on the heels of Universal moving Fast & Furious 7 up a week from April 10th, 2015, to April 3rd, Focus Features has announced some schedule changes of its own for 2015. Now, horror threequel Insidious: Chapter 3 will open not on April 3rd next year but May 29th. Furthermore, sci-fi drama Selfless has moved from February 27th to April 17th, and Oscar winner Kevin Macdonald’s treasure hunt drama Black Sea has been set for January 23rd.
Now, let’s look at those one at a time.
We don’t know much about Insidious: Chapter 3 other than that it will star The Grey actor Dermot Mulroney and A.N.T. Farm actress Stefanie Scott. Leigh Whannell is both directing and scripting this installment, and he is also expected to reprise his role as Specs. Also returning from previous installments will be Angus Sampson as Tucker and Lin Shaye as Elise Rainier. Unfortunately, Insidious and Insidious: Chapter 2 stars Rose Byrne and Patrick Wilson are done with the franchise.
Production was previously expected to start later this week on the horror flick, but the release date change may mean that the start date has been delayed. However, the change could also be a lightning-fast response to Universal slotting Fast & Furious 7 for April 3rd (that seems less likely). Also set to open on April 3rd is Nicholas Sparks adaptation The Longest Ride, so that weekend will be plenty crowded even without Insidious: Chapter 3. Now that the date has been changed, the threequel will open against Paramount’s animated Monster Trucks, which is hardly vying for Insidious‘s target audience.
Next, Selfless, from Immortals director Tarsem Singh, will star Ryan Reynolds and Michelle Dockery. Its logline reads as follows:
An extremely wealthy, elderly man dying from cancer undergoes a radical medical procedure that transfers his consciousness to the body of a healthy young man but everything may not be as good as it seems when he starts to uncover the mystery of the body’s origins and the secret organization that will kill to keep its secrets.
As for why Selfless got moved, it could have been the competition or it could have been more issues with the movie (this isn’t Selfless‘s first delay). If it had opened February 27th (two weeks after Fifty Shades of Grey), it would have been in direct competition with action-thriller Agent 47, comedy sequel The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel 2 and Will Smith’s crime caper Focus. Now, it’s opening against documentary Monkey Kingdom and Paul Blart: Mall Cop 2.
Finally, the announcement about Black Sea wasn’t a switcheroo – this is the first time the pic has been scheduled. The adventure stars Jude Law as “a rogue captain who goes on a hunt for sunken treasure, but as greed [and] desperation begins to take hold of his misfit crew, tensions cause the men to fight for their survival within their claustrophobic vessel.” Jodie Whittaker, Karl Davies, Scoot McNairy, Ben Mendelsohn, Konstantin Khabenskiy, Daniel Ryan and Michael Smiley co-star. Currently, its only competition is Blumhouse thriller The Boy Next Door, with Jennifer Lopez.
