After last weekend’s UK-Ireland box office results proved rather muted – no film reached the £1m mark for the first time since December 2020 – exhibitors and distributors will be anticipating a boost from this Saturday’s National Cinema Day (September 3), in which 560 venues across the UK will be offering tickets at just £3, for all screenings.
This weekend’s widest release comes from Entertainment Film Distributors’ Three Thousand Years Of Longing, playing in 545 cinemas. The Cannes 2022 premiere unites Tilda Swinton and Idris Elba and is George Miller’s first feature since 2015’s Mad Max: Fury Road. Elba play a Djinn who strikes up a deep bond with a woman named Alithea, who is a studier of stories, after she unleashes him from his bottle in Istanbul. Elba will also be on screens for a second session with Universal’s Beast, directed by Baltasar Kormakur, that took £600,259 last weekend from 601 locations at a £999 average.
Signature Entertainment is putting Fall into 438 sites – a record wide release for a non-animation title for the company. Directed by Scott Mann, Fall is a thriller about two women – played by Grace Caroline Currey and Virginia Gardner – who get stuck up an abandoned 2,000 ft-tall radio tower. Jeffrey Dean Morgan also stars.
Universal’s The Forgiven is out in 425 locations. Set in Morocco’s High Atlas mountains, the Toronto premiere tracks the fallout from a random accident on the lives of locals and Western tourists. Jessica Chastain, Ralph Fiennes and Matt Smith star, with John Michael McDonagh directing. Univeresal is also re-releasing Steven Spielberg ‘s E.T., at 533 sites, to mark the film’s 40th anniversary.
Another 40th annivrsary re-release is Star Trek II: The Wrath Of Khan. Nicholas Meyer’s sci-fi epic will play at 428 locations for Paramount (although not be playing daily in every site across the week).
Dublin-based Wildcard Distribution has the debut feature of Irish dance superstar Michael Flatley in 106 sites. Blackbird is a spy thriller, which also stars the lord of the dance Flatley. A retired secret agent discovers a dark secret about one of the guests at his Barbados nightclub.
Parkland’s It Snows In Benidorm plays at 95 locations. The Isabel Coixet-directed title stars Timothy Spall and Sarita Choudhury, and is produced by Agustín Almodóvar, Pedro Almodóvar and Esther García. Peter (Spall) gets laid off from his Manchester bank, travels to Benidorm to see his brother for the first time in years, and discovers his brother is not quite who he thought he was.
Doc specialist Dogwoof is releasing Sundance premiere The Territory at 18 sites. Alex Pritz directs this exploration of the plight of indigenous farmers in the Brazilian rainforest. Contemporary Brazil is also the subject of ICA Cinema’s Dry Ground Burning. It is directed by Adirley Queirós and Joana Pimenta and sees non-professional actors play versions of themselves, focusing on an all-female gang in the Sol Nascente favela.
Writer and filmmaker Iain Sinclair traces the route of his great-grandfather’s expedition to the Amazon in documentary The Gold Machine, directed by Grant Gee, that is out at eight locations for Darmouth Films, ahead of its release on Mubi.
Peccadillo Pictures is releasing Bretten Hannam’s Toronto premiere Wildhood, about two brothers on a journey of self-discovery, at 10 locations.
606 Distribution is playing Brett Harvey’s Long Way Back, about an estranged father reconnecting with his daughter in tragic circumstances.
Key holdovers include Andre Rieu’s 2022 Maastricht Summer Concert: Happy Days Are Here Again (Piece Of Magic); Beast (Universal); DC League Of Super-Pets (Warner Bros); Bullet Train (Sony) and Nope (Universal).
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