Blumhouse’s new take on Fantasy Island was released into theaters this past weekend and capitalized on the Valentine’s weekend date night crowd, pulling in $21.6 million worldwide thus far on a $7 million production budget. In other words, Fantasy Island is yet another low-budget horror film that’ll be profitable for Blumhouse, even if it’s not a massive hit.
Fantasy Island was released into theaters with a “PG-13” rating, but director Jeff Wadlow has revealed in a chat with Cinema Blend that he originally set out to make a rated “R” movie.
That said, it doesn’t sound like all that much was ultimately cut from the film.
“Upfront I said, ‘Jason Blum, the movie has to be rated R.’ And it’s not,” Wadlow explained. “That’s great example of having to change and kind of go with the flow. I felt that it had to be R, and I thought I shot an R movie, but then when we showed it to an audience we were like, ‘Well, it’s not really that R.’ And just a couple of trims and it was a PG-13.”
He continued, “There’ll be a slightly edgier cut that will be available later on. But the movie works, it’s much more about character and emotion, and it doesn’t matter if a movie’s PG-13 or R – those things come through when you have great actors like we have in our film.”
[Review] Painfully Dull Fantasy Island Is an Uninspired Getaway Devoid of Scares
