Movies

‘Wolf Man’ Movie from Universal and Director Leigh Whannell Moves into 2025

Published

1 month ago

March 29, 2024

Filming kicked off just a couple weeks ago on The Invisible Man director Leigh Whannell’s Wolf Man for Universal and Blumhouse, which had been ambitiously dated for release on October 25, 2024. As it turns out, however, a Halloween 2024 release was a bit too ambitious.

THR reports that Wolf Man will howl its way into theaters on January 17, 2025.

Christopher Abbott (Poor Things) has been cast in the titular role.

Wolf Man stars Christopher Abbott as a man whose family is being terrorized by a lethal predator.

Julia Garner (The Royal Hotel) will also star.

Writers include Whannell & Corbett Tuck as well as Lauren Schuker Blum & Rebecca Angelo.

Jason Blum is producing the film. Ryan Gosling, Ken Kao, Bea Sequeira, Mel Turner and Whannell are executive producers. Wolf Man is a Blumhouse and Motel Movies production.

The project will mark Whannell’s second monster movie and fourth directing collaboration with Blumhouse Productions (The Invisible Man, Upgrade, Insidious: Chapter 3).

In the wake of the failed Dark Universe, Leigh Whannell’s The Invisible Man has been the only real success story for the Universal Monsters brand, which has been struggling with recent box office flops including the comedic Renfield and period horror movie The Last Voyage of the Demeter. Giving him the keys to the castle once more seems like a wise idea, to say the least.

Movies

‘Abigail’ Just Outgrossed Fellow Universal Monsters Vampire Movies ‘Renfield’ and ‘Demeter’

Published

3 mins ago

April 30, 2024

John Squires

Now in its second week of release, the Radio Silence-directed Abigail is the third Universal Monsters vampire movie released in the last year, coming along in the wake of period piece The Last Voyage of the Demeter and horror-comedy Renfield. All three films have struggled at the box office, but Abigail at least has some good news to celebrate this week.

Renfield came along first in April 2023, ending its run with $26.4 million, while Last Voyage of the Demeter ended its own run with a mere $21.7 million. The vampire ballerina movie Abigail has already outgrossed both films, hitting $28.5 million at the worldwide box office this week.

The bad news is that Abigail‘s reported production budget was $28 million, so it seems unlikely to make a profit at the box office when you factor in the marketing spend and everything else on top of that figure. And that’s especially a bummer because Abigail is such a crowd-pleasing good time, with most horror fans agreeing that it’s one of this year’s best movies thus far.

The Universal Monsters brand has been struggling in the wake of Leigh Whannell’s hit The Invisible Man back in 2020, with these smaller spinoff movies failing to make their mark at the box office. Maybe it was never a good idea to release three low-key Dracula movies within the span of a single year, or maybe audiences just aren’t into vampires in general right now.

Whatever the case may be, Universal was smart to re-team with Whannell for a reimagining of the Wolf Man, which is howling its way into theaters in 2025. There’s a good chance that movie will blow the box office totals of Demeter, Renfield and Abigail out of the water, especially since it’s been a while since a Hollywood werewolf movie roared its way onto the big screen.

In the meantime, we expect Abigail will be coming home soon. Stay tuned for a date.

In Abigail, “After a group of would-be criminals kidnap the 12-year-old ballerina daughter of a powerful underworld figure, all they have to do to collect a $50 million ransom is watch the girl overnight. In an isolated mansion, the captors start to dwindle, one by one, and they discover, to their mounting horror, that they’re locked inside with no normal little girl.”