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MGM Delays 'Windtalkers'
Saturday, September 29, 2001 8:59 PM EDT
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Inc. decided Friday to delay releasing its big-budget World War II film, "Windtalkers" until next summer to avoid the box office uncertainty that has beset Hollywood since the September 11th attacks on America.
"There's so much uncertainty right now and we don't want to spend a lot of money on promoting the film," the film's producer, Terence Chang, told Reuters.
The movie, set for release on November 9th, was expected to be a major entry for the Thanksgiving holiday season. It has now been pushed to June 14, 2002, MGM said in a news release.
MGM did not want to risk a bad showing at the box office by releasing it at a time when ticket sales are down due to the somber national mood in the wake of the September 11th attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, Chang said.
"Windtalkers", based on a true story, was directed by action specialist John Woo and stars Nicholas Cage. It tells a tale of Native Americans who helped to thwart Japanese code breakers during World War II by transmitting war plans in the Navajo language.
"We feel certain this great film will be enjoyed by the broadest possible audience during the strong summer play period," Robert Levin, president of worldwide theatrical marketing and distribution, said in the MGM statement.
One studio source told Reuters that with only six weeks until the movie's debut, MGM would be spending millions of dollars on advertising and promotion when, possibly, TV coverage of a U.S. retaliatory strike could nullify the ads and take audiences away from theaters.
"It seemed to us to be not worth the risk because of the uncertainty," said the source who asked to remain anonymous.
Unlike major media companies with TV networks, cable TV operators, billboard companies, and theme parks, MGM does not have a wide variety of operations, and is highly dependent on box office receipts and video sales for its profits.
So, if an expensive film like "Windtalkers" were to flop, it would do more damage to the bottom line than a single movie failure would do at a company like The Walt Disney Co. or AOL Time Warner Inc.
Several movies have already been delayed by other studios - Arnold Schwarzenegger's "Collateral Damage" and Tim Allen comedy "Big Trouble" to name two - due to content that seemed insensitive to the national mood. But Chang said the delay of "Windtalkers" had nothing to do with the subject matter.
"It's more of a feeling that it's not a good time for any movie," he said, "It's a very patriotic film. It's a war film and terrible things happen during war, and we don't want to shy away from that."
The studio source said the film had been playing very well in front of test audiences, and MGM did not want to jeopardize what it felt was a good film in what might be a down market.
Chang was the producer of John Woo's "Face/Off" (1997) and since then has executive produced films such as "Anna and the King" (1999) and "Mission: Impossible 2" (2000).
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