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Star Trek Pushed Back to May 2009!

by Alex Billington
February 13, 2008
Source: Variety

The end of the writers strike is bringing about quite a few changes in Hollywood, and the first major announcement to hit surrounds J.J. Abrams' upcoming Star Trek. The movie was originally supposed to open on December 25th this year, but Paramount has now moved it to May 8th, 2009. Variety claims that the move was made because Star Trek has "the potential to gross more in May than in December." While I completely agree with that statement, there have been some internal rumblings from the set regarding Abrams' desire to film more than what was in the script.

My thoughts on this release date change are initially quite positive. While it is unfortunate that we won't see Star Trek for another 5 months beyond the 10 we still had to wait, I think this will benefit the movie quite a bit. December 25th is a terrible release date for any movies that have a very big fan base and require essential opening day or midnight viewings. Warner Brothers would never open The Dark Knight on December 25th because all the fans would demand midnight shows and who would want to skip out on Christmas Eve on the 24th to go see a movie? (I would!) The same applies to people who will spend an entire day or more waiting (or camping) in line. The numbers would be vastly less if it was during a holiday week. Christmas Day is a good day to open other movies, but just not big blockbusters with established fan bases.

That said, I have heard from sources inside the studio and involved with the film that Abrams has complained about his desire to add more scenes and edits. Star Trek has been filming in Los Angeles since early January. The writers strike prevented Abrams from making any changes while filming and now that it has ended, it sounds like he wants his chance to go back and make these changes. When directors are working on movies, they usually adapt and make changes on the fly as they're filming because it's hard to see exactly how a film will come together until they're actually filming on set. With the writers strike in place, filmmakers had to stick exactly to the script that was finished before the strike and were not allowed to make changes.

How coincidental is it that the day after the writers strike ends this announcement is made. Seems a bit more than random coincidence to me! And to be honest, I'm all for this. I have plenty of confidence in J.J. Abrams and I'm certain he knows what he is doing - just look at Mission: Impossible III, that movie was great! Not to mention "Lost" or Cloverfield.

Star Trek is directed by J.J. Abrams (of "Lost" and Mission: Impossible III) and written by Alex Kurtzman and Roberto Orci (of The Island, Mission: Impossible III, Transformers). The film is the 11th movie in the Star Trek universe. Watch the first teaser trailer for Star Trek if you haven't seen it already.

Visit the 2008 Release Schedule and 2009 Release Schedule for updated calendars and to see if other movies had been delayed by the writers strike as well.

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