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Who Killed Nancy

Green Zone Bumped by Weakened Uni

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Did a combination of Universal's box-office losing streak, the huge critical success of The Hurt Locker plus NBC/Uni topper Jeff Zucker coming out strongly in favor of "easy-to-digest concepts and wish fulfillment" lead to the decision to bump Paul Greengrass's Green Zone into an early 2010 release?

Matt Damon and Paul Greengrass during shooting of their Iraq War thriller

Variety's Marc Graser is reporting that Green Zone, which was never given a firm '09 release date but had been expected to compete as a fall/holiday awards season contender, will not open in '09 but rather on March 12, 2010.

This is a personal heartbreaker, as (a) I'm a huge Greengrass fan, (b) I have a heroin-habit craving for any Iraq War movie, and (c) I had a particularly keen interest in this futile-search-for-WMDs thriller. Greengrass swore to L.A. Times reporter John Horn last January that Green Zone "is not a movie about Iraq [but] a strong, contemporary thriller that is set in Iraq. Thrillers thrive on extremity, and there is no more extreme environment than immediate post-invasion Baghdad."

My theories about why Green Zone has been been '86-ed out of '09:

(a) Green Zone isn't The Hurt Locker, which is to say it's not as much a visceral, alls-out, pro-troops pulse-pounder as much as a viscerally shot (by Hurt Locker and United 93 lenser Barry Ackroyd) but essentially political minded quasi-downer about what a cock-up the American occupation was in '03 and '04.

I have Greengrass's Green Zone script (before Brian Helgeland came in or a rewrite) but if the final result is at all faithful to Rajiv Chandrasekaran's book it's almost a dramatic narrative version of Charles Ferguson's No End in Sight with the ludicrous incompetence of the American administrators in the early part of the Iraqi war and the pathetic errors of Iraqi Bush guy Paul Bremer as a backdrop.

Damon plays Roy Miller, a warrant officer who helps a senior CIA officer in the search for the mythical "weapons of mass destruction" during the first several months of the Iraq occupation. Damon completed Green Zone before starring in Steven Soderbergh's The Informant!, which will play at the Toronto Film Festival.

(b) Universal has determined that out of the 10 Best Picture contenders, the Academy has room in its collective head for one Iraq War film, and the recipient of that largesse -- The Hurt Locker -- has already been decided upon. And that other award-dispensing groups will probably concur. So with award-season action looking limited and the film perhaps not looking all that commercial on its own terms, Universal has decided to punt.

(c) The reason for this is that Universal's unfortunate losing streak has disemboldened management from taking any more chances of any kind. If Green Zone bombs or underperforms at the box-office it'll just be another strike against them in an already gloomy box-office year. Plus it obviously doesn't adhere to criteria recently urged by NBC-Uni honcho Jeff Zucker. "Easy-to-digest concepts and wish fulfillment is in vogue," he wrote in a recent memo to Uni toppers. "That's not our slate. And the choices have been too costly. You've got to fix both those things."

Downside: March '10 is eight months from now and the urgency/topicality of Iraq is losing sand by the week with Obama pulling the troops out. Doesn't it make sense to get Green Zone out while it's still semi-relevant? By next year Iraq will be even further back in the public mind."

Bottom line? Green Zone should have been greenlit and shot earlier. If it had come out last fall, bingo. But this was a bad Universal year, history is turning the page and people are disengaging on a Bush-era catastrophe.

Note: Thanks to The Playlist for highlighting the Green Zone aspect of Graser's story. The Green Zone news is buried inside a delayed Wolf Man story that wasn't even on the front page this morning.

Effin' Blue Dogs<< previous | next >>Latest Toronto Additions

Posted by Jeffrey Wells on July 29, 2009 at 6:49 AM

comment #1

byanyother says ...

Also Matt Damon overload.

Posted by byanyother at July 29, 2009 8:06 AM

comment #2

btwnproductions says ...

The more easily digestible WOLF MAN has also apparently been bumped (again), to next Feb.

LAND OF THE LOST aside, I do give Universal credit for going a higher road this summer, with DRAG ME TO HELL, PUBLIC ENEMIES, BRUNO, and FUNNY PEOPLE. No sequels, superheroes, or excessive digital effects in sight...which cost them at the multiplex.

Posted by btwnproductions at July 29, 2009 8:12 AM

comment #3

bluefugue says ...

Disappointing. United 93 made me an instant and eternal Greengrass fan. Easily the most important action/thriller film of the last half-decade, and one that serious filmmakers will be studying long after stuff like Transformers has vanished into the wind (I hope). Greengrass is the one action director of the current generation who can stand alongside the big kids.

Posted by bluefugue at July 29, 2009 8:14 AM

comment #4

bluefugue says ...

("Action" is only a limited subset of what Greengrass is capable of doing, btw.)

Posted by bluefugue at July 29, 2009 8:15 AM

comment #5

Steven Kar says ...

Universal also moved THE WOLFMAN to 2010.

Posted by Steven Kar at July 29, 2009 8:16 AM

comment #6

Gordie Lachance says ...

Jeff, the US getting out of Iraq is the ONLY thing that will make these movies palatable to audiences.

Posted by Gordie Lachance at July 29, 2009 8:55 AM

comment #7

DavidF says ...

At the risk of posting a DZ-like tangent, still nothing, Jeff, on the announcements for Toronto?

http://www.thestar.com/entertainment/tiff/article/673231

They now have the new Coen Bros film, the Michael Moore meltdown pic, Bad Lieutenant....oh, and Whip It....

Posted by DavidF at July 29, 2009 9:03 AM

comment #8

lipranzer says ...

I was upset to hear this as well, though the Damon factor shouldn't be overlooked either. Maybe Greengrass can enter it at one of the big festivals and build word-of-mouth?

Posted by lipranzer at July 29, 2009 9:14 AM

comment #9

Bob_Roberts says ...

Am I the only one who feels a twinge of sadness every time I see "10 Best Picture contenders". Does anyone actually think this is a good idea?

Posted by Bob_Roberts at July 29, 2009 10:15 AM

comment #10

JoseRC says ...

On the other hand they moved Paul Weitz's The Vampire's Assistant (previously Cirque du Freak) from a Jan '10 slot to October, so a lot of movement down Uni line indeed.

Posted by JoseRC at July 29, 2009 10:49 AM

comment #11

Chase Kahn says ...

"Easily the most important action/thriller film of the last half-decade, and one that serious filmmakers will be studying long after stuff like Transformers has vanished into the wind".

Tap the breaks...

Posted by Chase Kahn at July 29, 2009 11:17 AM

comment #12

p.Vice says ...

Wow, that article could provide a week's worth of stories.

My vote for most depressing line: Fox has its adaptation of "The A-Team," and Sony has its reboot of "The Karate Kid" on that date, as well.

There truly is nothing to look forward to.

Posted by p.Vice at July 29, 2009 11:24 AM

comment #13

storymark says ...

p, when have you looked forward to anything? To the best of my recollection, the only film you've ever said anything positive about on this blog was porn.

Posted by storymark at July 29, 2009 12:15 PM

comment #14

p.Vice says ...

I've had nothing but praise for what I saw of that Shatner-Khan loop that Jeff posted a couple months ago.

Posted by p.Vice at July 29, 2009 12:41 PM

comment #15

Steven Kar says ...

Just curious, which porn movie was it?

Posted by Steven Kar at July 29, 2009 1:08 PM

comment #16

p.Vice says ...

Haha, from what I recall it was more of a generalization, although perhaps storymark can enlighten us with further details.

And BTW story, I just posted a positive comment that referenced You the Living, which I recall also saying positive things about after seeing it at the 07 Toronto film festival. I guess the movies I like are ones that don't get much play here at HE.

Posted by p.Vice at July 29, 2009 1:15 PM

comment #17

Gordon27 says ...

was that the one you called the closest thing to a good movie to come out in more than a decade?

Even beyond the back-handed nature of the praise, it's also a comment that highlights exactly what story is making fun of you for.

Posted by Gordon27 at July 29, 2009 2:21 PM

comment #18

Gordon27 says ...

"Does anyone actually think this is a good idea?"

I wouldn't say it's a good idea, but, when 'Hurt Locker' was over, I figured it had no shot at getting a Best Picture nomination. Now that I've been reminded there will be 10 nominations, it's an almost certain shoo-in.

Posted by Gordon27 at July 29, 2009 2:23 PM

comment #19

CitizenKanedforChewingGum says ...

10 Best Picture contenders?? When the hell did this happen? Never heard anything about it.

Posted by CitizenKanedforChewingGum at July 29, 2009 2:47 PM

comment #20

DeeZee says ...

Makes sense to me. United was a dud and The Kingdom was Peter Berg's Miami Vice; and Jarhead was a flop for Mendes; so why even give Greengrass money for this in the first place? The only reason The Hurt Locker is making money is because it focuses on specific situations our troops are facing, rather than trying to summarize the war in general.

Posted by DeeZee at July 29, 2009 5:54 PM

comment #21

crazynine says ...

"Downside: March '10 is eight months from now and the urgency/topicality of Iraq is losing sand by the week with Obama pulling the troops out. Doesn't it make sense to get Green Zone out while it's still semi-relevant? By next year Iraq will be even further back in the public mind.""

Damn the U.S. military for turning the war around. If only they had the common courtesy to keep on losing the war, Matt Damon's movie might be a success!

A good movie is a good movie, no matter when it is released. There were dozens of Iraq War movies while the war wasn't going well, and they all flopped for two reasons: 1) they all sucked, and 2) they had no heroes.

Hurt Locker was the first Iraq War movie that *didn't* suck, and wasn't ashamed of its characters.

Sorry Hollywood, we didn't fuck up Iraq as bad as you had hoped. But don't, we still might be able to lose the war in Afghanistan in time to make the *2011* Oscar season!

Posted by crazynine at July 31, 2009 7:25 AM

comment #22