It’s such a boring day that I’m writing a piece that will put people to sleep. Last March an extended trailer for Alex Garland‘s Annihilation was shown at Cinemacon. It wowed a lot of journos (myself among them) and exhibs. I’d also been reading online that at the very least it has an absolute killer ending. But despite the Cinemacon presentation, Paramount announced it would come out in early ’18.

For whatever reason Paramount just research-screened Annihilation the other night. Why, I’m wondering, would they test-screen a film in late June 2017 when it’s reputedly going to open ten months hence, or in March ’18? If I didn’t know better I’d say Paramount is possibly re-thinking things and may change their minds and open it at the end of the year after all. Maybe.

I’m presuming Paramount is sticking to the ’18 plan, but it sure would be nice to see this dark Garland fantasia, based on Jeff Vandermeer’s 2014 novel, pop in November or December.

Natalie Portman (last woman standing), Jennifer Jason Leigh, Gina Rodriguez, Tessa Thompson, Oscar Isaac, David Gyasi and Sonoya Mizuno.

From a 7.14.15 Gizmodo interview with Garland, posted by Charlie Jane Anders:

Garland: “What I’d say is, that I’ve worked on different kinds of adaptations in the past. One of them was called Never Let Me Go, which was based on a book by Kazuo Ishiguro. Relatively speaking, what that film did was it kind of held up a mirror to the book. It was a slightly distorting mirror, in some respects, but basically it’s holding up a mirror…a sort of movie mirror, I guess.”

“The movie of Annihilation, Gardland says, is “not doing that. This is not tightly adhering to the beats of the novel in the same way. It’s a looser adaptation, although the basic precepts are still there.

“Let me put it this way: If you saw the film, you’d know what it was based on. I can say that. But that’s presumptuous of me…if I get to make the film, and you saw the film, and you’d read the book, you’d say, ‘This is based on Annihilation.’ So it’s not that loose.” But it’s not as close a copy as Never Let Me Go.”