On 3.22 Variety‘s Dave McNary reported that Ben Affleck‘s Live By Night, a 1930s crime drama based on a Dennis Lahane novel, would open on 10.20.17, or roughly two years after it began shooting in Georgia. Sasha Stone and I visited the set, remember, during the Savannah Film Festival.

A little more than a month later (i.e., on 4.26) the film was research screened at the Pasadena Arclight. (Obviously the Warner Bros. person who told McNary about the October 2017 release date gave him a bum steer.) Live By Night was research-screened again on Tuesday, 5.24 at the AMC Burbank 16. A couple of days ago it was learned that the new release date is 1.13.17.

Which means, of course, that Live By Night will get an awards-qualifying run sometime in December. But it’s a period genre film, and you know how Lahane adaptations tend to go (i.e., respectable craft, strong genre materials, contained in their own realm).

On top of which (I know I shouldn’t mention this but I am the proverbial scorpion being carried across the river by the proverbial frog) Affleck was hefty-sized that day in Savannah. He’s since lost the weight but his appearance in Live By Night will be…well, noteworthy.