Paramount pushes J.J. Abrams’ “Cloverfield Movie” back to 2018

PanARMENIAN.Net - Paramount and J.J. Abrams’ Bad Robot Productions have moved the science-fiction thriller “2017 Cloverfield Movie” back by more than three months to Feb. 2, 2018, from Oct. 27. The studio has also moved George Clooney’s “Suburbicon” forward a week from Nov. 3 to Oct. 27, Variety said.

This is now the second delay for the “Cloverfield” threequel, which had been originally titled “God Particle,” after it was pushed back for the first time from its initial Feb. 24, 2017, date.

“The 2017 Cloverfield Movie,” which will most likely be retitled, will become the first title to launch on Feb. 2, just two days before the NFL’s 52nd Super Bowl.

The story, set in the near future, centers on a team of astronauts on a space station making a terrifying discovery that challenges all they know about the fabric of reality, all while desperately trying to fight for their survival.

Nigerian-American filmmaker Julius Onah is directing. David Oyelowo, Gugu Mbatha-Raw, Ziyi Zhang, Elizabeth Debicki, Daniel Brühl, and Chris O’Dowd are starring.

The studio and Bad Robot have been developing the project since 2012. It’s the third part of the Cloverfield universe, launched in 2008 with the secrecy-shrouded found-footage monster movie “Cloverfield.”

Paramount-based Abrams was also a producer on last year’s “10 Cloverfield Lane,” which opened in March with Dan Trachtenberg directing. Abrams called “10 Cloverfield Lane” a “spiritual successor” to the original “Cloverfield.”

“10 Cloverfield Lane” starred Mary Elizabeth Winstead as a woman who wakes up in an underground bunker after a car crash with two men who insist that the surface of the Earth has become uninhabitable. The movie was one of the few Paramount films last year to perform well, with a worldwide gross of more than $100 million on an $8 million budget.