The Last Voyage of the Demeter was a damned one in Bram Stoker’s Dracula, but its movie equivalent is equally unfortunate it seems.
Not only has the movie sunk beneath the waves at the US box office (despite being exciting claustrophobic horror), it’s not able to do much better elsewhere as a studio buyout has smashed its release window to splinters in other countries including the UK.
The movie, which adapts the seventh chapter of the Dracula novel, was set to arrive in UK theaters this week, but was quietly pulled from release schedules. While part of the problem may well have been the poor performance of the film in the US, there’s a bigger factor at play that Slash Film brought to light.
Last month, UK distributor eOne announced it was shuttering all operations in the country, which was followed by its parent company Hasbro announcing it was selling eOne off to Lionsgate for a cool $500 million. That of course was followed by layoffs, and with Lionsgate having its own distribution channels in the UK, that effectively killed off eOne.
Another Nail in Dracula’s Coffin
It doesn’t mean death for the lord of the undead’s theatrical adventures abroad, but it will mean it might be a while before anyone in the UK can legally get their eyes and hands on The Last Voyage of the Demeter. Other countries such as India and Spain are similarly affected.
It won’t be the first horror release to see a massively staggered release in other territories because of studio red tape. Ti West’s Pearl took an additional six months to premiere in the UK for instance, and many big horror releases such as Scream VI and Evil Dead Rise don’t hit UK streaming services anywhere near as quickly as they do in the US due to differences in distribution rights.
For this particular horror movie, it’s another nail in the coffin for a disappointingly poor launch.
