Jump to content

Case 39

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This is an old revision of this page, as edited by 193.34.231.236 (talk) at 10:17, 26 February 2010 (Undid revision 346468254 by 193.34.231.236 (talk)). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

Case 39
promotional poster
Directed byChristian Alvart
Written byRay Wright
Produced byLisa Bruce
Steve Golin
Alix Madigan
Kevin Misher
StarringRenée Zellweger
Jodelle Ferland
Bradley Cooper
Ian McShane
Distributed byParamount Pictures
Release dates
August 31, 2009 (2009-08-31)
New Zealand
Running time
115 minutes
CountriesUnited States
Canada
LanguageEnglish
Box office$11,637,485

Case 39 is a 2009 horror film directed by Christian Alvart and stars actress Renée Zellweger and Canadian actress Jodelle Ferland. The film was shot in Vancouver in late 2006, and was scheduled to be released in August 2008, but it was pushed back to April 10, 2009, but now the film's domestic release date is January 1, 2010, which has now been scrapped. It is scheduled to be distributed by Paramount Pictures.

Plot

Social worker Emily Jenkins (Renée Zellweger) is assigned to investigate the family of 10-year-old Lilith Sullivan (Jodelle Ferland), as her grades in school have declined and an emotional rift with her parents emerges. Emily suspects that the parents have been abusing Lilith, and proposes to her department to take the child away from her parents' custody. Emily's fears are confirmed when Lilith's parents try to kill her by roasting her in the oven at their home. Emily saves Lilith with the help of Detective Mike Barron (Ian McShane). Emily is assigned to take care of Lilith until a suitable foster family comes when her parents are placed under a mental institution.

Not too long after Lilith moves in, strange things begin to happen around Emily and her work. A boy named Diego suddenly murders his parents one morning, and Detective Barron informs Emily that somebody called Diego from her house the night before the crime. As she is suspected to be involved in the incident, Lilith undergoes a psychiatric evaluation by Emily's boyfriend Douglas J. Ames (Bradley Cooper). During the session, however, Lilith turns the evaluation around, asking Douglas what his fears are and taunting him with her own threats. That night, after receiving a strange phone call in his apartment, Douglas is haunted by the sight of a swarm of hornets coming out of his body. He is overcome by his childhood fear of hornets until he injures himself to death in his bathroom.

Emily gradually becomes paranoid over having Lilith in her home, so she heads to the mental asylum for answers from Lilith's parents. They tell her that Lilith is a demon who feeds on human kindness, and that they tried to kill her in an attempt to save themselves. Lilith's father tells Emily she must kill her and the only way to do so is to get her to sleep. Shortly after Emily leaves the asylum, both parents die of unusual circumstances.

Detective Barron initially thinks Emily should seek psychiatric help, but is later on convinced when he receives a strange phone call in his home from Emily's cell phone, which is being used by Lilith. He arms himself at the police precinct to aid Emily in handling Lilith, but dies by his own hand when Lilith uses his fear of dogs against him. That night, Emily has Lilith drink tea spiked with sleeping pills. While Lilith is asleep, Emily sets her home on fire. Firefighters promptly appear to extinguish the fire, but Emily is shocked when Lilith appears next to her.

Police offer to escort Emily and Lilith to a temporary place to sleep. As Emily is following the police cars, she suddenly takes a different route and drives her car at a high speed, hoping to bring fear to Lilith. She then drives the car off the pier. As the car sinks, Emily struggles to lock Lilith in the trunk by folding the rear seats against her. She then exits the car, but as she swims away, Lilith suddenly grabs her leg after punching a hole on the car's left tail light section. Emily struggles to break free until Lilith finally lets go as the car continues to sink. She climbs back ashore, relieved to be rid of Lilith.[1][2]

Cast

Main Cast[3]

Production

On October 31, 2006, a fire started on the film's set in Vancouver. None of the cast were on the set at the time and nobody was seriously injured, though the set and studio were destroyed.[4]

Release

The film has had many release dates, since it first began production back in 2006. Its initial US release was February 8, 2008 which was changed to February 22, 2008.[5] It was then moved to August 22, 2008,[6] and then moved again to April 10, 2009. Then it got pushed back to a January 1, 2010. Now it has an undetermined date for 2010.[7] It was then totally removed from Paramount's release schedule.[8]

Its release has also been bumped many times in Australia, but was settling for an August 20, 2009 date, with promotional posters being seen in cinema foyers, but the release date was changed yet again, to November 5[9], and an official Australian website has been produced to promote the film.[10] A Mexican opening date has been set for December 4, 2009.[11]

In the UK, the trailer began playing prior to the start of the movie Daybreakers, showing a release date of 5 March 2010.

On 4 September 2009, The Spanish language version of the movie was leaked onto the Internet via various torrent and warez websites.[12]

Box office and reception

Case 39 was released to New Zealand cinemas on August 13, 2009 and in its opening weekend was ranked #12 with $35,056[13]. Averaging $1,845 at the 19 cinemas it was released, the film failed to garner attendance most likely due to extremely negative reviews. The film opened at a small-wide release in Australia, being shown on 85 screens. The film ranked #12 in its opening weekend with a screen average of $2,077 for a gross of $176,526. Extremely negative local reviews and a poor opening led to a shocking 70% 2nd weekend decrease. The film grossed a total of $AUD332,956.

The film has received mostly negative reviews and currently holds an 11% 'Rotten' rating on Rotten Tomatoes based on 9 reviews, with critics describing the film as "universally terrible", "dumb" and "not scary".[14] Gareth Jones of Dread Central gave the film 2 out of 5 knives, saying, "I'm sure it will do decent business among the undemanding weekend-horror crowd and Zellweger fans when it eventually sees the light of day. Nobody else need apply."[15] Margaret Pomeranz of the Australian version of At the Movies gave the film 1 star out of 5 stars, calling it "one of the least scary, dumbest movies I’ve seen in a long time." Co-host David Stratton gave it 1 1/2 out of 5 stars, commenting that "once it sort of kicks into the plot - once it really gets down to the nitty gritty, like so many horror films it just becomes really ridiculous and silly."[16]

References

  1. ^ Opening CASE 39
  2. ^ "CanMag.Com". Case 39 2008 Preview Page. Retrieved December 7, 2007.
  3. ^ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0795351/fullcredits#cast
  4. ^ Robert Matas (2006-11-02). "Special-effects fire destroys movie set". globeandmail.com. Retrieved 2008-04-07.
  5. ^ http://www.bloody-disgusting.com/news/9539
  6. ^ http://www.bloody-disgusting.com/news/10019
  7. ^ http://www.bloody-disgusting.com/news/11200
  8. ^ http://www.bloody-disgusting.com/news/17489
  9. ^ http://yourmovies.com.au/movies/index.cfm?action=movie_info&title_id=32273
  10. ^ http://case39.com.au/
  11. ^ Mexican opening date
  12. ^ http://warezforum.info/movies/490860-case-39-2009-ts-download-watch-online.html
  13. ^ Box Office Mojo - Case 39 New Zealand Box Office
  14. ^ "Case 39". Rotten Tomatoes. Retrieved November 5, 2009.
  15. ^ Dread Central - Case 39 Review
  16. ^ At the Movies (Australia): Case 39

External links

Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Case_39&oldid=346469367"