It's not like anyone was necessarily expecting Piranha 3DD and The Amityville Horror: The Lost Tapes to be landmark horror films, or even better than the films they're sequels for, but the situation has just gotten a little grimmer for both of them. Dread Central reports that both films have had their release dates canceled, with distributor Dimension films now scheduling them for "sometime in 2012." Piranha 3DD was due fairly soon, with a November 23 release date, while Amityville was set to come on January 27.
The late January release date for Amityville kind of indicated that it wouldn't be much to see-- that's usually the dumping ground for horror movies that wouldn't stand a chance anywhere else. But Piranha 3DD seemed to have some high hopes behind it, especially given that the first film grossed an impressive $83 million worldwide. Sure, only $25 million of that was made domestically, but that's usually the case with giant blockbusters too. And while they don't exactly have a big list of major stars returning for the sequel, they did manage to get Christopher Lloyd, Ving Rhames and Paul Scheer to come back, along with adding Gary Busey and David Hasselhoff--what more could you want from a B-movie?
The "sometime in 2012" release plan has ominous shades of "shoved on to DVD," but I expect them to at least give Piranha 3DD a run at a theatrical release. We'll keep an eye on it and let you know when and if that ever happens.
