Darren Aronofsky’s ‘Noah’ Hits Theaters March 28, 2014

After struggling for years making films that only played to a limited audience, Darren Aronofsky broke through to the mainstream with the release of 'Black Swan.' It gave him the power to get a big budget film made at Paramount, and that film is 'Noah.' It now has a release date of March 28, 2014.

That's an interesting slot because it suggests they don't think the film will be an awards picture. It's not that the Academy has a painfully short memory (though they do), but films that come out earlier in the year are on home video by the end of the year, and the studios generally don't care at that point (partly because awards lead to more box office business). That doesn't mean it's cooked, but it's not positioned well for awards.

What is interesting about the release date is that March has now become a big month for movies - but mostly for studio's slightly weirder pictures. 'John Carter' and 'The Hunger Games'  were both big movies, but it's hard to say if 'Games' would have been as big if it were coming out against 'The Avengers' or 'The Dark Knight Rises.' For the last couple years we've been seeing big movies come out in March, from '300' to Tim Burton's 'Alice in Wonderland,' so this is a good sign, all things.