We have plenty of new release dates to pass along:

  • Sony Animation scheduled two Genndy Tartakovsky’s projects.  The 3D cartoon Popeye that Tartakovsky will direct hits theaters September 26, 2014.  The sequel to Tartakovsky's Hotel Transylvania opens the following year on September 25, 2015.
  • Relativity scheduled fellow cartoon Turkeys---featuring the voices of Owen Wilson, Woody Harrelson and Dan Fogler---for a Thanksgiving release on November 14, 2014.
  • The Last Exorcism II: The Beginning of the End is dated for March 1, 2013.
  • The Aubrey Plaza comedy The To-Do List will move from Valentines Day next year to August 16, 2013.  Relativity took advantage of the open slot and moved the Nicholas Sparks adaptation Safe Haven from February 8 back to February 14, 2013.

Hit the jump for details on each project.

[All dates via Box Office Mojo and Variety]

popeye-genndy-tartakovsky

The Smurfs writers Jay Scherick and David Ronn penned the script for Popeye to bring everyone's favorite raspy sailor into the 21st century.  Avi and Ari Arad will produce under their Arad Productions banner in conjunction with Sony Pictures Animation.

Details have yet to surface on Hotel Transylvania 2, including whether Tartakovsky or voice cast members Adam Sandler, Andy Samberg, Selena Gomez, Kevin James, Steve Buscemi, David Spade and Fran Drescher will return.  Hotel Transylvania has earned $271 million worldwide as of this writing.

The Turkeys script---written by David L. Stern and John Strauss and rewritten by Craig Mazin---follows "two turkeys from opposite sides of the tracks who must put aside their differences and team up to travel back in time to change the course of history."  Stern, Strauss, and Mazin will produce along with Scott Mosier.

Ed Gass-Donnelly will direct The Last Exorcism II: The Beginning of the End, which returns to find Nell Sweetzer (Ashley Bell) struggling to put her life back together while the demon that possessed her continues to fight for her soul.  We caught the full synopsis at the American Film Market:

the-last-exorcism-2 poster

Eli Roth & Strike Entertainment bring us an even more terrifying and bigger scale sequel to THE LAST EXORCISM that grossed $70 million worldwide.  It looks like Nell Sweetzer’s last exorcism was not foolproof.  She is back… and so are her demons.

Continuing where the first film left off, teenage Nell Sweetzer is found dirty and terrified in the woods having just escaped a demon ritual in which a cult helped her give birth to a demon baby.  Confused and scared, Nell is examined by doctors but she doesn’t remember much about the previous few months except that as a result of everything, her family is now dead.  She is moved into Davreaux – a girls’ halfway house in New Orleans, where she will try to put her life back together with the help of the therapist, Frank Merle.  She even begins to date a boy named Chris and starts a job at a local hotel.

But something doesn’t feel right to Nell.  She is being sought after by the demon who possessed her in the first LAST EXORCISM.  It wants Nell, but in a different way than before…

Donald Glover, Rachel Bilson, Bill Hader, Andy Samberg, Alia Shawkat, Mae Whitman, Johnny Simmons, Connie Britton, Clark Gregg, Christopher Mintz-Plasse and Scott Porter co-star in The To-Do List, written and directed by Maggie Carey.  Here's the synopsis:

the-to-do-list-aubrey-plaza-rachel-bilson

THE TO DO LIST follows the story of Brandy Klark (Plaza), a Type-A, overachiever who comes up with a “to-do list” featuring all the risqué extra-curricular activities she missed out on in high school and wants to complete before college.

Julianne Hough and Josh Duhamel star in Safe Heaven, directed by Lasse Hallstrom (Dear John).  Here's the synopsis:

An affirming and suspenseful story about a young woman’s struggle to love again, Safe Haven is based on the novel from Nicholas Sparks, the best-selling author behind the hit films The Notebook and Dear John.  When a mysterious young woman arrives in a small North Carolina town, her reluctance to join the tight knit community raises questions about her past.  Slowly, she begins putting down roots, and gains the courage to start a relationship with Alex, a widowed store owner with two young children.  But dark secrets intrude on her new life with such terror that she is forced to rediscover the meaning of sacrifice and rely on the power of love in this deeply moving romantic thriller.