The Revenant Release Date Set for Christmas 2015; Iñárritu to Shoot in Sequence

Collider

THE REVENANT, Starring Leonardo DiCaprio and Tom Hardy, Gets Christmas 2015 Release Date; Iñárritu Hoping to Shoot in Sequence

By Adam Chitwood

Published Jul 14, 2014

Alejandro González Iñárritu's The Revenant, starring Leonardo DiCaprio and Tom Hardy, will be released on Christmas 2015 and possibly shot in sequence.

While many are eagerly anticipating director Alejandro González Iñárritu’s excellent-looking Birdman, which hits theaters this October, the filmmaker is already busy prepping his next feature, The Revenant. The Babel director has Leonardo DiCaprio, Tom Hardy, and Will Poulter set to lead the story of an 1820s fronterisman who is mauled by a bear during a fur trapping expedition, robbed, and left for dead, only to recover and set out to exact revenge on those who betrayed him. Now 20th Century Fox has staked out a prime December 25, 2015 release date for the pic, where it will square off against Mission: Impossible 5 and director David O. Russell’s next film Joy.

Additionally, Iñárritu has some very ambitious plans for the upcoming Revenant shoot, which is scheduled to be quite lengthy. More after the jump.

According to the Calgary Herald (via The Playlist), Iñárritu has scheduled an 80 day shoot for The Revenant, with filming poised to run from October to March in British Colombia and Alberta. That’s quite a long shoot for a film that doesn’t involve giant robots or monsters, but it may have something to do with the fact that Iñárritu is hoping to shoot the entire movie in sequence.

It’s actually quite rare for the scenes of any film to be shot in the order in which they appear onscreen, from beginning to end; scheduling your shoot that way can be tricky and quite costly. However, THR reports that Iñárritu intends to do just this on The Revenant, which reportedly adds an additional $7 million to the budget. Not to fear, though, as Megan Ellison’s Annapurna Pictures is in talks to come on as a financial backer for the project after Worldview Entertainment recently pulled out.

Iñárritu employed a similarly ambitious shooting technique on the upcoming Birdman, as the entire film is shot to look like it’s composed of one long, unbroken take. There's no confirmation that the filmmaker has been given the go-ahead to shoot The Revenant in order, but the 80-day shoot may signal just that. DiCaprio’s been growing some rather gnarly facial hair to take on the lead role, and I can’t wait to see the finished results of this promising project in a year and a half.