A new Scream, Creed, Shazam, and John Wick: All the new movies you’ll want watch in March
Other March releases that belong on your radar include a Dungeons & Dragons adaptation and the Adam Driver sci-fi feature 65
Film Features John Wick
March 2023 films to see: Creed III (Screenshot: YouTube/MGM); Scream VI (Photo: Paramount Pictures); Murder Mystery 2 (Photo: Scott Yamano/Netflix); SHAZAM! FURY OF THE GODS (Photo: Warner Bros. Pictures) Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves (Photo: Paramount Pictures) Graphic: Libby McGuire
March means the conclusion to awards season, but as Hollywood’s little gold men are handed out, the regular moviegoing schedule continues apace. And if there’s a theme to the month, it’s definitely sequels: Ghostface reappears in Scream VI, Michael B. Jordan returns both on screen and behind the camera with Creed III, Keanu Reeves ratchets up his body count in John Wick 4, and Shazam “Shazam!”s his way back to the cineplex. But if you’re seeking original stories, Focus Features is gifting you with Woody Harrelson in Champions and Willem Dafoe in Inside, plus recent Sundance award winner A Thousand And One. Read on for The A.V. Club’s definitive guide to the March 2023 films that merit handfuls of popcorn.
40 Comments
I found it strange that when I looked up Kurt Wimmer I saw that he’d already made a Children of the Corn movie in 2020… but that just meant it didn’t get distributed until 3 years after it premiered. Surely a good sign.Worth noting that Rye Lane was also at Sundance, and fairly well received, though I don’t know if it won any awards. Meanwhile, the Sundance film I’m most interested in seeing (William Oldroyd’s “Eileen”) appears to still be in negotiation over distribution. I’ll be annoyed if I have to wait until 2026 for it.
“Surely a good sign.”
They just recently dropped a trailer for it. Very un-Stephen King looking.
I’ve seen a good number of movies in the theater over the last couple months, and I don’t think I’ve seen one trailer there for Scream VI, and no TV spots yet either, whereas I’ve seen a bunch of TV spots lately for 65 which comes out the same day. You’d think an IP like Scream would get more promotion. In any case, I’m more excited to check out 65 though. A dinosaur movie that isn’t a bland Jurassic sequel? Count me in.
I’ve seen plenty of Scream trailers, maybe you’re not hitting the right movies, I usually see it before other horror movies. I stream everything, so I can’t speak to network/cable television, but the trailer is all over youtube.
Ah – well, I block ads on YouTube, so there’s that. I’m guessing the Scream trailer played before M3GAN in theaters? I only caught M3GAN recently when it became available as a digital rental.
Three more days until the unrated version is on Peacock! I got SO close to watching it as digital rental. SO CLOSE. So pumped now.
Megan, She Came From the Woods, Knock at the Cabin, Infinity Pool, etc. LOL, guess I’m telling on myself, I watch a lot of horror movies. Guess they’re focusing on the core audience.
Ha, I saw Knock at the Cabin and Infinity Pool in the theater, and yet no Scream trailer beforehand for me. Maybe it’s different theater chains showing different stuff *shrug*As for trailers seen at the movie theater, over the last 3 months I’ve been hit HARD with the Shazam trailer each and every time it seems. No matter if I watched an arthouse film like Triangle of Sadness, I got the same damn Shazam trailer probably 10 times in the last few months going to the movies. I have Zachary Levi’s dialogue practically memorized at this point.
I see just about all of my movies at AMC theaters, since I’m an A-List member. I’ve been seeing a lot of Cocaine Bear trailers (they worked, already have my ticket for this weekend), 65, which I agree, looks pretty cool, and yeah, I’ve seen the Shazam trailer plenty. I was so glad when Babylon came out, I was so sick of that trailer.
ur timing with ads might just be coincidental. I’ve definitely saw a teaser and full length trailer for this awhile ago.
the issue is that advertising has become so targeted it’s either people seeing a million of the same ad or people not seeing it at all. we’re 30 year out from must see tv when everyone would see the same movie ad during seinfeld.and you admittedly use adblocker for youtube, which is probably where 50% of the ad buy is.
True, true. I’m basing my lack of Scream trailer exposure mostly on my network/cable TV viewing and movie theater experiences.
Gotta be, because I watch a fair number of movies as well but only a small percentage is horror. Maybe I need to throw one in the mix this week so the scary movie algorithm stops ignoring me.
Just backing you here on not knowing where the Scream promotion is. Seeing this article my first reaction was “oh right, there IS another one of these coming out. Who is in this one?”.
I get more Pitch Black vibes from 65, but otherwise yeah it looks pretty fun. Driver makes pretty much any situation feel authentic.
I got a Scream ad in front of Ant-Man over the weekend. Ad, not a trailer. It was AMC saying tix are on sale now, before the trailers started.
I really like Luther but Stringer Bell put Idris Elba on the map, let’s be honest.
Yes, also the “Seeing Idris Elba on the big screen” part of the same sentence feels wrong since it’s on Netflix.
These are all retreads of the same crap we have been getting for decades. Hollywood sucks.
Hollywood is quite good at churning out what everyone fills the theater seats for.
The US added about 40 million people in the last 20 years, which definitely includes that prime movie-going demo – teenagers. And yet look at the results. I’d say the movie making / distribution biz is full of people who are garbage at their jobs.
Man, what could have happened that would cause a precipitous drop in theater attendance during 2020 and 2021 . . . .
You can hardly blame a little thing like theaters being closed for 15 months for completely cratering movie ticket sales. No, it’s definitely the quality of the films that’s to blame.
So first, I do want to point out I am not saying I love everything coming out of this industry, just that they put out what people want to see, which is often more of what they have seen.But that said, the graph you posted really has zero to do with “quality”. That general downward trend is simply the rise of so many entertainment alternatives, mostly spurred on by faster and faster internet making more options available. And of course that huge plunge is covid and closed theaters and finally slowly recovering interest in going back. And stuff that does not get coutned on that movie ticket sales number is all the stuff that goes straight to streaming, or goes to streaming so soon after release. Heck, Glass Onion, a film that would have been very successful in theaters, was deliberately only screened for a week before it was sent to streaming on Netflix. So much Star Wars content, several Pixar films, countless other properties, as set to stream.
So if you want to talk about Hollywood, if you could take all the content people are consuming, and could put all of that viewership in one chart regardless of venue, I think you would find that viewership of Hollywood products is UP significantly, not down. And much of that content, yes, is extensions of existing IPs.
At least 3 of these movies I will see in the theater opening week. Shazam 2 is hard as it comes out when the NCAA Tourney starts.
Scream, Creed, and John Wick? I’ll probably make the drive for Creed. Somehow I just recently saw John Wick for the first time. A few months ago coworkers are like “what are you doing standing here go punch out you have homework”.
I just saw John Wick (all 3 of them) this January as well. Yeah those are the 3 I will see for sure, I do want to see Shazam as well but I may have to wait for like a Monday or a Tuesday.
Creed 3 has a major Rocky 3 / Clubber Lang feel to it but I’m optimistic Jordan won’t steel too far into the silly.
CREED III:RETURN OF THUNDERLIPS
Maybe they can get a Polaroid after.
“You’ll want watch” guys I am begging you
All the new movies you’ll want watch in March*want to watch
I know this is nitpicky, but Scream 2 and 3 don’t take place in Woodsboro. Scream 2 happens at Windsor College which is canonically in Ohio, and Scream 3 is in Hollywood. The New York setting is unique and fun, but not the first time the series has left Woodsboro.
Scream 3 had a Woodsboro set though.
They’re all connected to Woodsboro, but this isn’t the first time I have seen the phrase “Scream 6 is leaving Woodsboro for the first time ever in the franchise.”
Can Woody Harrelson coach the team to the championships while transitioning into George C. Scott?! Tune in to find out!
“Scream VI picks up where last year’s Scream left off, moving the action for the first time away from Woodsboro to New York City.”not to be pedantic but until Scream 4 most of the Scream movies were actually not set in Woodsboro (2 was in some college town explicitly not in Woodsboro, 3 was set in LA) and now it’s split exactly even between Woodsboro/Not Woodsboro with 6
Damned fine month in the theaters, especially if you count Cocaine Bear this coming weekend. I could see myself heading into town every week. Well…. maybe not the 17th, but maybe. Cocaine Bear, Creed, 65, (inside?), Wick, DnD. None of that sounds like money wasted.
I’ll WANT WATCH YOU’LL WANT WATCH THEY’LL WAN’T WATCH WE’LL WANT WATCH
Am I the only one bothered by the fact that this version of Shazam doesn’t seem to have the Wisdom of Solomon but more like the goofiness of Kazaam?