BIDDING WAR BREAKS OUT OVER ROB ZOMBIE’S LORDS OF SALEM

Given how much fun I had watching Rob Zombie’s first two movies, House of 1,000 Corpses and especially its sequel, The Devil’s Rejects, I would really like nothing more than for his latest outing as a director, The Lords of Salem, to be good. I mean, I’m not optimistic, but I’d like for it to be good.

If nothing else, it seems that movie executives feel the film will profitable: while it debuted at the Toronto International Film Festival last night, the independently-produced horror film had three distribution offers before it even screened.

Deadline identifies two of those distributors as Anchor Bay (who, going into the screening, were apparently “in the lead”) and Millenium, but does not say who the third was. And apparently there was no deal to be made until after the screening — a sign of confidence on the part of the filmmakers (because if the movie sucked, those distribution offers could disappear quickly).

And, hey, from a business perspective at least, it makes sense that the filmmakers are confident, and that all these companies want a piece of Salem‘s action: according to Box Office Mojo, all of Zombie’s previous films have made a substantial profit, and this particular flick was produced by Jason Blum and Oren Peli, masterminds of such cheaply made, high-grossing genre fare as the Paranormal Activity franchise and Insidious. So, like I said — I don’t know if Salem will be any good or not, but it’s about as sound an investment as you’re gonna get in the movie business.

At the time of this writing, no announcements have been made as to who won this little competition, but I imagine that will change soon.

-AR