‘Jojo Rabbit’, Starring Taika Waititi as Hitler, Will Open in October

Jojo Rabbit, aka the movie where Taika Waititi plays an imaginary friend who just happens to be Adolf Hitler, has found its release date. Fox Searchlight (and Disney) will open the film in October, which sets it up for both awards season and festival season. The dark comedy, which Waititi wrote and directed, also stars Scarlett Johansson, Sam Rockwell, and Rebel Wilson. More on the Jojo Rabbit release date below.

Jojo Rabbit // In Theaters October 18, 2019 pic.twitter.com/f3Xzp07rSd

— Fox Searchlight (@foxsearchlight) May 13, 2019

Jojo Rabbit was always going to get a lot of attention. Not only is it the latest film from Taika Waititi, but it’s also a very dark comedy set in Nazi Germany, and focuses on a young boy whose imaginary friend is Hitler. That’s the type of scenario that raises eyebrows, and draws a crowd. And now, Fox Searchlight wants to increase the attention by setting it up for an awards season run. The film will open on October 18, 2019. That gives it a release date identical, or damn near, to two Fox Searchlight Best Picture winners – 12 Years a Slave and Birdman.

It’s clear that even with its strange premise, Fox Searchlight wants the film to be seen as timely – thus the new tagline above calling Jojo Rabbit an “Anti-Hate Satire.” When principal photography on the film began in May of last year, Waititi said: “I’m stoked to begin shooting my anti-war satire. We’ve assembled an incredible cast and I couldn’t be more excited to finally ridicule Nazis and their beliefs. This film is going to piss off a lot of racists and that makes me very happy.”

Jojo Rabbit follows a “lonely German boy (Roman Griffin Davis) whose world view is turned upside down when he discovers his single mother, (Scarlett Johansson), is hiding a young girl (Thomasin McKenzie) in their attic. Aided only by his idiotic imaginary friend, Adolf Hitler (Taika Waititi), Jojo must confront his naive patriotism.” Alfie Allen and Stephen Merchant also star.

Not only does an October release date set Jojo Rabbit up for the awards season conversation, it implies the movie will be part of festival season as well. You can all but bet the film will play at TIFF in September.

This is one of our most anticipated movies of the year, and I’m particularly excited that Waititi immediately followed up Thor: Ragnarok with something like this. More often than not, it seems like the indie directors who get swallowed up by the Marvel machine end up not making other films outside the MCU for quite some time. Waititi is also expected to direct the live-action Akira movie currently in development.

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from /Film http://bit.ly/2HgLfpg