Warner Bros. has confirmed that it aims to re-release The Dark Knight in US cinemas on January 23 – just six weeks after Chris Nolan’s records-swallowing behemoth is released on DVD and Blu-Ray.
Even though it’ll be widely available as home entertainment, Warners is hoping that the nationwide release will help the Batman Begins sequel accumulate the $4 million it needs to become just the fourth movie to hit the billion dollar mark worldwide.
"We wanted to provide one more opportunity for moviegoers to experience it on the bigscreen as it was meant to be seen," Dan Fellman, Warner’s president of domestic distribution, told Variety. Nevertheless we suspect that if the movie had been stuck on $700 million, the prints would have stayed in the warehouse.
The re-release won’t augment the movie’s Oscar chances, either – the nominations for next year’s ceremony are announced on January 22. But we’ve got a feeling that it’ll do ok in any case.
No word yet on whether the movie will also be re-released in the UK.