Entertainment Editorial: Is George Clooney the King of Fall?

So about once every three years there seems to be a Will Smith movie that opens on the 4th of July (Independence Day, Men in Black, Hancock, etc.) and it happens enough that his nickname has become “King of the 4th of July.” Which begs the question: What other time periods do movie stars “own?”

Perhaps the most obvious example would be George Clooney’s Fall dominance. He is the rare leading man who has never had an action franchise (the closest he’s come is starring in the worst Batman movie ever made and the Ocean’s 11 trilogy that wasn’t necessarily his to anchor and was more about clockwork plots than action scenes). As a result of never having his own Jason Bourne franchise (which disqualifies Matt Damon from Prince of the Fall contender-ship), Clooney’s never had too many movies open in the summer movie time season.

Where he’s dominated instead is the post-Labor Day moving going period where intelligent thrillers and well made dramas rule. Last year, he had the arty, Euro-pop assassin movie, The American, open on Labor Day, which is both borderline in terms of action content (the movie has too many quiet scenes to compete with the bombastic June entertainment) and on the calendar. Other than that, we have a solid Fall record that goes all the way back to Clooney’s first starring role, The Peacemaker which opened in late Septmeber, and includes Three Kings (early October), O Brother Where Art Thou (December), Intolerable Cruelty (October), to the first two Ocean’s Eleven movies which opened in December.

Then there’s his legendary run of more recent Fall hits. Great movies like Good Night and Good Luck, Michael Clayton, and Syriana (my personal favorite which he won an Oscar for). In 2009 alone, he had no less than three Fall movies that opened (Men Who Stare at Goats, The Fantastic Mr. Fox, and Up in the Air). [His lone directorial misfire was the tone-deaf comedy Leatherheads which opened in, you guessed it, April, widely known as the cruelest month.]

All of which brings us to Clooney’s latest two movies: The Ides of March (opening early October) and The Descendants (mid November), both opening this Fall. Both of them are already drawing rave reviews and, since you don’t have to gross that much to be a hit in the Fall, should be well received by the public. So what’s behind Clooney’s dominance of the Fall? Is it a tacit admission that the guy can’t exactly be counted on to gross summer blockbuster numbers or is it just an acceptance of the fact that Clooney would (admirably) rather make great movies than great amounts of money?