Oh, the dreaded January movie releases. It’s almost a stereotype that a film that gets released in the first month of the new year is being dumped by the studio so it won’t bomb as badly if it were playing later on during the year. Most industries are slow in January; you’re getting back into the swing of things after the holidays, and that takes a few weeks. So that’s why, even in a billion-dollar-a-year industry like the movie business, some films have to fill the void in the box office even in the slow season.
However, January film releases have seen their fair share of surprises. Sometimes it feels like a studio actually rolled the dice with a cool concept for a film that has the potential for big returns. It’s also a safe time to have a film that is high in concept but low in cost hit the screen, so if it’s a home run, executives can reap the rewards of a hit in January. Here are a few examples of January not sucking at the box office.
20Orange County - January 11th, 2002
Orange County
Orange Countystars Colin Hanks as a soon-to-be high school graduate who just wants to be a writer and yearns to get into Stanford and study under a prestigious professor and writer. When his guidance counselor sends the wrong transcript with his college application to the school, he now must prove who he is and how he yearns to attend the school, and the only person who can help him is his loser brother Lance (Jack Black).
A Star Studded Cast
Orange Countyis bound to get lost in the shuffle of early 2000s movies. But everyone in this film is on point. Colin Hanks plays the lead character, Shaun, who is likable and just trying to get the hell out of southern California. Jack Black is at his best as a sidekick character. Something that may have been beneath him career-wise at the time, and yet he owns it. It’s also chock-full of supporting roles from Lily Tomlin and Catherine O’Hara, Harold Ramis, John Lithgow, and Chevy Chase. It’s also produced by MTV and has a fun southern California rock vibe to the soundtrack. At an 82-minute runtime, you can’t go wrong with this comedy.
Rent on Prime Video
Related:Every Movie Releasing in Theaters in January 2024
19Matinee - January 29th, 1993
Matineefollows a group of teenagers who are about to go to an opening-night screening of an eccentric director’s new movie, “Mant!”. John Goodman plays the role of director Lawrence Woolsey, who has his big sci-fi monster movie premiere in Key West, Florida. He utilizes the current state of affairs to help draw excitement, as in the world around the event, the Cuban Missile Crisis is taking place.
An Underrated Joe Dante Classic
Leave it toJoe Dante to make a masterpieceof a movie that we all kind of forgot about in the early 1990s. There are a lot of great genre-specific filmmaking tactics being used here. A period film that has a dramatic historical moment at the backdrop of it and is seen through the eyes of a child. And it was also about the love for monster movies in the early 1960s. Joe Dante has, time and time again, made films like that, which have wowed us time and time again.
18Leprachaun - January, 8th, 1993
Leprechaun
A few weeks beforeMatinee, horror got a new face of evil.Leprechaun,starring Jennifer Aniston (you forgot that, didn’t you?) was released, thus creating a franchise about a murderous and monstrous leprechaun (Warwick Davis), who follows a man home from a trip from Ireland where some of his gold was stolen from him. The little creature goes on a murderous rampage to get his gold back.
A Cult Classic Holiday Horror
Horror was falling apart a bit in the early 1990s after a successful decade in the 1980s within the genre.Leprechaunwasn’t the hero many fans asked for, but it’s what they got for its new face of horror. As the franchise went on, it seemed to fall apart a bit and get even more campy than the one before it. But Warwick Davis is the film’s saving grace. Under an amazing makeup job, he brings some good scares, humor, and Irish charm to the role. What isn’t there to like aboutLeprechaunand most of its sequels? It’s the ultimate turn-your-brain off horror franchise.
Stream on Tubi
17Juice - January 17th, 1992
Juiceis about four friends from Harlem who begin to dabble in petty criminal attempts. The leader of the pack, Bishop (Tupac Shakur), becomes quite trigger-happy and plots a robbery one night. It, however, conflicts with the ideas of another member of the group, Q (Omar Epps). He is someone who aspires to be a DJ and gets a gig that conflicts with the night of the robbery. Tensions ensue among the two group members.
A Classic Commentary on the Loss of Youthful Innocence
The word “overlooked” may be used from time to time in this list, if you haven’t noticed by now. Most films in January are a bit undervalued. But Ernest Dickerson’s tale of innocence being lost in the inner city streets of Harlem is a heartbreaking tale.If only Tupac had lived longer and didn’t get mixed up with the wrong crowds in the music industry, who knows what he would have been able to do with his acting talents? He’s electric in this film.Juiceis a cautionary tale with themes that date back to old gangster pictures likeLittle CeaserandPublic Enemy.
Stream on Max via Prime Video
16Hostel - August 25, 2025
Released nationwide on January 6th, 2006, Eli Roth’sHostelis about venturing across Europe gone wrong was a big hit in the horror genre. Best friends Josh and Paxton (Derek Richardson and Jay Hernandez) stop off in Amsterdam on their summer trip, where they indulge in sex and drugs and then find themselves tied down to a chair being tortured by other fierce-looking humans as part of a deadly game for the wealthy.
Eli Roth’s Sophomore Classic
Eli Roth didn’t miss a step from his indie hit Cabin Fever to his big-budget movie attempt withHostel. On the heels of two Saw movies,Hostelhelped further the torture porn subgenre. The film is loaded with moments that make anyone squeamish look away. There is also a little cameo in the movie from Quentin Tarantino as a shirtless man yelling out the window, as well as Takasi Miike showing up in a cameo as well. Another fun fact:Hostelwas based on a real-life website based in Thailandthat claimed that for $10,000, customers could commit murder via the website.
Stream on Frevee
15Smokin' Aces - January 26th, 2007
Las Vegas magician and criminal turned snitch Buddy ‘Aces’ Israel (Jeremy Piven) has agreed to testify against mob boss Primo Sparazza. Before he can enter the witness protection program, Sparazza puts a bounty on Israel’s head while the snitch hides out in a penthouse overlooking Lake Tahoe. A group of eccentric hitmen and women make their way there to do the job and collect the bounty.
The Perfect Action Movie for January
IfSmokin' Aceshad had a June or July release, even in 2007, a year prior to the beginning of the MCU, it would have bombed. Sometimes it’s all about marketing a movie to fit the right weekend, andSmokin' Acesjust sounds perfect for an early-year release. The characters are entertaining; there isn’t too much depth to the film, but it’s a wild ride, and just look at this cast. Ryan Reynolds and Ray Liotta make a great young and aging FBI team. Alicia Keys, Chris Pine (pre-Star Trek), Ben Affleck in two scenes, Common, Andy Garcia, Joel Edgerton,and Taraji P. Henson.
14Split - January 20th, 2017
Splitis directed by M. Night Shyamalanand stars James McAvoy in one of the best roles of his career. With an initial release in late 2016, the film really hit traction with its bigger release in January 2017. In the role of Kevin (McAvoy), a man with 23 personalities, he kidnaps three teenage girls, and what’s even scarier is the emergence of the 24th one.
M. Night Shyamalan’s Big Return
For many years, people thought that Shyamalan had fallen hard due to one box office blunder after another over the last decade.Splitmarked his return to box office success and showed us that he could still make a heck of a suspenseful movie. It was a landmark movie in the career of Anna Taylor-Joy, who was fresh off her big debut in The Witch the year earlier, and a huge credit to James McAvoy here. He had been around the block for a few years in great movies, but boy does this film show his range and make him now able to rock it in genre movies.
13Don’t Be a Menace to South Central While Drinking Your Juice in the Hood - June 01, 2025
By 1996, many films about life in the hood had come to pass.Don’t Be a Menace to South Central While Drinking Your Juice in the Hood(orDon’t Be a Menacefor short) is a spoof of movies like Menace to Society and Boyz in the Hood done in a way that only Shawn and Marlon Wayans could do. It’s the tale of a guy trying to not be a part of the street lifestyle of South Central Los Angeles but is in close contact with his gang member cousin, so a series of hilarious spoof-like situations ensue.
A Classic Wayans Brothers Comedy
Marlon and Shawn always deliver on material like this. Don’t Be a Menace is a classic comedy that takes tropes that we have seen and shines a comedic light on them. It was made on a $3 million budget and had a domestic return of $20 million. Small numbers in the eyes of Hollywood, but it kept the Wayans making movies. We would see them do this kind of work again at the turn of the millennium with Scary Movie and many other comedies of this nature. Don’t Be a Menace has become a cult classic of the 1990s.
Stream on Starz via Apple TV
12Tremors - January 19th, 1990
InTremors, Fred Ward and Kevin Bacon play repairmen in a desert town called Perfection in the middle of Nevada. They plan to skip town, but before doing so, they begin to encounter a series of murders linked to strange, grizzly-looking creatures. Soon, they become the last line of defense against these worm-like underground creatures that want to eat any human they can that walks on the ground.
Tremors Kicked Off the 1990s Era of Genre Films
Kevin Bacon, Fred Ward, and…wait for it… Reba McEntire stars in this horror comedy that kicked off the decade in a fun way.Tremorsis a creature feature that drawsa little inspiration from the novelDune.But screenwriter S.S. Wilson got the idea for it while working out in the desert of California while in the navy. He rested on a rock for a few minutes and wondered what it would be like if a creature stalked him from underground, and he could not get off the rock.
Related:Why Tremors is the Perfect B-Horror Movie
11From Dusk Till Dawn - January 19th, 1996
From Dusk Till Dawn
From Dusk Till Dawnstars George Clooney and Quentin Tarantino as the infamous Gecko brothers, who have pulled off a bank robbery and need to lie low. They hit the Mexican border and kidnapped a preacher man and his family. The criminals and their hostages find a hideout at a topless bar that soon is revealed to be a hot spot for vampires to hang out in. Now all the humans in the club must band together and survive the night.
Tarantino and Rodriguez Make Movie Magic
With a script written by both Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez,From Dusk til Dawnis two superstars behind the camera, firing on all cylinders. To this day, this may be Robert Rodriguez’s best film. George Clooney would never do something like this now, so to see him in this role is a real treat, as is, of course, the iconic, seductive Salma Hayek dance number that turns utterly terrifying.
