Maple Pictures is looking to score a box-office hit with the comedy Good Luck Chuck, opening on 250 screens Friday, alongside other wide releases including Columbia’s sci-fi thriller Resident Evil: Extinction and the Universal teen comedy Sydney White.

Chuck, starring comedian Dane Cook and Jessica Alba, about a cursed dentist and an accident-prone penguin specialist, received a big push from Maple, with marketing comprised of posters and trailers, and a booth at Toronto’s recent beer festival. There were also promotional campaigns with companies including the online dating site Lavalife and MuchMusic, through which viewers could win a chance to attend the red-carpet screening in Los Angeles.

‘We’re hoping for good things… we’ve worked very hard on creating a unique and effective marketing campaign,’ Maple VP of publicity and promotion Angie Burns tells Playback Daily. Chuck is distributed by Lionsgate in the U.S.

The busy week will also see the theatrical debuts of recent TIFF titles including Montreal director François Girard’s Silk, the Alberta-shot The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford and Paul Haggis’ In the Valley of Elah.

The Canada/Italy/Japan copro Silk, a romantic period drama starring Keira Knightley and Michael Pitt, bows on 61 screens across Quebec with 47 French- and 14 English-language copies. It will play in English Canada next week in Toronto and Vancouver.

Warner Independent has opted for a platform release for Elah, opening it on 26 screens in cities including Edmonton, Victoria, Ottawa, Toronto and Halifax. The distributor will add 14 more screens next week and 16 additional screens on Oct. 5.

Jesse James opens exclusively in Toronto on Friday, followed by Calgary on Oct. 5. A spokesperson with distributor Warner Bros. says release dates in other Canadian cities have not been confirmed.

Meanwhile, TIFF People’s Choice award winner Eastern Promises from David Cronenberg opens wide on about 200 screens via Odeon Films after a stellar limited-release run last weekend.

ThinkFilm’s space documentary In the Shadow of the Moon, an audience award winner at Sundance, opens on one screen each in Toronto and Montreal, while Seville Pictures will release the Chinese title Sunflower on one screen at Toronto’s Carlton Theatres.

Coming up on Sept. 28, Seville will release Roger Spottiswoode’s Shake Hands with the Devil across Canada, while Mongrel Media will open the drama The Jane Austen Book Club.