Focus Features has given an awards-season opening date of Nov. 18 to Tom Ford’s “Nocturnal Animals,” starring Jake Gyllenhaal and Amy Adams.

Focus will expand “Animals” on Nov. 23 and go wide on Dec. 9. It bought worldwide rights last year at the Cannes Film Festival in a deal costing more than $20 million.

Michael Shannon, Aaron Taylor-Johnson, Isla Fisher, Armie Hammer, Ellie Bamber and Laura Linney also star in the drama. The film is an adaptation of Austin Wright’s 1993 novel “Tony And Susan,” described as a two-part story within a story.

The first part follows a woman named Susan who receives a book manuscript from her ex-husband — a man whom she left 20 years earlier — asking for her opinion of his writing. The second revolves around the manuscript, titled “Nocturnal Animals,” about a man whose family vacation turns violent.

“Nocturnal Animals” marks Ford’s return to directing, seven years after the release of “A Single Man,” which Ford self-financed. TWC distributed “A Single Man,” which grossed $24 million worldwide. Colin Firth received a best actor Oscar nomination for his role in the film as a depressed gay British professor living in Los Angeles in 1962.

Then in this interview on RogerEbert.com, he doubled down. “This country’s filled with ignorant jackasses,” he said. “The big red dildo running through the middle of our country needs to be annexed to be its own country of moronic a–holes. You can call it the United States of Moronic F—ing A–holes.”