REEL FAILURES ON SCREENS Flick flops
★THEY are the mega-bucks blockbusters that bombed at the box office! Yesterday we revealed director Sir Ridley Scott blamed millennials for historical epic The Last Duel flopping in cinemas.
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The £75million flick, which stars Matt Damon, Adam Driver and Jodie Comer, suffered from a smartphone generation that “doesn’t ever want to be taught anything”, according to the 83-year-old.
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But it’s far from being the only big budget picture which failed to live up to its hype as
JAMES MOORE reports…
GIGLI: The 2003 mobster comedy starring real-life couple Ben Affleck and Jennifer Lopez was so bad that it was pulled from cinemas. It cost £56million but made just £5m.
KING ARTHUR: LEGENDS OF THE SWORD: Guy Ritchie’s £130m historical turkey lost around £20m, despite a cameo by David Beckham. A planned six-film franchise was cancelled.
CATS: Despite a star-studded cast including Taylor Swift and Judi Dench, the film, based on the hit musical, was dubbed one of the worst ever made. Even original creator Andrew Lloyd Webber called it “ridiculous”. It cost £75m but raked in just £55m.
THE LONE RANGER: Casting Johnny Depp as a native American in the 2013 western provoked a backlash. With costs estimated at £300m, it’s reckoned to have made losses in excess of a £100m.
BATTLEFIELD EARTH:
The futuristic movie starring John Travolta was named the worst film of the decade in 2010 and a producer has since said it should never
have been made. It brought in less than half of its £55m budget and was panned by cinema-goers. SAHARA: The 2005 treasurehunting adventure starring Penelope Cruz had a budget of £150m but lost £63m after production costs spiralled, with a multi-million pound plane crash that didn’t even make it into the final cut of the film.
THE 13TH WARRIOR: This 1999 Viking saga featuring Antonio Banderas cost a tidy £160m to bring to the big screen but made only £45m. Co-star Omar Sharif was so disappointed he even temporarily retired from acting. THE ADVENTURES OF PLUTO NASH: This 2002 sci-fi comedy starred comedian Eddie Murphy as a smuggler running a nightclub on the moon and cost £75m to make. But the film was mauled by the critics and made just £5m back.
47 RONIN: Costing an estimated £160m, the 2013 samurai fantasy adventure starred Keanu Reeves but only notched up £100m in cinemas globally. Despite its losses, a sequel is in the pipeline.
MARS NEEDS MOMS: An animated 3D sci-fi flick from 2011, which sees a boy try to rescue his mum from aliens, got mixed reviews despite costing £112m thanks to motion capture technology. It scooped just £29m.
CUTTHROAT ISLAND: This swashbuckler from 1995 starring Geena Davis was plagued by production problems and expensive sets. Branded the biggest box office bomb by Guinness World Records, its losses adjusted for inflation were an eye-watering £110m.
MONSTER TRUCKS: A 2016 film about a teenager who finds a monster living in his truck, this crashed and burned at the box office. Made for £93m, ticket sales only reached around £47m.
JOHN CARTER: The 2012 fantasy adventure set on Mars was one of the most expensive movies ever made at over £260m but was dubbed a “big budget fiasco” after making only around £200m.