No hits yet so far this year, in terms of films released on or after Jan 1.

May not have any money makers until (potentially) SCREAM 7 which is coming in late February.

Crime 101 starring Chris Hemsworth, Mark Ruffalo and Halle Berry made 15 M this weekend but it cost 90 M plus to make.

The sci-fi film MERCY starring Chris Pratt which opened in late January is another failure. Hasn't even made back its 60 M budget worldwide. It has grossed less than 25 M domestically.

It's a pretty tall order for Pratt to be convincing as anything other than a dummy.
He should be sticking to roles like Star-Lord and Andy Dwyer from "Parks & Rec".

quote:

Originally posted by Tommy C:
No hits yet so far this year, in terms of films released on or after Jan 1.

May not have any money makers until (potentially) SCREAM 7 which is coming in late February.

"Send Help" from Sam Raimi has already made a nice profit before streaming and all that. I saw it and it was pretty good.

quote:

Originally posted by Tommy C:
The sci-fi film MERCY starring Chris Pratt which opened in late January is another failure. Hasn't even made back its 60 M budget worldwide. It has grossed less than 25 M domestically.

I haven't seen a lick of promotion for this film. Apparently it's already been release and this is the first I'm hearing of it. Hard to sell tickets to a film nobody knows about.

There is another sci-fi film coming up in March starring Ryan Gosling called PROJECT HAIL MARY.

I can guarantee that the movie won't be a hit. They need a better title. That doesn't sound like an adventure in space, at all...

Despite poor reviews, Scream 7 opened to 64 M domestically which is terrific for a horror film. Worldwide it made 97 M.

quote:

Originally posted by Tommy C:
Despite poor reviews, Scream 7 opened to 64 M domestically which is terrific for a horror film. Worldwide it made 97 M.

I saw that box office number and couldn't believe it. The reviews were absolutely horrible, without exception, and it smashes the franchise record.

However, there are reasons for it. "Scream" is a known title. Neve Campbell, Courtney Cox and even Matthew Lillard are back. There is no other good competition at the box office this weekend. Many areas on the East Coast have had terrible weather for weeks and people have been shut inside. Horror movies always have an audience and a guy with a big knife doesn't cost the studio 200M.

Finally, not all movies need to be profound or even coherent. If the audience thinks they are entertained, then they are.

So here comes "The Bride" this weekend and I'm thinking that "Scream 7" will either stay on top or probably be beaten by Pixar's "Hoppers", since I couldn't even get passed the Bride's reviews. Not all bad, a couple terrible, but the description alone makes me see why it's another notch in Christian Bale's repertory of unwatchable films.

"The Bride" is called a "scrappy punk feminist tragicomedy" in Variety and "one of the absolute worst movies I have had the displeasure of watching in this job" in The New York Post. It's also been called "a Bonnie and Clyde-esque take on a Universal Monsters movie" in Total Film. Not surprising as it was written and directed by Maggie Gyllenhaal, who has never been shy about her opinions.

Having perused the plot, and knowing Bale's taste in jobs, I tend to agree with the New York Post without wasting my time or money. How is it that someone did not learn from "Joker: Folie a Deux". There is no audience for these types of mixed-up concoctions except for the "brave artists" who make them. Why does anyone keep funding them when they are too niche to be popular entertainment?

Perhaps this is why unpretentious, by the numbers, slasher movies can still look good in comparison. We will see what the box office says.

They are predicting that The Bride is going to bomb this weekend. Cost at least 90 M to make and it may gross 10-15 M.

Who greenlights these types of films? How can you spend so much money making a movie that clearly has limited appeal ? And then when it fails, people are "shocked."

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Originally posted by Tommy C:
How can you spend so much money making a movie that clearly has limited appeal ?

Because (as has been proven time and time again) in Hollywood, "nobody knows anything."

quote:

Originally posted by Tommy C:
They are predicting that The Bride is going to bomb this weekend.

It already did, way back in 1985 when "The Bride" starring Sting, Jennifer Beals, Clancy Brown and David Rappaport lost a small fortune for the time. With all this talk of a feminist Bride of Frankenstein, how come nobody remembers the original idea in the original movie?

"The Bride" from 1985 was not a good film, mainly because neither Sting or Beals could act and they were onscreen a lot. However, the secondary story with Brown as The Monster and Rappaport as his tragic friend was straight out of "Mice and Men" and keeps it interesting. Not to spoil it, but this story even has a happy ending. You can still find it somewhere, I'm sure.

So Gyllenhaal can't claim dibs on the idea, not even on the title, and I don't know why it hasn't been mentioned among all this groundbreaking punk feminist talk.

I'm going to go see it since I like just about every actor in it. I think they're trying get some more of what they got with Gerwig's "Barbie", a story that resonated certainly in part because of its Progressive ideas.

Emerald Fennell is working well in that space with "Wuthering Heights" having just crossed 200 million in international grosses, coming on the heels of her earlier films "Promising Young Woman" and "Saltburn", both critically acclaimed, but with each having topped out at only 20 million in final grosses.

Maybe Jessie Buckley's imminent Academy Award win for "Hamnet" will draw some extra eyes to "The Bride". She is a fantastic actress, and was nominated for an Oscar for Gyllenhaal's previous film (and directorial debut), "The Lost Daughter", so there is some pedigree there, although that movie made ZERO in American theaters since it didn't even get a domestic theatrical release during the Covid era. In those terms, the returns for "The Bride" will literally be infinitely better than they were for Maggie's first film, no matter what they are.

The Bride made only 7.6 M this weekend in North America, about half of what they expected. Only 13 M worldwide. Horrible

Haha, maybe they should've tried "The Bride of Barbie" instead.

SCREAM 7 dropped alot in its second week, but it will probably reach 100 M domestically by next week, the first film of 2026 to do so.

quote:

Originally posted by chesspieceface:
Haha, maybe they should've tried "The Bride of Barbie" instead.

Probably wouldn't work now either.

Despite being a cultural movement in it's time and making a fortune for all concerned, "Barbie" has faded away from relevance rather quickly. Mattel didn't cash in on the merchandise as much as they wanted and nobody is rushing to watch it again like a Christman classic. Upon further examination, and after all the hype, "Barbie" is an abrasive film that insults at least the male half of its audience and was only visually constructed for younger kids.

It was a message movie, if you needed the message. Just look at Ryan Gosling's poor Ken.

First dumb as a post, love struck Ken. Then arrogant and misogynistic when aware of his power. And finally bested and discarded as an unnecessary accessory.

Talk about toxic masculinity, the only good Kens were the marginally weak, damaged and unpopular ones. Then Barbie becomes a real girl. With all the money, why has Barbie 2 not been made yet? Maybe no one is asking for it.

Not to get off hits and misses, but I feel stuck trying to find films I enjoy these days. You can have an entertaining story and still pitch a message, if you don't beat the audience over the head with it and it's not a fringe idea. You know the last best film I saw, last year's "Predator Badlands". Si-Fi action and a message.

Speaking about Barbie and Ryan Gosling, I recently saw the Denzel Washington high school football movie REMEMBER THE TITANS, for the first time, from way back in the year 2000.

19 year old Gosling is in that one. The film also had future stars Kate Bosworth and Hayden Panettiere in it, also.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Tommy C,

And speaking of Ryan Gosling, look for his "Project Hail Mary" to be a hit in a few days. I saw the trailer and wasn't moved to put it on my schedule, but I can see where his cute little rock alien companion is going to make it a space buddy movie. Would not be surprised if it goes for a big opening.

Saw "The Bride" yesterday. It was pretty good, and I think it'll be a "cult" movie down the line, although I'm sure that's not what they were looking for with that budget. Buckley is absolutely mesmerizing in the lead role (actually two roles), and Christian Bale is essentially playing Karloff's Frankenstein Monster, something like 40 years down the line from when the original Universal Monster movies were set. He's terrific, too. There's plenty of references to the whole mythos filtered through the century-plus journey it's made through pop culture, including even an homage to Mel Brooks' "Young Frankenstein", of all things. Definitely recommended.