New at BOP: Review: Matrix Resurrections Movie Review: Moonfall Movie Reviews: Scream The #1 Movie in America November Forecast The Many Saints of Newark October Forecast New Trivia Question All site updates Share & Save   Tweet Print this column

Michael Lynderey: It's one of those movies where even I wasn't sure two weeks ago if it was going to get a wide release or not. And it had really, really, negative reviews. Critics have shown no mercy. But hey! They beat Mortdecai and were just short of overtaking American Sniper, too, give or take a few million...

David Mumpower: Never has so much been made over so little as the world has done with the storytelling talent of George Lucas. I literally laughed out loud when I saw him complaining about Star Wars 7 not including his ideas. Disney should put that quote on the poster to enhance box office by 50%. With regards to Strange Magic, I'd sooner watch Practical Magic. (Google it, kids.) This movie's existence is akin to having to hire that creepy kid as an intern because his uncle is your boss' boss. To get the Star Wars toy revenue, Strange Magic had to be made. Nobody likes it yet here it is in all of its flailing glory.

Kim Hollis: Mortdecai, a comedy featuring Johnny Depp and Gwyneth Paltrow, earned just $4.2 million this weekend. What went wrong here?

Jason Barney: For Lionsgate, this is going to be a pretty serious misfire. Usually I am not one to pile on and take shots at an actor going through a bit of a dry spell, but it is hard to ignore that audiences are no longer embracing Depp’s projects. Mortdecai was made for around $60 million, so this opening is almost as bad as last week’s Blackhat. It isn’t as awful, but the reception is just as horrible. A film made for so much opening in the range of less than $5 million? Ouch. No scenario exists where any positive news can be found in the ashes of this failure. It opens in ninth? Going up against films that have been in theaters for weeks? Mortdecai will be a non box office factor by the time people read these words.

Edwin Davies: Depp's involvement was probably a big problem since his brand has been damaged pretty terribly by a string of bad choices, but for me the marketing was a real problem. There's a great article on Vulture taking apart how obnoxious the Mortdecai campaign was, particularly the way that the ads seemed to assume that everyone knew who the character was, and therefore they should be excited to see Johnny Depp playing him. That level of presumption, of assuming that people are on board when no one has heard of the character or the books the film is based on, meant that the ads did a terrible job of selling what the story was or even the general tone of the movie. There was probably a ceiling on how well the film could do on account of Depp's involvement and the bad reviews, but a campaign that actually tried to introduce the character to the audience might have helped.

Continued:       1       2       3       4