Monday Morning Quarterback Part II
By BOP Staff
February 11, 2015
Kim Hollis: Seventh Son, the long-delayed and troubled film from Legendary Pictures and Universal, earned just $7.2 million this weekend. What went wrong with this one?
Jay Barney: This one also has an interesting history, but the numbers are equally as bad as Jupiter Ascending. While the overseas box office has actually been quite good with over $80 million so far, an opening of seven million in the United States is terrible. Sure, it is opening in a crowded field, but coming out of the gate in fourth place barely ahead of weak films like Project Almanac or Black or White is awful. The budget was in the $95 million range so its domestic run is going to be pretty terrible.
Felix Quinonez: I think this is terrible but not at all surprising. When a movie is released so long after production, its fate is pretty much sealed. It seems to be doing well overseas and maybe has a chance to break even, but I don't see much of a chance for this to make any profit.
Michael Lynderey: It's really too bad that another fantasy film didn't do well. This genre has really faltered at the box office outside of the obvious mega hits. It's also odd that Jeff Bridges has essentially staked out his own somewhat Depp-like territory, playing the same bizarre character in a series of underperforming action-fantasy-science fiction movies. On the other hand, between Eddie Redmayne in Jupiter Ascending and Julianne Moore in Seventh Son, we did get to see the two Oscar lead acting frontrunners play villains in hammy genre films this weekend, which is a pleasure of its own.
Ryan Kyle: If your film costs over $100 million to make and the opening weekend can't even crack double-digits, you can't call this anything other than a complete disaster. Being on the shelf for nearly three years, at least Legendary Pictures got some kind of return on their investment, but I'm sure Legendary and Warner Bros. this weekend would have preferred to put these two turkeys straight-to-VOD and bypass the critical and commercial drubbing.
What I find most fascinating is that for a movie based off of a YA-novel, the exit polls accounted for more than half of the audience being 30 years of age or older. Either Jeff Bridges has a passionate group of fans or the marketing really failed to identify and connect with its target, and this statistic highlights it.
David Mumpower: With regards to box office, we frequently mention how much more a film has to gross overseas relative to domestic box office in order to turn a profit. The numbers on Seventh Son will have to be historic for it to break even. It's going to need at least $350 million overseas, so $83.6 million is only a nice start rather than a sign of future solvency.
As for the movie, my primary thought is that Kit Harington's attempts to leverage Game of Thrones into a movie career thus far have been jaw-dropping failures. On the plus side, it's always nice to see Jason Scott Lee to come out of seclusion long enough to appear in a film. I wish he enjoyed making movies more, because he has the talent to be a superstar.
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