Some were highly anticipated, some looked intriguing on the surface but failed to deliver,
and some struggled to even make the public aware of their existence, but they all have
one thing in common: they tanked badly at the box office.
Based on a notoriously dangerous real-life New Jersey theme park, Action Point starred
Johnny Knoxville of Jackass fame as the irresponsible owner of the most dangerous vacation spot
in America.
Featuring plenty of actual, life-and-limb threatening stunts from its seasoned performers,
Action Point promised lowbrow belly laughs along the lines of the Jackass film series.
There was only one problem: the movie's awful.
Fans found the theme park narrative to be awkwardly grafted onto what could easily have
just been another Jackass movie.
Even though Knoxville practically killed himself making the movie, the stunts were also seen
as uninspired and the laughs were few and far between.
Despite the premise and the pedigree to be a potential horror classic, Winchester was
just a disappointment.
Dame Helen Mirren starred as Sarah Winchester, heiress to the gun manufacturer's fortune,
who spent decades building strange additions onto her famous mansion.
The film posited that her bizarre architecture choices were driven by something decidedly
supernatural
Unfortunately, Winchester relies on cheap jump scares and questionable plotting in lieu
of anything resembling atmosphere or tension.
"I trust everything has been to your satisfaction so far?"
"I cannot fault the hospitality."
"it's quite a special house, is it not?"
The John Travolta biopic Gotti got a lot of press due to its star and subject, infamous
mob boss John Gotti, leading up to its screening at Cannes.
But its reception at the festival was less than rapturous, and upon its June release
in the U.S., few critics bothered to review it.
Literally every single one that did panned it — leading the film's social media account
to pin its subsequent poor box office showing on unfair negative reviews.
Literally every aspect of the film's production was roundly blasted, from its lack of coherent
themes and ham-fisted direction to Travolta's terrible lead performance.
The movie failed to even make back half of its paltry $10 million budget, which is a
sure sign of movie failure.
A futuristic sci-fi thriller with a cast most directors would kill for didn't stop Hotel
Artemis from completely tanking at the box office.
Part of the problem was that director Drew Pearce's preference for style over substance
resulted in a great premise falling flat.
Worse, the film's marketing, largely free of plot or character details, did nothing
to pull audiences in.
Those willing to take the plunge were met with a convoluted plot laced with laborious,
needlessly expository dialogue.
Despite its modest $15 million budget, Hotel Artemis didn't even crack half that at the
domestic box office as any good hotel owner will tell you, you just can't turn a profit
with that kind of vacancy rate.
The Darkest Minds seemed to come with a built-in audience.
It's an adaptation of the well-received young adult novel of the same name and features
superpowered characters that could have come straight from the latest X-Men movie.
Unfortunately, critics took the film to task for being muddled, confusing and trite and
it whiffed with audiences as well, failing to even clear $6 million in its opening weekend.
Many critics felt that Minds is guilty of pandering to its audience, giving them a predictable
story full of tired cliches and obvious plot twists.
In the case of The Darkest Minds, it seems like assembling rehashed plot points from
better movies wasn't enough to get audiences to care.
Many critics thought that Alpha would be a welcome return to form for Albert Hughes,
who was partly responsible for the classic hard-boiled crime pictures Menace II Society
and Dead Presidents.
Alpha tells the story of a prehistoric youth who becomes separated from his hunting group,
and in order to survive, partners up with a lone wolf abandoned by its pack.
It's a thrilling, gorgeously-shot adventure, but while the film scored with critics, it
failed to connect with audiences.
With an advertising campaign which seemed to be aimed more squarely at dog lovers than
fans of epic adventure, Alpha simply didn't generate the kind of positive word of mouth
that it needed.
It also had the misfortune of squaring off against Crazy Rich Asians and The Meg, two
films which destroyed at the box office.
Alpha failed to make back its budget domestically, but it seems destined for a robust second
life on home video.