8 Movies That Bombed So Hard They Bankrupted Studios

Australian Cinephile

Even The Man of Steel isn't exempt from killing his own studio through a bad box office performance.

Transcript

00:00Not every movie can be a box office smash, and that's okay.

00:03How much money a movie takes in often has little relation to its actual quality.

00:07Plenty of films are just too niche for a wide audience

00:10and go on to achieve dedicated cult followings once they're released on home media.

00:14But there's a difference between being a box office disappointment and being a box office bomb.

00:19And there's an even bigger difference between being a box office bomb

00:22and losing your studio so much money that they are forced to declare bankruptcy.

00:26And so with that in mind, I'm Ellie with WhatCulture,

00:29here with eight movies that bombed so hard that they bankrupt their studios.

00:35Number 8. The Golden Compass, New Line Cinema

00:38New Line was on top of the world back in 2007.

00:42Since 1967, the production company had built up a reputation for taking chances

00:47on oddball films that other parts of Hollywood might pass on.

00:50A Nightmare on Elm Street and the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles films

00:54were their greatest successes until 2003,

00:57when they produced the Lord of the Rings trilogy.

01:00It was easily their most profitable investment yet,

01:03with the films grossing nearly $3 billion worldwide.

01:06Riding high on this success, New Line immediately put $180 million

01:10towards adapting another popular fantasy book series for the big screen,

01:15Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials trilogy.

01:17Unfortunately, this stillborn film franchise did not perform quite as well as they hoped.

01:23It only took in $70 million in the United States,

01:26and while it performed much better abroad,

01:28New Line had sold the overseas distribution rights to fund the film's production.

01:32This meant that they never saw a dime of that foreign revenue.

01:36This was regarded as one mistake too much by parent company Time Warner,

01:40and New Line was swallowed up by Warner Brothers Pictures

01:43just two months after The Golden Compass's release.

01:46Number 7. The Lady Vanishes, Hammer Productions

01:50Hammer Productions and Alfred Hitchcock are two titans of British cinema.

01:54Hammer is still known worldwide for its timeless Hammer horror films,

01:58such as The Quatermass Experiment and Christopher Lee's iconic performance

02:02in their Dracula adaptation.

02:04Hitchcock is, of course, known for equally well-regarded classics

02:07such as Psycho and Vertigo.

02:09So you'd think that Hammer Productions' remaking a Hitchcock masterpiece

02:13would be a recipe for critical and box office success.

02:16Sadly, what looks good on paper doesn't always work out so well in reality.

02:21By 1979, Hammer's gothic horror films had fallen out of fashion,

02:25and they attempted to pivot towards more serious fare

02:27with films like The Lady Vanishes.

02:30But critics were lukewarm at best towards it,

02:32and it didn't exactly make a splash at the box office.

02:35This final financial disaster, after a long string of them,

02:38forced the studio into a long hibernation.

02:41Since a revival in 2007, they have been lending their name

02:44to the odd horror release, but they are undoubtedly a shadow

02:48of what they once were.

02:49Number 6.

02:50Looney Tunes Back in Action, Warner Bros. Feature Animation

02:54Remember when Brendan Fraser was the big star of the moment

02:57back in the early 2000s?

02:59After The Mummy hit our screens, Hollywood were determined

03:01to push him as the next big leading man

03:04and put him front and centre on most of their posters.

03:07So what went wrong?

03:08Well, apparently starring in movies like this one

03:11certainly didn't help.

03:12By all accounts, the production was a complete mess

03:15behind the scenes.

03:16Warner Bros. initially wanted it to be a sequel

03:18to 1996's Space Jam,

03:20but Michael Jordan refused to sign on again.

03:23Then they changed it to Spy Jam

03:25and tried to lure Jackie Chan into playing the title role.

03:28This also fell through, and eventually,

03:30long-time Looney Tunes fan Joe Dante

03:32was brought on to direct what would become Back in Action.

03:35He received absolutely no creative freedom,

03:38and the film didn't even make its $80 million budget

03:41back at the box office,

03:42only managing to pull in $68.5 million.

03:46Warner Bros. went from planning to release

03:48more Looney Tunes movies as soon as possible

03:51to shutting down its feature film animation division entirely.

03:54Now, just for the record, I personally love this film.

03:57It is my childhood,

03:58so I won't hear a negative thing said about it,

04:01and that is all.

04:025. It's a Wonderful Life, Liberty Films

04:06In the years before World War II,

04:08Frank Capra had earned himself the title

04:10of Hollywood Legend and three Academy Awards

04:13for Best Director.

04:14After returning from the war,

04:15he founded the production company Liberty Films in 1945,

04:19along with three other former servicemen.

04:22The very first film of the new company

04:23was to be It's a Wonderful Life.

04:26Unfortunately, while the Christmas classic

04:27actually did reasonably well at the box office,

04:30it was nowhere near successful enough

04:32to recoup its production costs of $2.3 million,

04:35and the fledgling studio found itself facing financial ruin

04:38barely a year into its existence.

04:41It was quickly swallowed up by Paramount,

04:43who locked Capra and his friends

04:44into multi-picture contracts with their studio.

04:47Liberty Films would only go on to release

04:49one more film under its label,

04:511948's State of the Union,

04:53before finally being dissolved in 1951.

04:56Capra later wrote of this failed venture

04:58that its purpose was to,

05:00one, influence the course of Hollywood films,

05:02two, make four former army officers independently rich,

05:05and three, virtually prove fatal to my professional career.

05:09Ouch, truly his own worst critic.

05:11Number four, Battlefield Earth Franchise Pictures.

05:15Say the words box office bomb to somebody,

05:17and there's a strong chance that this will be

05:19one of the films they think of first.

05:21John Travolta, a devout Scientologist,

05:23had been trying for years to get an adaptation

05:25of L. Ron Hubbard's Battlefield Earth greenlit.

05:29In 1998, he finally found a financial backer

05:31in the newly founded franchise Pictures,

05:34and things just went downhill from there.

05:36Upon its release in 2000,

05:37Battlefield Earth was savaged by every critic alive,

05:41amateur and professional.

05:42Everything from the acting,

05:44to the direction,

05:45to the special effects,

05:46was torn to shreds,

05:47and the whole fiasco ended up making

05:49only $29.7 million

05:51against the $73 million budget.

05:54John Travolta,

05:55newly restored to the spotlight

05:56thanks to Pulp Fiction six years prior,

05:59found his reputation once again in tatters.

06:02The people running franchise Pictures

06:03were later found guilty of inflating

06:05the budgets of the likes of Battlefield Earth

06:07and other features to scam investors

06:10and filed for bankruptcy in 2007,

06:13leaving behind nothing more than a legacy

06:15of dodgy dealings and awful movies.

06:18Number three,

06:19Mars Needs Mums,

06:20Image Movers Digital.

06:22Robert Zemeckis has had a varied career,

06:24to say the least.

06:25You'll find well-regarded successes

06:27in his filmography,

06:28such as Forrest Gump or Back to the Future,

06:30but you'll also see more than a few misfires

06:32like What Lies Beneath or Welcome to Marwen.

06:35While he didn't direct Mars Needs Mums,

06:37it was made by his company Image Movers

06:40as part of a joint venture with Disney,

06:42and his fingerprints are all over it.

06:44The odd motion capture animation

06:46that Zemeckis had previously used

06:48in A Christmas Carol was on full display again,

06:50and it looked just as unsettling here.

06:53In fact, the entire thing just looks downright ugly.

06:56Audiences seem to think so too,

06:58as the movie took in only $39 million

07:00against its $150 million budget,

07:03which cemented it as Disney's

07:05biggest financial disaster ever.

07:07Even before the film's release,

07:08Disney and Image Movers announced

07:10that Image Movers Digital,

07:11the division that made the movie

07:13would be closed down.

07:15Shutting down your company

07:15after your release fails is one thing,

07:18but going bust before the movie is even released?

07:20That has got to hurt.

07:222. Heaven's Gate, United Artists

07:25From the mid-1960s to the early 1980s,

07:28Hollywood was a hotbed of experimentation.

07:31Legendary pioneers like Martin Scorsese,

07:33Robert Altman, and Francis Ford Coppola

07:35were being given unprecedented freedom

07:38to make the kinds of films they wanted to make,

07:40free from the studio restrictions

07:41of the preceding decades.

07:43This era gave us some of the greatest

07:45American films ever made,

07:47but it all had to end sometime.

07:49Still riding high from his best picture-winning classic,

07:52The Deer Hunter,

07:53director Michael Cimino decided to write a tale

07:56about a dispute between land barons and settlers

07:58in 1890s Wyoming.

08:01Upon its release in 1980,

08:02Heaven's Gate was derided by every industry publication

08:05as one of the worst movies ever made.

08:08The critical thrashing was so bad

08:10that United Artists actually pulled it

08:12from the theatres after just one week.

08:14They attempted to release it again a year later

08:16in a slightly shortened director's cut format,

08:18but that also performed horribly,

08:20only taking in $3.5 million

08:23against its $44 million budget.

08:26Not only did Heaven's Gate put United Artists

08:28out of business,

08:29with the failing studio eventually becoming part of MGM,

08:32it brought an end to the freedom

08:34that Maverick directors had enjoyed

08:36in Hollywood for so long.

08:38Number 1.

08:39Superman 4 The Quest for Peace

08:41The Canon Group

08:42When the first Superman feature film

08:44hit cinema screens in 1978,

08:46it changed the landscape of film forever.

08:49With its groundbreaking use of special effects

08:51and genuinely emotional moments,

08:53it was the first indication for Hollywood

08:55that superhero movies might be worth investing in.

08:58Naturally, it was followed by three sequels

09:00in an attempt to cash in as much as possible

09:03on this new franchise.

09:05But being in something only for the money

09:06can be perilous.

09:08Sometimes you still luck out

09:09and get a halfway decent end product,

09:11and other times you get Superman 4.

09:13The film looks noticeably cheap the whole way through,

09:16a result of having its $36 million budget

09:19slashed in half.

09:20A particularly hilarious example

09:22is a scene in which Superman

09:23is supposed to be approaching

09:25the United Nations building in New York City.

09:27Of course, any viewer with even a vague idea

09:29of what that building looks like

09:31can see that Superman is not even in America.

09:34The scene was in fact shot in Milton Keynes

09:36with very little effort made to hide that fact.

09:39The Canon Group, teetering on the brink of bankruptcy,

09:41even with the movie's reduced budget,

09:43was brought out by Pathé Communications

09:46the following year

09:47and soon ceased to exist altogether.

09:50Not so Superman.

09:51And that concludes our list.

09:53If you think we missed any,

09:54then do let us know in the comments below.

09:56And while you're there,

09:57don't forget to like and subscribe

09:58and tap that notification bell.

10:00Also head over to Twitter and follow us there.

10:03And I can be found across various social medias

10:05just by searching Ellie Littlechild.

10:07I've been Ellie with WhatCulture.

10:08I hope you have a magical day

10:10and I'll see you real soon.

Category

Transcript

Be the first to comment

Recommended