Is 47 Ronin the biggest BO Disaster in Years? (1 Viewer)

[mattCR]

It's a reasonable question. With a budget reportedly nearing $225M, it made about $1M in it's opening week in Japan, leading some to start wondering how bad this is going to get for Universal.

http://herald-review.com/blogs/decaturade/the-beautiful-disaster-of-ronin/article_1c51a756-6c1b-11e3-8fb6-001a4bcf887a.html

I wasn’t around in 1980 to take in the critical and public reaction to Michael Cimino’s western “Heaven’s Gate,” but it’s the kind of epic, crawling cinematic disaster that doesn’t happen very often, presumably because it all seems so obvious in hindsight. With “Heaven’s Gate,” it’s at least understandable how it all came to be. Cimino had been tagged an ascendant director, fresh off an Oscar win in 1979 for “The Deer Hunter.” The film was squarely in his hands and his studio, United Artists, had reason for their faith in him. Cimino, in fact, was only partially responsible for the final product, which was hacked apart in the editing room after negative early press screenings.

The upcoming “47 Ronin,” on the other hand, is a whole ‘nother beast. This film looks like it will be a disaster without any qualifications or defensibility, a true catastrophe that went wrong from the very beginning but was pushed and shoved to this ultimate conclusion. And for that reason, I find it very interesting.

Does ANYONE have this in their Christmas viewing list?

 

[Kevin EK]

I take it your response to their unfortunate opening would be "Woah".

Sorry, couldn't resist the Keanu Reeves reference...

 

[schan1269]

I think this movies enormous problem(I'm still watching it though) is Keanu.

Granted, there probably weren't many American actors ready to pay tribute to a Japanese yarn.

I just wonder how much accuracy there is going to be. Hell...even the Japanese film industry have never told this story "this big".

I have to ask if this is a "late to the party" re-make of Chushingura.

 

[atfree]

Reviews are crushing and I just saw news that Universal is taking a charge-off against 1st quarter earnings in anticipation of massive losses with this movie.

 

[Malcolm R]

It would be in the running with Jack the Giant Slayer and The Lone Ranger for biggest bomb of 2013. Disney reportedly took a charge off of $190M for TLR.

I remember when I first heard about Ronin 47 and its bizarrely massive budget, that it would likely be a disaster. Anyone heard any scuttlebutt about why a studio head would green light a $250M samurai movie starring Keanu Reeves?

 

[Michael Elliott]

RONIN 47 (and to a point, OLDBOY) just aren't interesting enough to mainstream America. I had forgotten all about this movie coming out and in all honesty, I actually mixed it up for the earlier Keanu movie that he directed earlier this year. If this film actually has a budget of $250, you really can't blame the movie or Keanu. That goes back to whoever said this was a good idea and turned over a check.

I've probably seen around 130+ movies at the theater this year and have yet to see a trailer for this thing. Considering the "big" movies opening tomorrow, I'm guessing Universal is just hoping for some crumbs.

 

[Ruz-El]

I'm a pretty big Samurai fan and was curious about this one. Unlike Michael, I've barely been to the cinema this year, but did see a trailer for this one prior to "Thor The Dark World" and got completely turned off on it. I'm all right with Reeves in the roll, after the Matrix, any question of him being able to carry a big action film should be answered with a "Yup, he can do it". The problem with this one is at best it looks like an Asian "The Hobbit" type special effects extravaganza. It has zero appeal to me, especially after more down and dirty fair like 13 Assassins and The Raid.

 

[Ejanss]

Is it the biggest disaster? Well, even for '13, there's still that little matter of "Oogieloves' Big Balloon Adventure".

But yes, it had three big strikes against it:
1) Those who don't know Japanese mythology cheap-guffawing at the very mention of "Serious Keanu Reeves",
2) Those who do know Japanese mythology (and the fact that the story was a samurai drama with absolutely zero supernatural elements in it whatsoever) catching on from the trailer that the movie was pretty much Making Crap Up (and not even particularly original CGI crap at that), and saying "You have GOT to be (freakin') kidding ",
and
3) Long ago, about ten years back, I remember when Christmas Week was the "Dungeon" for hideous action movies the studios wanted to bury and pretend didn't exist:
Dungeons & Dragons, Street Fighter, Paycheck, The Emperor's New Groove...
Then the big-budget kiddy movies came along and made Christmas vacation popular again, but studios still like to wait until the critics are on vacation, and then pump up cool action trailers to grab at least one box-office weekend before they scram it.

And this....DEFINITELY looks like the kind of movie we'd get back then.

 

[schan1269]

A review comment...

""whereas the new scene pits Kai against a supernatural creature."
Oh boy, this sounds like a winner. Because just fighting people like in the original legend isn't enough. The studio has to muck it up with a dumb CGI creature."

 

[Richard V]

Suspect it will be a catastrophe of the highest magnitude. I have no interest in it, and the very thought of Reaves' starring makes me want to collapse into hysterical fits of laughter.

 

[mattCR]

Is it the biggest disaster? Well, even for '13, there's still that little matter of "Oogieloves' Big Balloon Adventure".

Oogie Love was a big disaster.. but it wasn't a $250M budget -before- advertising. I'm not sure where this thing gets going. While Lone Ranger was a loss, a real loss ..it made $89M domestic. But it also made $172M international (171.5) So while it lost, against a budget of $215.

Ronin had a production budget of $250.. and it may gross less then $20M US and less then $50M International.. if that.

 

[TravisR]

Simply due to the budget, I assume 47 Ronin will be a huge money loser but other than The Wolf Of Wall Street, I'm even less interested in all the other movies opening tomorrow (Grudge Match, Justin Bieber: Lame Concert Movie and The Secret Life Of Walter Mitty).

 

[Robert Crawford]

It would be in the running with Jack the Giant Slayer and The Lone Ranger for biggest bomb of 2013. Disney reportedly took a charge off of $190M for TLR.

I remember when I first heard about Ronin 47 and its bizarrely massive budget, that it would likely be a disaster. Anyone heard any scuttlebutt about why a studio head would green light a $250M samurai movie starring Keanu Reeves?

IMO, Jack the Giant Slayer was a pretty good film as I enjoyed viewing it at IMAX earlier this year and have since bought the 3-D BD.

As to 47 Ronin, once I realize they added CGI monsters and such, I was done with it.

 

[TonyD]

Ronin 47?

Anyway the trailers loooked good to me and I do want to see it but most likely not until it hits blu.

 

[Chuck Anstey]

I was interested in this up until I saw all the supernatural stuff. I'm not real familiar with 47 Ronin so either the original story did involve such supernatural stuff and I would be disappointed and not interested OR all of it was made up for the movie and I really wasn't interested in it.

 

[TravisR]

IMO, Jack the Giant Slayer was a pretty good film as I enjoyed viewing it at IMAX earlier this year and have since bought the 3-D BD.

I saw Jack The Giant Slayer in a nearly empty theater on opening weekend and I liked it too. I guess that shows yet again that box office gross has zero bearing on the quality (or lack thereof) of a movie.

 

[Michael Elliott]

I'm sure The Hangover 3 has made more money than my Top 10 list of te year combined.Agreed about Jack.

 

[Ejanss]

Oogie Love was a big disaster.. but it wasn't a $250M budget -before- advertising. I'm not sure where this thing gets going. While Lone Ranger was a loss, a real loss ..it made $89M domestic. But it also made $172M international (171.5) So while it lost, against a budget of $215.

Ronin had a production budget of $250.. and it may gross less then $20M US and less then $50M International.. if that.

That's...certainly a contender:
According to Wikipedia's entry, in unadjusted dollars, "Mars Needs Moms" still holds the #1 spot at making $38M on a $150M budget, while "The 13th Warrior"'s delays boosted the budget up near $160M and only brought in $60M.
And even those just ahead of Ranger, RIPD, John Carter, Final Fantasy, and Jack, in order.

(Although, adjusted for inflation, 13th and Cutthroat Island still have the 90's advantage.
By comparison, Heaven's Gate only made back $3M on an "astonishing" $44M budget in 1981 dollars, which would adjust to about a $110M loss today. Or about equal to what RIPD lost.)

 

[schan1269]

This movie made me look at Rotten Tomato's for reviews of the greats of Japanese cinema. We all know Seven Samurai is one of the greatest ever. I had never read a review, as I saw the movie well before the interweb. RT has a guy who dissented on SS by calling it "overly long and pretentious". You can guess the comments, but worthy of a couple laughs.

 

[Edwin-S]

My first reaction when I saw the trailer for this film was....WTF, supernatural monsters in 47 Ronin?! However, now, I have to say, "so what?" It is not like Hollywood hasn't taken the title from a book or property and proceeded to make a film that has little to no relation to the original source. Why should "47 Ronin" be any different? Why should they tell that story the same way as umpteen tellings before it.

I'm not too fussy for Reeves being the lead in it, but I may still go to see it.