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In the film and media industry, if a film released in theatres fails to break even by a large amount, it is considered a box-office bomb (or box-office flop), thus losing money for the distributor, studio, and/or production company that invested in it.
A box-office bomb, box-office flop, box-office failure, or box-office disaster is a film that is unprofitable or considered highly unsuccessful during its theatrical run.
- 20 How Do You Know
- 19 Heaven’s Gate
- 18 A Wrinkle in Time
- 17 Wonder Woman 1984
- 16 Mulan
- 15 X-Men: Dark Phoenix
- 14 Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within
- 13 The Adventures of Pluto Nash
- 12 Turning Red
- 11 Titan A.E.
Loss: $140 Million
Many box office bombs are testaments to misplaced ambition, but 2010’s How Do You Know is an exception to this rule. A modest romantic comedy, How Do You Know somehow cost $120 million to produce. The salaries of the star-studded cast contributed to the high price tag, with Reese Witherspoon ($15 million), Owen Wilson ($10 million), and Jack Nicholson ($12 million) making a lot for their work. Along with the hefty salaries for the talented cast, another issue with the film's budget stemmed fr...
Loss: $144 Million
Michael Cimono’s Heaven’s Gate is often seen as the movie that ended the auteur-driven mindset of Hollywood. A wildly ambitious epic Western, Heaven’s Gate cost $44 million and earned back less than $4 million. A true tragedy of ambition, Heaven’s Gate takes place alongside Damien Chazelle's Babylon and director Richard Kelly’s underrated sci-fi flop Southland Tales as a quintessential case of a visionary director whose carte blanch opportunity proved to be a financial disaster. The movie is...
Loss: $152 Million
Director Ava DuVernay’s adaptation of the famous young adult novelA Wrinkle In Time assembled an impressive cast,including Reese Witherspoon, Mindy Kaling, and Oprah Winfrey. The movie stars Storm Reid as a young girl whose scientist father goes missing, motivating her on a journey alongside her friends to travel across time and space to find him. The story is a beloved one and there was certainly a lot of talent involved. However, this was not enough to saveA Wrinkle In Time from a disastrou...
Loss: $155 Million
With 2020’s Wonder Woman 1984, there is the tricky question of the COVID-19 pandemic and its box office impact. Most of the bombs from the era were affected by theater closures caused by the pandemic, and it is impossible to know whether these movies might have performed better if released later. This is especially true as the studio made the unprecedented decision to also release the film for at-home streaming during its theatrical run. However, the only version of Wonder Woman 1984’s box of...
Loss: $159 Million
Another movie whose box office underperformance is inexorably tied to the COVID-19 pandemic, Mulan's live-action Disney remake, was released in theaters in September 2020. Like the beloved animated original, Mulan tells the story of the titular heroine, a young woman in Imperial China who is being pushed down one path in life as a dutiful wife, but challenges tradition when she poses as a male soldier and takes her father's place in the army. Earning lukewarm critical write-ups and significan...
Loss: $155 Million
Dark Phoenix was intended to be a star vehicle for Game of Thrones heroine Sophie Turner, who played the uncontrollable, tragic anti-villain Phoenix in this 10th X-Men movie. The story saw Jean Grey struggling with her new and extreme powers while being torn between her X-Men friends and a race of aliens attempting to use her as the ultimate weapon.It is an adaptation of a beloved comic book storyline that many fans feel was poorly done in 2006'sX-Men: The Last Stand. However, the response to...
Loss: $155 Million
In the early 2000s, video game adaptations seemed like a major moneymaking opportunity for Hollywood studios. While the critical failure of 1993’s Super Mario Bros and 1995’s Mortal Kombat should have given executives pause,there was too much excitement and too much money to be made in this new medium for anyone to consider temperance. As a result, viewers got a star-studded adaption of the incredibly popular Final Fantasy franchise in 2001’s Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within. The movie detai...
Loss: $156 Million
At various points in his career, Eddie Murphy seemed too big to fail. In the ‘80s, a string of hits like Beverly Hills Cop, Coming to America, and 48 Hrs made him an A-list leading man, only for just as many flops to ruin his reputation. In the ‘90s, Murphy reinvented himself as a family movie hero and enjoyed another set of successes with Dr. Doolittle and The Nutty Professor,both of which spawned sequels. However, this streak came crashing to a halt with 2002’s sci-fi comedy The Adventures...
Loss: $167 Million
In 2022, the tween comedy Turning Red saw Pixar take a creative risk by aging up the studio's target demographic. Where earlier Pixar movies were aimed at small children (despite their large fandom among all ages), Turning Red’s older protagonist and more mature jokes meant the fantasy comedy was aimed at preteens. The movie follows a young girl who, along with dealing with the other challenges of being a teenager, contends with turning into a giant red panda whenever she gets excited. While...
Loss: $170 Million
With 1997’s underrated Anastasia, director Don Bluth proved that he could do anything Disney could. However, the ambition of 2000’s Titan A.E., proved that, just like Disney, Bluth could also deliver some costly flops. The story of a young hero sent to save the human race after an alien species destroys the planet, Titan A.E.melded traditional 2D animation with 3D CGI to innovative effect. It combined that with an A-list voice cast, including Matt Damon, Nathan Lane, and Drew Barrymore. Howev...
- Colin Mccormick
A box-office bomb refers to a film that performs disastrously in terms of revenue, failing to recoup its production and marketing costs through ticket sales at the cinema. This phenomenon is an essential barometer for gauging a movie’s financial success or lack thereof.
- John Carter. $133-236 million. With an estimated budget of nearly $350 million, Disney's 2012 sci-fi action flick John Carter had to seriously deliver at the box office to make up for the fact it was one of the most expensive films ever made.
- The Lone Ranger. $186-221 million. Troubled with budget issues and production woes from the get-go, 2013's western action flick The Lone Ranger faced its fair share of hurdles and headaches that all contributed to it notoriously becoming one of the biggest box-office duds in cinema history.
- The Flash. $200 million. The Flash is the latest movie to be added to this list, and while the final box office is not written, it is clear the movie is a box office bomb.
- The 13th Warrior. $112-210 million. The charismatic Antonio Banderas portrays famous court poet and traveler Ahmad ibn Fadlan in the 1999 action historical fiction drama The 13th Warrior, loosely based on the Michael Crichton novel Eaters of the Dead.
Jul 20, 2023 · The 11 Biggest Box-Office Bombs. Christopher Nolan’s Oppenheimer. Photo: Universal Pictures. Chistopher Nolan is one of the highest-profile directors working in Hollywood today, a...
Mar 24, 2024 · Budget: $75 Million, Worldwide Box Office: $7.6 Million. From Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within to The Adventures of Pluto Nash, these are the biggest box office bombs of the 2000s.
