47 Ronin: Expected to be a blockbuster of the year (2013) turned to be a bummer. A movie having Keanu Reeves featuring in it, should have hit the heights but fell down on its face and got itself registered in the flops of the year. For me one of the major reasons of the failure was the selection of the director. With so big stars and money, how can producers afford to give the hold of the movie to a director who was directing his very first feature film of his career.
The Lone Ranger: Same year (2013), same result (disaster). Having Johnny Depp who packed up one of the biggest blockbusters of all time POC: On stranger Tides two years back (2011), the movie should have been nothing less than a treat to the viewers but nothing as such happened. Although the movie was nominated in two categories for Oscar, it was not sufficient enough for the audience and it also affected Johnny Depp’s market reputation.
One movie I would like to bring up here which did exceptionally well and against the expectations of some, it was Goal2
Having its prequel (Goal) do so well at the Box Office, the expectations from the second volume of the franchise were too high and it did not upset the viewers at all. It was an epic movie that had almost every element in it. When Munez (Lead actor) moves to the biggest football club Real Madrid to live his dream life and he faces many ups and downs, tibia (shin) injury and relationship crisis. Even after all these challenges he works hard and recover from the negatives and helps his team win the Champions League.
I had forgotten this, but… yeah, it might be the best example for me, too.
I was surprised at how BORING the movie was. It’s at least 10 minutes longer than it needs to be and the editing seems a little dodgy at times.
As to Crafter Man’s nomination of “It,” I would disagree that it was a terrible movie. It was a good story well told… but I do agree that it wasn’t scary, and I scare fairly easily.
This reminds me that, after enjoying all his previous pseudo-documentary work, Christopher Guest’s For Your Consideration landed with a heavy thud for me. I probably smirked a couple times but I barely remember it at all now and never felt compelled to re-watch it.
I went into Horns – directed by Alexandre Aja and starring Daniel Radcliffe – knowing basically nothing about the movie. No expectations entering.
But I have never in my entire life been so disappointed by the second half of a movie, based on the first half of the movie. At the midpoint, I thought it would rank as one of the best movies I’d seen that year. And then it went so comprehensively and thoroughly into the shitter that it still shocks me to think about it years later. Never before, and never again, have I seen such a perfect setup so perversely pissed away into mind-numbing tedium. Shocking. Still shocking.
I Robot
Legend of the Guardians: the Owls of Ga’hoole
Gor
Lifeforce
In each instance it seems that someone opted the rights to film a book, took a few facets of that book and proceeded to write a totally different story.
In the case of Guardians of Ga’hoole, they turned what was a rather dark tale with some rough incidents and neuter it so that toddlers could see a film about nice owls. My son who was 11 at the time, who had read the books was also truly disappointed.
I Robot and Lifeforce barely resembled their respective book sources. And Gor? Wow, you take the chance to make a film of a somewhat controversial adult fantasy book, and make it a PG shitfest. John Norman must have laughed and cried all the way to the bank.
Michel Faber’s novel Under The Skin was great: lyrical, heartbreaking, funny, satirical, and stomach-churning. It is a strong commentary on our hunger for consuming animals and what would happen if we ended up on someone’s menu.
The movie adaptation completely screwed this up.
Also, they didn’t have the main character keep the name she had in the book, and she was supposed to be ugly and in pain because her race normally walked on all fours and she had surgery to enable to walk like a biped and pass for human.
Hook and Coco, and both for the same reason: They endeavored to get the audience to cry through mostly mechanical means (treacly music, quivering characters) instead of by honestly engaging their emotions. Coco succeeded at this, but Hook fell flat and Spielberg never tried that nonsense again (although it worked perfectly for E.T.).