What were some of the biggest big budget movie flops?

JUPITER ASCENDING

Sci-fi films from the Wachowski siblings have a history of doing well, with The Matrix series and V for Vendetta both achieving critical and commercial success. However, 2015’s Jupiter Ascending did not follow the same path. The film, which starred Mila Kunis, Channing Tatum, Sean Bean, and Eddie Redmayne, followed an interplanetary warrior and a cleaning woman who finds out that she is galactic royalty. The film received general negative reviews, with the only part earning praise being the most expensive: the visual effects. The film crafted entire worlds, requiring expensive sets, costumes, make-up, and prosthetics. Because of the film’s expensive requirements and huge star power, it racked up a budget of $176 million, meaning that it needed to make a lot in order to be a box office success. Unfortunately, with lukewarm reviews and high competition from The Spongebob Movie: Sponge Out of Water and American Sniper, the film was not able to recoup its large budget. Jupiter Ascending made slightly over $47 million domestic with an additional $136.6 million in foreign countries for a total of almost $184 million, not nearly enough to make up the film’s budget and marketing. It is estimated that the film lost Warner Bros. over $80 million.

EVAN ALMIGHTY

Evan Almighty, the Steve Carrell-starring follow up to Jim Carrey’s Bruce Almighty, was the most expensive comedy of all time at the time of its production (it would later be surpassed by other high-budget films like Men in Black III). The reasoning is the film’s plot: the story follows Carrell’s Evan Baxter as a surrogate for the biblical Noah trying to prevent a flood in his city, but, eventually, the very expensive CGI flood, complete with very expensive CGI animals, does happen. The film wound up with a $175 million budget (over original projections of $140 million), hitting more than $200 million after marketing. The film’s money was ill-spent, as it received generally negative reviews from critics and even earned a Razzie Award nomination for Worst Prequel or Sequel (although it lost out on the honor to Cuba Gooding Jr.’s Daddy Day Camp). The film ended up earning $173 million worldwide and is estimated to have lost studios over $88 million.

1. GREEN LANTERN

Green Lantern is one of the most notorious super movie flops around. The film, which starred Ryan Reynolds as the titular hero and also featured Blake Lively, Angela Bassett, Mark Strong and Peter Sarsgaard, was one of the first superhero projects that future Arrow-verse creator Greg Berlanti worked on, and, needless to say, there were still some kinks to be worked out. Star Reynolds even went on to make fun of the film in his future, much better received superhero film Deadpool. Green Lantern was filmed on a $200 million budget, not including marketing costs, with The Hollywood Reporter estimating that, in order for the film to be a success for the studio, it would need to gross over $500 million. It didn’t come anywhere close, earning a worldwide total of $219.8 million. But hey, at least this film gave us Ryan Reynolds and Blake Lively’s marriage.

PAN

Peter Pan has been imagined into many different films, it makes sense that audiences might get a little bit oversaturated with the boyish character. That seems to have been the case with the overdone Hugh Jackman starring epic Pan, released in 2015. The Peter Pan/Captain Hook origin story also starred Levi Miller as Peter, Garrett Hedlund as Captain Hook, Rooney Mara and Amanda Seyfried, but, unfortunately, an all-star talented cast was unable to save the film from becoming a flop. Overdone visual effects and its fantasy setting led to high CGI costs, giving the film an overall budget of $150 million. In addition, the film was marketed heavily, with the studio hoping to sell it as a must-see family epic. Unfortunately, the $100 to $125 million in estimated marketing costs did not pay off, and the film was not able to become a hit domestically or internationally in much-needed markets like China, resulting in a multi-million dollar loss for the studio.

47 RONIN

Keanu Reeves is an action star who somehow managed to rebound from starring in 80’s classic comedy Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure to actually go on to become a serious actor. Reeves has the talent and star power that draws audiences in, but, unfortunately, even he wasn’t able to bring audiences out to see action movie 47 Ronin. The film was made on a high budget, with $175 million allotted for production costs plus an additional $50 million for marketing and distribution. Like many films with budgets that high, the film’s release was delayed repeatedly before it finally showed up in theaters for Christmas of 2013. It faced very stiff competition, finishing sixth in its opening weekend after The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug, The Wolf of Wall Street, Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues, The Secret Life of Walter Mitty and American Hustle. It ended up making only $38.6 million at the domestic box office. The film was also a failure in Japan, where people were upset that the plot didn’t closely resemble the epic it was based on. Although it ended up making $113 million foreign, it only brought the film to $151.7 million overall, which was not enough to make up for its high budget and made it a huge loss for the studio.

MARS NEEDS MOMS

Raise your hand if you’ve ever heard of Mars Needs Moms. No one? Makes sense. The 2011 animated sci-fi comedy was so quiet in theaters that most people, even film buffs, wouldn’t be able to say that the movie even existed, let alone tell you anything about it. The film, made using 3D motion capture computer-animation, stars Seth Green, Dan Fogler, Elisabeth Harnois, Mindy Sterling and Joan Cusack. Although it was produced by Back to the Future‘s Robert Zemeckis, the film didn’t get his magical touch, and the formulaic plot and creepy graphics made it an easily forgettable flick. The film’s production budget of $150 million before marketing and distribution costs meant that it would have had to make a large sum in order to be able to be profitable, but it flopped immediately, getting only $6.8 million during its first weekend in theaters. The film ended with nearly $39 million, which was not what mega-successful animation studio Disney was looking for.

THE 13TH WARRIOR

Compared to other films on this list, The 13th Warrior had a pretty small budget, hitting only $160 million for production and marketing costs. For the time (the film was made in 1999), this high budget was similar to the $300 million plus budgets studios are frequently giving away to action and superhero films; it was seen in the industry as a bloated sign of the film’s repeated reshoots and failures. The movie, which is based on a Michael Crichton novel and is a loose retelling of Beowulf, stars Antonio Banderas, Diane Venora and Omar Sharif and follows Banderas’ character goes on a quest to rid a Viking land of a scary and unknown threat. It received lukewarm reviews and even convinced Lawrence of Arabia‘s Sharif to consider retiring from acting. The discussion around the film, as well as stiff competition from horror classic The Sixth Sense, which still topped the weekend in its fourth week in theaters, meant that the film didn’t make a huge impact at the box office, making only $61.6 million worldwide.