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« Today's News: Our Take
What Were the Cineplex's Biggest Bombs of '06?
Which film follies were not just dramatically anemic, but memorably cash-poor as well? In alphabetical order, as detailed by Variety:
— All the King's Men ($7 million domestic gross versus a $55 million production budget, and despite an all-star cast)
— Sharon Stone's Basic Instinct 2 ($5 million versus $70 mil)
— Flushed Away ($61 mil versus $150 mil, though I cannot imagine it's any worse an animated film than Happy Feet, which my sons and I barely endured on Sunday afternoon. Subtle message that kids' film has.)
— Flyboys ($13 mil versus $60 mil)
— Hugh Jackman's The Fountain ($9 mil versus $53 mil)
— Freedomland ($12 mil, despite a cast that included Samuel L. Jackson, Julianne Moore and Edie Falco)
— Russell Crowe's A Good Year ($7 mil, hampered by misguided marketing)
— Lady in the Water ($42 mil versus $75 mil and a slew of critical barbs aimed at M. Night Shyamalan)
— Poseidon ($60 mil versus $160 mil)
— The Wicker Man (a $23 mil take and questionable plot tweaks did in Neil LaBute's horror redo)
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Dec 26, 2006 9:48 AM
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I've heard references to the "message" in Happy Feet (and I believe I heard that FOX News' Neil Cavuto ranted about it), but I've never heard what the actual message is.
What happened in Happy Feet that has people so offended?
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Dec 26, 2006 10:55 AM
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It's not that the message itself — mankind and industry are infringing upon wildlife and ecosystems — is offensive, it's that it is sooooo heavy-handed and entirely incongruous with the film's marketing as a "cute and funny penguins sing and dance" outing. (At one point, I said loudly and sarcastically, "Wow, real subtle.")
Also, the film had at least two false endings, either of which would have been a fine place to end things. Irony alert: Dad had the sons tough it out through the scary sequence (I thank my readers for the heads-up), but called it a day and ushered us out once the movie's aspiration to be endless became clear.
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Dec 26, 2006 11:10 AM
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OK, thanks for the info, Matt.
You mention that it had at least two false endings -- is it just me or is that an epidemic in movies of the last couple of years?
So many reviews seem to contain this criticism. I saw Casino Royale, and I thought it was ending several times. (Nonetheless, I thought it was pretty good.)
What is the reason for this? Is this the result of moviemaking by committee, where every producer/executive has a different idea of what the ending should be, and so, to maintain goodwill, all are included?
Or is it just inept directing? (I would tend to not blame the scriptwriter, because I think the perception of multiple endings comes more from the way a scene is presented -- the visual cues, the soundtrack, etc. -- but I suppose in some cases, the culprit could very well be a flawed script.)
I know this wasn't really the topic at hand, but you hit a nerve there.
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Dec 26, 2006 12:46 PM
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Ooh, a good 'n' pithy question. You should ask that in TVGuide.com's Flick Chick blog, hosted by Maitland, one of our film critics.
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Dec 26, 2006 12:59 PM
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Freedomland would be on my bottom of the year movies too. But I thought, with the exception of Edie Falco, the casting was the problem. Just because someone is a good actor doesn't mean all roles are right for them. (Insert Julianne Moore in particular wherever you want).
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Dec 26, 2006 2:55 PM
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I agree about Happy Feet, Matt. I was so looking forward to the movie, and ended up so very disappointed.
On the other hand, I was dreading Flushed Away, and only took my son because he was so excited about going. I was suprised to find that it was a great movie. It may not exactly be up there with Toy Story or even Cars, but it was very well done. Despite the fact that there looked like there would be a lot of "potty" humor it really wasn't over the top. It was well written, humorous for kids and adults alike, and not threatening like Happy Feet was.
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Dec 26, 2006 7:12 PM
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I can't believe people are complaining about Happy Feet's message. What's wrong with a children's movie that actually has a good message? In fact, it had several good messages and I thoroughly enjoyed the movie. When I watched it in the theater, everyone there seemed to be having a good time and people even clapped at the end. I agree that it could have been shorter, but visually the movie was stunning and I was pleasantly surprised that it was about a lot more than cute animated penguins dancing and singing.
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Dec 26, 2006 9:11 PM
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It's not that the message is wrong, for me anyway, but that it was never advertised as being about how man is killing the pinguins, and all that. It was advertised as cute dancing pinguins, and parents were surprised by all the man killing the world stuff. Might be too heavy for some kids.
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Dec 26, 2006 11:18 PM
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It wasn't that it was too heavy, it was that it lacked any subtlety. Children don't need to have an anvil dropped on their head to get a message. Adults are constantly underestimating them.
Instead of being a timeless story that includes the message about man's effects on the environment, it became a preachy political statement that lacks much literary merit and will disappear into the ether like all other sub par movies.
More than anything I think the movie was trying to hit the parents over the head with the message and as a result Happy Feet lost much of its potential as a good children's movie.
But what do I know? I'm just a youth librarian.
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Dec 28, 2006 1:30 AM
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