1844 Chapter 1844 Huge Gap

In 1997, in the third week of June, "Batman and Robin" and "My Best Friend's Wedding" came together strongly.

However, when the weekend box office statistics were released, everyone was stunned and almost couldn't believe their own glasses—not because the box office was too good, but because the box office was so far below expectations that people It is suspected that the box office statistics are wrong.

"Batman and Robin" was a big hit, and when more than 3,000 theaters were released simultaneously, it actually only handed over 40 million US dollars in box office-the three-day box office data can only be compared with "Independence Day" Last year's box office of 36 million US dollars on the first day of release was just to compete. What's more serious is that this work has plummeted by 23% compared to the 52 million US dollar box office of "Batman Forever". For a sequel movie, it's almost a devastating blow.

Before the movie was officially released, people had predicted countless possibilities, but only this one was missed: let alone surpassing "Independence Day" to create history, even the achievements of its own previous works could not be surpassed.

In the past month, "Batman and Robin" has been almost a bombing promotion. The entire promotion period has covered every corner of the North American continent with a carpet-like layout. heat.

For handsome guy there is George Clooney, for beauty there is Uma Thurman, for focus there is Arnold Schwarzenegger, for script there is Akiva Goldsman, for director there is Joe Schumacher, for story there is original comics In terms of roles, there is Bruce Wayne, and in terms of mass base, there is "Forever Batman"... No matter from any point of view, there is no doubt that this work is brilliant, and even the "New York Post" is bold Prediction, "The only question is: how high this work can reach."

But the truth is that "Batman & Robin" suffered one of the strongest box-office colds ever, in what the Los Angeles Times dubbed "June's coldest" box-office weekend, and it was almost disastrous.

Objectively speaking, the weekend box office data of 40 million US dollars is not a bad result for ordinary works. On the contrary, it is enough to win the weekend box office champion in the fierce competition of the summer file. However, for a highly anticipated work, for a work dedicated to breaking records, this result is not only far below expectations, it can even be said to be a complete failure.

This ending, which puzzled countless people, immediately aroused heated discussions among the media and the audience. After investigation, it was found that everything actually had a source: because this is really an extremely bad work.

The media's comprehensive review was only 25 points, which attracted a lot of complaints. Roger Ebert even commented, "This may be one of the worst comic-adapted films in film history, and even put 'one' It’s okay to remove it.”

Among film critics, it is generally commented that not only is the story mentally retarded to an intolerable degree, but it is completely at the level of a kindergarten cartoon plot; The image in the movie is also very different: the always flat-mouthed Poison Ivy can't even be called a vase, and the always clumsy Freeze Man is probably the first villain in history to be stupid to death. face sex. The smiling, playboy-looking Batman looks like a quarterback in a youth school movie, Batgirl who is always ignored by the audience but makes a sense of presence in inappropriate situations, and Robin who is always at a loss ...

A sentence from the "Chicago Tribune" represents the voice of the majority of film critics, "Batman with a perfect smile looks like Iron Man wearing the wrong armor." Bruce Wayne is the same, but his smile makes the gothic dark Batman look like a kid playing house in kindergarten.

Although hero comic films have never had any direct connection with acting skills, the image of Batman created by George has attracted strong backlash. Not to mention fans of the original comics, even ordinary audiences are seriously dissatisfied, saying that this may be "" Dumbest Batman ever."

The theater score representing the audience's reaction is only a bad "D-", which is undoubtedly the most terrible news-even if the audience doesn't buy it, how can a commercial blockbuster sell at the box office?

So badly sad that it's worse for "Batman & Robin," which not only explains why its opening weekend was such a flop, but also serves as a quick wake-up call for the franchise's future grosses.

Judging from the single-day box office of the film, the single-day box office on Friday was as high as 22 million US dollars, which also shows that the previous overwhelming publicity was very effective, attracting a large number of audiences to the cinema for the first time. However, the messy quality of the movie is holding it back. No one wants to go to the cinema to watch a "mentally retarded" work. Then it further fell to $9 million, and such a downward curve almost foreshadowed an avalanche of box office declines in the next week.

Behind this box office tragedy, it is worth noting that even though the previous publicity campaign completely occupied everyone's attention, the box office on the first day was only 22 million US dollars, which was not even comparable to the "Independence Day" experience. Compared with Friday's box office after Thursday's outbreak, this is undoubtedly the biggest question about George Clooney's box office appeal:

Sex as a shaker on the small screen. No one will deny the charm of George, even compared with Hugo, Brad, Tom and others, he is definitely not weak; but if he wants to evolve this charm into a driving force for the audience to enter the cinema, George Clearly there's still a long way to go, and he can't even match Brad, let alone challenge Hugo's hegemony -- a notion that now looks like a joke.

This is like a bucket of ice water, which quickly cooled the overheated brains of major Hollywood film companies, and they all questioned themselves, "Can George really compete with Hugo?"

Ninety-five million dollars? No, it's $40 million.

The opening weekend of "Batman & Robin" was nothing short of a disaster, made all the more embarrassing by the initial bouts of hype and drama that even Warner Bros. Panic. There are still some people in the company who are looking forward to the film's drop in the next week, hoping that fans of Batman's original comics will enter the cinema, but they are destined to be disappointed. The 70% drop in the next week has been completely announced A death sentence for this movie.

Who would have thought? "Batman Forever" was brilliant, but the sequel "Batman & Robin" was nailed to the pillar of infamy.

The Avengers, this title has spread more and more widely in the circle - as a kind of irony, it has even become the circle's way of saying to Joe, George, Arnold, Uma, Chris and others for a long time. Titles, George is Iron Man, Arnold is Hulk, Uma is Black Widow, Chris is Hawkeye, and director Joe is Director of S.H.I.E.L.D.

The menacing Avengers only persisted for one day - Friday's premiere day, and then it plummeted. Even the top screenwriters in Hollywood couldn't write such an ending, even better than "Batman and Robin". Returning to overtake "Independence Day" will be even more exciting.

Interestingly, the opening box office hit of "My Best Friend's Wedding" added a touch of dark humor to the situation.

This romantic comedy, which cost only 38 million US dollars, was screened in 2,100 theaters, but it delivered an excellent box office score of 22 million US dollars-and it is still in the same league as "Batman and Luo The box office data produced under the strong confrontation of "Bin" in the same schedule is almost amazing.

In addition, in stark contrast to its direct competitors, both media reviews and theater scores have overtaken, and praises for Julia Roberts and Cameron Diaz are endless. It all seems to indicate that "My Best Friend's Wedding" has accomplished the impossible, triumphing as a romantic comedy against superhero comic book movies.

For reference, the box office of "Speed ​​2" fell by as much as 54% in the second week, and the weekend box office was less than 7 million US dollars. This also means that the $130 million investment in the sequel film will come to naught.

Faced with such a situation, it couldn't be easier for major film companies to make a decision.

Warner Bros. immediately revoked the position of "Batman and Robin" publicity director, and internally announced that the adaptation of Batman will be shelved, and will not be discussed again in the short term. Barry Meyer even personally visited the crew of "LA Confidential" to express his condolences to the hard work of the crew.

Warner Bros., Twentieth Century Fox, Paramount Pictures, Universal Pictures and Sony Columbia Pictures jointly banned Uma. After that, Uma fell into a long blank period with no known end, so many People almost forget that there was such an actress in the circle.

Even Joe Schumacher, George Clooney and Arnold Schwarzenegger were seriously affected. Joe faced a situation of no films to make in the next three years; after Arnold suffered such a blow, he was completely devastated. In 1994, "True Lies" became his last glory. , but the box office performance has always been unsatisfactory, and it has been silent for many years; after George suffered such a blow, he returned to the field of TV dramas and entered the dormant period again.

Ambition has barely had time to emerge from the tip of the iceberg before it is mercilessly extinguished. Is this a tragedy, or a comedy? If you understand it from the perspective of the Avengers, this is actually a comedy.