The film industry does not stand still and in 2022, there were many films that stood out and influenced the audience such as ‘The whale’Everything everywhere at once’ or ‘Batman’ etc.
Many of them were critically acclaimed and even won major awards, unfortunately some of them, despite telling new stories, having top actors and established directors, just couldn’t grab attention and ended up failing at the box office.
Although the list is long, here are the 5 most popular movies that just didn’t live up to expectations.
Movies that turned out to be flops at the cinema in 2022
‘Babylon’
“Babylon” tells how excesses and scandals change the Hollywood industry in the 1920s through various characters, when it turns from silent to talkative.
Margot Robbie, Brad Pitt, Tobey Maguire and Olivia Wilde were just some of the talent who worked on it, but still, it only made 5.4 million in its opening weekend against an 80 million budget.
Some of the factors that could directly affect it were the lack of publicity, its story which may seem boring to the eyes of the new generations and that people are more interested in seeing ‘Avatar 3’ which was released days before.
‘Lightyear’
This film based on the beloved character from ‘Toy Story’ offered a story where the space ranger confronts Zurg and himself over the guilt he feels for ‘failing’ one of his missions.
Although the plot showed valuable lessons of trust and friendship, it was released in theaters when the Covid-19 pandemic was still active and even though vaccines were already a reality, not many people attended the cinema for their own safety.
Unfortunately, it was also heavily criticized for featuring a kiss between two women, which divided millions of parents over whether or not it was okay to add scenes like this to children’s stories.
“Lightyear” made $226 million, and while that seems like an acceptable number, the reality is that it barely managed to recoup its budget of $200 million.
“The unbearable weight of enormous talent”
Nicolas Cage, playing himself, takes on the role of a CIA agent after attending a party and soon realizes that a Mexican cartel leader is kidnapping his daughter and must save her at all costs.
The feature film received good reviews but was not profitable, earning $29 million against a budget of $30 million.
Nor the duo she had with the actor of the moment, Pedro Pascal, which created a wave of memes on TikTok he could save her.
‘Amsterdam’
In a similar case to ‘Babylon’, ‘Amsterdam’ seemed to have everything to sweep the cinema with stellar performances from Christian Bale, Margot Robbie, John David Washington and Annia Taylor-Joy.
However, at the time of its premiere it received poor reviews from critics and something that also hurt it was the controversy of its director David O. Russell, who has been accused of violence and sexual harassment.
In fact, it made $31 million in its first weekend when it cost around $80 million to make.
‘Strange World’
Disney generally has successful premieres regardless of whether it is inside the cinema or on its platform, which we saw with “Red” or “Soul”, but for the feature film “Strange World” it was not so.
It introduced the first LGBTQ+ protagonist and also, the trailer showed that the plot was innovative to attract families to the cinema.
Its lack of publicity and short stay on the board made it one of the biggest failures of the franchise, earning only $62 million of the $135 million it cost to make, meaning it did not recoup its production costs.
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Source: univision
Camila Luna is a writer at Gossipify, where she covers the latest movies and television series. With a passion for all things entertainment, Camila brings her unique perspective to her writing and offers readers an inside look at the industry. Camila is a graduate from the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) with a degree in English and is also a avid movie watcher.
