7 ago 2013 ano - GUARDIAN
The Lone Ranger:
a box office flop
rides into town
Descrição:
It was billed as one of the summer's biggest blockbusters, reuniting Johnny Depp – as Tonto in The Lone Ranger – with the team behind the huge success of the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise.
But Walt Disney has now warned that the film could instead go down as one of the year's biggest flops, predicting losses of almost $200m.
The Lone Ranger, which opens in Britain this weekend, stars Armie Hammer as the masked Texas lawman and Depp as his Comanche spirit guide. Budgeted at $225m, the film, directed by Gore Verbinski and produced by Jerry Bruckheimer, suffered a tortuous production process and met with largely scathing reviews on its release in the US.
Concerns over the odds of recouping the investment were reportedly voiced during production, and the shoot halted for several months over fears it was running over budget. Disney was at one point reported to be threatening to shelve the entire movie over spiralling costs, partly spooked by the failure of another western, Cowboys and Aliens.
When the film opened in the US and Canada over the 4 July Independence Day weekend it took just $29.9m. By comparison, the Superman reboot Man of Steel took $125m over the same period.
Whether The Lone Ranger goes down in movie history as a grand disaster rests on the shoulders of European cinemagoers – who traditionally embrace Depp but may feel more ambivalence towards the western. Promoting the film before its UK release, cast and crew appeared to lay blame for the film's box office failure in the US at the feet of the critics.
Depp said: "I think the reviews were written seven to eight months before we released the film. [The critics] had expectations that it must be a blockbuster. I don't have any expectations of that. I never do." It was a view echoed by Bruckheimer, who said he predicted a revision of the film as an unfairly dismissed classic in a few years. "It's one of those movies that whatever the critics missed in it this time, they'll review it in a few years and see that they made a mistake."
Armie Hammer, who plays the title role to Depp's Tonto, also advanced the opinion the critics had sealed the film's fate before they saw it. "I think it was the popular thing when the movie hit rocky terrain [the critics] jumped on the bandwagon to try and bash it." He claimed that, incensed by the commercial success of another summer blockbuster despite lukewarm reviews, critics redoubled their efforts against The Lone Ranger. "They tried to do the same thing to World War Z, it didn't work, the movie was successful. Instead, they decided to slit the jugular of our movie."
At its third quarter results, announced on Tuesday night, Disney said the film would lose between $160m-$190m as heavy promotion failed to sell tickets.
Adicionado na linha do tempo:
The Johnny Depp Chronology
Johnny Depp and Amber Heard Complete Timeline
The Johnny De...
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