Universal Picture’s Battleship grossed only $25.3 million dollars in its opening weekend.
By: A.J. Niles
Universal Picture’s Battleship, Rihanna’s first blockbuster movie, is being labeled a disappointment by many critics. It seems that movie goers agreed, as the summer blockbuster failed to dethrone The Avengers and meet financial expectations. According to The Hollywood Reporter, ‘Battleship’ cost over $200 million to produce and was expected to bring in between $35 – 40 million in its opening weekend.
Battleship’s international gross of $226.8 million provides some cushion, but it needed a strong domestic performance to end up in the black. A $25.3 million opening means the movie might not clear $70 million or $80 million over the long haul domestically, resulting in a notable loss for Universal and sparking plenty of Monday-morning quarterbacking within the studio about what went wrong.
There’s already speculation that Battleship, starring Taylor Kitsch, Rihanna, Brooklyn Decker and Liam Neeson, will follow the same course as Disney’s John Carter, which debuted to $30.2 million in March and topped out at $71.8 million domestically. Overseas, John Carter, also starring Kitsch, earned $200.6 million. The pic resulted in a $200 million write-down for Disney.
Battleship, a science fiction film based off the Hasbro board game of the same name, did well with the older crowd, with 66% of viewers over the age of 25, but not with those that are considered apart of Rihanna’s fan-base.
Could this be a sign that Rihanna’s star power is fading? Many of her critics would consider this another miss-step in a series of miss-steps that includes her supposedly going behind her label’s back to record records with her ex-boyfriend, Chris Brown. However, Rihanna did land at number four on this year’s Forbes Magazine’s “Top 100 Celebrities List,” grossing over $53 million, behind Jennifer Lopez, Oprah and Justin Bieber.
What are your thoughts? Do you feel that ‘Battleship’ Flopped this weekend? Did you go see the movie?
I think the critics have sabotaged this movie. They have given it mostly negative reviews, and have caused a lot of people to skip seeing it. I’m sure it’s because the Avengers is still fresh on everyone’s minds, and Michael Bay let a lot of people down with the Transformers franchise. And to top it off, Rihanna’s in it, so they just want to pick at her I guess. But I did see it and I thought it was pretty decent. Now will I see it again like I did with The Avengers? No. But it’s worth a watch while it’s in the theaters. Me personally, I’ll probably go see The Avengers again before Spiderman comes out.
Yeah I think the critics messed up this movie too before people even got a chance to see it first. But I’m one of those people that doesn’t read reviews before movies, so I know I will be seeing it. It’s an action movie and it looked good in the previews.
Looks like it is just another case of being a Michael Bay movie released at the wrong time. I was entertained and Rihanna did ok in it. It doesn’t deserve all the bashing it got, but it definitely wasn’t going to be the film to dethrone the Avengers in its opening weekend. People should have known this.
I guess the Rihanna Navy was too busy seeing The Avengers movie again last weekend.
I guess that Rihanna Reign does let up when it comes to movies and opening weekends. Ah well, it should catch up some to the Avengers once the hype runs out. People love their comic book movies.
I actually thought it was a pretty good movie. It wasn’t better than the Avengers but it was just as entertaining as Transformers for me. It’s a good summer blockbuster and it’s worth seeing. People need to stop letting the critics tell them what movies to see because you’ll miss out on some good ones like that.
I’ll be waiting until it comes out on DVD!!!!
This girl can’t even fart without things being completely over analyzed and taken out of context. The movie was not a flop, it just didn’t dethrone the Avengers. And I didn’t expect it to. However, it will end up getting on the right track and do well in the box office. It already has internationally. Americans just have to get over the Avengers first. Most of us are still seeing it again.
I haven’t made up my mind on rather or not I want to see this movie. Michael Bay movies are usually hit or miss with me. I am curious to see how Rihanna does in it, but tickets cost too much money for me to be running to see a film in which the celeb is more intriguing than the plot itself. I could realistically just grab popcorn and watch Rihanna tweet’s all day and be just as entertained for free.
The movie is a certified flop. It’s a Michael Bay film with a major superstar in it and it still did not come in first in the box office. It could not beat that old a– Avengers movie. Anybody associated with the movie knows its a flop, and they are completely embarrassed that even with Rihanna and Transformers’ like action, people still chose to see a almost 4 week old movie instead.