The Fall Guy stumbled out of the weekend box office well below expectations for the start of the summer movie-going season. This drove the year-to-date box office down 43 percent compared to 2019.
Worse case projections had Fall Guy opening at $30 million. Best case predicted as high as $40 million. Nope — $28.5 million. Worldwide, it grossed just $65.4 million. Break-even is likely around $450 million, and there is zero chance of that.
This image released by Universal Pictures shows Emily Blunt, right, and Ryan Gosling in a scene from ‘The Fall Guy.’ (Universal Pictures via AP)
Wait till you hear what came in second place at this weekend’s box office. But first…
Compared to last year’s disappointing box office performance, 2024 is down 22 percent.
Please, please, please don’t buy the spin from the sycophantic entertainment media. The problem is not streaming, the pandemic, or a lack of product. The problem is this…
Hollywood is not making movies people want to see.
There was streaming in 2019.
The pandemic is three years behind us.
There has been no shortage of wide releases this year.
The problem is the appeal of the product — the product is movies, and polls prove people are falling out of love with the movies.
How many bad hamburgers must you pay for before you stop buying hamburgers?
How much bad service before you are no longer a return customer?
How much price gouging before you decide to stop being gouged?
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For nearly a decade, movies have disappointed us, insulted us, sought to destroy the innocence of our children, and made us uncomfortable with all the homosexuality and lecturing. For nearly a decade, our heroes (Indiana Jones, etc.) have been emasculated, the stories have been dull, and the characters uninteresting and sexless (unless gay). For nearly a decade, instead of exiting the theater elated and enlightened, we have exited disappointed, deflated, insulted, and feeling ripped off.
Harrison Ford in Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny (2023). (Lucasfilm)
The things we most love about the movies — adventure, sensuality, universal themes, escapism, and unforgettable characters —have been exterminated in favor of dull, simple-minded, pedantic, left-wing Puritanism that divides and bores. Movies used to give us something to think about, now they tell us what to think. This means that the only thing we take home with us is the sense that we just wasted three hours we could’ve spent playing video games, surfing the Internet, watching YouTube… Anything but that terrible movie.
Top Gun: Maverick, Spider-Man: No Way Home, Sound of Freedom, Barbie, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 3., Oppenheimer, Super Mario Bros. Movie, Avatar: Way of the Water, Dune II, John Wick Chapter 4… These titles prove all the entertainment media sycophants wrong with their quisling excuses for the slow death of the greatest art form ever created. Those titles prove that people still yearn for the magic, and The Fall Guy felt like nothing close to magic. It looked like just another hollow, CGI’d, overlong, overstuffed piece of ironic distance.
This image released by Universal Pictures shows Ryan Gosling in a scene from ‘The Fall Guy.’ (Universal Pictures via AP)
Guess what came in second at this weekend’s box office? A lousy 25-year-old movie called The Phantom Menace was re-released and earned $8.1 million.
A bad movie available to watch at home for two decades is driving more people to theaters than today’s garbage — which once again proves people do want to go to the movies. The only thing stopping them is shitty people making shitty movies.
John Nolte’s first and last novel, Borrowed Time, is winning five-star raves from everyday readers. You can read an excerpt here and an in-depth review here. Also available in hardcover and on Kindle and Audiobook.
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