Walt Disney Pictures (and the egos of Jerry Bruckheimer and Nicolas Cage) suffered a major blow over the weekend, as Sorcerer's Apprentice opened to a piddling $17.4 million at the box office, finishing in third place behind Inception and Despicable Me. Some would say the movie was cursed, and I haven't seen the film yet, but I think the blame lies with five key elements gone wrong:
The PG rating: This was the biggest problem of all. The cast would suggest the film has an older audience, but then Disney gave the film a PG rating and tried to spin it as a "family film." Families do not want to take kids to see this movie because it stars that kid from Tropic Thunder and the trailer is full of scary fighting scenes. You know who would want to see that movie? Teenagers and adults. But adults don't go see PG movies on date night, and teenagers are like, so whatever about those "baby" films. You know what they go see? Inception, because it's rated PG-13.
The Star: Look, I love Jay Baruchel as much as the next person. Really, I do. I think he's very funny, and can be charming without becoming Michael Cera-esque (in other words, annoying). But do I think he's a leading man? No. And he's not even not a leading man in that way that Justin Long or Jesse Eisenberg are not leading men. You know - where you don't expect them to be leading men until they are leading men and then all of sudden the world explodes into geek-cute. Jay is not that guy. And as I mentioned before, Jay's fan base (coeds and frat boys who quote lines from Knocked Up on a regular basis) are not going to shell our their hard-earned beer money to watch Jay in a PG wizard movie. It's just not going to happen.
The Kung-Fu: Oh man, kung-fu is soooo three weeks ago. Seriously, the summer of 2010 will forever be known as The Summer of Mediocre Family Films About Martial Arts. Between The Karate Kid (which I refuse to see on principle) and The Last Airbender, audiences are over kung-fu. And I know studios love to put martial arts in movies because it guarantees them success internationally, but next time, make sure you open your kung-fu movie first. The movie poster for Sorcerer's Apprentice was also strikingly similar to that of the The Last Airbender, which is confusing. And that brings me to .....
The Marketing: The tagline for this movie was "It's the Coolest Job Ever." What does that even mean? What is this movie about? That tagline could apply to a host of different genres and films - The Bourne Identity, The Pacifier, even the upcoming The Social Network. How is Jay Baruchel's wizarding a "job"? Does he get paid for it? If one is "called" to be a wizard, then is that really the same thing as having an occupation? Do you get dental? Is being a wizard a chore? Or does he do it for free because he likes having fight scenes in Chinatown so much?
The Concept: The story behind Pirates of the Caribbean was very easy to understand - hey, remember that ride you love so much? We made it into a movie. Not so with Sorcerer's Apprentice, where many kids do not get (or care about) the Fantasia reference, and where the tie-in is still confusing to the rest of us - hey, remember that silent movie with the classical music? Remember the broom scene with all the water? This is that scene, but live-action. Plus other things. Oh, and Nicolas Cage plays a homeless man with magical powers. And did I mention the kung-fu? Audiences LOVE kung-fu!
Here's what the suits at Walt Disney Pictures will likely say was the cause:
Sorcerer's Apprentice was not a sequel, and audiences didn't want to see a non-Harry Potter wizard movie. Best way to move on is to make more sequels, since we know those will be a hit. Hey, has anyone seen my script for the live-action Rescuers Down Under lying around?
Sigh.
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Related Links:
* Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides Plot Makes Me Eat My Words
* Fixing Walt Disney Studios in Five Steps or Less
* National Treasure 3: We've Got Writers
July 20, 2010
Sorcerer's Apprentice: A Post-Mortem.
Labels: Walt Disney Pictures
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1 comments:
This really perfectly captures a lot of what I felt doomed the movie, too. It just looked like a movie that didn't know what it wanted: A family film that's too dark. A dark film that's too family friendly. Who knows. It just looked really cookie cutter no matter what it was. You know, people tend to salivate over the supposed carcass of Tom Cruise's film career, but Nic Cage is in a very similar place. I think people are sick of him in roles like this, the smug quippy trying-to-act-like-he's-not-nic-cage-but-acting-just-like-nic-cage parts. A better, more currently popular actor would've probably elevated Baruchel. But having Cage there meant you needed a strong second lead to lift a lot of the weight.
But I do have to say that I don't think this is necessarily Disney-specific. I see this type of hogwash coming out of every film studio. Hollywood is tripping over itself and totally devoid of creativity. If not for Avatar spillover, Toy Story 3 and Twilight, the box office would be in terrible shape (and it ain't in good shape now). They all want to make these factory-made movies, over-CGI'd and insepidly plotted and keen viewers see right through it.
I think Disney should be ashamed of far too often going back to the same well and not trying originality. At least Tron Legacy, despite being a sequel, looks like a work of amazing art. But I don't see a whole lot on the horizon that isn't just the company skeet-shooting for a golden goose they could saturate all the markets with. Maybe they need to go back to trying to make good movies and go in new directions instead of constantly trying to replicate Pirates of the Caribbean.
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