MovieChat Forums > The Good Lie (2014) Discussion > $3M gross on a $20M budget

$3M gross on a $20M budget

posted 9 years ago by light-ning-volts
7 replies | jump to latest

Holy hell, how does a movie distributed by a huge studio, with a big lead star and critical acclaim bomb this hard?

It didn't help that Warners decided not to bother promoting it and to release it on less than 500 screens in early October. That's why it "bombed". Very strange release strategy for a film with strong reviews, an audience-friendly PG-13 rating, a big name star, and a feel-good story.

[–] NoleGirl 9 years ago

I saw two commercials total for this film and my local theatre had no advertisements for it whatsoever. It was bizarre. The movie received a standing ovation at TIFF that lasted for five minutes and that is a rare achievement. I'm bit sure why Warner didn't push this film.

[–] mpboylanjr 9 years ago

Very true. Way better than average film that they didn't push. I didn't even hear of it until I watched it on Fios OnDemand this week. I wouldn't say it's a bomb if it's open nowhere people can see it and not shown to the masses at all. I don't get why these movie companies throw away 20+ million on a film and then don't even get it out there? If it was pushed hard and in every theater I'd call it a bomb but in this case it just wasn't shown anywhere and it should have been

[–] 9 years ago

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[–] sinclair26 9 years ago

I had never even heard of it until we rented Dolphin Tale 2 the other day & there was a preview for it & we looked it up & found out it was in redbox. I am sure as more people hear about it people will be wat hing it. Remember Crash or Frequency? No one had heard of those until after they came out on video & ended up big hits.

[–] fiatlux-1 9 years ago

I'd never heard of this film at all. Never saw an ad or a poster for it.
I only discovered it when perusing Netflix for something new to see.
I think it even came up when I clicked on 'Reese Witherspoon' for films.

Thoroughly enjoyed this film. It was a bit propaganda-ish I will say, the whole Sudan-ways-are-better-than-America-so-I'll-just-quit-my-job plot line was a bit exasperating.

But it stayed interesting and the characters were mostly well-fleshed out.
Yes, I agree with others here that the film seemed to encourage & endorse a criminal act (Immigration fraud). But again, many films tend to glamorize and/or justify such actions for the *greater good*.

I liked how they cast actual refugees, and that most of them did indeed become citizens.

I'd say this cloud is Cumulo Nimbus.
Didn't he discover America?
Penfold, shush.

[–] bruiser-t-cat 8 years ago

I've never heard of it. It came on to at the hotel I'm in and I was wondering what it was about. I'm assuming they did little to no marketing.