Dumbest studio greenlights

[Peter Paltridge]

Usually, everything that's popular gets a movie eventually. And if it's a book, it's completely inevitable. This begs the question of just how they're going to pull off filming "Fifty Shades of Grey," which is little more than porn. If they're faithful to the book at all, the film will get an NC-17 and be prevented from wide theatrical release.

But I hadn't heard anything yet, until I heard this (click the link):
Movie Pictures | Movie Posters - Yahoo! Movies

Everything about this doesn't work. It is a 32-page novelty picture book with The Worst Word You Can Say in the title. How.....

My best guess is that they'll simply tack the title onto a generic family "kids are a pain" movie like Parental Guidance, similar to "basing" a movie on What To Expect When You're Expecting.

 

[Shawn Hopkins]

You can never tell if a concept is going to be dumb until you see the finished product. Clue, for example, seems like a really stupid thing to make a movie out of, but it's a very entertaining film.

 

[the greenman]

Gambling is the nature of Hollywood. I recently been listening to Kevin Smith talk about his desire to make Hit Somebody his final film. It never got greenlit, and even Jerry Bruckheimer loved the script, but now it's going to be a four hour tv miniseries, and we will get Clerks 3 as his final feature length film.

 

[Dantheman]

Sometimes I wish Hollywood would remember the words of Jurassic Park's Ian Malcolm or the Federation President from Star Trek VI, in that just because you can do a thing, it doesn't mean you should do a thing.

 

[Hanshotfirst1138]

Gambling is the nature of Hollywood. I recently been listening to Kevin Smith talk about his desire to make Hit Somebody his final film. It never got greenlit, and even Jerry Bruckheimer loved the script, but now it's going to be a four hour tv miniseries, and we will get Clerks 3 as his final feature length film.

Hollywood is also more conservative than ever in projects it chooses to allot money for, whereas TV, though it doesn't allow you the budget or the resources, has allowed for some very adventurous stuff like The Wire. More and more talented filmmakers seem to be gravitating towards TV, largely just by necessity since they're more likely to get funding there.

 

[Monterey Jack]

Why Disney invested close to $300 million on John Carter Of Mars, a pulp character that's a century old with no "brand recognition" to modern-day audiences, I will never know.

 

[Hanshotfirst1138]

That had the potential for a big franchise written all over it, but maybe you're right in that that they were late to the party after Avatar and the dozens of knock-offs. The colossal mis-marketing and the incomprehensible screenplay didn't help either.

 

[Shawn Hopkins]

There's nothing wrong with the John Carter concept. It's one of the most beloved adventure novels ever. It was just botched at every turn when making and promoting the movie.

 

[stephane dumas]

I guess sometimes, some of these flops later became cult movies later thanks to popularity in videos rentals and dvd sales like UHF. But I wonder if some of these movies might had been ahead of their time? We could wonder why the pirate movie "Cutthroad Island" (1995) failed but Pirates of the Caribean was a hit?

 

[Surreal Kangaroo]

Why Disney invested close to $300 million on John Carter Of Mars, a pulp character that's a century old with no "brand recognition" to modern-day audiences, I will never know.

I agree that the budget was way too high, but I thought that John Carter definitely had franchise potential. I think the marketing was poor.

 

[Kindness King]

Greenlighting John Carter wasn't dumb, it was the marketing department that dropped the ball. It's chosen release date more than likely didn't help either. Wasn't someone at Disney let go because of what happened with it? At any rate, the advertising for Disney needs an overhaul.

 

[MadMan400096]

The idea behind Cowboys and Aliens was just stupid: a mundane genre mixed with a fantastic one. I was expecting a bad film when I first saw it in my school auditorium, and it didn't disappoint. I've never seen it after that one showing, and I still consider it one of my most hated movies, thanks to the insane, gap-filled writing, bad characterization, shoddy CG effects, and its utter slaughter of my suspension of disbelief. I believe I should explain the latter, since that's what really killed the movie for me.

Spoiler

Ella, the mysterious girl, dies, and is revived by fire, just because she's an alien. *goes to a furniture store to destroy couches with bare hands out of sheer frustration* So yeah, it's basically a blatant "screw you" to not only any kind of internal logic, but also to our intelligence, as well as an unnecessary and utterly moronic plot twist, and being an alien gives it absolutely no justification. Not helped by her dying for real in an explosion at the end of the movie.

I know not everything has to be realistic, but all I ask is for a work to have some sense of believability. The spoilered part did not. But I'm getting off topic. Whoever greenlit it must have been hit on the head with an anvil.

 

[G. Wen]

Anyone remember during the mid to late '90's, Hollywood kept greenlighting NBA stars in movies? You know, movies such as Shazaam, Steel, something with Dennis Rodman... What the hell were they thinking?

 

[Classic Speedy]

The idea behind Cowboys and Aliens was just stupid: a mundane genre mixed with a fantastic one. I was expecting a bad film when I first saw it in my school auditorium, and it didn't disappoint. I've never seen it after that one showing, and I still consider it one of my most hated movies, thanks to the insane, gap-filled writing, bad characterization, shoddy CG effects, and its utter slaughter of my suspension of disbelief. I believe I should explain the latter, since that's what really killed the movie for me.

Spoiler

Ella, the mysterious girl, dies, and is revived by fire, just because she's an alien. *goes to a furniture store to destroy couches with bare hands out of sheer frustration* So yeah, it's basically a blatant "screw you" to not only any kind of internal logic, but also to our intelligence, as well as an unnecessary and utterly moronic plot twist, and being an alien gives it absolutely no justification. Not helped by her dying for real in an explosion at the end of the movie.

I know not everything has to be realistic, but all I ask is for a work to have some sense of believability. The spoilered part did not. But I'm getting off topic. Whoever greenlit it must have been hit on the head with an anvil.

My problem with Cowboys & Aliens was that it took itself way too seriously. With a title like Cowboys & Aliens, I expected something over-the-top and witty, a la Men in Black. Instead, I got a morose, slowly-paced movie where nobody smiles and most everything is shot in the dark. And I didn't find the aliens interesting or convincing at all.

Anyone remember during the mid to late '90's, Hollywood kept greenlighting NBA stars in movies? You know, movies such as Shazaam, Steel, something with Dennis Rodman... What the hell were they thinking?

Not to start thinking like a movie exec here, but... I'm guessing their reasoning was that because people followed basketball players, they'd follow them anywhere, including in the movies. Arguably, the only time this worked was Space Jam, which was a hit. Though I'm not sure how much of that can be attributed to Michael Jordan and how much can be attributed to the Looney Tunes characters.