The 8 Movies That Died At The 4th of July Box Office

The Fourth Of July frame sees usually two types of releases – the studio’s most expensive tent-poles and the less fortunate movies positioned as counter-programming.

Here are the 8 movies that died at the 4th of July box office over the past two decades.

1. The Lone Ranger (2013)

The irresponsible production costs, plus a global marketing blitz reported to be $150 million, ended with The Lone Ranger becoming one of the biggest financial disasters on record, with Disney expected to take a $190 million write-down on the picture. Read More

2. Legend Of The Seven Seas (2003)

DreamWorks financed Sinbad: Legend Of The Seven Seas for $60 million and incurred one of the biggest write-downs on record, taking a colossal $125 million loss on the animated film after a massive worldwide marketing spend. The huge failure of Sinbad: Legend Of The Seven Seas marked the end of traditional animation for DreamWorks. Read More

3. Wild Wild West (1999)

Wild Wild West represents the absolute worst in reckless, wretched excess — plenty of which rests on the shoulders of former hairdresser to Barbra Streisand, turned producer Jon Peters. Peters has since gained minor notoriety for being the dipshit that gave Kevin Smith three directives for writing his abandoned Superman Lives script — no Superman suit, no flying and there must be a giant spider to fight. Jon Peters yielded a lot of power at WB in the late ’90s and used his clout to get his ridiculous giant spider into this idiotic movie. The man should be studied for very successfully reaping the benefits of being stupid at work. Read More

4. The Adventures Of Rocky And Bullwinkle (2000)

After The Rocky and Bullwinkle Show creator, Jay Ward’s death in 1989, his daughter Tiffany Ward inked a long-standing licensing deal in May 1991 between Jay Ward Productions Inc. and Universal.  Eventually in the late 90s Universal announced plans for two movies from The Rocky and Bullwinkle Show.  First up was the box office bomb Dudley Do-Right in 1999 ($9.9 million gross) and then The Adventures Of Rocky And Bullwinkle, an expensive live-action/CGI hybrid that the studio planned as an event family picture. Read More

5. The BFG (2016)

Disney has been successful in releasing 5 types of properties: Star Wars, Marvel, Pixar, in-house animation, and library titles with built-in brand awareness like The Jungle Book. When the mouse house strays from what is familiar, the results can be staggering, near record-breaking losses — like The BFG, Tomorrowland, and The Finest Hours. Read More

6. The House (2017)

The House was positioned as counter-programming to Despicable Me 3 and became Will Ferrell’s worst wide opening in his career. Read More

7. Rebound (2005)

This lame Martin Lawrence vehicle was shuffled around the release calendar and then dumped as counter-programming to War Of The Worlds. Rebound opened with a career low for Lawrence. Read More

8. Summer Of Sam (1999)

Summer Of Sam was dated as counter-programming to Wild Wild West and South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut.  Despite lukewarm reviews, auds gave the movie a rare and hateful D- cinemascore and it quickly tanked out of theaters. Read More