Pandorum

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  • Directed By: Christian Alvart
  • Written By: Travis Milloy, Christian Alvart
  • Release Date: September 25, 2009
  • Domestic Distributor: Overture
  • Cast: Dennis Quaid, Ben Foster, Cam Gigandet

Box Office Info:
Budget: $40 million Financed by: Constantin; DFFF; FFA
Domestic Box Office: $10,330,853 Overseas Box Office: $10,314,474


The budget for Pandorum was $40 million and it was financed by the German based Constantin, which received additional German grants and tax breaks.  The German funding organization FFA contributed $600,000 to the picture and the German Federal Film Fund (DFFF) invested $5M.

Summit handled international pre-sales to distributors, which kicked off at the 2008 Cannes Film Festival.  Overture Films was tapped to distribute in the US.  Overture, the short lived distribution company owned by cable giant Starz, acquired the rights for slightly less than $10 million.  Pandorum was successfully pre-sold around the world as a potential trilogy, which never materialized after it flopped.

Overture dated Pandorum for September 25 and it bowed against the Bruce Willis sci-fi pic Surrogates and the remake of FamePandorum was not screened for critics and the reviews that eventually posted were dreadful.

The movie had little buzz and was booked into 2,506 theaters and pulled in a terrible $4,424,126 — placing #6 for the weekend led by the holdover Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs.  Pandorum sank 55.3% in its second weekend to $1,979,061 and fell 58.4% in its third frame to $822,415 and then promptly lost most of its theater count.  The domestic run closed with just $10,330,853.  Overture would see returned about $5.6 million after theaters take their percentage of the gross, which leaves much of their P&A expenses in the red, as well as their acquisition cost.

Pandorum tanked in every offshore market, grossing $10.3 million across many distributors.  Constantin guaranteed a large release in Germany, in return for the millions in German grants that were awarded to the production and it bombed with an awful $932,423.

4 Comments

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  1. People just don’t no good films anymore! And it drives me nuts! Pandorum was a great sci-fi film. Surrogates was an awful film and don’t get me wrong I love Bruce Willis as an actor I’m a big fan but I hated that movie.! It’s a shame that people don’t know a good movie sometimes if it was flopping on their face like a just landed tuna! I wish I had millions because I would buy it and make the second film. It would only need Ben Foster and a surprising pop-up of Dennis Quaid. And the girl would like to kick the hell out of everyone LOL. The possibilities are endless!

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