The newest high-profile Hollywood production from director David O. Russell, Amsterdam, has reportedly lost over $100 million in its first weekend. Initial opening weekend estimates had expected profits in the $15 million area, but it has failed to hit even half that, according to Deadline. It has only grossed $6.5 million in the United States thus far, and only about $10 million internationally. The comedy film’s stated $80 million budget was double that of Russell’s last, hugely successful, period piece American Hustle. The picture earned $251.1 million internationally on a budget of $40 million, and it was nominated for 10 Academy Awards.
Unfortunately, this latest addition lacks that little something that made previous ones so special. A move from Boston to Los Angeles, followed by a suspension in production due to the COVID epidemic in March 2020, drove up the already enormous cost of manufacturing, the paper claims. The film was supposed to start filming in 2020, but the actors refused to film outside of Los Angeles, therefore the production was delayed until January 2021. Staying on the West Coast was compromised for an extra $30 million. Not a single extra dime could be traced back to the A-list performers. Christian Bale, Margot Robbie, John David Washington, Rami Malek, Robert De Niro, Anya Taylor-Joy, Taylor Swift, and Michael Shannon all showed up because they wished to collaborate with Kurt Russell.
Even after the director’s history of tiffs with talent, many talented people stuck around—and some even worked for pay. Bale and Russell spent a combined five years on the project. Meanwhile, reactions were generally negative. The film has received 33% approval from critics and 60% approval from audiences on review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, indicating that positive word of mouth is not helping its cause. “a cinematic fraud that fails to convince us it’s genuinely any excellent as a film or worth even a second of time taken seriously,” as Chase Hutchinson put it, sums up the film’s reception.
The animated family picture featuring singer Shawn Mendes, Lyle, Lyle, Crocodile, came in second, while the horror flick Smile, which has been a surprise smash and has gone significantly above predictions, finished in third at the box office.