Monday Morning Quarterback Part II

By BOP Staff

February 3, 2016

Yeah, I'm not sure why we're in this movie, either.

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Kim Hollis: Fifty Shades of Black, the Wayans parody of the earlier romance(?), earned $5.9 million during its debut weekend. What do you think of this result?

Jason Barney: Unfortunately this opening wasn't bad enough. I hate to sound too critical, but I would have to be in a certain frame of mind - like having seen every other film available - to even consider paying money to see this. On the plus side, most people seem to agree. Opening in ninth place during a relatively soft time of the year, to just under $6 million presents a certain lack of enthusiasm most films would want to avoid. The sad thing is this film may float toward profitability.

Ryan Kyle: Hopefully this low gross will finally be the straw that breaks the camel's back and make these Wayans parody films disappear (or at least only be made for VOD). A $5.9 million opening is poor for any release, but made for only $5 million, no real coin will be lost outside of the spend for prints and advertising. It's another loss for Open Road Films, a distributor that still hasn't found its groove.

Felix Quinonez: It's definitely nothing to brag about, but it did actually surpass its production budget in three days. So, while I can't imagine this having anything close to resembling legs, I can still see a possibility of it turning a profit so there could still be more of these "movies."




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Ben Gruchow: A bad Wayans spoof is still better than a good Friedberg/Seltzer spoof, and probably more gratifying than a Zucker spoof at this point. That said, I haven't seen the movie yet, but there are precious few moments in the trailer where I even cracked a faint smile; the RT score aside, I think it's telling that there's been no footage of the movie marketed or screened beyond that single trailer. Wayans was a guest on The Daily Show a few days back; despite a sharp and genial air from him during the interview itself, the customary clip shown was nothing beyond the short bit of the female lead getting her head stuck in the elevator. Still not funny, and there wasn't much audible laughter from the audience in the studio.

Kim Hollis: I guess it's fine considering the budget, but I sort of wonder why they even bother with this stuff at this point. Here's a movie with no apparent audience - the people who like 50 Shades of Grey aren't going to watch it, and the people who mock the source material don't want anything to do with the spoof, either. And yet I'm sure we'll see another version of the same idea in a couple more years.

David Mumpower: By my calculations, it earned one dollar per ESPN commercial aired. Seriously, I felt like the movie was stalking me. As was the case with A Haunted House and its sequel, one of the least likely sequels ever by the way, it's the type of performance that will justify further satires. For a minimal investment, producers receive slightly better than minimal returns, making this a weird form of virtual arbitrage. But seriously, the real winner here is me since I never have to watch a commercial for the movie again.


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