blade runner 2049

‘Blade Runner 2049’ has made $240.6 million globally, but the big budget science fiction sequel is coming in much lower than expected and will ultimately be seen as a failure and a loss.  The loss looks to only hit co-producers Alcon Entertainment.  Partner Sony will make back its $110M investment thanks to the agreement brokered in which Sony recoups its money first in exchange for a smaller cut of the back end.  This is a wise deal, as it turns out, seeing as how this movie will not be making a profit with its theatrical release.  Warner Brothers distributed ‘Blade Runner 2049’ in North America, thanks to a longstanding deal with Alcon, but did not invest in the movie.

‘Blade Runner 2049’ cost a reported $155 million to produce, after rebates and tax incentives but before marketing.  Alcon is looking at a loss of approximately $80 million.

As a rival studio chief declared:

“To the lay moviegoer, this was an obscure IP and the marketing campaign never told a story whatsoever. I still don’t know what this movie is about. Replicant? WTF is a replicant? The marketing campaign assumed the entire audience was in on the property.”

Wall Street analyst Eric Handler agreed, saying:

“The first film was very much a cult classic, which translates into a nice film. Despite this film’s excellent reviews, it could not really grow the audience beyond its core.”

Of course, ‘Blade Runner 2049’ was the sequel to 1982’s Ridley Scott classic ‘Blade Runner’.  Director Denis Villeneuve came aboard fresh off the success of his critically acclaimed hit ‘Arrival’.  The film was headlined by Ryan Gosling, fresh off awards buzz for last year’s Academy Award winner for Best Picture, ‘La La Land’.  He was joined by film and sci-fi legend Harrison Ford, the star of the original movie, and Jared Leto, whose profile is at an all-time high after appearing as The Joker in last year’s hit ‘Suicide Squad’.

Unfortunately, the original ‘Blade Runner’ was a box office flop which grew into a cult favorite and is considered a classic by sci-fi fans.  But in this day and age, most people have never seen it and it was widely believed that in order to understand ‘2049’, one had to have not only seen the first, but be intimately familiar with it.

There is still home video which could help a great deal.  Unfortunately, there is no release date at this time, but it is believed that ‘Blade Runner 2049’ will be released in January 2018.

Source: The Hollywood Reporter