DOA: Dead or Alive opened on just 505 screens this past weekend and earned just $260,713 at the box office. To give you an idea of just how bad that is, Pathfinder, which has been playing for 10 weeks, earned more money on just 46 screens. But there's a reason for this debacle.
Dimension Films and Weinstein Company basically dumped the movie with zero TV advertising. You simply cannot open a movie during the crowded summer months without some TV ads promoting the movie. The strangest thing about this film's demise is that it was once a tentpole picture.
Last summer, the movie was slated for a big August release, which was later bumped until October. Those dates came and went and no film came out. Even the PR reps didn't seem to know what was going on with the film.
Finally, the movie showed up as a June 19 release. But the film was not screened for press or word-of-mouth and no talent came out to promote it. There wasn't a junket or a premiere.
It was literally dumped in theaters with only some online advertising. I haven't seen the movie, so I don't know if it's a total bomb. But I do know that the film had a solid budget and a talented director, Corey Yuen ( The Transporter 1 and 2 ), a good writer in JF Lawton ( Pretty Woman ) and at least one big-name star in Jaime Pressly, thanks to her hit show, My Name Is Earl.
Also, the movie made over $6 million in foreign sales, where I assume they actually promoted it. I've never seen a studio invest in a movie and then throw it away like this. If they were going to dump it, why delay it twice and then choose the summer season to do it?
DVD buyers certainly won't be impressed with Over $260,000 at the box office written on the box. DOA is a solid franchise from Tecmo that has sold millions of copies of games globally. It's got a built-in fan base that the studio virtually ignored.
I talked to people in the gaming industry this past week and most of them didn't even know the movie was opening Friday. That speaks volumes for what a botched job Dimension/Weinstein did on this movie. Back to Gaming Guru Copyright 2007 by WRAL.
com. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. DOA: Dead or Alive opened on just 505 screens this past weekend and earned just $260,713 at the box office.
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