Released on Amazon Prime Video without going through the cinema box, the film “Chaos Walking” which brings together Tom Holland (“Spider-Man”) and Daisy Ridley (the “Star Wars” postlogy) has experienced many production problems.
On paper, Chaos Walking had all the keys in hand to be successful with the public. Adapted from the first part of the literary saga Le Chaos on the move by Patrick Ness, the film directed by Doug Liman (Memory in the skin) brings together a prestigious cast including Tom Holland (Spider-Man) and Daisy Ridley (Star Wars postlogy), but also Nick Jonas and Mads Mikkelsen.
So why Chaos Walking has it not met with the expected success? Originally entrusted to Robert Zemeckis, the film finally changed directors shortly before the start of filming, following the latter’s decision to devote himself to other projects.
His replacement Doug Liman, a filmmaker specializing in big budget productions, is also known in Hollywood for his ability to handle difficult projects; for example, he had not hesitated to start filming Edge of Tomorrow when the film’s script did not yet have an outcome!
An “insortable” film
But at the end of the shooting, the result did not live up to expectations. This is even an understatement, as the result seems distressing in the eyes of the managers of the Lionsgate studio: according to comments reported by the Wall Street Journal, the film would have been particularly qualified “insortable” at the end of this nightmarish projection.
While it is common in Hollywood for additional scenes to be filmed (or returned), it is nevertheless here entire sections of the feature film that have been modified in an attempt to minimize the extent of the damage.
“We wouldn’t be shooting additional scenes if we weren’t sure the film would work.” confided to our American colleagues an employee of Lionsgate, remarks which one could not however qualify of a communicative optimizes …
Lionsgate
Millions of additional dollars are thus spent to finance these new shots, an investment which however fails to correct the situation. The sentence is then irrevocable: massacred by American critics when it was released in theaters on March 5, the film is also a monumental oven at the box office, with a total of $ 25 million raised at the international box office for a budget. estimated at … 100 million!
The disaster is of such magnitude that the film was deprived of theatrical release in many countries, including France: it is therefore not in the cinema that French spectators were able to discover Chaos Walking, but directly in SVOD via the Amazon Prime Video platform.
In the past, films shunned upon their release have acquired over the years the status of cult work, but everything seems to indicate that Chaos Walking will, for its part, be destined to sink into eternal oblivion. A godsend for its two main actors, probably very happy that this monumental flop – not to say embarrassing – does not mar their respective careers.
