The Last Airbender currently stands at 9% on Rotten Tomatoes, with just 9 positive reviews. For those not keeping count, that’s bad. As we know, however, review scores are only half the story. If the movie makes a big enough profit, M. Night could rise phoenix like from the ashes of his recent career. So what are its box office chances?
With a reported $150m production budget, there is sure to be a pretty weighty marketing package behind the film, which may be almost as much again. As we all know, if you get enough promotional power behind a film, people are gonna go see it. But in this instance, is that going to be enough? Looking at the other elements, i think the answer is going to be a resounding no.
The first alarm bell is the complete lack of star power. The director himself has seen his star falling for several years, so little help there. And whilst there are some recognisable names and faces within the movie, from a mainstream point of view, i don’t see any actors that are going to draw people in. Dev Patel did star in the Academy Award winning Slumdog Millionaire, but one big movie doesn’t necessarily make a star.
Brand recognition is usually a selling point with movies based on an existing property, but that isn’t necessarily going to be that effective here either. Adapted from a Nickelodeon kid’s animated series, it did get big ratings for a cartoon, but only ran for three seasons. Being mainly a kid’s show, it has limited appeal to non-geeky adults, so i can’t imagine the average movie goer will know much about it. Avatar does have a dedicated cult following, but there is a big difference between cult and mass appeal. This will be made even worse by the fact that it isn’t actually named after the original cartoon, thanks to Mr Cameron’s co-opting of the Avatar name several years ago for a little project he released last year.
It’s impossible to foresee really, but it is highly possible that The Last Airbender will fail to recoup its budget, and it is currently estimated that it will have an opening weekend of around $50m. The review scores certainly aren’t hopeful – to put it in perspective, Jonah Hex opened with around $5m in its first weekend, and had a higher aggregate score on Rotten Tomatoes.
So what does this mean for Shyamalan? Was this his last chance to get the audience back onside? There is a lot of apathy, and even hatred around for the director now, but i think some of it is a little harsh. I’m not a big fan myself, but i did like The Sixth Sense and Unbreakable, as did a lot of people. Both of these films are present in the IMDb250, and were huge when they were originally released. His output since has steadily deteriorated, but when i hear people blast his work, and include his earliest two films, it gets to me. A lot of those same people praised these movies when they were originally released, and it is almost like they are trying to rewrite Shyamalan’s history. There is a reason that he was given a huge amount of money to make The Last Airbender, and that is because he HAS shown great talent in the past.
The Last Airbender was a risk, for both director and studio. It is set to fail by the looks of it, but i don’t necessarily think either made the wrong decision. Shyamalan is a filmmaker, that is his job, to make films. We were all complaining that he was making the same type of movie over and over, and that we were sick of his ‘formula’. So he took on something completely different, something ambitious, and i think he should be praised for trying. He is being lambasted now, but if he had gone and made another movie in the style of his others, he would have gotten a similar reaction. It was almost a no-win situation for him. Yes, if he had done a good job of The Last Airbender, then he would have won, and we would all have congratulated him, so for that, he is culpable. I just don’t think he should be criticised for taking the project on, just for its failure.
I think, however, we should also praise Paramount for taking the risk. Shyamalan was struggling, but had created a reputation for crafting some good drama, with interesting stories. The studio had a property that they could have easily handed over to a Michael Bay or Stephen Sommers, and sat back as the overblown popcorn action movie brought the dollars rolling in. They tried to do something a bit different. They gambled money on a man who at least had the potential to produce something unique, something special. That this decision ultimately ended in failure is unfortunate, but that doesn’t necessarily make it a wrong one. Without decisions like this we wouldn’t get films like Where The Wild Things Are, or Green Zone. It is a miracle either of these movies ever got commissioned, and whilst neither was a resounding commercial or critical success, both hold a lot of meaning for those that do love them. No company can afford to make losses on all their movies, but with the huge amounts of profit that are gained in the industry, i think it is important to make a gamble now and then on an interesting idea, and a talented filmmaker, that could quite conceivably produce something great.
I’m not suggesting that we should all go out and watch The Last Airbender. If it is as bad as everyone is saying, we should treat it with the contempt that it deserves. Neither am i saying that Shyamalan should be given another $150m to make a movie. He has had his chance, and much like Richard Kelly after his flops Southland Tales and The Box, his best option is to go away and quietly try to construct something brilliant, and hopefully surprise us in a couple of years time. In order to do this, he needs a bit of slack. If The Last Airbender does fail financially, and if he retreats humbly, give him the space. Of course, if it makes Transformers 2 type profits, we should all be very, very scared…
Bazmann – You can follow me on Twitter at www.twitter.com/baz_mann
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Personally I think everyone is judging this too harshly – it looks amazing and I’m interested enough not only to watch this but I also want to find out more about the series.
I think a lot of kids will want to see this – and it has a general fantasy appeal for anyone who liked LOTR or HP. Pll just see the director and make automatic assumptions, I’m glad he's been let off the leash to try something a new and a bit different.
From what I can tell the spirit of the toon is captured here, though it's been given a darker edge to keep older pll interested too – it may not be a huge hit but I think it can hold its own and will be a bit of a slow riser.
There's loads of kid movies without any star pulling power it's not really needed because half the time the stars aren't within the kids radar, it's more for the older pll again – but films like this will rely on kids dragging there folks along and/or geeks perhaps enjoying more than expected.
I'd hate to see M Night sink into obscurity as he's one of my fave directors (his only dud in my mind is The Happening), even though he can be formulaic he's good at telling a story and pulling you into his world, plus he's best at character driven dramas and creating a bit of depth and realism into the strangest of scenarios.
Like you say I think it's just in vogue right now to bash anything with his name attached to it regardless of the fact pll loved the first few films – they'll soon change right back again and find someone else if this turns out to be half way decent.
Plus we've still got the “mystery” film with Bruce Willis staring – chances are this will be the break M Night needs to get pll to restore there faith in his directing abilities again.
I think you do need to watch the cartoon series before you defend M. Night Shyamalan. There's a lot of differences between the movie and the cartoon that a lot of die hard fans are upset about (myself included) and the movie definitely does not capture the “spirit” of the cartoon series. I think your opinion may be a bit biased since Shyamalan is one of your favorite directors but honestly this movie was poorly produced and I'm not even bashing anything with his name attached to it (well, besides this one), if anything I am a fan of a few of his works (The Village, Sixth Sense, and Signs). So before anyone watches this movie I'm begging you, PLEASE SEE THE CARTOON SERIES FIRST! Then do your bashing.
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It was awful, the movie isn't very faithful to the tv series and the casting was horrible. Prince Zuko is supposed to be good looking but they cast some lanky kid with big ears and a nose who is probably related to M Night getting his big break.. I almost laughed out loud when I saw Aasif Mandvi(from the Daily show, very funny) come on screen as Admiral Zhao… turns out it wasn't very funny because by that time I had realized I had just wasted $10. Don't go see this movie, I was truly dissapointed.
Good article, just one little thing:
Article Quote:
“it did get big ratings for a cartoon, but only ran for three seasons.”
'Avatar: TLA' was set up to only have three seasons-so it was an overall success even though it does seem like having only three seasons isn't very good.
See, Aang learns about the three other elements-one per season (Season one he learns water, season two he learns earth and season three he learns fire) and then he proceeds to 'the final battle'.
but overall a good, interesting article.
As in vogue as it is to insult Shymalan, there's a dirty little secret, mainly that his films are profitable. So far with the exception of Lady in the Water, all his films have turned a huge profit even The Happening and if the opening day is any indication TLAB won't be an uminitigated disaster even if its not profitable. Critics and Fanboys might not like it but the guy still carries weight.
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Domestically, it won't make up to $150 million. All his movies, especially the ones panned by reviewers, have never made it past $100 million, and it was better for him with those ones cost they cost like $40 million or $70 million to make, so technically, making $95 million domestically was a success. And then he went on to make a bulk of the money through foreign revenue. I think that's what will happen with airbender. Domestically it will flop. World wide, it will bring in probably enough to cover £150 million. I heard marketing cost an additional $130 million, which means the entire movie budget is over $280 million. I don't know HOW he's going to make all that, even with foreign revenue. Prince of Persia had better reviews than Airbender, and a much popular cast, and it still didn't shatter box office the way everyone thought it would. (Cost $200 million to make. Has made $300 million, over $200 million of which come from foreign revenue). If Airbender is going to make back $280 million, man it's going to need its fans to back it up. Word of mouth. And right now, man, hardly any fan is backing this movie.
[…] The Last Airbender – Shyamalan's Last Hurrah? : HeyUGuys – UK … […]
I don't necessarilly think the film is going to be profitable it's just not going to be the careeer ending death nail that its being made out to be. To compare it to Prince of Persia TLAB made more in two days (one of which was a weekday) than POP made opening memorial day weekend.(Monday excluded).
Also I'm not sure what you mean when you say all his movies have never made it past 100-million, Signs and The Sixth Sense both made well over 200-million in the US and the Village, (not well reviewed by the way) made 114-million in the US. Unbreakable also was just shy of 100-million but that was almost a decade ago. Finally the Happening, was not a stellar performer but even so 63-mil for a panned horror flick whose biggest star is Whalberg isn't bad at all.
Shyamalan just isn't the box office posion that some people wish he was in fact I would say even with some underperformers on his resume he's quite the opposite.
Thanks to share this.
I really appreciate this site to watch the last airbender movie.
And perhaps your biased towards the cartoon – seriously how did you expect a live action film to fully capture the anime style humour? To me the spirit of a thing has more to do with the characters, story and overall series arc – less to do with how close the actors resemble there 2D counterparts or other minor visual differences.
The film is drawing in a wider audience than just those who enjoy the cartoon, and i highly doubt you need to watch or understand it to be able to critic the film – there two separate entities.
BTW I’m a comic book reader and fan of most the CBM's out there – since there's several years of history to wade through when concerning most major comic book adaptations I’ve come to expect an obvious difference in the two media, now the fact i can reference YEARS of stories, arcs, characters, powers, costumes, deaths, births, marriage, rebirths, reimaging’s and soo much more that it could literally take up pages – and Last Airbender has WHAT? Three seasons and a few years behind it?
Seriously if i can accept differences (I’d actually rather see something new, not just some page for page/ word for word adapt) and still enjoy these two separate entities – then i see no reason why fans of this series can't just grow up and realise it's not all about what they want to see!
Plus for the record i have since posting seen several of the episodes from the series and though it's enjoyable, it's nothing special or original – in fact I’d go so far as to say the film looks to have improved it. and I’m not just saying that because I’m a fan of M. Night, in fact i look at his (and any other director i like) films with a much more critical eye (I’m a media student, and lover of film) pll nowadays just want too much from films and i do blame the PTB who hype these films to heights they can never hope to reach, but if your sensible you take all that with a pinch of salt.
At the end of the day films are all about entertaining you, taking you away from the real world and transporting you to a place where anything is possible – all you need to do is sit back and enjoy the ride without thinking too deeply about the why's, what's or where's.
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umm I liked the Last Airbender…Transformers 2 sucked big time as do all Michael Bay's sexist, unoriginal films
Colossall failllll… excellent job smack Knight lol
In case any missed it ..sarcasm heh
dumb review. A lot of ifs only covers one’s tail
M. Knight should not be lauded for anything these days. This was a terrible movie. During a recession, after Hollywood’s recent unannounced tix price increase, we don’t need so called journalists giving sources excuses. Bad is bad. Whether it has an impact on M. Knight’s career, we’ll just have to wait to see, not read dribble like this. Sorry, but I’m so tired of this kind of nothingness written these days.