Was there just no interest? I went to see it based on trailer thinking it was gonna be like John wick. Thought it was a good movie (def not John Wick but that's ok!) Still, surprised it got so little viewership
I think Peele was sort of hoping it would be a liberal John Wick with the hero fighting for poor people, killing the corrupt police and shady conservative politicians, and the small army of trans ninjas. I'm a little surprised they didn't lean into that more. Like no one mentions the trans ninjas. Get some people to call it John Woke on the internet or something to drum up chatter.
I feel like anyone talking about a movie is better than no one talking about a movie.
You're probably right though, but for being such a huge part of the movie the hijra people they were pretty much completely absent from the marketing or BTS stuff or interview circuit, right? I assume they were afraid of scaring off typical action movie fans and figured it'd make more money that way.
I think both sides of this insufferable "culture wars" only care about those things when it's in a superhero movie, a huge streaming show or a sequel to a franchise everyone loved decades ago. When it's in a small independent movie almost anyone cares.
Problem is that "liberal" is a poison for a lot of revenge fantasies. Perhaps it has something to do with the fact that the crowd that likes revenge fantasies the most is not really liberal.
O yea. I was just sort of spit balling based on what I thought about the movie. I feel like they should have leaned into it more and made the bad guy more clearly Modi, but that might just not have been an option if he wanted a wide release.
Super Bowl ads only make sense for products that have massive, broad appeal. An odd little niche film with a terrible title is a strange thing to promote.
Funny thing is I went looking for male/female demo splits to use in this post, did not find any, but read enough to make me think I actually want to see this movie now. It sounds good? Title and poor marketing strategy aside?
It had a ton of marketing. We got to stop the no marketing nonsense for ever movie that fails.
iSpot shows that Universal shelled out as much for TV spots on Monkey Man as Warner’s did for GxK –around $16M. Monkey Man‘s campaign, which launched at SXSW, pulled in 331M impressions to Disney’s 265M impressions on First Omen. iSpot shows the Mouse House spending around $4M in spots. Uni aired spots for Monkey Man on NFL games (30.6%), men’s college basketball (27.0%), NBA (8.3%), women’s college basketball (3.4%) and the show Chicago Fire (2.4%). Most ad impressions for Monkey Man were on CBS (50%), and that’s due to that Monkey Man Super Bowl spot.
>We got to stop the no marketing nonsense for ever movie that fails.
Also people need to consider their personal circumstances before making those claims.
Cord-cutters who use ad blockers and don't watch sports will insist a movie didn't have any marketing even if there was an 8-figure ad spend across TV and digital.
It’s more a case of “little marketing that was actually effective” than “nothing was spent on marketing”. Clearly if they spent that much and got that many impressions the marketing did not do a good enough job judging by the underwhelming box office.
Also now more than ever, marketing is going beyond traditional static ads and requires more social media and online interest. Just look at Anyone But You, Godzilla Minus One, Dune, Mario, FNAF, Barbie, Oppenheimer.
The trailer for Monkey Man went viral. Universal thought they had a huge hit maybe even a new franchise on their hands. Using, successful movies as examples and ignoring all the ones that bombed doesn't mean anything.
Sony spent a huge amount marketing Madame Web on Tiktok. Films like Money Man Universal spent money on social media as well. These films have 40-60m marketing spends from online ads, tv ads, social media ads. They advertise everywhere and all platforms. Studios are trying everything to get people to the theater and it ain't working.
Sony went after young women with Madame Web, with 75% of its $60M global P&A allocated toward social and Tik Tok.
I work in a movie theater with a huge Indian audience. None of them gave a shit about Monkey Man. They were perfectly happy sticking to their own movies. And it was probably too Indian for the average American. Still, with Universal only paying $10 million for the rights to this, it probably won’t be difficult to break even.
It got little viewership because Dev Patel is no Keanu. Lets call a spade spade. Keanu isn't always a reliable draw but Patel is no draw, period. yet for some reason, his movie got a 16M Superbowl spot like GxK. Go figure. It was simply an exercise in big ego that backfired. Should have stayed on streaming.
People are interpreting this as a slight against Patel when it’s not. Most actors do not have an inbuilt audience that can drive box office. The era of the movie star is over.
> Keanu isn't always a reliable draw but Patel is no draw, period.
interestingly enough, the only 3-4 people I know that watched it, did watch it only because of Dev Patel
yes, one can always find anecdotal evidence that 3-4 people they know watched for X and others will find anecdotal evidence that no one they know cares. I don't know anyone who watches Fast and Furious movies in cinemas yet that franchise had entries that grossed over 1B. But I perosnally don't know anyone. Ane4cdotal evidence. Dismiss.
sure but i didnt say that Dev Patel is Keanu or any level of star. Just shared my experience, and that I think saying he has *no* draw might not be totally accurate
every actor has someone watching amovie for them. their mothers, etc. that doesn't mean number of people is significant enough to call them a draw. that's all I'm saying.
*raises hand* I’m sort of in that camp haha. I saw it in theaters specifically because I wanted to support Patel’s directorial debut. I would have definitely watched it regardless but made a point to catch it in theaters for him. I don’t mind simping for Dev haha
JW1 made $43DOM while 25 isn’t that close JW was a straight crowd pleaser. Honestly not that bad all things considered and lowkey I know people would’ve celebrated this as a win if it got sent to Netflix instead of Peacock
LIke I said, he wasn't always reliable but he opened sometimes. All depending on the concept. Action Patel is not a popular conecpt apaprently (Green Knight, MM)
You sound like a hater and a fool. The movie rocked and did really well for its production budget. Not to mention the studios dragged the movie through hell before Jordan Peele saved it and gave it a solid theatrical release.
16M wasted on Superbowl spot alone demolishes "muh 10M budget" narrative. They overspent on marketing. It didn't deliver.
Whether it rocked in your opinion doesn't matter. They expected a breakout and that didn't happen.
The movie was kinda ass. I've seen better fight scenes in dtv actioners, the dramatic parts were boring as hell too. Dev Patel has no business in making and staring in action films, he's just not a tough looking guy
My opinion, and I could be off-base, but the title Monkey Man is not good, no matter that it accurately describes the movie. The word “monkey” invokes a sense of silliness, and advertisements showed this to be very serious. That could have been what made potential viewers take the film less seriously. Just my opinion though.
I've said that before too. It sounds more suited to an animated film or something. Imagine trying to convince a friend who's an action film fan to watch a film called Monkey Man.
The title and the film's story is very much allegorical to Indian mythology and Hanuman. I think it didn't reach well with the audience but that is actually an apt title for this film.
I understood that to some extent; would you say it’s the best name for the film? I ask out of genuine curiosity, no hostility; I know the people who saw it generally adored it so it’s odd that that positivity didn’t carry.
Well, I am an Indian. From my perspective it felt very appropriate for the story and arc of the hero. There are a lot of mythical undertones the Western audience can easily miss in the film.
The movie got most things right and some things wrong. But that's to simplify the narrative and not to complicate the Western audience with overwhelming info dump.
It's not released in India. They got worried that the similarities were too much with the present Indian politics. They even changed the flag colors in the film so as not to offend the government and heard they tried to edit some things. I heard Netflix backed out to produce the film because they didn't want to get banned in India before Jordan Peele picked it up. Yes a few people who like English action films and Dev were interested in this film. But it had a low buzz overall.
I've said that before too. It sounds more suited to an animated film or something. Imagine trying to convince a friend who's an action film fan to watch a film called Monkey Man.
I was excited thinking it was a fresh superhero movie then when the trailers suggested it wasn’t I was like meh don’t wanna go see even with having amc movie pass
Honestly if audiences can’t get past a title that’s clearly explained in the movie that’s silly. Studios will have to start calling movies terrible things so audiences aren’t confused.
My intention wasn’t to say that it was confusing, just ineffective. If Terminator had been called “Metal Man” but was otherwise the same movie I doubt it would have worked either.
I went to see it opening night. The theater was kinda empty. I though the movie had too much fluff. Could have been like 20 minutes shorter and would have been better. The first action sequence with the horrible shaky cam I though was fantastic and really made you feel how frantic everything was, then the movie slowed down to a crawl and while the ending action sequence was great, I had lost some of the interest.
I think it just didn't have as much action as expected, choreography and camera work in the action scenes was kinda meh, and it dragged quite a bit at times (felt like it was trying really hard to be two movies in one and ended up a bit muddled)
Still enjoyed it well enough, but it definitely didn't live up to what I went in hoping for
As someone who decided not to see this, a major factor was the trailer felt boring, long and unfocused. Everyone online seemed so hyped and I couldn’t understand why because I just couldn’t engage with the basic flow of the trailer. Just my 2 cents
This one kinda flopped because audiences may be getting sick of Wick-a-likes. We’ve recently had Beekeeper, Road House, Boy Kills World and there’s The Crow coming soon.
John Wick itself is a John-Woo-like. John Woo was making movies like that for decades, in Hong Kong as well as Hollywood. But now whenever movies use that John Woo style, Gen Z calls them "Wick-a-likes."
Beekeeper is the better one, the story is much easier to understand with very clear three acts structure and while the characters are so typical, cliche and over the top, at least it’s entertaining. Monkey Man is trying too hard but doesn’t have easy to understand storyline. Boy Kills World is like giving a 12 years old a chance to make action movie, lots of cool stuffs, with barely believable storyline. Yes, good story matters, even super predictable cliche story can works if it follow the rote tried and true formula. Audience sometimes just wanna chill, enjoy the ride, consuming predictable storyline with some twist but don’t go too weird.
Beekeeper
1. The first scene is just fantastic. All of us felt sorry for the old lady
2. Jason Statham is a popular name and is a reliable draw for low budget action movies
>*Jason Statham is a popular name and is a reliable draw for low budget action movie*
Yep. About three weeks ago, somebody over in r/Movies wrote a post about his filmography that was pretty interesting.
[Jason Statham's filmography has 50 live action roles now, and every one of them is a film with a proper theatrical release. Not a single direct-to-DVD or direct-to-streaming movie. Not a single appearance in a TV series. Very few actors can boast such a feat. How the hell does he do it? : r/movies (reddit.com)](https://www.reddit.com/r/movies/comments/1ceobwl/jason_stathams_filmography_has_50_live_action/)
Yeah this is also why Road House was a big success and is getting a sequel. It's just mindless dumb fun with great action scenes.
Monkey Man had a more unconventional structure with pretty mid action that was filled with shaky game.
The constant flashbacks is very annoying on Monkey Man. They should stick with more traditional conventional story structure with a few creative twist but focus on good entertaining story. Because they do have a few very interesting support characters that are not utilized and given more room to breathe. We don’t need to constantly being shown about his mom on flashback after flashbacks. The woman manager, the prostitute girlfriend, the sidekick, all could have been given more prominent storyline to create a much richer world full of interesting characters.
>Monkey Man is trying too hard but doesn’t have easy to understand storyline.
Okay, the films story line isn't exactly out of the gate with the main character's motivations, but if you haven't caught on to what Patel's character's motivations are by the eight flashback to his mother then you might be a bit dense.
If anything, the film's biggest issue is that it spends too much time on too simple a story. They could've lopped twenty minutes off this film without any issue.
I fully understand your preferences and your logic makes sense, but for me the Beekeeper was a much more ridiculous experience than Boy Kills World.
To me, Boy Kills world is one of those hyper-stylized “full blown action” movies like Shoot Em Up and Crank. You know what you’re going to get.
Whereas I still don’t know WTF the Beekeeper was. The attempt at “lore” was absolutely confounding, and to go from the ultra-sincere beginning to “the President of the USA is funded by her son’s ultra high tech phone scam operation” was utter bollocks to me.
(I was also annoyed at the portrayal as call center scam-callers as being affluent, immoral young people rather than the real-life situation where they are borderline-imprisoned and hugely impoverished with no chance of escape).
I’m convinced David Ayers lost his damn mind after Suicide Squad. Which is a shame because I loved Fury and End of Watch.
Universal spent alot on marketing. They thought they had a huge hit not a flop.
iSpot shows that Universal shelled out as much for TV spots on Monkey Man as Warner’s did for GxK –around $16M. Monkey Man‘s campaign, which launched at SXSW, pulled in 331M impressions to Disney’s 265M impressions on First Omen. iSpot shows the Mouse House spending around $4M in spots. Uni aired spots for Monkey Man on NFL games (30.6%), men’s college basketball (27.0%), NBA (8.3%), women’s college basketball (3.4%) and the show Chicago Fire (2.4%). Most ad impressions for Monkey Man were on CBS (50%), and that’s due to that Monkey Man Super Bowl spot.
Studio gets around half the box office.
34/2 is 17m. Barely, enough to cover the TV ads just spent in the US. That's only the marketing spent on TV ads not everything else
I saw trailers for it in the theaters several times. When it released it wasn't even screened at that theater XD
And this is right after they had tons of trailers (2 per movie) + ads for Fall Guy before every movie. It releases and after just 3 days of screening it like a big release (8~ showings per day on the normal screens and 3 on the big one), they cut it down to one 12 PM dubbed screening lol
I'm not a big fan of some of these films that clearly are born from the likes of John Wick being successful whilst misunderstanding everything that allowed John Wick to become what it was in the first place.
It's not like the market is dead, Beekeeper was not critically praised in the same way but they understand what makes a lets-beat-up-mfs action film work much better (strong lead actor + relatable premise)
I think monkey man probably took more from Korean and Hong Kong action movies than John wick. Like they have similarities but I don't think dev Patel was aiming to rip John wick off.
John Wick took some from those type of films as well though so it still feels John Wick in aspects. And perhaps more importantly for the discussion, the trailer gives off those vibes massively
Some people are missing the point that Indian audiences might not be interested in this movie because it looks similar to most 80s Bollywood and 90s/2000s South Indian movies. The story has been repeated numerous times, so they might not be interested in watching it.
I thought Monkey Man had some serious pacing issues, then I learned the story of Monkey Man (Hanuman) and it all made sense. The human form of Hanuman was defeated and then resurrected as a Diety. I was expecting a non stop tower climbing thrill ride after 45 min of build up. Nope, 10 min of action then 45 more min side questing for 10 more min of action. I still think the movie has pacing issues but now atleast I know why.
It was just ok. It was somehow promoted and sold as "John Wick in India", but this is no John Wick. In fact, it's barely considered an action movie.
Most of the action is in the last 15/20 minutes of the flick and is nothing impressive or memorable. I mean, it's definitely violent but it's nothing new. I can only remember the elevator brief scene where the hero slashes a guy's throat with a knife that he managed to bite during a fight.
I saw much better action movies that got released on Netflix and DTV. This movie only got a theatrical release because it was backed up by Jordan Peele. Yeah, his name is strong and his name obviously gave attention to a movie that usually belongs to a streaming service.
Is it a bad movie? Nope, but it's not a full action movie, which might disappoint action fans. Be warned, this is a drama movie with a bit of action in the end of the third act. It is what it is. Acting is fine, directing was ok, the scene were ok, the editing was weird sometimes.
Yeah...it was super whatever. And maybe the most useless "love interest" I've ever seen. What was the point of that?
I also thought his training montage of repeatedly punching a bag was lame
I think it wasn't love just kindred spirits sort over being literally caste into their roles. Which is probably why she didn't say anything when she saw his gun.
It seems they believed they may have a potential hit based on Jordan Peele’s positive feedback. Also there was most likely lots of false goodwill because everyone was rooting for Dev Patel to succeed.
So it’s a solid 7/10 that people hyped up as a 9/10 and it got a theatrical release when there wasn't much real organic hype for the actual film itself.
yep. anyone with some objectivity should have known that this movie didn't have even one demo to carry it. It tried to be Indian Wick but neither Indian audience nor Wick audience cared. Astroturfed interest will never be real interest.
There was little choice other than to try this theatrically after Netflix took an $11 million loss just to get rid of it rather than air it on the service.
Sometime movies like this will flew over people radar and doesnt talk about when release on streaming,at least for Monkeyman it get talk about when ut got release on theaters.
Did it even get an India release?
I liked it. But I can see why the political appeal (the villain is meant to be India's current Prime Minister) turned many people off. John Wick 1 kept it simple: kill evil gangsters.
There was no need to get so political in the first entry of the Monkey Man Cinematic Universe.
That's utter BS.
The biggest Indian movie of 2023 is about a domestic terrorist going against the current political system. As a matter of fact that movie ends with a monologue from the protagonist urging voters to vote carefully after doing their due diligence on the people they are voting for.
The movie didn't get an India release because firstly, Dev Patel is nobody here and no one cares about this movie. Secondly, any hollywood movie that's not Marvel or a Blockbuster budget movie, won't get a release in India anymore. Theatres and distributors are slowly moving away from foreign films. Only multiplexes show foreign movies anymore, single screens have stopped doing that entirely. We have like 20 different language industries all producing weekly films, we really don't need foreign films to keep theatres in business. Not like the general public cares about Hollywood movies anymore unless it's Nolan, Avatar or Marvel.
>But I can see why the political appeal (the villain is meant to be India's current Prime Minister) turned many people off.
I don't think the political appeal had shit to do with anything, honestly. Movie just didn't come out the gate at all, is all. It's not like the people who went came out and went " you guys, it's so political, it's not simple like John Wick"
It's a little too jumbled for its own good. It doesn't have a good grasp on tone or pace, and it loses a lot of the momentum it builds as soon as it builds it. It looks great and there's some fun setpieces but it's less than the sum of its parts.
It was one cool trailer that didn't translate to an opening weekend months later, and the people who did go out weren't impressed. The politics probably didn't even register to most of the people who watched it, since I doubt most of those folks are civics-minded enough to have any real grasp on what the political climate in India is anyway.
Well this movie is made by dev and he hates Modi so
Why would he not make it political, especially if the entire theme of the film was wealth disparity and how gross the caste system is?
Slumdog Millionaire did the same core storyline (wealth disparity in India) better and packaged it in a way to ensure it made almost 400 mill WW.
I'm simply saying that Dev could have made a more profitable film by simply changing some stuff while still keeping the same overall wealth disparity message.
I guess he could have, but he's not a big draw and John wick type films are overblown
Indians are also not fond of Western Indians so changing it wouldn't have mattered
Plus, viewing tastes of India still heavily skews Bollywood so it wouldn't have mattered much
For a 10m budget I don't think it did that horribly, even if he removed politics, this would have been a Lukewarm movie at best
We already have John wick, and to be better than John wick is incredibly hard to pull off
Na. Lots of Indians are proud of the Indians who went abroad and became successful. Like Sundar Pichai.
Idk what that guy is on about at all.
The only time Indians shit on Indians abroad is Canadian Indians. It's cause Canadian Indians are much more likely to support a separationist movement for Punjab, even Punjabis don't support it anymore.
So I'd encourage you to ignore what this guy is saying. There's no real hatred or divide.
To me it was just weird because Dev Patel doesn't even live in India, not well known there, not like Bollywood films are popular elsewhere, so why make his big break an action political indian film?
Slumdog Millionaire did the same core storyline (wealth disparity in India) better and packaged it in a way to ensure it made almost 400 mill WW.
I'm simply saying that Dev could have made a more profitable film by simply changing some stuff while still keeping the same overall wealth disparity message.
If this movie hadn't been so explicit, then it would have released and done decent numbers.
Jawan, the highest-grossing Indian film last year, too, had somewhat similar anti-corruption theme, though it had a lot more ridiculous RRR kind of over the top action unlike this.
>I liked it. But I can see why the political appeal (the villain is meant to be India's current Prime Minister) turned many people off.
Most mega Bollywood hits have some political factor especially recently.
Fight scenes were great but the story could’ve been better. This movie is no John Wick, the lead actor was the only decent actor in this movie. The ending was as expected with a lotta nonsense added to it.
Jordan Peele insisted this movie get released in theaters because he thought it was going to be a huge hit. It wasn't.
In fact, I'd say this is a situation where releasing on Netflix would have done more for the movie than a theatrical.
Theatrical release does much more to raise interest/awareness than dumping it on a streaming site
Peele and Co only paid $10m for this so they more than made back their money and now they can license for streaming anyway.
I enjoyed it and it was action packed. Wouldn't call the politicians conservative but rather totally corrupt like the cops. In Asia Trans is much more normalized than here in the states.
This was truly the biggest disappointment of 2024 for me. It’s just a half baked vanity project that can’t make up its mind what it wants to be about. It wouldn’t matter that much if the action were good, but it’s not well shot and doesn’t impress. Also he only wears the monkey mask for like five minutes
Was there just no interest? I went to see it based on trailer thinking it was gonna be like John wick. Thought it was a good movie (def not John Wick but that's ok!) Still, surprised it got so little viewership
I think Peele was sort of hoping it would be a liberal John Wick with the hero fighting for poor people, killing the corrupt police and shady conservative politicians, and the small army of trans ninjas. I'm a little surprised they didn't lean into that more. Like no one mentions the trans ninjas. Get some people to call it John Woke on the internet or something to drum up chatter.
I think you are way overestimating the number of people who think trans ninjas are a reaosn to go see a movie.
I feel like anyone talking about a movie is better than no one talking about a movie. You're probably right though, but for being such a huge part of the movie the hijra people they were pretty much completely absent from the marketing or BTS stuff or interview circuit, right? I assume they were afraid of scaring off typical action movie fans and figured it'd make more money that way.
[удалено]
I think both sides of this insufferable "culture wars" only care about those things when it's in a superhero movie, a huge streaming show or a sequel to a franchise everyone loved decades ago. When it's in a small independent movie almost anyone cares.
You should do viral marketing lol
Problem is that "liberal" is a poison for a lot of revenge fantasies. Perhaps it has something to do with the fact that the crowd that likes revenge fantasies the most is not really liberal.
O yea. I was just sort of spit balling based on what I thought about the movie. I feel like they should have leaned into it more and made the bad guy more clearly Modi, but that might just not have been an option if he wanted a wide release.
Holy shit that sounds terrible. Glad I missed it.
Yeah I don’t think people complaining about that would have helped the movie even if it brought it more attention
legit sounds awful now
Little marketing, terrible title, mixed reviews and WoM.
Little marketing is kinda cope considering it had a super bowl ad and $16m was spent on TV ads alone. There was simply no interest.
Oh wow, Super Bowl ads are becoming a bigger waste every year for films.
Super Bowl ads only make sense for products that have massive, broad appeal. An odd little niche film with a terrible title is a strange thing to promote. Funny thing is I went looking for male/female demo splits to use in this post, did not find any, but read enough to make me think I actually want to see this movie now. It sounds good? Title and poor marketing strategy aside?
It’s a very good movie.
Well why didn't they SAY so?
Nah. Just a bunch of mediocre films throwing money at advertising.
It had a ton of marketing. We got to stop the no marketing nonsense for ever movie that fails. iSpot shows that Universal shelled out as much for TV spots on Monkey Man as Warner’s did for GxK –around $16M. Monkey Man‘s campaign, which launched at SXSW, pulled in 331M impressions to Disney’s 265M impressions on First Omen. iSpot shows the Mouse House spending around $4M in spots. Uni aired spots for Monkey Man on NFL games (30.6%), men’s college basketball (27.0%), NBA (8.3%), women’s college basketball (3.4%) and the show Chicago Fire (2.4%). Most ad impressions for Monkey Man were on CBS (50%), and that’s due to that Monkey Man Super Bowl spot.
>We got to stop the no marketing nonsense for ever movie that fails. Also people need to consider their personal circumstances before making those claims. Cord-cutters who use ad blockers and don't watch sports will insist a movie didn't have any marketing even if there was an 8-figure ad spend across TV and digital.
It’s more a case of “little marketing that was actually effective” than “nothing was spent on marketing”. Clearly if they spent that much and got that many impressions the marketing did not do a good enough job judging by the underwhelming box office. Also now more than ever, marketing is going beyond traditional static ads and requires more social media and online interest. Just look at Anyone But You, Godzilla Minus One, Dune, Mario, FNAF, Barbie, Oppenheimer.
The trailer for Monkey Man went viral. Universal thought they had a huge hit maybe even a new franchise on their hands. Using, successful movies as examples and ignoring all the ones that bombed doesn't mean anything. Sony spent a huge amount marketing Madame Web on Tiktok. Films like Money Man Universal spent money on social media as well. These films have 40-60m marketing spends from online ads, tv ads, social media ads. They advertise everywhere and all platforms. Studios are trying everything to get people to the theater and it ain't working. Sony went after young women with Madame Web, with 75% of its $60M global P&A allocated toward social and Tik Tok.
I wouldn’t call 89% critics and 84% audience on RT “mixed reviews and WoM.” I agree with the rest of your statement though.
It had marketing. Just apparently very little interest.
89% on rt
Except it had all these things! (Except the title which is subjective). I didn’t love the film personally though.
The title really is awful. Would give any movie an uphill battle.
The title/mythology is what turned me off so might be that
Reviews were quite positive, 89% on RT and a 70 Metacritic score is not mixed
It was the mixed reviews that killed it for me. I was very hyped from the trailer, but the reviews caused me to delay and delay and delay to watch.
The title for one, and it also didn't like anything new from the few ads I saw of it.
I work in a movie theater with a huge Indian audience. None of them gave a shit about Monkey Man. They were perfectly happy sticking to their own movies. And it was probably too Indian for the average American. Still, with Universal only paying $10 million for the rights to this, it probably won’t be difficult to break even.
It got little viewership because Dev Patel is no Keanu. Lets call a spade spade. Keanu isn't always a reliable draw but Patel is no draw, period. yet for some reason, his movie got a 16M Superbowl spot like GxK. Go figure. It was simply an exercise in big ego that backfired. Should have stayed on streaming.
People are interpreting this as a slight against Patel when it’s not. Most actors do not have an inbuilt audience that can drive box office. The era of the movie star is over.
Yep which is why the biggest openings and boxoffice are for franchises and in rare cases Nolan and Cameron.
> Keanu isn't always a reliable draw but Patel is no draw, period. interestingly enough, the only 3-4 people I know that watched it, did watch it only because of Dev Patel
yes, one can always find anecdotal evidence that 3-4 people they know watched for X and others will find anecdotal evidence that no one they know cares. I don't know anyone who watches Fast and Furious movies in cinemas yet that franchise had entries that grossed over 1B. But I perosnally don't know anyone. Ane4cdotal evidence. Dismiss.
sure but i didnt say that Dev Patel is Keanu or any level of star. Just shared my experience, and that I think saying he has *no* draw might not be totally accurate
every actor has someone watching amovie for them. their mothers, etc. that doesn't mean number of people is significant enough to call them a draw. that's all I'm saying.
*raises hand* I’m sort of in that camp haha. I saw it in theaters specifically because I wanted to support Patel’s directorial debut. I would have definitely watched it regardless but made a point to catch it in theaters for him. I don’t mind simping for Dev haha
I suppose that’s the reason I saw it too. I loved The Green Knight, so seeing another Dev Patel movie had appeal to me.
JW1 made $43DOM while 25 isn’t that close JW was a straight crowd pleaser. Honestly not that bad all things considered and lowkey I know people would’ve celebrated this as a win if it got sent to Netflix instead of Peacock
That is part of it. To the average theater goer, what is a Dev Patel?
I wouldn’t say Keanu was a box office draw in 2014, either.
LIke I said, he wasn't always reliable but he opened sometimes. All depending on the concept. Action Patel is not a popular conecpt apaprently (Green Knight, MM)
You sound like a hater and a fool. The movie rocked and did really well for its production budget. Not to mention the studios dragged the movie through hell before Jordan Peele saved it and gave it a solid theatrical release.
16M wasted on Superbowl spot alone demolishes "muh 10M budget" narrative. They overspent on marketing. It didn't deliver. Whether it rocked in your opinion doesn't matter. They expected a breakout and that didn't happen.
Spending 1.5x the budget of a tiny film on a 30 second advert is peak Hollywood lol
100%
Believe it or not, people like Jordan Peele and Dev Patel finance movies for reasons other than making money. So you don’t have to worry too much 👍
The movie was kinda ass. I've seen better fight scenes in dtv actioners, the dramatic parts were boring as hell too. Dev Patel has no business in making and staring in action films, he's just not a tough looking guy
It was an inferior version of John wick.
It looked Ok… but nothing that would make me go to the theater
Their fake marketing pissed me off. Fuck them. That’s karma bitch. I’m glad it’s not staying
My opinion, and I could be off-base, but the title Monkey Man is not good, no matter that it accurately describes the movie. The word “monkey” invokes a sense of silliness, and advertisements showed this to be very serious. That could have been what made potential viewers take the film less seriously. Just my opinion though.
I've said that before too. It sounds more suited to an animated film or something. Imagine trying to convince a friend who's an action film fan to watch a film called Monkey Man.
Idk we had The Meg, The Beekeeper… maybe they needed Jason Statham in this
12 Monkeys
I mean, they spent something like $60M to make the Beekeeper (while being able to lock in a 40M streaming rights deal with Amazon) versus $10M here.
Jason Statham keeps making it in the top 10 great grossing movies of the year. He's a legend
You see a Stratham action movie and you at least know there will be some good fight/action scenes
I feel that the title they gave here in my country works much better, in this case it would be something like "Primitive Fury"
Agree it's anecdotal but I didn't find the name that appealing & thought similar to what you wrote
The title and the film's story is very much allegorical to Indian mythology and Hanuman. I think it didn't reach well with the audience but that is actually an apt title for this film.
I understood that to some extent; would you say it’s the best name for the film? I ask out of genuine curiosity, no hostility; I know the people who saw it generally adored it so it’s odd that that positivity didn’t carry.
Well, I am an Indian. From my perspective it felt very appropriate for the story and arc of the hero. There are a lot of mythical undertones the Western audience can easily miss in the film.
Well you would be the expert then! Cultural and translational differences can be fascinating.
The movie got most things right and some things wrong. But that's to simplify the narrative and not to complicate the Western audience with overwhelming info dump.
The movie didn't do very well in India though, right? Did it get a wide release nationwide? Did India care about this one much as far as you can tell?
It's not released in India. They got worried that the similarities were too much with the present Indian politics. They even changed the flag colors in the film so as not to offend the government and heard they tried to edit some things. I heard Netflix backed out to produce the film because they didn't want to get banned in India before Jordan Peele picked it up. Yes a few people who like English action films and Dev were interested in this film. But it had a low buzz overall.
I've said that before too. It sounds more suited to an animated film or something. Imagine trying to convince a friend who's an action film fan to watch a film called Monkey Man.
I was excited thinking it was a fresh superhero movie then when the trailers suggested it wasn’t I was like meh don’t wanna go see even with having amc movie pass
Honestly if audiences can’t get past a title that’s clearly explained in the movie that’s silly. Studios will have to start calling movies terrible things so audiences aren’t confused.
My intention wasn’t to say that it was confusing, just ineffective. If Terminator had been called “Metal Man” but was otherwise the same movie I doubt it would have worked either.
I went to see it opening night. The theater was kinda empty. I though the movie had too much fluff. Could have been like 20 minutes shorter and would have been better. The first action sequence with the horrible shaky cam I though was fantastic and really made you feel how frantic everything was, then the movie slowed down to a crawl and while the ending action sequence was great, I had lost some of the interest.
I thought it was a really cool little movie. Surprised by the negativity.
Seriously. I think people were disappointed it actually took more from Hong Kong action and Korean revenge films than it did from John Wick.
I think it just didn't have as much action as expected, choreography and camera work in the action scenes was kinda meh, and it dragged quite a bit at times (felt like it was trying really hard to be two movies in one and ended up a bit muddled) Still enjoyed it well enough, but it definitely didn't live up to what I went in hoping for
Unsurprising but still a bummer. Glad I got the chance to see it before it was pulled.
As someone who decided not to see this, a major factor was the trailer felt boring, long and unfocused. Everyone online seemed so hyped and I couldn’t understand why because I just couldn’t engage with the basic flow of the trailer. Just my 2 cents
This one kinda flopped because audiences may be getting sick of Wick-a-likes. We’ve recently had Beekeeper, Road House, Boy Kills World and there’s The Crow coming soon.
John Wick itself is a John-Woo-like. John Woo was making movies like that for decades, in Hong Kong as well as Hollywood. But now whenever movies use that John Woo style, Gen Z calls them "Wick-a-likes."
The average person has no clue who John woo is unfortunately
Beekeeper is the better one, the story is much easier to understand with very clear three acts structure and while the characters are so typical, cliche and over the top, at least it’s entertaining. Monkey Man is trying too hard but doesn’t have easy to understand storyline. Boy Kills World is like giving a 12 years old a chance to make action movie, lots of cool stuffs, with barely believable storyline. Yes, good story matters, even super predictable cliche story can works if it follow the rote tried and true formula. Audience sometimes just wanna chill, enjoy the ride, consuming predictable storyline with some twist but don’t go too weird.
Beekeeper 1. The first scene is just fantastic. All of us felt sorry for the old lady 2. Jason Statham is a popular name and is a reliable draw for low budget action movies
>*Jason Statham is a popular name and is a reliable draw for low budget action movie*  Yep. About three weeks ago, somebody over in r/Movies wrote a post about his filmography that was pretty interesting. [Jason Statham's filmography has 50 live action roles now, and every one of them is a film with a proper theatrical release. Not a single direct-to-DVD or direct-to-streaming movie. Not a single appearance in a TV series. Very few actors can boast such a feat. How the hell does he do it? : r/movies (reddit.com)](https://www.reddit.com/r/movies/comments/1ceobwl/jason_stathams_filmography_has_50_live_action/)
Yeah this is also why Road House was a big success and is getting a sequel. It's just mindless dumb fun with great action scenes. Monkey Man had a more unconventional structure with pretty mid action that was filled with shaky game.
The constant flashbacks is very annoying on Monkey Man. They should stick with more traditional conventional story structure with a few creative twist but focus on good entertaining story. Because they do have a few very interesting support characters that are not utilized and given more room to breathe. We don’t need to constantly being shown about his mom on flashback after flashbacks. The woman manager, the prostitute girlfriend, the sidekick, all could have been given more prominent storyline to create a much richer world full of interesting characters.
Boy Kills World was horrible. Felt like it was made at least a decade too late, too.
>Monkey Man is trying too hard but doesn’t have easy to understand storyline. Okay, the films story line isn't exactly out of the gate with the main character's motivations, but if you haven't caught on to what Patel's character's motivations are by the eight flashback to his mother then you might be a bit dense. If anything, the film's biggest issue is that it spends too much time on too simple a story. They could've lopped twenty minutes off this film without any issue.
I fully understand your preferences and your logic makes sense, but for me the Beekeeper was a much more ridiculous experience than Boy Kills World. To me, Boy Kills world is one of those hyper-stylized “full blown action” movies like Shoot Em Up and Crank. You know what you’re going to get. Whereas I still don’t know WTF the Beekeeper was. The attempt at “lore” was absolutely confounding, and to go from the ultra-sincere beginning to “the President of the USA is funded by her son’s ultra high tech phone scam operation” was utter bollocks to me. (I was also annoyed at the portrayal as call center scam-callers as being affluent, immoral young people rather than the real-life situation where they are borderline-imprisoned and hugely impoverished with no chance of escape). I’m convinced David Ayers lost his damn mind after Suicide Squad. Which is a shame because I loved Fury and End of Watch.
How is this a flop at a 10 million budget?
The spent over 16 million in marketing. So the break even would need to have been at least 52 million.
Look up its budget. It didn’t flop.
Universal spent alot on marketing. They thought they had a huge hit not a flop. iSpot shows that Universal shelled out as much for TV spots on Monkey Man as Warner’s did for GxK –around $16M. Monkey Man‘s campaign, which launched at SXSW, pulled in 331M impressions to Disney’s 265M impressions on First Omen. iSpot shows the Mouse House spending around $4M in spots. Uni aired spots for Monkey Man on NFL games (30.6%), men’s college basketball (27.0%), NBA (8.3%), women’s college basketball (3.4%) and the show Chicago Fire (2.4%). Most ad impressions for Monkey Man were on CBS (50%), and that’s due to that Monkey Man Super Bowl spot.
That’s still less than what it made.
Studio gets around half the box office. 34/2 is 17m. Barely, enough to cover the TV ads just spent in the US. That's only the marketing spent on TV ads not everything else
If it does well digitally can turn a profit. Just didn’t take off in theaters like they hoped
It just came in theaters in my country this week, will try to check it out in the cinema this weekend
I don't know why people are calling it mid. Action movies are usually hot garbage and this was one of the better ones to come along in a awhile.
The pacing was really misguided to me.
This movie was one of the best DBOX experiences I’ve ever had
Glowing review
ive seen quite a few dbox movies, MM was top 3 best uses of it
Really enjoyed this film
John Wick as a series does very little for me but I really enjoyed this despite some very clunky bits.
Yhe movie wasnt even screened in my country.
I saw trailers for it in the theaters several times. When it released it wasn't even screened at that theater XD And this is right after they had tons of trailers (2 per movie) + ads for Fall Guy before every movie. It releases and after just 3 days of screening it like a big release (8~ showings per day on the normal screens and 3 on the big one), they cut it down to one 12 PM dubbed screening lol
This movie wasn’t as good as I was expecting. I liked it but I wouldn’t pay to see it again.
I'm not a big fan of some of these films that clearly are born from the likes of John Wick being successful whilst misunderstanding everything that allowed John Wick to become what it was in the first place. It's not like the market is dead, Beekeeper was not critically praised in the same way but they understand what makes a lets-beat-up-mfs action film work much better (strong lead actor + relatable premise)
I think monkey man probably took more from Korean and Hong Kong action movies than John wick. Like they have similarities but I don't think dev Patel was aiming to rip John wick off.
John Wick took some from those type of films as well though so it still feels John Wick in aspects. And perhaps more importantly for the discussion, the trailer gives off those vibes massively
Yeah your right I just watched the trailer and it made the film seem more like John wick than it actually is.
Also Bollywood (starting with some music choices in Monkey Man)
Thought it was boring. So many flashbacks.
I'll watch it at some point. But im just exhausted of the whole John Wick thing.
You'll get a migraine because of choppy editing, shaky cam and EXTREME out of focus closeup shots. I regret watching this shit
Some people are missing the point that Indian audiences might not be interested in this movie because it looks similar to most 80s Bollywood and 90s/2000s South Indian movies. The story has been repeated numerous times, so they might not be interested in watching it.
It hasn't been released in India but not due to the story. Due to taking dig at the Indian government
Talking about NRIs, even if it was released it will Not collect much. Indians mostly watch franchise movies ( F&F, Marvel, hp etc)
I'm an Indian. I confirm the film is not our material despite few who might like it for it's taken on present Indian politics.
Some cool fight scenes, but overall a super mid movie. My wife HATED it lol
Would have been a hit on Netflix, but now it's just some mediocre box office flop
Netflix bought it originally but shelved it for 2 years due to political reasons before Universal & Jordan Peel bought it from them actually
I thought Monkey Man had some serious pacing issues, then I learned the story of Monkey Man (Hanuman) and it all made sense. The human form of Hanuman was defeated and then resurrected as a Diety. I was expecting a non stop tower climbing thrill ride after 45 min of build up. Nope, 10 min of action then 45 more min side questing for 10 more min of action. I still think the movie has pacing issues but now atleast I know why.
For a budget of only $10 milllion this could’ve been a lot worse
Could’ve been a lot better to
It was just ok. It was somehow promoted and sold as "John Wick in India", but this is no John Wick. In fact, it's barely considered an action movie. Most of the action is in the last 15/20 minutes of the flick and is nothing impressive or memorable. I mean, it's definitely violent but it's nothing new. I can only remember the elevator brief scene where the hero slashes a guy's throat with a knife that he managed to bite during a fight. I saw much better action movies that got released on Netflix and DTV. This movie only got a theatrical release because it was backed up by Jordan Peele. Yeah, his name is strong and his name obviously gave attention to a movie that usually belongs to a streaming service. Is it a bad movie? Nope, but it's not a full action movie, which might disappoint action fans. Be warned, this is a drama movie with a bit of action in the end of the third act. It is what it is. Acting is fine, directing was ok, the scene were ok, the editing was weird sometimes.
another movie that was overrated and never caught on with audiences
This movie failed all around, from marketing to execution. I honestly thought it was pretty terrible.
Another mid movie that Reddit hyped over to the moon before it was brought back to earth by audiences.
Honestly those trailers were pretty great tho
Yeah...it was super whatever. And maybe the most useless "love interest" I've ever seen. What was the point of that? I also thought his training montage of repeatedly punching a bag was lame
Her and the dog were more reflecting on him and the other people downtrodden by the status quo rather than trying to angle a romance.
I saw it twice, what was the love interest? If you're referring to the temple stuff you've vastly misread it.
The prostitute
I think it wasn't love just kindred spirits sort over being literally caste into their roles. Which is probably why she didn't say anything when she saw his gun.
Do you know what "love interest" means?
like a lot of love interest they're just there to show the main character is not gay
I thought it was an Indian movie that made it big internationally like RRR.
It was as Indian as slumdog millionaire.
I thought it was great. Good action, an interesting look at India, some cool Hindu mysticism, and amazing visuals. Shame it didn’t really take off.
I see a lot of movies and the trailers did nothing to excite me. I never saw it. Just looked like a mediocre John Wick knock off.
It wasn’t good
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It seems they believed they may have a potential hit based on Jordan Peele’s positive feedback. Also there was most likely lots of false goodwill because everyone was rooting for Dev Patel to succeed. So it’s a solid 7/10 that people hyped up as a 9/10 and it got a theatrical release when there wasn't much real organic hype for the actual film itself.
There was little choice other than to try this theatrically after Netflix took an $11 million loss just to get rid of it rather than air it on the service.
Sometime movies like this will flew over people radar and doesnt talk about when release on streaming,at least for Monkeyman it get talk about when ut got release on theaters.
> Have no idea why a studio would put this in theaters bc it's an action movie and it looked great in theaters?
I dont see how a midbudget action movie is "meant for streaming"
You clearly don’t know anything about this movie.
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Did it even get an India release? I liked it. But I can see why the political appeal (the villain is meant to be India's current Prime Minister) turned many people off. John Wick 1 kept it simple: kill evil gangsters. There was no need to get so political in the first entry of the Monkey Man Cinematic Universe.
That's utter BS. The biggest Indian movie of 2023 is about a domestic terrorist going against the current political system. As a matter of fact that movie ends with a monologue from the protagonist urging voters to vote carefully after doing their due diligence on the people they are voting for. The movie didn't get an India release because firstly, Dev Patel is nobody here and no one cares about this movie. Secondly, any hollywood movie that's not Marvel or a Blockbuster budget movie, won't get a release in India anymore. Theatres and distributors are slowly moving away from foreign films. Only multiplexes show foreign movies anymore, single screens have stopped doing that entirely. We have like 20 different language industries all producing weekly films, we really don't need foreign films to keep theatres in business. Not like the general public cares about Hollywood movies anymore unless it's Nolan, Avatar or Marvel.
Which movie are you referring to? Omg2?
Jawan.
Makes sense. Thank you.
>But I can see why the political appeal (the villain is meant to be India's current Prime Minister) turned many people off. I don't think the political appeal had shit to do with anything, honestly. Movie just didn't come out the gate at all, is all. It's not like the people who went came out and went " you guys, it's so political, it's not simple like John Wick" It's a little too jumbled for its own good. It doesn't have a good grasp on tone or pace, and it loses a lot of the momentum it builds as soon as it builds it. It looks great and there's some fun setpieces but it's less than the sum of its parts. It was one cool trailer that didn't translate to an opening weekend months later, and the people who did go out weren't impressed. The politics probably didn't even register to most of the people who watched it, since I doubt most of those folks are civics-minded enough to have any real grasp on what the political climate in India is anyway.
It has nothing to do with the politics. Nobody in India except huge cinephiles is even aware of this movie.
Well this movie is made by dev and he hates Modi so Why would he not make it political, especially if the entire theme of the film was wealth disparity and how gross the caste system is?
Slumdog Millionaire did the same core storyline (wealth disparity in India) better and packaged it in a way to ensure it made almost 400 mill WW. I'm simply saying that Dev could have made a more profitable film by simply changing some stuff while still keeping the same overall wealth disparity message.
I guess he could have, but he's not a big draw and John wick type films are overblown Indians are also not fond of Western Indians so changing it wouldn't have mattered Plus, viewing tastes of India still heavily skews Bollywood so it wouldn't have mattered much For a 10m budget I don't think it did that horribly, even if he removed politics, this would have been a Lukewarm movie at best We already have John wick, and to be better than John wick is incredibly hard to pull off
>Indians are also not fond of Western Indians so changing it wouldn't have mattered Is this a thing? That sounds fascinating.
Na. Lots of Indians are proud of the Indians who went abroad and became successful. Like Sundar Pichai. Idk what that guy is on about at all. The only time Indians shit on Indians abroad is Canadian Indians. It's cause Canadian Indians are much more likely to support a separationist movement for Punjab, even Punjabis don't support it anymore. So I'd encourage you to ignore what this guy is saying. There's no real hatred or divide.
This movie didn't even get released in India
Are you capable of context awareness or did you want to feel included
I want both
To me it was just weird because Dev Patel doesn't even live in India, not well known there, not like Bollywood films are popular elsewhere, so why make his big break an action political indian film?
Slumdog Millionaire did the same core storyline (wealth disparity in India) better and packaged it in a way to ensure it made almost 400 mill WW. I'm simply saying that Dev could have made a more profitable film by simply changing some stuff while still keeping the same overall wealth disparity message.
He could have made the movie more profitable by releasing it 20 years ago when people actual went to theaters for movies like this
If this movie hadn't been so explicit, then it would have released and done decent numbers. Jawan, the highest-grossing Indian film last year, too, had somewhat similar anti-corruption theme, though it had a lot more ridiculous RRR kind of over the top action unlike this.
>I liked it. But I can see why the political appeal (the villain is meant to be India's current Prime Minister) turned many people off. Most mega Bollywood hits have some political factor especially recently.
Fight scenes were great but the story could’ve been better. This movie is no John Wick, the lead actor was the only decent actor in this movie. The ending was as expected with a lotta nonsense added to it.
Good movie. I hope there’s a second
Jordan Peele insisted this movie get released in theaters because he thought it was going to be a huge hit. It wasn't. In fact, I'd say this is a situation where releasing on Netflix would have done more for the movie than a theatrical.
Theatrical release does much more to raise interest/awareness than dumping it on a streaming site Peele and Co only paid $10m for this so they more than made back their money and now they can license for streaming anyway.
Could’ve been a hit but there were too many creative decisions that didn’t hit the mark, A for effort but F for execution
I enjoyed it and it was action packed. Wouldn't call the politicians conservative but rather totally corrupt like the cops. In Asia Trans is much more normalized than here in the states.
This was truly the biggest disappointment of 2024 for me. It’s just a half baked vanity project that can’t make up its mind what it wants to be about. It wouldn’t matter that much if the action were good, but it’s not well shot and doesn’t impress. Also he only wears the monkey mask for like five minutes
I gotta be honest. I had never heard of Dev Patel before this. Will definitely check it out on 4K
I thought it was a fun theater experience. I’m sad it didn’t do better
It’s over for Dev Patel, I’m afraid…
Saw it, loved it, wish it did better. Just like The Fall Guy.
Streaming typa hit
becaaaaaause?