M. Night Shyamalan's 'After Earth' Flops With $9.8 Million


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This weekend will once again belong to Fast & Furious 6, but M. Night Shyamalan's After Earth looks unlikely to even take the #2 spot after a disappointing Friday opening of $9.8 million. Now You See Me (which has a cast featuring the likes of Mark Ruffalo, Michael Caine and Morgan Freeman) took #2 with $10 million and looks set for a weekend of $27.8M. After Earth on the other hand - which has a 'B' CinemaScore despite being torn to pieces by the majority of critics - looks set for a three day total of only $27.2 million (although some analysts are predicting a number as low as $25 million). It's not exactly clear what has caused the movie to underperform, especially with Will Smith and his son Jaden (who found his own success with The Karate Kid) in the two leading roles, although it's thought that the last few Shyamalan films have just put audiences off going anywhere near anything that has his name attached. With a $130 million budget, only its overseas opening can save it now. According to Deadline, "the studio worked "really hard" to fix this crapfest in post-production and that even an arrogant know-it-all like Shyamalan was aware the pic didn?t work but couldn?t fix it on his own."

http://www.comicbook...s/news/?a=80663

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Why does hollywood keep giving him all these big budget films? He hasn't done anything good since Unbreakable.

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Why does hollywood keep giving him all these big budget films? He hasn't done anything good since Unbreakable.

Unbreakable was awesome, I must see that again :)

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Unbreakable was awesome, I must see that again :)

It was a nice movie 13 years ago :D For me it was a movie to watch once, not more....

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I thought Unbreakable was really good. And I enjoyed watching Signs too. As for The Happening, it was good enough for me to finish it from beginning to end. The same goes for The Last Airbender. I was looking forward to After Earth but for some reason, I forgot about it. And after reading all the bad reviews for it, I have no desire to watch it in theatre.

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The problem wasn't just MNS but that this, like Battlefield Earth, is essentially a Scientology inpired flick - Smith and his wife likely being closeted Scientologists. The word got out to quite a few movie & sci-fi sites and....

http://www.vulture.com/m/2013/05/after-earth-will-smith-love-letter-to-scientology.html

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/a-scientologist-reviews-earth-guest-561310

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Why does hollywood keep giving him all these big budget films? He hasn't done anything good since Unbreakable.

It not Hollywoood or M. Night Shyamalan's fault guys he just trying to be another Stephen king Wannabe. People are just not falling for it because more people Prefer Stephen King.I eman dont get me wrong M. Night Shyamalan's is good his movies just be better if they went straight to DVD or on Demand.

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I didn't even know that he was the director until a few days ago. I don't think I saw Shyamalan's name on any of the promotional material that I saw.

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I thought Unbreakable was really good. And I enjoyed watching Signs too. As for The Happening, it was good enough for me to finish it from beginning to end. The same goes for The Last Airbender. I was looking forward to After Earth but for some reason, I forgot about it. And after reading all the bad reviews for it, I have no desire to watch it in theatre.

Nor me its a Blu-Ray watch now

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I didn't even know that he was the director until a few days ago. I don't think I saw Shyamalan's name on any of the promotional material that I saw.

Same, I think I finally heard he was attached like 2 days before it's release. Hollywood did a great job of keeping his association a secret. Just not good enough. Some coworkers know I like movies and were asking if I planned to go see it, I told them I had no intention of seeing it in the theaters especially since I find out he was responsible, and they all started going off on how all his films have sucked after The Sixth Sense. I do not think so, if anything I think a few of his films sucked, and others were misguided but had good stories and bad execution.

He is a classic example of a theory I have about a decent amount of creative types though. They do their best work initially, and just fade off into the sunset. Reason being is that first work was the culmination of their childhood and early adult years, so it really contained the best of all of their creativity. After they have success of that creativity, they then only have a few months to a few years to be creative again, and you are never going to be an entire lifetime of creativity. It is why so many bands first album is usually their best one. It is only the true geniuses who continue to keep doing remarkable work that are truly special.

So I do think people are extra hard on my man, but at the same time he has never delivered like he did with The Sixth Sense. He basically shot his load all at once.

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I don't buy into the Will Smith hype. His best films are I Am Legend, The Pursuit of Happyness and Seven Pounds. It's important to note that they aren't his typical films, they aren't action blockbusters. He is actually at his personal best in dramatic films. Will Smith + action will always be a very average or bad.

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I don't buy into the Will Smith hype. His best films are I Am Legend, The Pursuit of Happyness and Seven Pounds. It's important to note that they aren't his typical films, they aren't action blockbusters. He is actually at his personal best in dramatic films. Will Smith + action will always be a very average or bad.

Will Smith is at his best as the Fresh Prince of Bel Air. I think Shyamalan should do a sitcom where a troubled inner-city youth gets sent to live in Al Gore's mansion to learn about environmentalism. They could call it the Prince of Fresh Air.

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Will Smith is at his best as the Fresh Prince of Bel Air. I think Shyamalan should do a sitcom where a troubled inner-city youth gets sent to live in Al Gore's mansion to learn about environmentalism. They could call it the Prince of Fresh Air.

How long have you been working on that one dude? :laugh:

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Will Smith is at his best as the Fresh Prince of Bel Air. I think Shyamalan should do a sitcom where a troubled inner-city youth gets sent to live in Al Gore's mansion to learn about environmentalism. They could call it the Prince of Fresh Air.

Write it!

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Will Smith is at his best as the Fresh Prince of Bel Air. I think Shyamalan should do a sitcom where a troubled inner-city youth gets sent to live in Al Gore's mansion to learn about environmentalism. They could call it the Prince of Fresh Air.

Genius!! :laugh:

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Why does hollywood keep giving him all these big budget films? He hasn't done anything good since Unbreakable.

Unbreakable was awesome, I must see that again :)

Indeed, Unbreakable was his last good film. After that, his films were meh, except perhaps The Sixth Sense.

Will Smith is brilliant in comedy roles but he usually sucks in dramatic ones. As for MNS, he needs to hang it up.

True.

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Same, I think I finally heard he was attached like 2 days before it's release. Hollywood did a great job of keeping his association a secret. Just not good enough. Some coworkers know I like movies and were asking if I planned to go see it, I told them I had no intention of seeing it in the theaters especially since I find out he was responsible, and they all started going off on how all his films have sucked after The Sixth Sense. I do not think so, if anything I think a few of his films sucked, and others were misguided but had good stories and bad execution.

He is a classic example of a theory I have about a decent amount of creative types though. They do their best work initially, and just fade off into the sunset. Reason being is that first work was the culmination of their childhood and early adult years, so it really contained the best of all of their creativity. After they have success of that creativity, they then only have a few months to a few years to be creative again, and you are never going to be an entire lifetime of creativity. It is why so many bands first album is usually their best one. It is only the true geniuses who continue to keep doing remarkable work that are truly special.

So I do think people are extra hard on my man, but at the same time he has never delivered like he did with The Sixth Sense. He basically shot his load all at once.

I still like Shyamalan. The man has potential. He had me until the end of The Village, but I still look forward to his films hoping for a return to form.

I don't think he shot all of his load at once with The Sixth Sense. If anything, I think that film cursed him. After The Sixth Sense, he became known as that guy. The guy who does the twist ending thing at the end. The mainstream audience went into each new film of his expecting a twist, and for it to top the bar set by The Sixth Sense, but they never delivered. I think that if The Sixth Sense had been released some years later, and a few of his other films came before it instead, then he would still have a solid career because he wouldn't have been under the pressure to twist all of the time. The Village could have been an excellent film about a real monster in the woods.

I agree with your theory. There are a lot of bands out there that when I give their first album a listen, I think it's the greatest thing, and when their second album comes out, and I give it a listen, I find myself asking, "where did they go?"

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I like saying his name... M Night shyamalan.... ooooh yeaaahh...

Pretty sure the majority of people who like him really only just like the opportunity to get to say that glorious name.

As for the movie, I'll see it eventually. I have average expectations.

Edit: If I ever direct a movie my name will be Theodore Pumperschnickle, memorable and awesome to say!

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This guy destroyed Avatar the Last Air Bender! for me he is dead and ill never pay to see one of his movies!

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