The third time is not a charm. “Expendables 3” is a bust at the box office despite an all star cast and millions spent on promotion.
Sylvester Stallone’s clever franchise brought in Mel Gibson this time and bombed. Harrison Ford wasn’t much a draw either, even though he’s not a big part of it. Maybe Bruce Willis was wise to sit number 3 out, as Arnold Schwarzenegger et al failed to do much business this weekend.
On Friday night, holdovers “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles” and “Guardians of the Galaxy” held “Expendables 3” to third place. Not only that but the Lions Gate release didn’t do much better than Jeff Bridges and Meryl Streep in the futuristic “The Giver” and the comedy “Let’s Be Cops.”
You’ll recall the hoopla about “E3” in Cannes. LionsGate rolled tanks down the Croisett, held a huge press conference and threw a rat you know what of a party.
But it seems the nostalgia for all this evaporated. Maybe it’s because Mel Gibson looks like a mountain man now. But audiences didn’t want him. Last night the movie did $5.9 million. “E2” took in $10.5 million on its opening night exactly two years ago.
Producers are hoping for major overseas money. They opened in Lebanon, Singapore and Thailand– not exactly capitals of cinematic sophistication.
