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Can Lionsgate's Movie Division Bounce Back After Getting Thrown 'Overboard' in 2018?

2018 Studio Report Card: Can "Hellboy" and a fifth "Rambo" movie make up for a disappointing year at the box office?

| December 26, 2018 @ 11:45 AM
Lionsgate 2018 Check In With Bug

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There's no denying this one: Lionsgate's film division had a dismal year at the box office, topping out at $388 million -- the company's worst domestic box office performance since 2011.

The brightest spots on Lionsgate's slate were two modestly budgeted films with female leads: Paul Feig's thriller "A Simple Favor," which earned $53.5 million domestically, and Anna Faris's remake of "Overboard," released under the Pantelion Films banner to just $50.3 million.

The Sundance acquisition "Blindspotting" garnered some major critical acclaim, but little else. And the company took big losses on the Mila Kunis-Kate McKinnon comedy "The Spy Who Dumped Me" and the sci-fi film "Kin."

Lionsgate also missed the bullseye with one of its priciest bets: the $100 million-budgeted "Robin Hood," which has managed just over $30 million so far at the domestic box office. The fantasy adventure starring Taron Egerton has also underperformed overseas, though it still awaits a release in China. It's shaping up to be one of this year's biggest Hollywood bombs.

Also Read: 'Robin Hood': The Biggest Blockbuster Bomb of 2018

"They had a tough year," Doug Creutz, a senior media and entertainment analyst with Cowen Companies, told TheWrap. "They try and play in the mid-budget range, and given the dollars to blockbusters these days, I think that's just a tough place to be in."

This year's slate was the product of a prior executive team. In May, Nathan Kahane was named Motion Picture Group President, joining his former Good Universe co-founder and Lionsgate co-chairman Joe Drake (who rejoined Lionsgate in October 2017).

And the rest of the company made up for the film division's weakness, with Lionsgate beating Wall Street earnings expectations for the last two quarters on the back of massive subscriber growth from Starz and the strong performance of its TV division.

Even at the film studio, insiders are bullish about a 2019 slate that includes some higher profile projects like a "Hellboy" reboot with David Harbour, Tyler Perry's final Madea movie, a fifth "Rambo" movie from Sylvester Stallone and a third "John Wick" action film starring Keanu Reeves.

Also Read: 'Hellboy' Trailer: David Harbour 'Smashes Things Real Good' in First Look (Video)

The company is also plotting a Starz spinoff about the hotel that serves as a safe house for the franchise's assassins, with Reeves expected to guest star.

The hope is that lighting can strike twice for Drake, who spearheaded the "Hunger Games" and "Expendables" hits during his previous run at Lionsgate from 2007 to 2012, when the studio took in a record $1.2 billion domestically.

"Joe's had some success before. They're going to basically try and pick better movies than the last team did," Creutz said, noting that there's less room in the current marketplace for mid-budget movies of the sort on the mini-major's slate. "They're going to have their work cut out for them. They'll have some bigger films next year, so hopefully that will help."

The company isn't just relying on old IP, either, with Doug Liman's "Chaos Walking," a dystopian sci-fi film starring Tom Holland and Daisy Ridley and Roland Emmerich's WWII epic "Midway" also opening in 2019.

Also Read: Lionsgate to Release Rian Johnson's 'Knives Out' With MRC

In addition, Sam Raimi is directing "The Kingkiller Chronicle," a film based on a series of fantasy books by Patrick Rothfuss about a musician/adventurer, that the studio hopes will become a franchise involving a TV series and a video game as well. "Hamilton" creator Lin-Manuel Miranda on board as an executive producer and music composer.

"It would be hard to see how they would do significantly worse than this year," Creutz said. "If they just revert to the mean, that would be a meaningful improvement."

'Captain Marvel' Edges Out 'Avengers: Endgame' as IMDb's Most Anticipated Movie of 2019 (Photos)

  • Most Anticipated Movies 2019 Disney/Marvel/Universal
  • David Harbour Hellboy Lionsgate
  • aladdin teaser Mena Massoud Disney
  • Joker Screentest teaser Warner Bros.
  • glass m night shyamalan james mcavoy bruce willis samuel l jackson comic-con 2018 Universal
  • it fan cast beverly marsh jessica chastain New Line/Getty Images
  • martin scorsese Getty Images
  • California Brad Pitt Leonardo DiCaprio Once Upon A Time In Hollywood Tarantino Sony
  • jessica chastain dark phoenix EW/20th Century Fox
  • The very first trailer for "Avengers: Endgame" is now out, and surely you all have seen it by now if you're reading this. It's not super heavy on detail, which is to be expected this far out, but there are still details we can glean about the plot of this crazy thing. So let's do dive in. 1. Tony Stark is adrift in space in the Guardians' ship All of the first minute of the trailer is spent with Tony Stark, who is adrift in space in the Milano seemingly about to run out of food and air. Tony is recording a goodbye message to Pepper Potts. It seems likely this could be the very beginning of "Avengers: Endgame," with a rescue to mirror Thanos' attack on the Asgardians in "Avengers: Infinity War." The question is: who's doing the rescuing? Could Captain Marvel show up on the stage that early in this? 2. Nebula is with him Nebula was the only other survivor from Titan, and I guess the ship that she rammed into Thanos during the big battle in "Infinity War" wasn't fit to fly after she wrecked it.Of course, if Nebula is with Tony, why wouldn't they be able to get anywhere? She would know how to fly the Milano, you would think. Hmmm. 2. Thanos is still wearing the burned up Infinity Gauntlet We get a brief look at Thanos on that planet he retired to after doing mass murder on a scale hitherto undreamt of. He's set up his armor as a scarecrow, and he's still wearing the Infinity Gauntlet. We know it's not completely broken -- we saw him use the burnt-out gauntlet to teleport out of Wakanda at the end of the battle there. But is there a reason he's still wearing it? Maybe he knows that the Avengers will need it if they wanna undo what he did? That's how it goes in the comics, anyway. 3. They know Spider-Man got dusted There's a shot in Avengers HQ with Bruce Banner (Mark Ruffalo) looking at two pictures and crying. The pictures are of Scott Lang and Peter Parker. Presumably this means the Avengers think they both got dusted. That makes sense for Scott, since he really did disappear at the time of the snap as he was in the Quantum Realm at the time. But they would have known Peter went to space with Tony Stark in pursuit of the Black Order. Of course, there's a pile of other questions this item inspires. Like: Could that scene happen after Tony is back on Earth? Do any of the other Avengers even know Spider-Man's secret identity? I guess Pepper or Happy could have told them, presuming they survived. Anyway, this is an interesting nugget, at least. 3. Clint Barton (aka Hawkeye) is now Ronin 4. The surviving Avengers on Earth have a plan 5. Scott Lang (aka Ant-Man) is out of the Quantum Realm Marvel Studios
  • captain marvel second trailer monday night football carol danvers brie larson Marvel Studios
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Quentin Tarantino's "Once Upon a Time in Hollywood" and Martin Scorsese's "The Irishman" also high on moviegoers' minds

The trailer for "Avengers: Endgame" smashed a YouTube record to be the most-watched video in 24 hours, but the character who might just save all the Avengers butts in that film, "Captain Marvel," beat out "Endgame" in a survey of the most anticipated films of 2019. IMDb analyzed page views and their updating MOVIEmeter rankings from IMDb Pro to determine the 10 films fans are most excited for moving into the new year. Spoiler alert: there are a lot of capes and spandex on the list.

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