Commentary: Why Eddie Murphy's 'Meet Dave' Bombed
Posted on: Saturday, 19 July 2008, 00:00 CDT
By Patrick Goldstein
Eddie Murphy has pulled off an almost unprecedented achievement with "Meet Dave." He has delivered a movie that even 20th Century Fox couldn't market.
Buried in bad reviews, the Brian Robbins-directed "Meet Dave" grossed barely $5 million over the weekend, making it a contender, along with "Speed Racer," as the summer's top flop.
For the past several years, Fox has been the marvel of the movie industry, having had more success with more awful movies than anyone in Hollywood. With the exception of this spring's Dr. Seuss movie, "Horton Hears a Who!," Fox has released 16 consecutive movies since last summer that have earned such awful reviews that they haven't even reached the 50 mark on Rotten Tomatoes, the minimal grade the online review aggregator gives for an average movie.
More recently, Fox did a perfectly good job of opening the dumb comedy "What Happens in Vegas" and has kept M. Night Shyamalan's hapless thriller "The Happening" alive, so alive that it's managed to top the $140 million mark in global box office.
"Meet Dave" has a steeper price tag, costing somewhere in the $75 million to $80 million ballpark. Even though Fox has a partner on the film, New Regency, it will be hard pressed to make back any money.
Murphy must have seen what was coming; he was a no-show at his own premiere.
So what went wrong with "Meet Dave"? And what does it portend for Murphy's career? Here are a few theories:
Even though they're madly envious about Fox's ability to turn lemons into lemonade, rival marketers say Fox made a rare but fundamental misstep with "Meet Dave" by running away from the film's concept. The idea might be dumb -- Eddie Murphy is actually a spaceship from a distant planet visiting Earth, taking the form of, well, Eddie Murphy -- but at least it's a viable comedy premise.
But people who saw the ads had virtually no idea what the movie was about. Even people who had seen the trailer or the TV spots couldn't grasp the premise. Fox had ignored a primal marketing law: If you have a concept, market to the concept, not away from it.
It's another big dent in Eddie Murphy's box-office armor, making you wonder whether his lack of popularity inside the industry -- where he is viewed as a spoiled, self-absorbed jerk who barely bothers to turn on the charm -- soon will spread to the outside world.
Murphy rarely does interviews, and, as his no-show at the premiere proves, he's not much of a team player. He has managed to rebound from flops, but his act -- both on-screen and off -- is getting stale. He turned in a bravura supporting role in "Dreamgirls," but otherwise, he has spent the past decade skating by, starring in a variety of ambition-free movies.
Source: Tribune-Review/Pittsburgh Tribune-Review
User Comments (0)
RSS Feeds