As it turns out, alienating the vast majority of paying customers isn’t a good business strategy. Who could’ve guessed?
Well, not the filmmakers behind “The American Society of Magical Negroes,” apparently.
The film, which generated a decent amount of social media buzz and news coverage for its racially-charged plot (the story features a secret society of black Americans dedicated to appeasing white people in an effort to make them less “dangerous”), just ended its theatrical run after only 21 days.
For perspective, the average theatrical window for a movie released between January and April is around 30 days — with virtually all successful films extending their runtimes far beyond that window.
But “The American Society of Magical Negroes” was far from successful. In fact, by every measure, it was an utter disaster.
Financial Losses
Though an official budget for the film has yet to be released, multiple unconfirmed reports — including this story from film critic Jordan Ruimy — estimate the budget to have been around $15 to $20 million.
According to Box Office Mojo, the film only brought in $2.48 million at the worldwide box office.
Would you ever see this movie?
Even if the estimated budget is too high and the film cost, let’s say, $10 million, it was an epic financial failure.
Given the 2.5 times rule (to account for marketing and profit splits with theaters, films generally need to make 2.5 times their budget to break even), even then the film would have lost over $22 million.
Critically Panned
But, with lower-budget films such as this, oftentimes filmmakers and movie studios can at least count on good reviews.
Even if the film wasn’t a financial success, perhaps good word of mouth from said reviews can propel its VOD and Blu-Ray sales.
Unfortunately for Focus Features, they won’t even have middling critical reviews to fall back on.
The Rotten Tomatoes critics score for “The American Society of Magical Negroes” currently sits at a solidly-rotten 28 percent.
Perhaps this film will serve as a lesson for filmmakers and film studios going forward.
When audiences take time out of their day to sit down and watch a movie, they want to be entertained, not preached to.
Until Hollywood learns that lesson, it will no doubt continue to suffer the incredible financial woes that have been plaguing the industry for years now.
