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Dwayne Johnson’s high hopes for The Smashing Machine were dashed this past weekend, at least at the box office. The biopic of former mixed martial artists Mark Kerr, which had no shortage of promotion prior to its release, finished third in the weekend box office rankings with just $6 million in earnings – the worst opening weekend for a movie starring The Rock.
Not only did The Smashing Machine finish in third over the weekend behind One Battle After Another, which made $11 million in its second week, it made $27 million less than something that wasn’t even technically a movie: Taylor Swift’s Life of a Showgirl album release “cinematic experience.”
The Smashing Machine, which had a production budget of $50 million, had been projected to open somewhere between $8 million to $15 million. Instead, it got smashed by an 89-minute mix of music videos, behind-the-scenes footage, and lyric videos.
According to The Hollywood Reporter, nearly 90 percent of Showgirl ticket buyers were female, while around 70 percent of The Smashing Machine ticket buyers were male. So it wasn’t as much a matter of Taylor Swift stealing The Rock’s audience as it was Showgirl taking a number of premium large-format screens away from The Smashing Machine, which has a B- CinemaScore.
Responding to the poor opening weekend at the box office, Dwayne Johnson took to social media with a message.
“From deep in my grateful bones, thank you to everyone who has watched The Smashing Machine. In our storytelling world, you can’t control box office results — but what I realized you can control is your performance, and your commitment to completely disappear and go elsewhere. And I will always run to that opportunity. It was my honor to transform in this role for my director Benny Safdie @bowedtie. Thank you brother for believing in me. Truth is this film has changed my life.”
Other reasons for the disappointing opening weekend at the box office for The Smashing Machine, according to Variety, included the film not being able clearly target a particular audience (it’s an arthouse drama starring the world’s biggest action star), and the movie receiving poor word-of-mouth reviews after such huge critical acclaim leading up to its release.
The Smashing Machine is now projected to earn around $15 million domestically by the end of its run. Throw in the fact that, as David A. Gross, who runs the FranchiseRe movie consulting firm, told Variety, “Sports dramas do not travel well overseas,” and it is going to be almost impossible for A24 to recoup the $50 million it spent on the movie (much of it in the form of Dwayne Johnson’s salary).