Movies produced by right wingers always suck, and they never make money. (See the recent release of “Atlas Shrugged,” an “objectivist” fantasy based on Ayn Rand’s 1957 novel, which circled the drain after its first weekend, for example.) So it would have been a surprise if “The Undefeated,” the deceptively titled documentary about the Quitter from Wasilla had done boffo box office when it opened in limited release this weekend. Why anyone would waste their hard-earned money on a puff piece about a unpleasant, vindictive ignoramus is another question.
Here, from IndieWIRE, are the preliminary numbers:
The Sarah Palin documentary “The Undefeated” earned decent, but by no means, overwhelming ticket sales on Friday and Saturday, earning an approximately $5,000 per-theater average across 10 screens, according to distributor ARC Entertainment. Sunday numbers were not available. And exact figures appear to be confidential.
While the distributors are heralding the sales as a big win—and “stronger than expected, with the large markets trending towards weekend per screen averages above $10,000 driven by multiple sold-out runs,” according to a press release—the final results are no game-changer, indicating Palin’s fan base either isn’t as strong as they might hope, bad reviews kept them away, or they simply would rather spend their hard-earned dollars on “Harry Potter” and “Winnie the Pooh.”
If box office translated to election results, a $7,000-10,000 weekend per-screen average would roughly equate to a respectable showing, but not enough to pull a majority victory, behind such recent stronger candidates as Werner Herzog’s “Cave of Forgotten Dreams” (4 screens, $27,820 average), “The September Issue” (6 theaters, $36,772 average) and “Joan Rivers: A Piece of Work” (7 theaters, $23,479 average).
In an interview with The Hollywood Reporter, the film’s producers went through the entire cycle of denial producers experience when faced with poor bad box office receipts. First comes defiance, then excuses and, finally, wishful thinking.
Defiance:
“We didn’t put a nickel of P&A [prints and advertising — an industry term for investments in marketing a film] into this and the distributor had the movie for only three weeks. To describe this as anything but a hit is inaccurate,” director-writer Stephen Bannon told The Hollywood Reporter on Sunday.
“We took out only one ad, which is what AMC required of us. We did a high-risk thing. I wanted to see how we could open on word-of-mouth and social media,” said Bannon.
Trust me on this: If Bannon could have raised $20 million for P&A that he could have used for television ads in key markets, he would have.
Next up: Excuses.
Bannon also said the numbers are misleading, given the small theaters where Undefeated played.
“This is a documentary opening against Harry Potter on the toughest weekend of the year. We had small numbers but only in small theaters. In bigger markets, like Orange County, we’ll do $12,000 per screen,” Bannon said.
“One theater had, like, 95 seats. Most places upgraded us to a bigger screen because of demand. Where we had the capacity, we did more than $10,000 per screen,” he said.
Bannon also said audiences reacted much in the same way they did at the premiere in Pella, Iowa a few weeks ago: with standing ovations. He said he intends on putting video of the positive response online.
And, finally, wishful thinking:
“The combination of passionate audience response, sustained standing ovations and in-theater Twittering convinces us that this is a special film that will have incredible word-of-mouth,” said Glenn Bracken Evans, co-founder of Victory Film Group, which financed the film with its partners.
ARC Entertainment and Cinedigm, which helped get the film into theaters, opened the film in Palin strongholds—Atlanta, Dallas, Houston, Denver, Phoenix, Orlando, Indianapolis, Kansas City, Oklahoma City and Orange, Calif.
“The Undefeated” has received almost entirely negative reviews in the legitimate media. It is highly unlikely that word-of-mouth will be able to turn it into a hit.
