5 Reasons ‘Charlie’s Angels’ Tanked at the Box Office – And Why Elizabeth Banks Isn’t Fazed

Another weekend, another box office flop. This past weekend, Sony’s “Charlie’s Angels” fizzled out in theaters with just $8.35 million grossed domestically against a reported $48 million budget, becoming the third film in as many weeks to tank in theaters.

At a time when there’s a stronger than ever push for women to be represented both in front of and behind the camera, Sony made the decision to bring “Charlie’s Angels” back to theaters for the first time in 16 years. Elizabeth Banks, who found box office success as director of “Pitch Perfect 2,” signed on to both direct and star as the Angels’ new Bosley. Kristen Stewart, having spent her post-“Twilight” career mostly on the indie scene, returned to mainstream films alongside Ella Balinska and Naomi Scott in the lead roles.

With pre-weekend tracking not exceeding $20 million, “Charlie’s Angels” wasn’t expected to be a major hit, but not even its target female demographic showed up. Here’s why we think that happened.

1. Reboots are slumping

“Charlie’s Angels” is the latest in a series of attempts by major studios to revive major IP from a past generation, only to fail to generate any interest beyond a very small following.

Just this month, Paramount, Skydance, 20th Century Fox and Tencent took a big loss on the theatrical release of “Terminator: Dark Fate” — a $185 million reboot of the sci-fi franchise that first launched in 1984 and that has seen two other unsuccessful big-screen reboots since 2009. And earlier this month, Warner Bros.’ “The Shining” sequel “Doctor Sleep” dozed to a dismal $14 million opening despite critical praise and a modest $50 million budget.

“Charlie’s Angels” is a different film from the past two weekends’ box office flops, but they are all trying to appeal to nostalgia for projects that came out more than 25 years ago. The problem is that it has been so long since those original titles came out that younger moviegoers are not as familiar or as attached to them as older audiences, diminishing their ability to generate strong moviegoer turnout…….read more

Source: The Wrap