Last weekend, the film, The Gunman, starring Sean Penn along a list of renowned actors was released in theaters. The movie opened with a less than the expected $5 million, resulting in the film being a massive flop. Sean Penn plays a former Special Force soldier who tries to reconnect with his long time lover, but must complete a series of mission absolve his name. The Open Road Films release is Penn’s worst debuted weekend for any of his movies opening in more than 2,000 theaters. The 54-year-old acclaimed actor two Best Actor Oscars couldn’t keep “The Gunman” from flopping with just $5 million, $45 million less than box office winners “The Divergent Series: Insurgent.” It seem that audience should add Sean Penn to the list of aging actors who has lost their finesse to attract a box office crowd. Sean would join the list of Hollywood venerable stars who appears to have lost their star appeal. All this comes a week following, Liam Neeson, a stars who has infamous for his role in action films. Run All Night debuted with an underwhelming $11 million. Neeson previous action thriller " A Walk Among The Tombstones did fairly better, opening $12 million. This is quite reduction for the 62-year old Neeson whose Taken films combine grossed 914 million, an average of $ 304 million between 2009 and 2015. However, perhaps audience are finding the vengeance sort out story too jaded, hence as the finale Taken was the first that failed achieved the 100 million benchmark projected. It’s a recent trend with former box-office muscle men like Arnold Schwarzenegger and Sylvester Stallone showing signs of similar box-office atrophy. Sylvester Stallone, 68, failed to appeal to moviegoers with 2013’s “Escape Plan” and 2012’s “Bullet to the Head,” both of which opened below $10 million. In addition, last summer’s “Expendables 3” didn’t match the success of the earlier entries in the franchise- primarily because the film was leaked online before it actually opened domestically. Stallone’s last non-action outing, the boxing comedy “Grudge Match,” didn’t have audiences did not have rushing to the theaters. Grudge opened to $7 million and finished below $30 million domestically in 2013. The once governor of Califormia, Arnold Schwarzenegger hasn’t had a hit since stepping down in 2011. His last three action films “Sabotage” and “Escape Plan,” in which he co-starred with Stallone, and “The Last Stand” – all tanked. Is it that these actors has lost their relevance in Hollywood movies? Or is the type of movies which these actor star in has become blase, and audience are expressing their disinterest by not turning up. For the latter, i doubt it, no matter how moviegoers has seen repeated action thriller, or the type of CIA drama or espionage films, these sort of movies will never get old. For Instance, the last James Bond movie, starring was a major success for the franchise, pulling in over a Billion dollars globally. Though the argument that James Bond is a brand name and is connected far back as the 60's would serve to invalidate my premise, it still an epitome of prospect in these kind of film genres. In regard to relevance of these aged actors, it is possible they have lost some semblance of pull power, but its obvious their is some juice left in them. Overseas, has been more favorable to the elderly stars. Films that flopped in North America have seen better gross. Stallone and Schwarzenegger’s “Escape Plan” made just $25 million for Lionsgate in the U.S. in 2013, but took in $112 million internationally, including $40 million from China alone. Denzel Washington is one of the prime examples of actors whose last film The Equalizer, was a slight disappointment locally but managed to grossed over $100 million overseas. The senior stars have resumes that are hard to argue with, so they’ll be OK. Neeson is the king with $6.4 billion in global grosses over the course of his career, boosted by supporting roles in the “Star Wars” and “Dark Knight” movies. Schwarzenegger has generated $4.2 billion globally, and Stallone is not far back with $3.3 billion. Paramount Pictures executives might be watching the geezer gang with a bit of anxiety, and hoping that an established franchise can indeed make a difference. They are banking that Schwarzenegger can wield his former box-office clout when the pricey and special effects-laden “Terminator: Genisys” debuts on July 1. That’s because there are two more films in the series scheduled, for 2017 and 2018 and Schwarzenegger will be 70 when the latter rolls out Possibly for the actors that has actually lost their appeal, they may attempt to reform their brand to accommodate more genres of films. Or perhaps Audience wants to see their favorite stars act in different films.
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