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‘Red One’ & The New Arithmetic of Flops

The Rock’s kidnapped Santa caper sure looks like a $253 million Christmas catastrophe for Amazon MGM Studios. It also represents the peril of a certain kind of genre and a limit to its star’s bankability.

’Red One‘ is also another example of the industry overestimating The Rock’s bankability.
’Red One‘ is also another example of the industry overestimating The Rock’s bankability. Photo: Tristar Media/WireImage
Scott Mendelson
November 19, 2024

It’s easy to dunk on Red One, the early-Christmas-season film about a North Pole security officer (Dwayne Johnson) recruiting a mercenary (Chris Evans) to help track down a kidnapped and uncomfortably buff Santa Claus (J.K. Simmons). The Amazon MGM Studios action-comedy cost a reported $253 million to produce, not including P&A. Its Friday-Sunday debut netted $32 million, while the film earned just $50 million in two weeks of overseas theatrical release. By most conventional theatrical measures, this is a catastrophe.