5 Reasons Doctor Sleep Snoozed at the Box Office – TheWrap

For a second straight weekend, a movie from a major studio has disappointed at the box office. But while the struggles of Terminator: Dark Fate were somewhat of a surprise, the sluggish numbers for Doctor Sleep are a shock.

Made on a $50 million budget, Doctor Sleep was tracking to earn a solid $25 million to $30 million in its opening weekend. But that ended up being way off the mark: It only made $14 million from 3,855 screens.

The disappointment came despite plenty of positive signs for the film. It had a 75% critics score and 90% audience score on Rotten Tomatoes and ringing endorsements from Stephen King, who called it one of his favorite film adaptations of his books, and stars like LeBron James.

Also Read: How 'Doctor Sleep' Star Ewan McGregor Overcame His Worries About Following 'The Shining'

Im really baffled by this one, said comScore analyst Paul Dergarabedian. It really takes anyone in this business back when the tracking is so very wrong about a movie thats so well received.

Doctor Sleep is now the fourth flop for Warner Bros. in the three months, joining The Kitchen, Motherless Brooklyn, and The Goldfinch. The good news for Warner Bros. is that it has two mammoth hits to cushion the disappointments. Joker and It: Chapter Two have combined to gross $1.45 billion worldwide.

So what went wrong with Doctor Sleep? Here are a five factors.

1.) A Much Older Horror Audience

In the current horror boom, women under 25 have been a driving force in turning scary movies into big hits. Blumhouse films like Us, for example, had a strong turnout from audiences under 35 and have had near 50-50 ratios in turnouts for audiences above and below the age of 25.

But Doctor Sleep skewed older. CinemaScore polls reflected an audience that was 74% over the age of 25 and 57% male. It: Chapter Two, which skewed older than Blumhouse films, had an audience that was 67% over 25 and 53% male.

Also Read: Doctor Sleep Shines With Early Critical Praise: The Best Stephen King Adaptation Since Shawshank Redemption

2.) Too Much Time Between Sequels

Stanley Kubricks The Shining was released in 1980, nearly 40 years before its sequel Doctor Sleep. Warner Bros. marketing Doctor Sleep as a Shining sequel probably didnt do the film any major favors.

The trailers and posters for Doctor Sleep were selling the film hard as a sequel to The Shining, which is great for longtime Kubrick fans but may have backfired with younger moviegoers who dont have such an emotional connection to The Shining,' Dergarabedian said.

Yes, audiences probably remember Redrum and the lady in the bathtub (which is why so many people loved the Shining homage in Ready Player One.) But does everyone remember every characters name, every line that was spoken, and every dark corner of the Overlook Hotel? Probably not, and that hurt Doctor Sleep.

Dergabedian notes that this is far from the first time in recent years that a sequel has been released long after the original.

I think its sort of the same phenomenon we saw with Terminator: Dark Fate and Blade Runner 2049. Both were films that were pretty well received by critics and had a big cult fanbase, but they were following up on films that came out decades ago. For younger audiences, they either havent seen the films at all or havent seen them in such a long time that they think they wont get the nods to the original film.

3. The Doctor Sleep Release Date

Warner Bros. released Doctor Sleep in November instead of before Halloween or in September, which has become a strong release month for horror films.

WBs critical mistake was not releasing one of the ultimate horror flicks of all time during the haunting season, Exhibitor Relations Jeff Bock told TheWrap. There was certainly a window last weekend to do so, and honestly, they completely misjudged it.

Also Read: 5 Reasons Why 'Terminator: Dark Fate' Misfired at the Box Office With $70 Million-Plus Loss

The weekend of Oct. 25 was relatively open, and studios generally dont release horror movies in the month of November.Of course, Warner Bros. might have been trying to give moviegoers a break, since It Chapter Two opened Sept. 6 and the horror-comedy Zombieland: Double Tap opened Oct. 18. But hindsight is 20/20.

4.) A Short Doctor Sleep Marketing Campaign

The great majority of marketing for Doctor Sleep came in the two months prior to its release. Trailers were attached to Warner Bros. biggest hits, It: Chapter Two and Joker.

But with awareness among younger audiences clearly lower than anticipated, a larger or more spaced out marketing campaign might have helped Doctor Sleep.Perhaps trying to build buzz for Doctor Sleep in the summer might have helped, especially considering that Doctor Sleep star Ewan McGregor earned headlines in August with the news that he will star in a Star Wars streaming series about Obi-Wan Kenobi.

Also Read: Will the Box Office Rely on Disney Again This Holiday Season?

5.) Not All Stephen King Adaptations Are Equal

Audiences are clearly not tired of Stephen King adaptations, as illustrated by the runaway success of the two It films and the more modest success of Pet Sematary.But Kings ability to tell many different kinds of horror tales may have worked against Doctor Sleep.

The basic premise of It is easy to explain: A killer clown lives in the sewers of Maine and terrorizes children. Pet Semetary also has a straightforward concept: A haunted graveyard brings the dead back to life as malicious revenants. Sold and sold.

Also Read: Why 'Joker' Has Outperformed All Other R-Rated Films at the Box Office

But The Shining and Doctor Sleep are more psychological and slow-boiling in their horror. The Shining deals with weighty problems like addiction and isolation, and explores how they can cause a family to crumble. Doctor Sleep shows us how Jack Torrance has passed down his demons to his son.

Theres certainly an audience for cerebral horror, but it isnt as easy to promote as Pennywise the Dancing Clown.

Stephen King isn't just an author by this point: He's an institution, a legacy of classic horror stories that capture our imaginations, fuel our nightmares, and speak -- when he's at his best -- to our shared experiences as flawed, emotional beings. The best King stories scare so many of us that we all feel connected, and even the worst are usually pretty fun.

King's books and short stories quickly became hit movies, many of them celebrated in their time, and some flopped so hard that hardly anybody remembers them. Cataloguing every adaptation might be a fool's errand, so we made some tough choices and decided to focus only on his theatrical releases.

And even then, there are so many King adaptations that it gets tricky. The sequels to King's work rarely have anything to do with the source material, so they're all disqualified (even though some, like Larry Cohen's prescient anti-fascist monster drama "A Return to Salem's Lot," are genuinely interesting). We also cut King some slack and removed "The Lawnmower Man" from our watch list, since he fought to have his own name removed from the film and won.

(There are also some adaptations that are simply difficult to find in America, like the Indian adaptions of "Misery" and "Quitter's, Inc." -- "Julie Ganapathi" and "No Smoking" -- but we tried. We promise we tried.)

Even with all those caveats we felt one particular film deserved a quasi-official, honorable mention. Before we rank into every theatrically-released Stephen King adaptation let's give out one honorable mention...

Honorable Mention: "Tales From the Darkside: The Movie" (1990)

Stephen King wrote only one installment of this feature film version of the "Tales From the Darkside" TV series, but it's a doozy. "Cat From Hell" (which was originally intended for "Creepshow 2") stars Buster Poindexter as a hitman hired to murder a cat, but the cat has other, shocking ideas. Darkly humorous and surprisingly gross, it's definitely the highlight of this anthology -- although the other installments aren't half-bad.

44. The Mangler (1995)

Tobe Hooper's adaptation of King's short story about a haunted laundry machine is insane in all the wrong ways. It's a tonally scatterbrained, shrieking, overacted mess of a movie. Too bizarre to feel real, too abrasive to work as camp, "The Mangler" is about as bad as a Stephen King movie can get.

43. Cell (2016)

John Cusack and Samuel L. Jackson are two of the only people in the world who weren't talking on their cell phone when a weird psychic zombie virus was unleashed through all the earpieces. The concept was already outdated by the time "Cell" (barely) came to theaters -- we all know everyone would be texting nowadays -- but the film's weak characters, laughable mythology and bizarre finale are the real reasons why this adaptation flops.

42. A Good Marriage (2014)

Joan Allen and Anthony LaPaglia seem like the perfect married couple. But while her husband is off on one of his many business trips, Allen discovers that he's actually a serial killer. Essentially a dramatic two-hander, Allen and LaPaglia have a few great moments as they find their marriage going through unexpected changes, but Peter Askin's generic direction neutralizes most of the suspense, and the storyline peaks early and quickly fizzles out. It's not terrible; it's just dull.

41. 1922 (2017)

Thomas Jane plays a farmer plotting to kill his wife in this Netflix original, but of course irony rears its ugly head and his uppance doth come. "1922" plays like a radio true-crime drama from the 1940s, but way too long and with an inexplicably distracting accent from Jane, who has to carry a lot of this film on his own. Sadly, like his character, he can't quite get away with it.

40. Graveyard Shift (1990)

You'd think Stephen King's short story about industrial workers fighting killer rats would make for an entertaining creature feature, but "Graveyard Shift" dawdles too long and doesn't get to the icky good stuff until closer to the end, and there isn't enough drama to keep us engaged until then. But at least it's got Brad Dourif, playing a fascinatingly intense exterminator who steals every single scene he can find.

39. Firestarter (1984)

Drew Barrymore plays a young girl with pyrokinetic powers, and Martin Sheen and George C. Scott play the sinister men who want to kidnap her and exploit her abilities. It starts well, but the movie loses focus for most of the second act before picking up again with a genuinely explosive climactic battle. "Firestarter" was a great role for Barrymore, but Scott's performance as a Native American is bizarre and inappropriate.

38. Silver Bullet (1985)

A series of full-moon murders convinces a disabled boy, played by Corey Haim, that a werewolf is on the loose in his town. Naturally, no one believes him, and naturally, he's right. Gary Busey shines as Haim's miscreant uncle, and Everett McGill is tragic and scary as a cursed priest, but "Silver Bullet's" subpar production values and completely unconvincing monster effects drag down this otherwise likable film.

37. Children of the Corn (1984)

Stephen King's tale of a young couple trapped in a town overrun by homicidal kids is a great idea for a movie, but Fritz Kiersch's adaptation wanders aimlessly in search of scares, and the over-the-top supernatural finale is unintentionally hilarious. Linda Hamilton and Peter Horton make little impression as our heroes, but at least John Franklin and Courtney Gains are scary as hell as the teen cult villains. Narciso Ibez Serrador's "Who Can Kill a Child?" (1976) did the same basic idea so many years earlier, and so much better, that Kiersch's film seems especially disappointing.

36. Apt Pupil (1998)

"Apt Pupil" is impossible to watch without drawing disturbing parallels. Bryan Singer's bleak coming-of-age drama stars Brad Renfro as a teenager who cons a fugitive Nazi, played by Ian McKellen, into revealing his darkest secrets, and the relationship they form is unwholesome to the extreme. It's undeniably scary, and Renfro and McKellen give great performances, but almost every scene in this film seems reminiscent of the accusations against Singer accusations, so it's still incredibly hard to get through.

35. Dreamcatcher (2003)

It's important to remember that some Stephen King stories are completely nuts, and if you need an example, look no further than "Dreamcatcher." Thomas Jane (again), Timothy Olyphant, Jason Lee and Damian Lewis play childhood friends who got psychic powers from a disabled child and now are humanity's only hope, because an alien race of "s--t weasels" (actual terminology) is about to take over the whole planet. It's too absurd to take seriously, but if you get on this film's bonkers wavelength, it's undeniably amusing.

34. Sleepwalkers (1992)

Stephen King's first original screenplay, "Sleepwalkers" stars Alice Krige and Brian Krause as mother-son cat monsters who are also lovers. They're plotting to suck the life force out of virginal Mdchen Amick, and their one weakness is actual house cats, which leads to one hilarious feline moment after another. Cheesy and lurid, with very questionable visual effects and storytelling choices, but at least Mick Garris' film is never boring.

33. The Dark Tower (2017)

Stephen King's enormous fantasy epic yielded a frustratingly small and conventional movie adaptation. Tom Taylor plays a youngster who stumbles into a timeless battle between good and evil, represented by the heroic Roland Deschain (Idris Elba) and the villainous Walter Padick (Matthew McConaughey). The CGI action and rushed storyline are pure Hollywood hackery, but Elba is so incredibly charismatic that the film is watchable -- disposable, but watchable -- anyway.

32. Riding the Bullet (2004)

Jonathan Jackson stars as a death-obsessed college student who hitchhikes home to visit his sick mother and encounters a grim specter of death along the way. "Riding the Bullet" seems more personal than Mick Garris' other King adaptations, with earnest attempts to tackle big philosophical subjects, and David Arquette is entertaining as the angel of death. But at feature length, this material feels pretty skimpy.

31. Secret Window (2004)

Another well-constructed film, made increasingly uncomfortable by context. Johnny Depp stars as a troubled, struggling, once-popular artist, accused of plagiarism by a mysterious stalker played by Jon Turturro. David Koepp's adaptation of "Secret Window, Secret Garden" is relatively slick and suspenseful, but it's difficult to watch a film about Depp threatening his wife and losing his mind without mentally sidestepping into some unsettling and distracting territory.

30. Creepshow 2 (1987)

The second film in Stephen King and George A. Romero's horror franchise, this time directed by Michael Gornick, is more of a mixed bag than the original, with the conventional vengeful statue yarn "Old Chief Wooden Head" completely failing to pass muster. Fortunately, the slime monster short "The Raft" makes up for it, and road-trip ghost story "The Hitch-Hiker" concludes "Creepshow 2" on an amusingly grim note.

29. Carrie (2013)

Kimberly Peirce's remake of "Carrie" updates King's first novel to the present day, and adds a (perhaps ill-advised) plot point involving social media, but it's still fundamentally the story of an abusive relationship between a mentally ill mother and her repressed and psychically powerful daughter, played respectively by Julianne Moore and Chlo Grace Moretz. Both actors make the most of their roles, with Moore in particular having a wild time. However, this respectable but unremarkable remake never quite feels as raw and frightening as the original.

28. Thinner (1996)

Robert John Burke stars as a corrupt, heavyset lawyer who uses his mob connections to stay out of jail after he accidentally hits an old gypsy with his car. Her widower curses him to get "thinner," every single day, until he wastes away into nothingness. Tom Holland's film is a nasty piece of work that plays more like a cruel joke than a feature film. But as cruel jokes go, it's a good one.

27. Maximum Overdrive (1986)

The only film that Stephen King directed himself, "Maximum Overdrive" tells the story of a group of strangers who get trapped at a gas station when all the machines on Earth come to life and start killing everybody. Terrorized by vehicles and vending machines, they're forced to fuel the trucks, and it's just about as ridiculous as it sounds. But it's such an entertaining mess, and the soundtrack by AC/DC kicks so much butt, that it's developed a well-deserved reputation as a cult oddity.

26. The Running Man (1987)

Arnold Schwarzenegger stars as a wrongly accused man, forced to fight for his life against colorful superpowered murderers for the benefit of a live studio audience. "The Running Man" may not be subtle, but its portrayal of TV gone sadistic and amok feels prescient anyway. The action is entertainingly bizarre, and iconic game show host Richard Dawson plays a fantastically evil version of himself. It's an effective media satire and a ripping sci-fi thriller.

25. The Green Mile (1999)

Frank Darabont's second Stephen King adaptation tells the story of Depression-era death row inmates and guards, whose lives are forever altered by the arrival of a mysterious, magical new prisoner. Michael Clarke Duncan earned an Oscar nomination for his performance as the tragic John Coffey, Sam Rockwell and Michael Jeter steal scenes as his fellow prisoners, and Tom Hanks adds gravitas. "The Green Mile" is a handsome but bloated production, told in broad strokes with mixed but often impressive results.

24. It: Chapter Two (2019)

The Loser's Club has all grown up -- and is now played by recognizable actors like James McAvoy, Jessica Chastain and Bill Hader -- and they return to Derry to confront their childhood traumas, in the form of the evil Pennywise the Clown (Bill Skarsgrd, as scary as ever). Director Andy Muschietti knows how to build a great scare, and "It Chapter Two" has some doozies, but the conclusion of this horror epic falls prey to tedious mythologizing and a flashback structure that treats the adult Losers like afterthoughts in their own story. It's a disappointing conclusion to the instant classic "Chapter One."

23. Hearts in Atlantis (2001)

Anton Yelchin stars as a young boy who becomes fascinated with his new neighbor, played by Anthony Hopkins, who has strange psychic powers. Scott Hicks's coming-of-age film is slight, frequently to a fault, but the performances by Yelchin and Hopkins (and Hope Davis as Yelchin's self-obsessed mother) are so rich and excellent that "Hearts in Atlantis" makes a strong impression anyway.

22. In the Tall Grass (2019)

A little boy calls for help inside a field of grass, prompting a brotherand sister to search for him and get hopelessly lost inside a verdant labyrinth of violence and fear. Directed by Vincenzo Natali, who previously made a simple geometric shape seem terrifying in "Cube," this adaptation of a novella by King and his son, Joe Hill, excels at transforming everyday vegetation into the stuff of nightmares. The plot gets bizarre, and eventually flies off the rails, but "In the Tall Grass" stays riveting regardless.In the Tall Grass (2019) A little boy calls for help inside a field of grass, prompting a brother and sister to search for him and get hopelessly lost inside a verdant labyrinth of violence and fear. Directed by Vincenzo Natali, who previously made a simple geometric shape seem terrifying in "Cube," this adaptation of a novella by King and his son, Joe Hill, excels at transforming everyday vegetation into the stuff of nightmares. The plot gets bizarre, and eventually flies off the rails, but "In the Tall Grass" stays riveting regardless.

21. The Night Flier (1997)

A serial killer flies from one small airport to another, killing everyone they find, and a tabloid reporter played by Miguel Ferrer is on the case. The supernatural story gets increasingly ridiculous, but that's the point: Ferrer plays a cynic who finds himself suddenly believing the weird tales he peddles. "The Night Flier" gives Ferrer one of his very best roles and spins a very unusual yarn in the process.

20. 1408 (2007)

John Cusack plays a non-fiction writer who spends the night at allegedly haunted hotels, but when he winds up in room 1408 he gets more than he bargained for. Mikael Hfstrm's incredibly clever film finds a way to keep Cusack in his room, constantly bombarded by terrors, for almost the entire, gripping running time. It's one of the great modern haunting movies.

19. The Dark Half (1993)

Timothy Hutton plays a novelist almost-but-not-entirely like Stephen King, who wrote under a pseudonym, had that pseudonym exposed, and publicly "killed" his alter ego. The problem is, Hutton's doppelgnger refuses to stay dead. George A. Romero's creepy and personal horror story goes in weird directions, but Hutton's impeccable dual performance keeps "The Dark Half" rooted in nightmarish and engrossing allegory.

18. Cat's Eye (1985)

A scheme to stop smoking goes horribly wrong, a jilted husband makes a deadly wager, and a cat struggles to rescue a little girl from a monster in "Cat's Eye," one of the best horror anthologies of the 1980s. Each segment is an excellent shocker in its own right, with twisted senses of humor and seat-clutching suspense. The only thing keeping "Cat's Eye" from classic status is the weak framing device, which doesn't do much to connect the stories together, other than the (mostly incidental) presence of a cat.

17. Needful Things (1993)

Max von Sydow opens up a knick-knack store in Castle Rock, Maine, where every customer finds exactly what they desire, and all it ever costs them is a little favor. Gradually the whole town starts turning on each other, building to a hellish conclusion. Fraser C. Heston's film has a lot of story to fit into just one movie, and sometimes feels rushed, but the fantastic performances by von Sydow, Ed Harris, Amanda Plummer and J.T. Walsh more than compensate. It's one of the better horror movies about the insidious power of temptation.

16. Pet Sematary (1989)

"Sometimes, dead is better." Stephen King's vicious and horrifying tale about a family's grief gone disturbingly wrong became an emotionally explosive and creepy film from director Mary Lambert, who plays up the melodrama and lets King's strange supernatural storytelling speak for itself. Dale Midkiff and Denise Crosby hold their own as the couple mourning their soon-to-be-resurrected child, while Fred Gwynne creates an indelible horror icon as their too-helpful neighbor Jud.

15. Pet Sematary (2019)

"Sometimes, dead is better." Stephen King's vicious and horrifying tale about a family's grief gone disturbingly wrong became an emotionally explosive and creepy film from... wait, didn't we just do this? The remake of "Pet Sematary" is just about on par with the original, with a few notable changes that keep the story feeling relatively timeless but not entirely familiar. Kevin Klsch and Dennis Widmyer's adaptation amplifies the shocks and makes the atmosphere even creepier than ever, but which version is actually "better" is probably just a matter of taste.

The rest is here:
5 Reasons Doctor Sleep Snoozed at the Box Office - TheWrap

Reviewed and Recommended by Erik Baquero