Ridley Scott’s new featureThe Last Duelcame up short big time at the box office when it was released, pulling in about $10 million in domestic ticket sales against its $100 million budget. Featuring an A-list cast including Matt Damon, Ben Affleck, Jodie Comer, and Adam Driver, all of the right pieces seemed to be in place for the movie to be a hit, but for whatever reason, people just weren’t flocking to the theaters to catch this one on the big screen. Perhaps giving the feature a theatrical release was the biggest mistake, at least that’s what Affleck is theorizing.
Recently, Affleck had a chat withThe Hollywood Reporter,and he touched onThe Last Duelflopping hard at the box office. For his part, the actor feels that this is much different compared to thebox office bombs he was a part of in previous years, as he didn’t feel those movies were all that great.The Last Duel, meanwhile, he truly feels is a great movie that deserves to be seen. It all seems to come down to the ways the industry has been changing, something that’s been exacerbated by the pandemic.
“Really, the truth is that I’ve had movies that didn’t work that bombed, that weren’t good. It’s very easy to understand that and why it happened. The movie is sh*t, people don’t want to see it, right? This movie,The Last Duel, I really like. It’s good and it plays — I saw it play with audiences, and now it’s playing well on streaming. It wasn’t one of those films that you say, ‘Oh boy, I wish my movie had worked.’ Instead, this is more due to a seismic shift that I’m seeing, and I’m having this conversation with every single person I know. Though there are various iterations, the conversation is the same: How is [the movie business] changing?"
Ben Affleckgoes on to explain how things have changed since he was a kid and the “TV at home was an 11-inch black-and-white TV.” Nowadays, people can own hi-def televisions with 65-inch screens for a fraction of the cost that they used to be, turning every living room into a miniature movie theater. Affleck believes that lengthy dramas in particular are movies that people would rather stream at home where they could pause it as necessary, and he saw the writing on the wall even before the pandemic.
“And you know what? I knew it was changing before the pandemic hit withThe Way Back. I remember feeling like, ‘Sh*t, I really love this movie, and no one’s going to see it.’ I could just tell; it’s not going to land in the theaters. People don’t want to go see dramas. Then the pandemic hit, and ironically, one of the first few films that wasrushed to streamingwasThe Way Back, and people did see it. I said, ‘You know what? This isn’t bad.’ I would rather have people see this and watch it, and I don’t need to be stuck to the old ways [of doing business]."
Ultimately, Affleck saysThe Last Duelwould have “done better on streaming” because of the way these kinds of movies are marketed. Perhaps time will be kind to the movie and it will get its just attention in due time. For now, fans can catchAffleck’s latest performance inThe Tender Bar, hitting theaters on Dec. 17 before becoming widely available for streaming on Prime Video on Jan. 7.
