Finally, Johnny Depp’s star has dimmed just a bit as my predictions for The Lone Ranger‘s failure have come to fruition. Debuting over the holiday weekend at a dysmal $48.7m box office intake, the modern-day adaptation of the Lone Ranger’s and Tonto’s adventures is going to cost a lot of people a lot of money. How much? Well, with the estimated budget for the film clocking in around $215m, Disney is set to lose roughly $150m on the film over production and marketing costs.
While Disney distributed the film, the film’s producer Jerry Bruckheimer will also carry the load along with Disney, as his huge gamble on Johnny Depp’s star recognition didn’t pan out quite as well as he was hoping. It also doesn’t help that Depp’s portrayal of Tonto was borderline offensive. I’m very obviously not a fan of Depp’s caricature acting, and it seems like most are growing weary of the act, as his name used to almost guarantee a large box office intake. I’m more concerned with how the flop will affect Armie Hammer’s career. The Lone Ranger was to provide Hammer a path towards stardom following The Social Network, but now it seems he might be a lonely ranger for awhile longer.
Of course, despite $150m being a very, very large amount of money to lose, Disney’s other big summer films, Iron Man 3 and Monsters University have made enough where the House that Walt Built shouldn’t be too worried about their profits for the year. Hopefully, this will mark the end of the Disney and Bruckheimer collaborations, as The Pirates of the Caribbean franchise grew way too long in the tooth, and The Lone Ranger looked nothing more than a simple setting swap.
[via /Film]