It's mid-January and you know what that means: shitty movies studios don't want (or probably ever wanted) get tossed to audiences more interested in catching up with late-December releases and award season contenders. One such film is Paramount's Monster Trucks, out today, which deals with cars being powered by monsters. Yes really. Paramount had no idea what to do with this film, though, as its behind the scenes tale shows.
- For some reason, it has a $125 million budget.
- Director Chris Wedge, moving to live-action after spending his career directing animated films, developed the idea for the film in 2013 with his then four-year old son. The studio, if they even knew of this development, was somehow okay with it and greenlit the film.
- The film is written by Derek Connolly, Colin Trevorrow's collaborator on Safety Not Guaranteed, Jurassic World, and Star Wars Epi 9.
- Paramount didn't want a cute kids film. They wanted a huge blockbuster franchise that could sell a shit ton of toys without having to split the cut with another company (like they do with Transformers/Hasbro).
- Production began in May 2014, with a release date scheduled for the following May. It's release date would be delayed four times.
- When production wrapped, Paramount President Adam Goodman was fired and the film was delayed to Christmas 2015.
- In May 2015 (the same month it was originally set to hit theaters), it's moved again to March 18, 2016.
- Two months later, Paramount fires their head of Animation, Bob Bacon, and completely eliminates the position all together.
- In November 2015, Paramount delayed the film one last time, to today, giving its spot to The Little Prince instead. In a typical messy fashion, Paramount dropped that film a week before its scheduled release, stating that French producers didn't pay the studio the money they agreed to for P&A. It was never released in US theaters and was acquired by Netflix several months later.
- This past June, over a year after its original release date, Paramount finally releases a trailer and oh boy:
- In September, Paramount announced a $115 million write-down thanks to an unreleased film, which everyone immediately links to this movie.
- The film is being released in over 3,000 theaters and currently at 41 on Metacritic.
Sourcewhats your favorite messy behind the scenes story, ontd?
