#1
"A great film concept is not just one that feels clever, or gives a zing of 'I gotta see what that is,' but also illuminates something about human nature through the characters involved or speaks to something in society," the team behind The Flop House tells Bored Panda.
"Those themes don't have to be huge or overt, but if it doesn't have that core, you're in trouble. Some terrible movies have been made from fine premises, but they fail because you walk out saying, 'Yeah, I know the plot – but what was it about?'"
The podcasters point out that when it seems like a movie has a great concept but doesn't execute it well, it's probably because something went wrong along the line. "Sometimes, it's a 'too many cooks in the kitchen' situation," they give an example.
"Film is highly collaborative, and at its best, that means you get something more impressive than any one person could create, but if the people in charge aren't all on the same page, then there's no sense there was an overriding vision."
#2
#3
Other times, The Flop House team notes, these films fail because they are just a cash grab. The recent trend of never-ending remakes is an example. "Sometimes, projects are doomed from the start because they're just a cynical attempt at cashing in on IP the filmmakers hope audiences remember, but there's been no attempt to discover why that IP is being revisited and what new is being brought."
Can this be a genre problem? Just one glance at this list proves that fantasy and sci-fi may flop more often in the eyes of the audience than other genres. "Some genres become difficult through overfamiliarity," The Flop House hosts admit. "It's hard to do a giant fantasy epic that breaks new ground because post-Star Wars, everyone got obsessed with the same screenwriting models, and the stories started feeling the same."
#4
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#6
According to the podcasters, a lack of institutional knowledge can also be a contributing factor in an anticipated movie's failure. "Musicals are much less frequent on the big screen than in classic Hollywood, and now, fewer people know how to shoot them," they point out. "They get cut all to hell when it would be more effective and impressive to just watch people sing and dance."
"Some genres get harder, just as they seem to be getting easier," The Flop House team says. "Action is less thrilling now that special effects can do literally anything because it loses any sense of reality that an audience can connect to." However, they do say that it’s likely that no genre is inherently more difficult. "They all just have different challenges."
#7
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#9
The Flop House has covered its fair share of stinkers, but what about those that had a really promising premise? Sometimes, it seems that the movie can't really figure out how to handle it. The team gives Next (2007) with Nicolas Cage as an example. "[It's] about someone who always knows what's going to happen, well, 'next.' The problem is that [this] overpowers the main character so much that the movie never figures out how to appropriately challenge him."
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The podcasters also name a more recent film, Don't Worry Darling (2022), as an example that failed to deliver on its solid concept. The problem with this one was overfamiliarity, according to them. "[It] was a movie we all kind of enjoyed because it was well acted and beautifully presented, but the central twist has become overfamiliar, and the film didn't quite bring enough new elements to it."
#13
#14
"Then there are movies that don't go far enough," The Flop House team points out. "If it were made in the '70s in Italy, I Know Who Killed Me (2007) might be a fun giallo thriller, but the version we got, while over-the-top, never quite pushed itself into the kind of stylish absurdity that would let the audience know that it could have fun and not take it seriously."
#16
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#18
A captivating idea is a great foundation for a film. However, it's not enough for it to stand on its own. And the movies in this list might just be proof of that. There are far too many things needed for a movie to do well at the box office or become a cult classic many years after its release.
A film historian and filmmaker Wheeler Winston Dixon, a professor at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, told CNN that there is a great deal of things that can go wrong for filmmakers. "It's always a crapshoot because there are so many factors you don't know about before you're going into something. Even with all the elements in place, there's always an element of chance."