Denial Ends Up the Year as a Flop

It has been 3 months since the opening, but Denial, David Hare's screenplay about the Irving v. Lipstadt trial, can now be classified as a flop.  Despite the draw of names like Rachel Weisz, Tom Wilkinson, and Timothy Spall, the results for Weekend Number 12, December 16-18, are in and are dismal. The movie-tracking company Box Office Mojo gives weekend gross for the entire US as a mere $7,800, an average of $163 per theater for the weekend. The next step is the placing of the movie in “download to own” status.

That is usually considered a death sentence to box-office activity but Denial is slated to open in the UK and Ireland on January 27, 2017, Brazil on March 9 and Germany on April 13th.  In Brazil the movie will have the name Negação while in Germany the title will be Verleugnung.

“Box-Office Flop” status is awarded to any movie which has box office receipts less than the cost of production. The costs of production are estimated to be closer to $20,000,000.  While the distributor, Bleecker Street, is keeping mum about the production budget, total domestic gross is just over $4,000,000. Maybe Bleecker Street is in Verleugnung?