10 Big Films From 2013 You've Probably Already Forgotten About

10. Gangster Squad

U.S. Release date: January 11th What was this about again? Set in Los Angeles in 1949, a team of police officers work together to bring down Mickey Cohen, a ruthless mob king who runs the city. If you didn't know any better, would you have guessed that "Gangster Squad" actually came out this year? The first trailer for the movie was unveiled in the beginning of May 2012, and it was initially set to be released that following September. But controversy surrounding the July 2012 movie theater shooting in Aurora, Colorado forced producers to make a tough decision. There was a moment in the initial trailer where characters holding machine guns were shooting theater patrons through the screen at the famous Grauman's Chinese Theatre. The film's producers decided to do a series of re-shoots, removing the theater scene completely, which caused "Gangster Squad" to be pushed back for a January release. The re-shoots did not seem to matter, however, as the film wound up getting middling reviews from film critics and a tepid audience response overall. While the movie did cross $100 million worldwide, it only took $46 million in America. When you have a cast that includes Josh Brolin, Ryan Gosling, Sean Penn, and Emma Stone, you would hope your movie could perform better than that. Of course, any movie getting an early January release is going to have a tough time getting much notice. After all, this was a time when "Django Unchained", "Les Miserables", "Zero Dark Thirty" and "The Hobbit" were all battling each other in the box office. Having said that, released just one week later, "Mama" was able to make double what "Gangster Squad" made in its opening weekend. This might suggest that audiences just weren't all that crazy about seeing the film in the first place. Now, "Gangster Squad" just seems like a distant memory and it's one of those cases where news about the movie winds up being more memorable than the actual movie itself.
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Ken writes movie reviews on his blog, kenoncinema.blogspot.com. He currently resides in New York City. Twitter: @keng324