10 Awesome Recent Movies That Didn't Deserve To Bomb

2. The Northman

Budget: $70 million

Box Office: $23.5 million (to date)

Robert Eggers' historical epic The Northman may have only recently hit cinemas, but its opening weekend box office in the U.S. confirms it to be a commercial failure.

No matter how warmly received the film was by critics, and that it scored a surprisingly not-bad "B" CinemaScore despite its surreal nature, it was always going to face an uphill struggle theatrically.

With a stonking $70 million budget - or, if some sources can be believed, $90 million - The Northman would need to cross $150 million to get anywhere close to profitability, which even with pop-culture's current obsession with Vikings, it had zero chance of doing.

As brilliant as the film is, Universal was mighty optimistic - or, some might say, delusional - to think that a big-budget Eggers-directed film would catch on with the mainstream.

Given that Eggers' previous film, The Lighthouse, failed to turn a profit on a mere $11 million budget, it was undeniably wishful thinking that The Northman would be a breakout hit, even with its more accessible subject matter.