10 Box Office Flops Much Better Than Their Reputations
4. The 13th Warrior
Budget: $160 million
Worldwide Gross: $61.7 million
Delayed for more than a year due to poor responses from test screenings, The 13th Warrior had a lot of people, including some of the actors involved, weary of its final product. But even after numerous re-shoots and edits, this movie came out the other end like a more polished version of Conan the Barbarian. And...why is that somehow a bad thing?
Indeed, one of the biggest criticisms lobbed against the Antonio Banderas medieval action thriller, is that it seems trapped in the 80s. But if that's meant to somehow diminish the brutal action sequences that feature limbs being chopped off and blood spurting out of every major orifice in the human anatomy, then it's totally unfair to lambast a movie for earning it's R rating.
Carnage candy is everywhere in this movie, but beneath all the blood and guts is a story of a man seeking to initiate himself into a group of which he seems to be ill-equipped to fit in with. It's like a less patronising version of Dances With Wolves.
Banderas plays the part with an air of mystery about him, and moves effortlessly between the battle scenes and the quieter moments with his new comrades. It's not exactly Gladiator, but it certainly gets the job done.