10 Great Movies That Inexplicably Flopped At The Box Office

6. The Iron Giant (1999)

Brad Bird's deeply personal Iron Giant was met with overwhelming critical success upon release. The Los Angeles Times dubbed it "a classic even though it's just out of the box", and The New Yorker hailed it as a "modern fairy tale". Many critics praised its skilful animation, and its blend of a simplistic story with sophisticated themes.

Due to the poor box office performance of Warner Bros. previous animated film, the Arthurian Quest for Camelot (1998), the studio had little confidence in The Iron Giant's box office prospects, and as a result the studio committed few resources to its marketing budget. They neglected to arrange fast food and cereal tie ins, a staple of 90s animated movie films, and even only produced one teaser poster, which then unsurprisingly became its official poster.

After the film reputedly received the highest test screening scores they'd received in the last 15 years, the studio realised their mistake, but it was too late. The film was released to wide acclaim but little fanfare, and grossed a criminally low $31.1 million against an estimated $50 million budget.