10 Recent Box Office Bombs EVERYONE Saw Coming
4. Black Bag
Steven Soderbergh's new spy thriller Black Bag is the best-reviewed major release of 2025 so far, yet despite near-universal critical acclaim, did anyone even know it existed until a week or two before release?
The low-key marketing campaign didn't suggest that Focus Features had a ton of confidence in this one, and it certainly didn't help that the film was saddled with a terrible title that's more likely to make people think of bin-liners than a sexy, star-studded spy outing.
But the real killing blow was the film's stonking $50 million budget.
This might not sound immediately absurd given Soderbergh's industry cred and the superb cast including Cate Blanchett, Michael Fassbender, Naomie Harris, Regé-Jean Page, and Pierce Brosnan, but given that Black Bag is a largely dialogue-driven film taking place in just a few rooms, it's tough to see where all the money went.
As such, it didn't stand a chance at the box office, opening to a brutal $7.5 million in North America, ensuring it's basically impossible for the film to gross the $100 million it'd need to be considered a theatrical success.