20 Recent Movies That Were Sent Out To Die
7. Idiots
Macon Blair's new R-rated comedy Idiots generated solid buzz out of its Sundance premiere back in January, at which point it still had the decidedly more attention-grabbing title The S**theads.
But when it was acquired by Independent Film Company the next month, they decided to give it a decidedly blander new name, presumably in the hope of making a bigger dent at the box office.
Yet between its limited release in barely 1,000 North American cinemas and a marketing campaign which painted it as an extremely broad buddy comedy, it was little surprise that Idiots grossed just $1.2 million.
Even accepting that IFC doesn't have a massive budget for marketing, they really didn't make much effort with this one.
They would've been better off keeping the original title and rolling the dice on a marketing campaign which leaned into the film's edgy vulgarity rather than presenting it as a more generic and approachable studio comedy.