Mr. Floppy 02.09.07: The Sylvester Stallone Special

Posted by Peter Bielik on 02.09.2008

A very funny teaser that grabs your attention.

Sylvester Stallone is right now experiencing a pretty successful comeback. 2006's Rocky Balboa was met with universal critical acclaim and is considered by many the second best installment in the series (after the original of course). The fans all over the world echoed the critics' sentiments and helped make Rocky's swan song (hopefully, I don't think I want to see a grey-haired Rocky with glaucoma eyes) a very nice sum of $155,689,933. It was a fitting way for Sylvester Stallone to retire his most iconic character. As of this moment, Rambo is also saying goodbye in theaters worldwide, albeit the reception is a littlee colder than in Rocky's case. The movie itself is reportedly also very good (haven't seen it yet), so if it plays anywhere near you, go help make this film a success. Rambo is an icon. He doesn't deserve to flop.

With these two films being probably the last chance old Sly gets at experiencing any significant box-office success, I think now's the time to look at some of his less successful endeavors.
I originally wanted to write only about one of them, but I couldn't decide which one, so I decided to write a little special. I think everybody agrees it's well deserved. That doesn't mean I don't like the guy, but I just really like the sound of "The Sylvester Stallone Special". "SSS". I am weird this way.





Year of the cock-up: 1995

Budget: $90,000,000

Domestic gross: $34,693,481

Foreign gross: $78,800,000

Worldwide gross: $113,493,481


This character is without a doubt the most famous one from a popular British comics series- 2000 AD. Dredd is a law enforcement officer in a violent city of the future (called Mega City 1) where uniformed Judges combine the powers of police, judge, jury and executioner (Dredd himself for example shot a man in his legs for crossing the street on a red light). That's a pretty good premise for a good action sci-fi film, but just like with many older comic book adaptations, something went awfully wrong.
The first and biggest mistake the filmmakers made (and that's unanimously agreed upon) was removing Dredd's helmet. In the original stories, Dredd never takes his helmet off and on the two occasions he did (in 30 years worth of history), you weren't able to see his face. In the film, you get plenty of Sly's face, right along with piercing blue contact lenses to boot. Sure, he wears the helmet a little in the beginning, but that really isn't enough. What makes this decision worse is that Stallone actually has just the right face for this character and if they stayed more true to the original, it might have been a very good film.

The person to blame for this decision is none other than Sly himself. He thought that the people around the globe are paying money to see him and therefore the helmet has to go off, so they get the dose of Stallone they paid for.
Director Danny Cannon was so disheartened over his constant creative disputes with Sylvester Stallone that he swore he would never again work with another big-name actor. He also claimed that the final version was completely different from the script, due to the changes Stallone demanded.
With these changes the script eventually evolved into a big mess, where Rob Schneider is cracking "funny" jokes, Dredd gets romantically involved with Diane Lane, Mean Machine (the comic series premiere villain) gets turned into a babbling moron and Armand Assante tricks his way into a big-budget movie.

The reviews unceremoniously buried the film and audiences didn't show much enthusiasm of seeing this flick either. When you look at the final tally, it may look pretty good, but keep in mind that the distributors keep only circa 55% of the profits, the rest goes to the theaters. That makes Judge Dredda credible member of the "Mr. Floppy" club. This film was one of the first signs of Stallone's diminishing drawing power (mainly in the US as internationally, he drawed good money up until 1997).

This movie basically destroyed Danny Cannon's career, as this was his first big project and the results were unimpressive to say the least. Thankfully, Rob Schneider's career didn't suffer so bad, he bounced back and was able to make Deuce Bigalow: European Gigolo.





Year of the cock-up: 2001

Budget:$72,000,000 estimated (reportedly, it bloated to $94,000,000)

Domestic gross: $32,720,065

Foreign gross: $22,024,673

Worldwide gross: $54,744,738


In 1997, Stallone attended 1997 Italian Grand Prix in Formula 1. After this event, he went on record saying he wanted to make a movie about this worldwide racing phenomenon. However the plan to base the movie on F1 was dropped, presumably because the rights for the F1 license were way too expensive and the conditions under which the license would be allowed to use were very strict.
Not giving this idea up, Stallone was able to work out a less expensive deal with CART (now known as Champ Car nowadays, after CART went bankrupt in 2003). He originally conceived the film as a biopic of Brazilian driver Ayrton Senna, a very popular three time Formula 1 champion who tragically died during a race in 1994. This plan changed and the new story was A LOT less ambitious-- a young talented rookie driver is losing his focus and an old veteran is brought in to help him re-ignite his career.
Renny Harlin was the director and even though he has a MASSIVE flop on his track record (previous Floppy inductee- Cutthroat Island), he's a decent director that definitely knows how to pace and shoot an action movie.
The producers believed the worldwide popularity of Formula 1, CART or IndyCar would result in big attendance so they pr. The movie premier took ovided a big budget and financed a major advertising campaign which is estimated to have been near $10 million. The movie premiere took place at Grauman's Chinese Theatre, with several CART competitors driving and demonstrating pit stops in modified Champ Cars down Hollywood Blvd.

But all this pomp didn't help a single thing. People were obviously not interested in watching a movie about racing, they'd probably rather watch the racing itself. The movie wasn't entirely bad, but it was extremely clichéd and rather dull.
Sylvester Stallone was asked in an interview about films he would wish had not done, and he listed this as one of them.




Year of the cock-up: 2002

Budget: $55,000,000

Domestic gross: $79,161 (limited release)

Foreign gross: under $10,000,000

Worldwide gross: in the immortal words of Matt Foley----JACK SQUAT!!


This is the strangest flop of Stallone's career. I have absolutely no idea how the producers managed to spend $55 million on this piece of crap. The script is a shining example of a Direct to Video masterpiece.

FBI agent Jake Malloy is trying to find a serial killer targeting cops. The killer decides to hit Malloy where it hurts, killing one of Malloy's friends on the force, and brutally killing Malloy's fiancé Mary. That leads to Malloy looking at the bottom of a Jack Daniels bottle way too often and gives Sylvester Stallone the opportunity to give us his scintillating character study of a depressed alcoholic. Malloy's friends sign him to a remote detox clinic in a snow-covered part of Wyoming. The clinic specializes in rehabilitating alcoholic cops and looks like goddamn fortress. The interiors are so grey, claustrophobic and downright depressing, that it just screams "ideal place for curing alcoholism". Malloy however isn't destined to calmly get rid of his rampant alcoholism, because the killer is one smart cat. He finds his way inside and starts killing the inmates. What follows is a demented version of And Then There Were None with the added bonus of Tom Berenger as a janitor. The killer's identity is blatantly obvious to anybody who has seen at least two similar films and his IQ cracks the third digit. I can't imagine who thought this looked promising.

The film was released in 2002, but filmed all the way back in 1999. The film was intended to be released in November 1999 or May 2000 by Universal Pictures and producer Brian Grazer, then it was delayed for several more years in the US. Universal tired of the film, sold its distribution rights to DEJ in the USA and finally was released theatrically three years after its completion.
If there's one positive thing from this movie, it's probably Stallone's $20,000,000 paycheck. Positive only for him, but that counts for something. Anytime you're able to get this much money for participating in something as bad as D-Tox---well, you must've done something right in your life.




Year of the cock-up: 2000

Budget: $40,000,000 (or $64,000,000 depending on the source)

Domestic gross: $14,967,182

Foreign gross: $4,445,811

Worldwide gross: $19,412,993


This is a remake of an old 1971 Michael Caine film of the same name. Caine got a small part in this film as a nod to the original.
I don't know what the obsession in Hollywood is when it comes to remakes. It's gotten so out of proportion in the last few years, that right now it's almost sickening. They are remaking films that don't need to be remade at all. Get Carter is a fine example. The original is a classic, old school crime film that is as good as it could possibly be. Why do it again? Why invest so much money into it?
Sometimes the remakes are better than the original (the recent 3:10 to Yuma for example), but in the VAST majority of cases, it's the exact opposite. And that's where we find Get Carter. To put it bluntly- this movie sucks. It's one of the most boring films I've ever seen, as I was never able to finish watching it. Seriously- it's a story about a guy seeking revenge, kicking ass and taking names. How do you fuck that up?
To add salt to the wound, the movie also bombed at the box-office, with the international earnings especially being downright laughable.
I don't know what was going on with Sly in the latter days of his career, but either he lost all sense and judgment or no decent scripts whatsoever were sent his way.
Avoid this film at all costs. Even if it lays in a $3 bargain bin. Don't think for a second that you're gonna check this out if it really is that bad. It's not worth it. Anytime you see Get Carter in the TV program, think for yourself—"here are 90 minutes of my life that I'm going to save for something more interesting". Like scratching your own ass, drawing circles on an empty paper, reading the editorial in a porn mag, or just sitting straight and staring into a wall. Anything. You've been warned.






Year of the cock-up: 1992

Budget: $40,000,000

Domestic gross: $28,411,210

Foreign gross: $42,200,000

Worldwide gross: $70,611,210


This was released shortly after Arnold's Kindergarten Cop. That was a huge success and people really enjoyed seeing the hard-as-nails buff action hero deal with little kids. When I was a young boy, my father took me to the city. He didn't take me there to see a marching band, but instead we did see Kindergarten Cop. I liked it very much and even though it hasn't aged very well, it's probably the only decent film of this particular brand of comedies.
After Arnie succeeded with this premise, every tough guy wanted to have his own wacky comedy. And Sylvester Stallone was probably the biggest action movie star except the future governor. And he also wanted to show the audiences he has a lighter side and can make them laugh. To provide an example, Stallone appeared in diapers in a dream sequence. Ehm, funny.
The movie tanked and it was the last time Stallone ever attempted to make a comedy in this vein (Oscar is different- it's not dumb).
But the trend of jacked up action stars playing in comedies targeted at children prevails to this day. Both Vin Diesel (Pacifier) and The Rock (Game Plan) had surprisingly good success with these kind of films.
For trivia, I think it's fair to add that Sylvester Stallone considers this the worst film he's ever done. I'm not exactly sure if it's worse than Party at Kitty and Stud's, but the man himself said it so I'll believe his word.
While this movie didn't flop that bad, it REALLY sucks and I have to include it here simply because NO article concentrated on Stallone's missteps would be complete without mentioning Stop! or my mom will shoot (which is probably one of the dumbest titles ever).
But fear not, there will be a lot of wacky diaper comedies in the coming years, because obviously- that's the thing to do if you make it as an action star. Thanks a lot Arnold.





This is a special Mr. Floppy award. You can consider it lifetime achievement. Sylvester Stallone has a nice collection of flops on his track record and that's a feat worth recognizing.
Like I said in the beginning- I have nothing against him. I really like Rocky, Cliffhanger, Tango & Cash, Demolition Man and First Blood. I think he also is capable of delivering pretty good performances (Cop Land) even though he's generally ridiculed as an actor. Compared to fellow 80's star Arnold Schwarzenegger, Stallone is a master thespian.
But he really has made some questionable decisions in his career, regarding projects in which he would participate. John Travolta would agree with me.

Let's hope the recent success (which definitely owes a lot to nostalgia) will not usher Sly to once again participate in projects that would enlarge his flop-list. Both Rocky Balboa and Rambo are great ways to go out in style, with head held high and say goodbye to a long and profound career.

So, Sylvester Stallone, for all the achievements in filming enormous flops over the years, I hereby award you the title—Mr. Floppy.






Print this picture and put it on your wall. You know you want to.

- Chleba