Liam Neeson’s Beloved $177M Action Flop Should Have Been a Trilogy, Says Director
More than a decade after its release, director Joe Carnahan still believes a 2010 action movie he made had franchise potential. The film starring Liam Neeson could have launched a full trilogy, according to the filmmaker.
The A-Team director shares hopes for trilogy
Joe Carnahan recently looked back at what happened with The A-Team, the big-screen action flick inspired by the classic 1980s TV show of the same name. The 2010 movie arrived with a solid cast and decent reviews, but it never exploded at the box office the way the studio had hoped. Carnahan now believes the film had all the pieces to launch a bigger franchise. In his view, the main issue wasn’t the movie itself but how it was promoted.
Carnahan said in an interview with Empire the marketing missed the mark and didn’t sell the film the way it should have. “This is one of those movies where we screwed up the marketing. We should have made three of these,” the filmmaker shared. Even today, Carnahan still sees The A-Team as one of the closest things he has made to a superhero-style action adventure.
The A-Team brought together a pretty stacked cast. Neeson stepped in as the mastermind leader John “Hannibal” Smith, while Bradley Cooper played the slick and charming Templeton “Face” Peck.
The lineup also featured Jessica Biel, Patrick Wilson, and Quinton “Rampage” Jackson, who took on the role of the tough B.A. Baracus. Director Joe Carnahan later said the cast built great chemistry while filming, spending plenty of time together to build a strong team dynamic on set.
At the box office, the A-Team pulled in around $177.2 million worldwide. Still, the timing didn’t exactly do it any favors. Carnahan pointed out that the release landed right in the middle of the FIFA World Cup and faced heavy competition in theaters. One major rival was The Karate Kid, which ended up dominating ticket sales and raked in roughly $359.1 million globally, leaving The A-Team trailing behind.
Source: Comingsoon.net