Even though the 20th Century Fox film Knight and Day’s soft domestic opening left Hollywood and the media second-guessing everything from the title and marketing campaign to the viability of its stars Tom Cruise and Cameron Diaz, the film has slowly established itself to become Fox’s biggest 2010 release with $262.3 million worldwide gross.
The film’s $76.4 million domestic gross was considered low for a summer Cruise action vehicle. But the pic rallied overseas with $185.9 million in foreign grosses. While Fox’s Date Night and The A-Team did more domestic business, Knight and Day’s overseas gross placed it ahead of those films and demonstrates the value stars still have overseas. Of course, the studio’s biggest movie revenue source for 2010 was Avatar, but that film was released in 2009 as was Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel.
The offshore gross of Knight and Day did not help the film’s perception because most of its overseas business came late in the summer and during the fall. That’s because studios bypassed the World Cup, when nobody outside the US seems interested in going to the movies.
That bolsters the case for Cruise, who is once again in demand on his next vehicle after Mission: Impossible Ghost Protocol. Among the films he’s being courted for are New Line’s Rock of Ages musical, and At the Mountains of Madness, the HP Lovecraft adaptation that will … Read More