Red One, starring Dwayne Johnson and Chris Evans, comes to Prime Video this week

No cinema release in France, the Christmas comedy will be offered directly in streaming.

After respecting a 28-day window in American theaters, Red One will be released worldwide on Prime Video this Thursday, December 12. The comedy of Jake Kasdan (the new ones Jumanji) with Dwayne Johnson (which is a hit at the same time thanks to Moana 2), Chris Evans (former Captain America), Lucy Liu (Kill Bill) And JK Simmons (Whiplash), was initially designed for the streaming platform. Amazon MGM Studios changed its mind and released it to U.S. theaters, as well as a handful of other countries, where it raked in “only” 85 million dollars in domestic, and 164 million in total. Not enough to repay its enormous budget of over 200 million.

The chronology of American media allowing a film to be offered less than a month after its theatrical release, even in “wide release” (which is the case for Red Onereleased on more than 4,000 screens in the US), Prime has just announced its launch on the platform for this week. A process already used by the firm to Saltburnby Emmerald Fennel or for Airby Ben Affleck. Here too, the film will arrive in streaming from December 12. But without going through the cinema box.

Small score for Dwayne Johnson and Red One at the US box office

The question wasn't so obvious, because previous collaborations between Dwayne Johnson and Jake Kasdan worked very well for us. The two opuses of Jumanji have crossed the 3 million admissions mark in France. If the score of Jungle Cruise is a little below, it is not catastrophic either, the film having accumulated 840,000 cinema tickets during the summer of 2021. As for Black Adam, a superheroic production from Warner-DC which flopped in the US, it still attracted more than 2 million spectators in France at the end of 2022.

However, our media timeline being much less flexible than in the United States, if Red One was released in theaters in France, so Amazon would have had to wait 17 months before being able to offer it for streaming on Prime Video.

Not to mention the bad publicity that accompanied the production and release of the film in its country of origin: Dwayne Johnson was accused of behaving like a diva on the set, experiencing a series of delays and bizarre requests (he allegedly asked his assistant to provide him with empty bottles so that he could relieve himself between takes…). Behavior that would blows the budget of this blockbuster.

When Red One arrived in theaters, it was its promotion that was singled out. The star, paid for her posts on social networks, insisted on the critical success of Red Oneassuring that he had received “90% positive reviews” on Rotten Tomatoeswhile the film is “certified rotten” on this same site, with only 33% positive opinions from the press. On the public side, the score climbs to 90% “among verified accounts”and 84% “all opinions combined”which multiplied the reactions accusing the production of having paid the site to obtain laudatory comments on the film… The Rock was also mocked for his IMAX promo, taking an example from Christopher Nolan and his defense of cinema in theaters during the release ofOppenheimer.

Red One will it ultimately be a streaming hit? Amazon management has already made it known that its success “wouldn't measure up to movie studio standards”explain Deadline. The fact that it does not reimburse its budget in theaters does not mean that it will be a failure: the studio is banking on the popularity of its actors to attract numerous subscribers from this week, counting on more than 200 million registered worldwide across 240 countries. The American site concludes with a recent example of major action success on the platform: Road Houseby Doug Liman. If the director was extremely disappointed that his film with Jake Gyllenhaal was not released in cinemas, he recorded 1.2 billion minutes of viewing on Prime. Red One will he do better? Response in a few days…

Here is its trailer:

Yes, Dwayne Johnson (sometimes) pees in bottles on set