Hollywood just can’t help itself.
The entertainment industry’s box office declines over the past seven to eight years have been catastrophic. In 2018, total domestic box office was $11.9 billion. In 2025, that number was $8.65 billion, and it looks even worse adjusted for inflation. $11.9 billion in 2018 in today’s dollars is nearly $15.5 billion, meaning that 2025’s box office was over 44% lower than seven years ago.
The reasons for this are complicated. Some if it is the rise of streaming services, making it so audiences can stay home and wait for films to hit Netflix, Disney+, or HBO Max. Some of it is that YouTube and TikTok have taken a larger proportion of leisure time viewing. But a substantial portion of the problem is that Hollywood has become progressively more antagonistic towards a majority of the country in the past half decade.
Marvel, the “Star Wars” franchise, Disney animated movies, “Snow White,” the list of properties and studios incorporating obvious left-wing political messaging is endless. Hollywood in the past few decades has never been right-wing, but the obvious disdain with which they’ve treated those viewpoints has turned millions of people off from going to the movies. Yet somehow, still, major studios are giving tens of millions of dollars to left-wing figures to make politically charged content.
The latest example? A retelling of the Frankenstein story, directed by Maggie Gyllenhaal, called “The Bride!”
You may not know it, but “The Bride!” opened in theaters this weekend, and with the first box office estimates in, it’s on track to be one of the biggest bombs in film history.
Writer and Director Maggie Gyllenhaal (R) and Warner Brothers CEO Pam Abdy pose upon arrival for the world premiere for the film ‘The Bride!’ in central London on February 26, 2026. (Photo by Brook Mitchell / AFP via Getty Images)
‘The Bride!’ A Proudly ‘Feminist’ Film, Is A Box Office Disaster
In the lead up to the film’s release, Gyllenhaal on her press tour spoke to The New York Times about her decision to turn to directing and motivations for making the film. Sure enough, she mentioned “what’s happening culturally,” and Donald Trump winning the 2016 presidential election. Perfection.
“And I wonder if what’s happening culturally is going to bring an unstoppable response, especially from women,” Gyllenhaal said. “I don’t know if I’ve said this out loud before. Again, maybe I’ll get in trouble, but I actually think that when I really became a director was the morning that Trump was first elected. I was like, I have a lot more to say than I’ve been saying.”
Of course. Of course.
Speaking to the media during her press tour, Gyllenhaal said that she wanted to make a film from the perspective of the bride of Frankenstein because in most tellings of the classic story, that character is rarely seen or heard from. This presented an opportunity to make the character more feminist and focused on “consent.”
“She finds herself in such an insane situation,” Gyllenhaal said. “Having been brought back from the dead without her consent to be the wife of someone that she’s never met.”
A film specifically designed to be a feminist version of a character basically nobody cares about. Doesn’t sound like a wise investment for a major studio, does it? Sure, give it $10-15 million to show left-wing creatives that you’re on their side, but don’t spend a bunch of money on it. Right? Well, Warner Bros. Studios decided this brilliant idea was worth spending $90 million on. Incomprehensible.
Still, even if the obvious motivations behind it are eye-roll worthy, a well written, directed, and acted film could still be worth watching. Yet here’s what Reason’s review of “The Bride!” says about it.
“There is not a single scene, line reading, or fleeting moment that lands. Every single actor is miscast. Every single idea is underdeveloped. Every single moment of intended catharsis is maximally cringe. It is a total and complete misfire, in which every creative choice is a bad one.”
Oh boy. Not a great start, huh?
Kyle Smith, reviewing the film for The Wall Street Journal, said the political motivations are so obvious it borders on offensive. “She even finds a reason to shout ‘Me too!’ a couple of times,” he writes.
And sure enough, despite Gyllenhaal appealing to female audiences by hating Trump and turning the story into a feminist utopia, nobody showed up for opening weekend. With that $90 million budget, the film made just $3 million on its opening day, on its way to an $8 million weekend.
“One of the biggest disasters in Hollywood history.” How often have we heard that phrase over the past few years? And in fact, some estimates have suggested it won’t even reach $8 million, more in the $6.5-$6.7 million range. Remember too, studios get roughly 50% of a film’s box office gross. So for their $90 million investment, plus marketing costs, Warner Bros. is going to bring in roughly $3.35 million in its opening weekend. Oof. How much will this movie wind up losing? Well, for most releases, marketing is budgeted for 50-100% of production costs. But even assuming they spent just 25% of the budget to market this film, that’s another $22.5 million. If the film goes on to gross in the $20-30 million range, with international box office included, the studio would lose over $100 million. Potentially much more.
And therein lies the problem with the modern entertainment industry. Nobody knows what they’re doing creatively. And the executive and development ranks are infested with hard-left ideologues who live in a bubble of progressive absurdity. Instead of prioritizing quality, originality, humor, and talent, they’ve chosen political conformity. The most generic, boring, divisive, cringe view anyone’s ever seen, with tens of millions of dollars wasted on films that have no chance of success.
It’s brutal. And it’s why nobody shows up, unless it’s for franchises that audiences know will avoid this type of moral lecture. How long can it go on this way? How many “biggest disasters” are worth it to them? Guess we’re going to find out.
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