5 Christmas Movies Which Bombed at the Box Office

We’re nearing the holly-jolly time of the year when everything is draped in white snow and everyone wants to snuggle in a blanket with a hot beverage. The perfect entertainment for the evening? Christmas movies that exude the holiday spirit and kickstart the feel-good weeks as the year ends.

Hollywood takes massive advantage of this feeling and produces movies that will enchant people for years to come and make movies that will become a part of their perpetual holiday traditions.

However, there are some Christmas flicks that failed to hit the mark and didn’t receive as much appreciation as other, more classic movies did. As you gear up to make your Christmas watchlist, you might want to reconsider if you have added the following movies to your list since they clearly failed to impress the masses or make a dent at the box office.

Home Alone 3 (1997)

Fans were utterly disappointed with this Alex D. Linz-starrer Christmas sequel. The previous Home Alone movies have been nothing short of masterpieces that continue to be screened during the Holiday season. However, with merely a 35% score on Rotten Tomatoes and $79 million in box office collections, Home Alone 3 became the runt of the franchise. It was made with a budget of $31 million.

Directed by Raja Gosnell, the movie did not align with the essence of the previous Home Alone movies and missed the mark on the feel-good comedy that made the franchise an instant hit. The plot seemed too far-fetched while the adorable cast couldn’t do much to take it across the finishing line.

Noel (2004)

Despite a massively star-studded cast featuring the likes of Penélope Cruz, Susan Sarandon, Paul Walker, and Alan Arkin, Noel failed miserably at the box office with just $2.2 million in gross collections. The plot was pretty straightforward for an ensemble cast as the characters face the travails of life on a daily basis only for the magical Christmas Eve to change it all.

The movie stands small with a 28% approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes with a few critics not being able to finish the movie altogether. Somewhere in the midst of the highly talented cast, the story and the overall sentiment appeal seem lacking.

Four Christmases (2008)

Not even Vince Vaughn, Reese Witherspoon, and Robert Duvall could save this movie from being disastrous at the box office. Failure of such movies proves that star power is not enough for a movie to charm the masses since they observantly seek a good story to round it all out. Rotten Tomatoes gave this movie a 25% score as the story just couldn’t bring all the elements together, made with a budget of $80 million. Though it managed to earn $160 million at the box office, reviews have been widely negative for the movie.

Brad and Kate are the central characters played by Vaughn and Witherspoon. Due to the overbearing holiday spirit, they decide to make other plans so as to not face their families but destiny chooses a third plan for them, changing their lives in ways they never imagined. The story had a lot of potential which just never got realized in the flick.

Love the Coopers (2015)

Another ensemble cast with the hopes of tapping into a wider fanbase failed to do so with Love the Coopers. Barely $42.4 million in box office collections, the movie failed to garner popular support despite having a $17 million budget.

Imagine making a movie with the likes of Alan Arkin, John Goodman, Ed Helms, Diane Keaton, Anthony Mackie, Amanda Seyfried, Marisa Tomei, Timothée Chalamet, and Olivia Wilde in the cast and still not finding success at the box office.

The numbers game is tricky, to say the least, no matter how great actors one puts on the big screen. The overall Christmas cheer and emotion are lacking in this story that follows a family’s annual holiday tradition of coming together for dinner but a few visitors and a series of events throw a curveball in their plans.

Surviving Christmas (2004)

Directed by Mike Mitchell, viewers failed to survive the movie Surviving Christmas where Ben Affleck plays the role of a materialistic man with all the wealth in the world. So much so, that he pays a family to spend Christmas with them, and the events that follow go comically wrong.

With Catherine O’Hara and Christina Applegate also starring, Surviving Christmas could only manage a $15 million box office collection as compared to the $45 million budget. This might just be the worst movie in Affleck’s filmography, a man who aced the role of Batman in the DC universe.