Box office disaster sails for Victoria Park

Everyone loves to see Hollywood humbled with a box office bomb. But when it comes to definitive lists of the biggest flops of all time, there’s always a certain amount of disagreement. Production budgets are often exaggerated and figures adjusted for inflation. But one film that consistently figures in the Top Three of Shame, alongside the likes of 47 Ronin and The 13th Warrior, is Renny Harlin’s 1995 comedy pirate movie Cutthroat Island.

Part of the appeal of this one is that Harlin was the toast of Hollywood at the time, having directed such hits as Die Hard 2 and Cliffhanger. He also had a glamorous girlfriend in Thelma & Louise star Geena Davis. So what could possibly go wrong when he directed the future Mrs Harlin in her very own $90m vanity picture with the aim of turning her into a big female action hero? Everything, apparently. The shoot was plagued with disasters, including raw sewage being pumped into a tank where the actors were supposed to film. Harlin spent $1m of his own loot on script re-writes. Matthew Modine was a last-minute replacement for Michael Douglas, who quit when he found that his role had been reduced. And Oliver Reed was fired after getting into a drunken bar brawl and pulling his pants down to proudly display his tattooed penis to an unimpressed Ms. Davis .

When it eventually opened, Cutthroat Island received decidedly mixed reviews. It also earned just $10m at the box office, bankrupting production company Carolco. But Harlin’s ignominy was not yet compete. He even lost out at that year’s Golden Raspberry awards, when the Worst Director gong went to Paul Verhoeven for Showgirls. Harlin and Davis, who had married during the production, divorced in 1998. Neither of their careers really recovered from the fiasco, though Harlin did return to the briny in 1999 for the entertaining Deep Blue Sea and picked up three more Golden Raspberry nominations for Driven, Exorcist: The Beginning and The Legend of Hercules. Hollywood didn’t make another pirate movie until Pirates of the Caribbean in 2003.

But the funny thing about Cutthroat Island is that it isn’t that bad. If you have a nostalgic love for the old-fashioned swashbuckling genre then it’s undeniably enjoyable to see all those familiar elements brought to the screen on such a grand scale. There’s a daring escape from a sea port crawling with English soldiers and hostile pirates, a spirited and athletic swordfight, a sea battle featuring broadsides and boarding, and the eventual discovery of the treasure. The only thing linking them together, however, is a meandering plot about the quest to reunite three parts of an ancient treasure map. Sexy, statuesque Davis cuts a strapping figure, although Modine seems rather less comfortable.

So this is a great choice for Bristol Bad Film Club‘s annual big summer outdoor screening, which takes place on Saturday 20 August in Victoria Park. Gates open at 8pm and the film hits the screen at sunset. Picnics are welcome. Admission is just £5 (kids under 10 get in free – it’s a PG certificate film), with all profits going to Friends of Victoria Park in association with VPAG. Advance tickets are available here. If you can’t get enough of bad films, the Bristol Bad Film Club’s next screening is the extraordinary GetEven at the Bierkeller on June 16.

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