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This summer, Dwayne Johnson is back in another one of his big-budget action movies. Skyscraper has one of the biggest movie stars in the world in a Die Hard-esque adventure where he has to stop a group of criminals while trapped inside the most advanced building in the world. The movie is arriving in a month where every other major release is either a sequel or somehow tied to a franchise, but that just might be one of Skyscraper's greatest strengths, according to producer Beau Flynn.
There are 10 sequels on the left and right of us in our release window, which is really sobering in a way. It's so important to us to make original movies and try to create something different. And a huge part of why we get to do that is Dwayne Johnson.
There are definitely a lot of sequels coming out in July. Among the major releases this month are films like Ant-Man and the Wasp, The First Purge, Hotel Transylvania 3: Summer Vacation, The Equalizer 2, Mamma Mia: Here We Go Again!, and Mission: Impossible - Fallout. That's a lot of sequels, with Skyscraper as the only big-budget original movie that can compete with them. However, part of the reason for that is Dwayne Johnson. He's a really bankable star, and his presence in the movie is why it can have such a large budget. In this way, Johnson is helping to promote original films and help them compete in ways that they ordinarily couldn't.
However, it should be noted that while July is packed with sequels, August actually has a lot of original or non-sequel movies hitting theaters. Films like The Meg, Mile 22, The Spy Who Dumped Me, BlacKkKlansman, and Crazy Rich Asians are all in August, which is actually a little refreshing.
Additionally, in the case of Skyscraper, part of the appeal was that it was an original movie with a throwback action movie feel that didn't cost a tremendous amount (relatively speaking) to make. The budget for the movie was actually $125 million, which is still a lot of money, but it's low compared to some of the other blockbuster films out there. Dwayne Johnson further detailed this while talking to the Los Angeles Times.
Well, the original scripts that are coming in are certainly not coming in at this size and scale. Of course, in today's market there are superhero movies and sequels and big franchises, which work very well and they're very entertaining, and it's what we do. But with Skyscraper, the original IP [intellectual property] made it very appealing. I think there was also something interesting to the studios in that we were going to be cost-conscious and create a summer movie that didn't have to be $250 million. You could cut that in half and it would still feel like a big, entertaining movie.
If anyone can pull off a movie like Skyscraper, it's The Rock. The film looks super fun, and I'm sure that people will be filling the theater to check it all out. If Johnson can create a franchise out of fighting an earthquake, he can do anything.
Skyscraper arrives in theaters next weekend on July 13. For more movie news, keep it right here at CinemaBlend.
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