STRANGE WILDERNESS

Strange Wilderness

Strange Wilderness was financed for an estimated $20 million (though that seems way too high for the slapdash production) by Level 1 Entertainment. The first film Level 1 put into production was the Adam Sandler produced Grandma’s Boy (2006) and Strange Wilderness began filming a few months after Grandma’s Boy wrapped production. Paramount acquired US distribution rights and clearly had no expectations for the picture, opening the male skewing comedy over Super Bowl weekend in 1,208 theaters and not screening it for critics, where it placed outside the top 10 at #12 with $3,001,719 — and holdover idiotic comedy Meet The Spartans took most of Strange’s auds. It fell 50.5% the following weekend to $1,485,874 and promptly lost most of its theater count. Strange Wilderness left theaters after five weeks with only $6,575,282. Paramount would see back about $3.5 million after theaters take their percentage of the gross, which barely puts a dent in the modest P&A spend. Overseas, Strange Wilderness did abysmal business in the few territories it found a theatrical release, grossing just $389,452. Home video sales were better than the box office take at $10.4 million (less after resellers take their cut and manufacturing costs).