I'm referring to "Dunkirk" which is a film that involved zero US soldiers and was about a battle that most Americans have not heard of and yet the film did very well at the domestic US box office.

Was it the marketing?

Was it the Chris Nolan fans coming out in force?

Maybe something else?

Probably the Dark Knight factor. But I've heard NUMEROUS comparisons in the news to the Brit civilian boats assisting in the rescues to the Cajun Navy in Houston.

Perhaps you should try it under Stuka attack

Might just be the American way of associating with the underdog British solders trapped by the evil Nazis Hell yes we cheer for the Brits,,,But it seems to be a good show to show some history..i don't know about the cinematics not having seen it but waiting for the DVD to come out (I hate going to the movies) But it puts a Hollywood spin on the actual event and might be good for us to learn a bit about the actual events

Not Stukas but: Cajun Navy Says Looters Shot At Boats During Attempted Rescue In Houston

That's shocking F4UDash4. I expect those Cajun chaps are well equipped to repel boarders

Its a good movie .......I thinks that's why people went. I think they will probably go to see the new Churchill movie .."Their Finest Hour" ?? as well

1) I think Americans are less ignorant than usually credited for
2) The Nolan factor. At least one of my friends went to watch it simply "because Nolan". I at least have never felt disappointed by a film directed by Nolan.
3) The film simply is very, very good. As a film, not as a war flick, or as a documentary. Great visuals, probably the best (if caustic) score that Hans Zimmer ever wrote, a compelling (true) story.
4) The still somewhat fascinating conundrum that Dunkirk probably was the least likely and therefore finest victory of the Allies in WW2 which at the same time still appears as a defeat. As far as military history is concerned, it's the "Mona Lisa" effect (smiling and not smiling at the same time, depending on the distance between the observer and the painting itself).
5) Timing. The war movie genre is dead, or so we've been told. Nobody makes live flight stunts - it's all CGI these days, we've been told. But every now and then a film comes along that does everything differently, and is successful with it. Maybe people just wanted a film for a break that wasn't over the top comic book superhero action, but a piece about extraordinary feats performed by ordinary people.
6) Word of mouth still works.

My daughter mainly wanted to go because Nolan, Zimmer. History was third

I think Hollywood has been making a LOT of assumptions and getting many of those assumptions dead wrong lately.

I think being a studio exec is a very short lived career these days!!


Alien Covenant.... I think few people care about that franchise. Same with Pirates franchise. Transformers is... dying too. Marvel superhero movies are... too many too often now. They are beating a dozen dead horses, and wondering why no one wants to watch.

Not enough original content IMO.

Frankly I think PART of the reason Dunkirk made money, is that this was something fresh in a rotting field of has-beens. Sure, the history attracted some.

Not everything Hollywood is creating is mediocre, some is quite good. But I think audiences are tired of spectacle for spectacle's sake. Story and character matters, and has been largely overlooked in the quest for ever more spectacular effects.

The other day I watched a movie, and it was mostly decent. But it had two major issues: first, for a few scenes, it was almost impossible to distinguish the good guy from the badguy, and became very confusing for a few minutes. In other movies such a mistake in casting and clothing/makeup could cause the entire movie to be wasted if the audience couldn't sort that out fast. The second? The movie makes a very significant judgement on a real-world political issue. I mean c'mon, do we really need real-world politics injected into an escapist action movie?!?!

I keep wondering how long the gravy train will last for the Marvel comic book movie juggernaut? Up to now there has not been a box office flop.

Was the last Fantastic 4 successful at the box office?

That bombed but it was not made by Disney. It is indeed a Marvel comic but the FF property at the time was owned by 20th Century Fox. You are right though and I should have specified DISNEY owned Marvel stuff.


However, the Spiderman films all did very well under Sony.

Sorry, I wasn't trying to be pedantic, I just didn't know all the ownership details. I know Spider-Man and X-Men have different movie rights arrangements than the Avengers group, but I don't follow it in detail and didn't know who did FF.

The Fantastic Four movies were a spectacular failure. The reason is that the producers' contract option to make the film was running out (no film by date X: Contract runs out, rights fall back to Marvel, and are open for a new bidding round), so they had to do something ... and "something" they had made.