The career of an actor-director is like any other: it is filled with successes, big hits, but also failures, and real industrial underperformance… Dany Boon was unfortunately confronted with this this year, with Life for Real, his eighth film as director. This film, which marked his reunion with Kad Merad, fifteen years later Welcome to the Ch’tisand nine years later Superchondriac, failed to appeal to the general public. Alone 802,000 moviegoers watched this film. With a substantial budget of 23 million eurosthe film is the biggest economic fiasco for the actor-director, but also for French cinema in 2023.
For comparison, in 2021, his film 8, rue de l’Humanité, centered on confinement and broadcast exclusively on Netflix, had benefited from a lower budget, at 14 million euros. In the casting, Dany Boon starred alongside his partner Laurence Arné, but also Liliane Rovère, François Damiens and Yvan Attal. Broadcast in more than thirty different countries and languages, the film is the second French Netflix production to have been broadcast in prime time on a French television channel. Broadcast on July 3, the comedy appealed 3.04 million fans, and 21.5% of housewives under the age of fifty.
His biggest budget was for Raid Dingue
Dany Boon’s other films have all been real successes: in 2018, his film The Ch’tite family, with Laurence Arné and Line Renaud, benefited from a budget of 28 million euros. The film was a huge hit in theaters, with 5.6 million admissions at the box office. The previous year, Crazy Raidwhich starred Alice Pol, Michel Blanc, Anne Marivin and Florent Peyre, attracted 4.57 million moviegoers, for a record budget of 32 million euros. In 2014, the reunion of Kad Merad and Dany Boon in Superchondriachelped by Alice Pol again, and Judith El Zein, convinced 5.27 million French people, for a similar budget, at 31.6 million euros.
In 2011, his Franco-Belgian film Nothing to declare, in which Dany Boon opposite Benoît Poelvoorde, Karin Viard and François Damiens, with a reduced budget of 24 million euros, was a real hit, attracting 8.1 million French people. This is the filmmaker’s second best score, behind the unforgettable Welcome to the Ch’tis. In 2008, the pranks of Kad Merad, Dany Boon, Anne Marivin, Guy Lecluyse, Line Renaud and Philippe Duquesne, brought together more than 20.5 million fans in France, and 26 million worldwide, with a reduced budget at 12 million euros. A triumph which will forever remain in the annals of the French film industry. Finally, in 2006, Dany Boon’s very first production, called The House of happinesswith Michèle Laroque, Line Renaud and Daniel Prévost, attracted 1.15 million fans for a budget of 9 million euros.
Corinne Masiero doesn’t seduce when she’s not Captain Marleau
As for the other big French fiascos of the year, we can cite Abbot stone by Frédéric Tellier and Jeanne du Barry by Maïwenn. The first, carried by Michel Vuillermoz and Emmanuelle Bercot, with a budget of 15 million euros, attracted only 770,000 people, despite a selection at Cannes. The second, worn by American actor Johnny Depp, but also Pierre Richard, with a budget of 22.4 million euros, also attracted only 760,000 fans. Finally, in terms of major industrial accidents, we can cite the film The Marginalwith Corinne Masiero, with only 51,000 tickets, and In full firewith André Dussollier and Alex Lutz, which only brought together 31,000 film fans…