The internet would have you believe that Keanu Reeves can do no wrong, and while he’s certainly one of the most universally beloved actors in Hollywood and an all-round good guy as countless reports have made abundantly clear over the years, he’s not above starring in a terrible movie or two. In fact, one of his very worst efforts is dominating Netflix today, with 47 Ronin currently the third most-watched film on the platform around the world.
The movie is one of those projects that everybody knew was going to bomb from a mile off, and on that front it at least managed to live up to expectations. The unproven Carl Rinsch was handed a massive $225 million budget to make his feature directorial debut on a fantasy-tinged adaptation of a real historical event that happened during the 18th Century, albeit one that didn’t include shapeshifting sorceresses, dragons and Reeves passing himself off as a half-Japanese outcast.
Way out his depth, Rinsch was eventually booted from the production during the editing process after he lost control of 47 Ronin, which included extensive reshoots to bump up Keanu Reeves‘ screen time and saw the costs balloon as a result. The would-be epic wound up being delayed several times, and when it finally hit theaters in December 2013, it ended up going down in history as one of the biggest box office disasters of all-time.
47 Ronin was widely panned by critics and holds a Rotten Tomatoes score of just 16%, while it only managed to recoup just over $150 million on the big screen, resulting in a loss of more than $100 million for Universal. Incredibly, though, a sequel is in the works for Netflix, one that takes place 300 years in the future for some reason and has been described as a sci-fi cyberpunk martial arts actioner.
