Brosnan vs Craig: The Box Office Numbers

Stumbled across this on one of the Bond Facebook groups.

https://hmssweblog.wordpress.com/2016/05/26/sequel-007-movies-listed-by-number-of-tickets-sold/

Spy Command wrote:

Last year, this blog published a post about how the last eight James Bond movies performed in number of tickets sold in the U.S. and Canada.

Since that post ran, we now have the final figures for SPECTRE. No major changes in the conclusion. Bond movies during this period — featuring two different Bond actors, Daniel Craig and Pierce Brosnan — sold between 23 million and 27 million tickets each.
The one exception was Skyfall with Craig, which was much higher.

Here’s the information again, with one change. Before, we listed the movies sequentially. Here, they’re listed highest to lowest, along with the average ticket price during the year of release. The information is from the BOX OFFICE MOJO website.

Skyfall (2012): 37,842,000/average ticket price $7.96
Die Another Day (2002): 27,584,000/$5.81
Tomorrow Never Dies (1997): 26,911,200/$4.59
Casino Royale (2006): 25,428,700/$6.55
The World Is Not Enough (1999): 24,853,800/$5.08
GoldenEye (1995): 24,403,900/$4.35
Quantum of Solace (2008): 23,449,600/$7.18
SPECTRE (2015): 23,001,900/$8.43

Interesting. It may be a biased opinion because I love TND, but it's good to see it so high on the list. SF and DAD were both anniversary films, whereas TND, though off the back of the success of Goldeneye, it was up against Titanic. Even though TND had a mixed reception from critics, word of mouth must have been excellent, and the film worth enough for it to still get bums on seats.

Just occurred to me that Brosnan and Craig starred in the same number of Bond films. In judging their tenures, I have to say that Brosnan had at least three watchable films, while Craig only had two. IMO anyway, but interesting how it turned out in the end.

CJB wrote:

Just occurred to me that Brosnan and Craig starred in the same number of Bond films. In judging their tenures, I have to say that Brosnan had at least three watchable films, while Craig only had two. IMO anyway, but interesting how it turned out in the end.

Well Brozzayawn wasn't offered a huge contract the way Craig has been enticed for at least 2 more films...the producers see Craig as the bigger star where actual receipts are concerned. I was actually more glad to see Brozza go.

bitchcraft wrote:

Well Brozzayawn wasn't offered a huge contract the way Craig has been enticed for at least 2 more films

That's true.

Nevertheless, both DAD and SP convinced me that their respective stars had run their course with the character.

Brosnan still gave a solid performance in DAD - arguably his most confident performance. It only teases what a 2004 film could have been had it existed and had a good script.

FieldsMan wrote:

Brosnan still gave a solid performance in DAD - arguably his most confident performance.

Until he shaved off his beard and became a cartoon character. It went downhill after that.

Nah, Bond's scenes with Raoul, Chang, and Frost are great.

Can't necessarily blame Brosnan for the script which called for Bond forgetting he spent 14 fucking months being tortured the minute he waltzes off that boat. Correct me if I'm wrong, but doesn't the only subsequent (barely there) mention of the torture occur when Bond is balls-deep in Jinx and cries about how long's he gone since his last fuck ("I missed the touch of a woman" or something like that)?

I think Brosnan would have loved to play a rough Bond. He said The November Man is the Bond movie he always wanted to do.

CJB wrote:

Can't necessarily blame Brosnan for the script which called for Bond forgetting he spent 14 fucking months being tortured the minute he waltzes off that boat. Correct me if I'm wrong, but doesn't the only subsequent (barely there) mention of the torture occur when Bond is balls-deep in Jinx and cries about how long's he gone since his last fuck ("I missed the touch of a woman" or something like that)?

I think both Brosnan and Craig suffer from a lack of quality scripts (one decent one apiece), there is however baggage that seems acutely connected to Craig that demands films contort to suit him or else he will make his feelings known, this is a contrast to Brosnan who oddly seems more willing to adapt on reflection. Equally as Walecs points out, Brosnan wanted a Bond film of the type given to Craig, maybe the physical stuff might have bee less convincing but maybe also the script might have given us a intelligent agent living on his wits rather than the emo-thug who just smashes anything in his path?

Brosnan would have wanted something like Skyfall I imagine and would have done admirably in that, considering the Bond of that film is actually Bond, not the generic action figure of CR.

FieldsMan wrote:

Brosnan would have wanted something like Skyfall I imagine and would have done admirably in that, considering the Bond of that film is actually Bond, not the generic action figure of CR.

I'd agree with that, for all sorts of reasons I feel Skyfall works better as a coda to the original series than having any connection to CR or QoS...indeed one of Spectre's biggest millstones is the awkward way it tries to shoehorn Craig's first two outings into the mix, definitely makes for an eyeroll moment without any of the charm that let you give Roger or Pierce a pass.