Why this year’s most acclaimed film flopped

You can’t risk that kind of long-term strategy unless your other films are profitable, of course, but luckily for Warner, some of 2025’s biggest money-spinners have been on the company’s slate: as well as Sinners, these include A Minecraft Movie, Final Destination: Bloodlines, F1, Superman, Weapons, and Conjuring: The Last Rites. If One Battle After Another hasn’t been as lucrative, well, it’s still enhanced Warner’s reputation as an auteur-friendly studio, forged a relationship with Anderson, and granted them a highly respected film which will be an awards-season favourite. Besides, as Bleasdale points out, “They get Leonardo DiCaprio to come to their Christmas party.”

So was the studio right to bankroll One Battle After Another? “Considering everything else that they have had this year, it’s a no-brainer,” said Lucas Shaw on a recent edition of a film industry podcast, The Town. “You have a movie from a great contemporary film-maker that’s got good reviews, and now with Sinners you have two heavy contenders at the Oscars. Paul Thomas Anderson [who has never won an Academy Award] can get his Oscar, then you call it a win and decide that your other successes have covered it. Look, if you’re running a movie studio, you have to be able to take a couple of big swings.”

The whole affair echoes The Studio, Seth Rogen’s Apple TV comedy series about Hollywood executives. One episode is devoted to the studio boss’s desperation for someone to thank him on stage at the Golden Globes – the jokey suggestion being that the film business isn’t solely about the bottom line. There’s also the scene in which Catherine O’Hara’s character sums up her experience of running a studio. “The job makes you stressed, and panicked, and miserable. But when it all comes together and you make a good movie, it’s good forever.”

The Studio might see Hollywood through a rose-tinted lens, but if there are still Hollywood executives who are willing to spend more than $130m to make “a good movie”, that’s something to be pleased about. And maybe One Battle After Another wasn’t such a major gamble. If you produce a cartoon, a superhero film or a video-game adaptation that flops – such as Smurfs, The Flash or Borderlands – you can’t console yourself by talking about art and prestige. But if you put your money into a Paul Thomas Anderson film then, whatever happens at the box office, you’ve still got a Paul Thomas Anderson film. The chances are that you’ll be proud of it. In some ways, it’s about as safe a bet as a studio executive can make.