Written by Seth Reiss and directed by Kogonada, “A Big Bold Beautiful Journey” follows David (Colin Farrell) and Sarah (Margot Robbie) having a chance meeting at a wedding. This should’ve been the end of their interactions. However, the GPS systems in their respective rented automobiles keep bringing them together. Eventually, they embark on a journey that entails walking through a series of inexplicably placed doors that lead to events from their tormented pasts. In confronting yesteryear turmoil (like David’s High School heartache or Sarah’s remorse over her deceased mom), perhaps they can forge a new romantic spark.
The first Robbie star vehicle since she blew up the box office with “Barbie” in 2023, “A Big Bold Beautiful Journey” failed to win over many, if any, hearts in its theatrical run. The film opened to $3.25 million from 3,330 theaters, a dismal bow for a $45 million-budgeted enterprise. Recent films like “It Ends With Us,” which blew everyone away at the box office, have proven that romantic dramas can still excel financially on the big screen in the modern world. So what happened here? Why did “A Big Bold Beautiful Journey” fizzle out despite its buzzy leads?
The story lacks conflict
The trailers for “A Big Bold Beautiful Journey” let viewers know that the film involved Margot Robbie and Colin Farrell’s characters wandering through doors that lead to different parts of their pasts. However, it was less clear what exactly the conflict was in the story. All the great romantic dramas of years gone by make the central hurdles in their stories abundantly clear in promotional materials. “Brokeback Mountain” uses severe societal stigma and the threat of violence to give some conflict to the central relationship, while “Casablanca” leans on Rick’s cynicism and the occupying Nazi forces to provide turmoil. Even the best romantic comedies do this: “Sleepless in Seattle,” for instance, hammers home how its lead characters live in different cities and invites us to wonder about how they would engage in a romance under those conditions.
In contrast, the marketing for “A Big Bold Beautiful Journey” (and even the final film in many respects) failed to deliver a tangible sense of conflict that would make viewers care about why and how these two people would fall in love. There wasn’t even the promise of a potential love triangle to stir things up. Instead, the cutesy marketing just made it look like an inevitability that they were meant for each other. That’s just not how you get romantic drama movie fans into theaters. Famous mainstream cinematic romances are about love overcoming grand obstacles. “A Big Bold Beautiful Journey” forgot that part of the equation and paid the price at the box office.
Colin Farrell is not a sure-thing at the box office
In August 2003, The Numbers published a piece with the very striking headline: “Will ‘S.W.A.T.’ Finally Make Colin Farrell a Superstar?” It was a query reflecting how the man was omnipresent at the time (having just come off lead roles in “Phone Booth” and “The Recruit”), yet hadn’t proven himself a definitive box office draw. In the years that followed, Farrell never reached movie stardom, instead headlining costly box office bombs like “Alexander” and “Total Recall.” Not excelling in that department, though, opened the door for him to anchor acclaimed indie and arthouse hits like “In Bruges” and “The Lobster.”
Farrell not becoming a Tom Cruise-level box office draw didn’t end his career. It instead pushed him into exciting new directions that allowed his artistic gifts to flourish. Still, the reality is that Farrell isn’t a major draw for the general public when he’s front-and-center on the poster. He even starred in one of the few pre-COVID 19 live-action Disney remakes that cratered in “Dumbo.” Thus, it was always odd hinging a romantic drama like “A Big Bold Beautiful Journey” on Farrell. It’s now been over a decade since Hollywood essentially gave up on trying to make him an A-list leading man, with the 2014 flop “Winter’s Tale” the last straw.
The marketing materials were forgettable
Even if you encountered the marketing campaign Sony Pictures Releasing mustered up for “A Big Bold Beautiful Journey,” chances are it didn’t stick around in your memory. The first U.S. poster just featured Robbie and Farrell standing against a dark blue background holding yellow and blue umbrellas, respectively. There was no indication that this was a fantasy feature or what time period it was set in. A second U.S. poster didn’t help illuminate matters and simply swapped out the vague background with a bunch of clouds.
Bizarrely absent from any of these U.S. posters and billboards were the central doors that spurred the entire plot. Only on a U.K. poster did the doors and a more fantastical ambiance finally appear. In the U.S., though, “A Big Bold Beautiful Journey” had uninspired posters that looked more like cologne ads, not posters for a must-see motion picture featuring one of Hollywood’s biggest stars in Margot Robbie. Generic TV spots only compounded the film’s marketing problems.
While fellow 2025 romantic drama “Materialists” was preceded by cute promotional concepts like a parody of those classic Mastercard commercials, “A Big Bold Beautiful Journey” went with commercials that just faded into the background. Perhaps in an attempt to not scare away viewers who could be wary of a somewhat outlandish concept, “A Big Bold Beautiful Journey” hit theaters on the wave of a generic marketing campaign that sealed its box office fate.
Dire early reviews led to bad word of mouth
Mainstream movies offering surface-level spectacle and pleasures can overcome bad write-ups if they deliver big explosions, romantic melodrama, or other crowd-pleasing elements. In the era of superhero movies and mega franchises, that’s the new normal. Adult dramas, however, are a different story. These movies require positive reviews to gain momentum and grab the attention of movie-goers. If such films get bad reviews from the get-go, then it’s basically game over. When prestige is the name of the game, positive word-of-mouth is vital.
“A Big Bold Beautiful Journey” landed some scathing early reviews. Critics were quick to point out that there weren’t any exciting surprises or twists in the story. With that pre-release consensus, any movie-goers on the fence about seeing this original romantic drama were undoubtedly compelled to spend their time and money elsewhere. Things only seemed to get worse as more and more reviews rolled in (the film’s Rotten Tomatoes score settled on an underwhelming 36%, and the audience score of 58% wasn’t exactly inspiring), and the film’s box office fate was sealed.
The date night movie competition was strong
The September 2025 box office took off like a rocket with “The Conjuring: Last Rites” blowing everyone away. The horror flick opened to a whopping $83 million, with 51% of its opening weekend revenue made up of female movie-goers. One week later, “Demon Slayer: Infinity Castle” raced past all expectations for how big an anime film could debut in the United States. Both features drew in lots of women and young people, which inevitably included lots of date night moviegoers. If you were a young couple looking for a movie to see in theaters in mid-September 2025, then you had lots of options. That pretty much cut off the only market “A Big Bold Beautiful Journey” (which dropped on September 19) was aiming to exploit.
In a vacuum, an action-packed anime film and a horror feature shouldn’t have directly competed with a romantic drama about grappling with trauma. However, both of those competing titles promised much more enthralling times at the movies than the downbeat, buttoned-up material offered by “A Big Bold Beautiful Journey.” Additionally, the latest “Conjuring” film likely felt more timely as a date night offering, given that September is the start of the spooky Halloween season. With “Last Rites” and “Infinity Castle” conquering the box office, it was clear which movies would come out on top in September 2025’s date night moviegoing competition. “A Big Bold Beautiful Journey” never had a chance.