From his continued work as Nick Fury in the Marvel Cinematic Universe to cinematic classics like “Pulp Fiction,” audiences have turned up to see him do his thing on the big screen for decades. Unfortunately, his latest cinematic foray didn’t arrive with the level of fanfare he’s accustomed to.
Directed by Richard Gray, Roadside Attractions’ “The Unholy Trinity” opened this past weekend at the box office, though one would be forgiven for not noticing. It grossed just $559,610 on 771 screens, making for a downright terrible $725 per-screen average. For context, “How to Train Your Dragon” brought in $83.7 million on 4,356 screens for a $19,214 per-screen average. While nobody was expecting this Western to do DreamWorks business, the end result leaves much to be desired for all involved.
Set against the backdrop of 1870s Montana, “The Unholy Trinity” picks up with Isaac Broadway (Tim Daly), a man who’s on the verge of being executed when he asks his estranged son, Henry (Brandon Lessard), to kill the individual who framed him for a crime he didn’t commit. Unable to refuse him, Henry then travels to the town of Trinity, where he winds up getting caught in a power struggle between the town’s sheriff Gabriel Dove (Pierce Brosnan) and a mysterious figure known as St Christopher (Jackson). David Arquette (“Scream”) and Q’orianka Kilcher (“The New World”) also star.
So, how is it that a movie with a big star like Jackson and a former James Bond managed to generate so little interest on its opening weekend? There are several factors at play, but the biggest one of all is that virtually nobody has heard of this film. (Not literally nobody, of course, but relative to the larger world of cinema, it might as well be nobody.)
