Well, it’s official: Babylon is a huge bomb. Damien Chazelle’s three-hour film has been described as “polarizing” – meaning a lot of people loathe it – and audiences have overwhelmingly chosen to avoid it. There’s no way around it: Paramount will lose tens of millions of dollars on Babylon. Its theatrical release is now two weeks long and the domestic box office is… *insert sad clown trombone* $10.8 million total. The film cost $78 million just to produce, and that’s before the promotional and marketing costs. A total disaster.
I said before that I understood why the trade papers were hanging Babylon’s failure around Margot Robbie’s neck – after all, she was the face of the film, she did the most promotion and she was really selling it like her life depended on it. But guess who else is to blame? Paramount executives, Damien Chazelle and Brad Pitt. Pitt gave zero interviews to promote Babylon and he only showed up at a few screenings/premieres. Pitt was never going to have to “wear” Babylon’s failure the same way Margot has to. But he’s still paying his crisis managers, so magically, we’re getting all of these dumb stories about Brad’s relationship with Ines de Ramon. I hope this woman is collecting her checks on time.
Brad Pitt and Ines de Ramon welcomed 2023 from Mexico! The couple arrived in Cabo San Lucas ahead of the holiday weekend and celebrated New Year’s Eve together Saturday in the popular tourist destination in Mexico’s Baja California peninsula.
“They are dating and having fun,” a source tells PEOPLE. “They have a good thing going on. There is no stress. Brad is enjoying it.”
The insider adds that the actor, 59, “is not seeing anyone else right now” besides the 32-year-old jewelry designer, 32.”He is spending more time with Ines,” the source says. “He is very happy.”
Their getaway comes just under two weeks after de Ramon joined Pitt to celebrate his 59th birthday in Hollywood, California. PEOPLE confirmed in November that Pitt and de Ramon had “been dating for a few months.” They were first photographed together on Nov. 13 alongside Cindy Crawford and Rande Gerber backstage at a Bono concert at Los Angeles’ Orpheum Theatre.
There’s something so rote and perfunctory about Pitt’s relationship updates. Like, I’m sure there are still People Mag readers who are excited to learn that Pitt “finally” found someone to date, but it just feels so… stage-managed and dry. As I said, I hope Ines is cashing those checks. I wonder if Jennifer Aniston was mad that Pitt took Ines down to Cabo too – Cabo is Aniston’s favorite vacation destination! Ah, well. At least we’re not talking about Babylon’s box office flop.
Photos courtesy of Backgrid.
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- Austin, – Actor and film producer, Brad Pitt, during the Formula 1 Aramco United States Grand Prix 2022, 19th round of the 2022 FIA Formula One World Championship from October 21 to 23, 2022 on the Circuit of the Americas, in Austin, Texas. Pictured: Brad Pitt BACKGRID USA 22 OCTOBER 2022 BYLINE MUST READ: Best Image / BACKGRID USA: +1 310 798 9111 / usasales@backgrid.com UK: +44 208 344 2007 / uksales@backgrid.com *UK Clients – Pictures Containing Children Please Pixelate Face Prior To Publication*
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- Austin, TX – Brad Pitt during the Formula 1 (F1) United States Grand Prix in Austin, Texas. Pictured: Brad Pitt BACKGRID USA 23 OCTOBER 2022 BYLINE MUST READ: Best Image / BACKGRID USA: +1 310 798 9111 / usasales@backgrid.com UK: +44 208 344 2007 / uksales@backgrid.com *UK Clients – Pictures Containing Children Please Pixelate Face Prior To Publication*
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- Austin, TX – Brad Pitt during the Formula 1 (F1) United States Grand Prix in Austin, Texas. Pictured: Brad Pitt BACKGRID USA 23 OCTOBER 2022 BYLINE MUST READ: Best Image / BACKGRID USA: +1 310 798 9111 / usasales@backgrid.com UK: +44 208 344 2007 / uksales@backgrid.com *UK Clients – Pictures Containing Children Please Pixelate Face Prior To Publication*
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- Los Angeles, CA – Celebrities attend the premiere screening of ‘Babylon’ at the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures in Los Angeles, California. Pictured: Brad Pitt BACKGRID USA 15 DECEMBER 2022 USA: +1 310 798 9111 / usasales@backgrid.com UK: +44 208 344 2007 / uksales@backgrid.com *UK Clients – Pictures Containing Children Please Pixelate Face Prior To Publication*
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- Los Angeles, CA – Celebrities attend the premiere screening of ‘Babylon’ at the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures in Los Angeles, California. Pictured: Brad Pitt BACKGRID USA 15 DECEMBER 2022 USA: +1 310 798 9111 / usasales@backgrid.com UK: +44 208 344 2007 / uksales@backgrid.com *UK Clients – Pictures Containing Children Please Pixelate Face Prior To Publication*
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- Los Angeles, CA – Celebrities attend the premiere screening of ‘Babylon’ at the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures in Los Angeles, California. Pictured: Brad Pitt BACKGRID USA 15 DECEMBER 2022 USA: +1 310 798 9111 / usasales@backgrid.com UK: +44 208 344 2007 / uksales@backgrid.com *UK Clients – Pictures Containing Children Please Pixelate Face Prior To Publication*
I am 48 years old and I would not date a 59 year old right now…
46 and same.
Also a friend was trying to talk me into going to see this, but 3 hours? Nope. I already wasn’t interested.
Even if he is a multi-millionaire?
@justpassingby… Well, my husband is 11 years older than me. You never know who you will fall in love with…. That said I wouldn’t date Brad Pitt no matter what his age! 😆 Daniel Craig however…. 🤤
No thanks, I no longer have any interest in any Brad Pitt info.
Ewww anything Brad Pitt makes me wanna barf 🤢
Is it that the failure is being stuck to Margot because she was the face of the film, or is it that she was made the face of the film because they figured it would flop so people like Pitt took a giant step back?
As Chazelle is overhyped oscar academy darling, and Pitt is an Hollywood veteran, Robbie was always the weakest link as a young woman with some consecutive very public flops to throw to the wolves.
But it is interesting to see Brad Pitt trajectory in this not so post pandemic streaming era and compares it to other real superstars of the same level …. Tom Cruise crushing everything with maverick this year, will Smith staying on top with bad boys in 2020, and an oscar(even with the controversy) last year.
His Bullet train being meh, and a whitewashing mess, and now the biggest failure of 2022 on his shoulders… With his decaying former good looks it seems like his character in babylon is mirroring his current life as a star actor on his way to become a irrelevant has been
Lots of updates on his younger women. No updates on his kids but Pitt is just so happy. Rich, happy, abusive loser.
The trailer for Babylon was so bad. I’m not surprised it was a giant flop.
I saw it over the weekend against my will and ended up thinking it was pretty incredible. Imo it’s going to be a movie that we’ll look back on in a decade and finally give it the credit that it deserves.
I think the problem with a 3 hour epic is that audiences have become so used do tidy 7 part Netflix releases that no one has the attention span or the desire to watch long ass movies anymore.
Unless it is a Marvel movie (which are all now 3 hours long).
What did you like about it? I’m not trying to sound combative with that, just genuinely interested.
I watched the trailer too and was… bored. It seemed like typical oscar bait.
Happy New Year Celebitches!!! I know I must be in the minority here, but I find these PR-driven Brad Pitt romances high-larious and am enjoying these “leaks” to the press…he’s so sweet, she’s so sweet, his friends approve, her friends approve, she loves dogs, so does he, he listens to Frank Ocean, so does she, he’s a misunderstood, sensitive artist that only she can understand…rinse and repeat. NEXT UP: Brad and Ines love adventure! They’ll be taking the next SpaceX shuttle to outer space. Stay tuned for more details on People magazine!
I’m not a Robbie fan, but she shouldn’t get the blame. The primary reason why this movie flopped hangs on the producers who greenlit the production and the overrated Damien Chazelle who wrote the screenplay and directed the film.
I miss how his hair used to change depending on the relationship. But his recent girlfriends are all like Angelina…
LOL!
OMG, YESSSSSS. Let us never forget Brad’s Paltrow-era hair.
I want Pitt to date a 3rd degree blackbelt. And then just wait to see how long before he shows up with black eyes.
He’s always been an empty husk of a person, hence his chameleonic traits.
I just find it hilarious that he went on and on about how borrrrrrrred he was in his marriage to boring old Jen and how he needed more excitement and meaning in his life so he ran off after AJ and her jet-setting, humanitarian ways only to flake out on all of the humanitarian stuff and the family he apparently wanted so badly, become an addict and an abusive dick and then wash up to live basically an identical life to Jen. He’s even holidaying in Cabo! Just. Like. Jen. So the problem was never her. It obviously wasn’t AJ either. It was him. He’s, as you say, a hollow shell. A husk of a man. He can only imitate and copy.
Movie theaters haven’t recovered. And most likely won’t. Who wants to go to a gross theater when you can watch at home? Hollywood needs to recalibrate.
Agreed. Chazelle should have never been given that budget. Even before covid, non franchise movies were becoming unstable
Agreed. I keep saying, unless it’s a big action movie, scary movie, or kids movie, it’s not going to do well in the theater. Normal people can identify these trends, so why aren’t studios accepting it and adjusting their releases for theaters or streaming accordingly? People don’t go to the movie theater to see dramas and comedies anymore, because those are experienced perfectly fine at home.
Also, it must be said that there are those of us who love going to the theater but haven’t returned at all since COVID started. That’s the case for me and I’m sure I’m not alone.
Yep, theaters are way overpriced, there’s always someone talking and/or on their phone, and here’s a big one — movies are too damn long these days. If they put an intermission back in like in the old days, they’d get more butts in seats, because people wouldn’t be dreading needing to pee so badly for half the movie, or have to get up halfway through and miss something. Also a mental break is needed for something that long.
It’s just these films aren’t good, entertaining or adequate enough for the public.
we know from Titanic era that People will bear with 3 hours films if it worths it
Great point. I’ve been stunned by how long most of the major award contenders/buzziest films are this year — Babylon is 3 hours long; TAR, The Fabelmans, Avatar, and Elvis clock in at 2.5 hours; and Glass Onion, Top Gun, Triangle of Sadness, Everything Everywhere All at Once, The Woman King, and She Said are all just below 2.5 hours.
I’m just trying to rent these at home and have had trouble deciding what runtime I can handle that day, so I imagine the theater experience is brutal. I don’t mind long movies, but there was a long stretch time when a movie over 2 hours and 15 minutes was rare!
Netflix has a section of ’90 minute movies’ so even they are aware that people, even at home, don’t want to (or cannot) sit for 3 hours.
I so agree. I haven’t been to a movie theater in three years—I think the last thing I saw there was Knives Out—and it would take something really really awesome to bring me back into one. I can watch a movie at home every night for a month on Netflix for less than the price of one theater date, where I have to burn gas to drive there, sit in an uncomfortable seat on a dirty floor, while people around me talk on their phones eat too loud and breathe at me.
Even places that are usually on his side like the dailyfail, feel like it’s fake. He has done the same dating routine and used the same qoutes too many times. It’s too planned out and there’s too many updates as if we are in the early 2000s. Using this played out tactic has caused him to lose that allure.
I dunno it sounds like all of people mag’s new relationship roll out blurbs. They are never tabloid breathless and after doing them for years and years they aren’t gonna get too excited and they shouldn’t ! wondering if this new chick (I’m not gonna remember her name until they’ve hit a year) is an actual jewelry designer at Anita Ko or an executive for the business? Any rate I love Anita ko jewelry. And I hate 3 hour movies.
I’ll sit through a 3-hour film in a theatre if it’s action-packed, thriller, or comedy — something that will jolt the senses without me needing caffeine or running to the restroom for a break. I’ll wait for 3-hour dramas to come On Demand without taking myself to the theater for it.
I wouldn’t date Brad Pitt if you paid me. He’s gross and his personality sucks from what we all have learned in the past decade. He’s really heading into the dried up old man sitting at the bar era.
@Trish, Yep. Sitting right next to Depp. He’s even adopted the multiple necklaces and baggy clothes wardrobe. Maybe even stopped bathing, because he looks smelly like Depp.
Pictures or the date didn’t happen.
The movie sounds horrible.
Brad’s PR leaks remind me a whole lot of Taylor Swift’s very formulaic PR relationships of years past. They feel so incredibly fake, and I’m fascinated by the fact that his team thinks this is a good or believable strategy.
As for Babylon — I liked La La Land and Whiplash, but the trailers for this were godawful. Looked like it had no plot, just *party vibes.*
I was so confused to learn this movie was set at the end of the silent Hollywood era. I’ll admit I’m no wardrobe expert but the clothing seemed so off, the posters looked like the ’70s.
I saw Babylon over the weekend. It was essentially an ode to the movies. I thought it was great. The movie opens with a seemingly gratuitous party scene that later makes sense in the scheme of the film. But that was kind of the only party scene in the film, the movie focuses on Margots character who is becoming a star and Brad’s character who is a huge star navigating through the changes of Hollywood, as well a Diego Chavez’s character who rises up to the ranks of a studeo excec.
Imo it had more of a plot than Once Upon a Time in Hollywood which had similar vibes but I thought Babylon was better.
This is really good to know. I think the marketing really failed this film because it emphasized the partying so much. I love movies about the movies so I will definitely check it out now.
Babylon presented a real marketing problem from a trendy-PR POV. How do you advertise a 1920s set Hollywood silent-to-sound era movie without saying what it’s actually about? Younger audiences regard the 20s as the Stone Age, if they know of it at all. And Hollywood movies rarely hit at the box office. Solution: emphasize stars, mad-crazy glamourous parties,
Chazelle-cachet, and celebrity-without-limits. Seriously wow audiences. Unfortunately, this approach left most folks baffled.
Suddenly his PR team is not longer making fakes stories about him spending bday and hollydays with Angie’s kids. Do you note it? Maybe because they want zero contact with her mother’s abuser. Good for for them.
Yes and for the last 6 years whenever he had a movie to promote his PR team did nothing, but bash Jolie in the media. It’s only in the last couple of months when he’s been outed as an abuser with proof and he has no chance of winning the court case that has Pitt been trying to change tactics to focus on a fake relationship.
Also, he doesn’t mention the kids because it’s basically public knowledge now that the kids don’t want anything to do with him.
Yes and they witnessed it all…no way the plane was his first explosion.
People aren’t seeing the movie because of Brad Pitt. Hopefully there’s more awareness of what a POS he is.
Do not underestimate how much the movie in general is not what people want to see.
Hollywood and middle Americans, who are the majority of Americans, increasingly live in two separate worlds.
KAISER, The movie cost $110 Million not $78M
Production was 78 on top of marketing. Kaiser wrote that.
But the information is wrong, the production cost was 110 million, there is no information about the marketing cost, but given the fact that the film did not have much marketing, I would add another 50 million to the bill.
Those leaks are so cringy, he’s almost 60 for f… sake. And the previous ones were even funnier “they do solo dates but also group dates”
Who writes this shit?
Pitt probably spent the “vacation” smoking weed and downing booze. I hope that Ines bows out of this contract and puts her safety first.
2022 has just been tragic for Hollywood, eh? I know it’s 2023 but anyway, this is like 9th (if not more) headline I read about a film being a huge bomb.
Hollywood needs to start getting their sh*t together. If they continue like this, their creative bankrupcy will turn into financial bankrupcy.
She smokes weed and drinks too.
I love to read an expose about Brad Pitt. He is so protected by the film and media industries. why? Why is he so powerful and influential as his wiki describes him?
I’m not sure he carries a lot of power at this point. He always had two things going for him: his looks and the women he was dating. He gained power because he was a tabloid staple and brought in tons of money. Women (the ones he was dating and the ones that paid to see his movies) made him who he is. He is nowhere near that level at this point. He is dating Insta models and makes up stories about dating jewellery designers and professors because no-one else is willing to date him.
Notice she’s the trendy type of girlfriend/wife. Brad wants his own tall, dark haired Amal/Megan.
He was married to a tall, dark haired women and none of his PR girlfriend are anything like Amal/Megan so I don’t get your comment.
Again no photos…oh wait, we do have the ones of her on Xmas eve smoking a cigarette (wink, a joint – she’s also been touted as an certified integrative health coach LOL) and do a quick look-see on Instagram- the girl drinks a lot. It’s actually sad…besides his alcohol bloat face since this summer and now all this blahblahblah it seems Brad is officially not sober. Addiction is a beast I’d wish on noone especially the children of alcoholics. Go to rehab, dude. Maybe we’ll see them walk at Golden Globes but you know they are both so private, wink wink.
The movie just isn’t family holiday fare. Throw in the cold weather and it was a recipe for sure failure. This would have been fine on streaming but no one wants to go to a theater for this. Huge miscalculation coming straight from the top.
They were betting on this being prime-Oscar bait.
Saw it this weekend and its over the top, but not in a good way. The first 20 minutes was almost completely unwatchable. Nudity and overall gross stuff was so egregious- felt like watching pr*n. Brad Pitt plays every role exactly the same – there is no nuance. Its not fair to pin this all on Margot Robbie. I’d argue BP’s role was bigger than hers and he just fell flat. He also sounds like Jack Nicholson now, but without the onscreen charisma.
I had the tuned to back to back Friends episodes last night, and they showed the one he appeared in.
It was super uncomfortable to watch – he played a resentful angry guy who verbally attacked Rachel repeatedly, angrily indulged his addictive substance of choice (carbs) and lashed out blaming her for it. All I could think was “we’re seeing a glimpse of the real Brad: swap out AJ for Rachel, booze for carbs, his kids for all the other Friends and head/wall punches for fist bangs on the table and that’s him, that’s what he’s probably like IRL”
Gross
“the 32-year-old jewelry designer, 32” is barely over half his age. also People needs copyeditors. lol.
Sie ist Gesundheitscouch und wird permanent mit einer Zigarette in der Hand gesehen?? Außerdem glaube ich das sie älter ist, jedenfalls sieht sie älter aus! Passt gut zu ihm.
I guess at a certain age that men do not care if their main squeeze is using them as long as she is young and sexy.
Some nights, I despair over how shallow and self-serving the world is.