Trivia / Deepwater Horizon

• Ability over Appearance: As the footage at the end shows, Mark Wahlberg, Kurt Russell and Gina Rodriguez look almost nothing like their real-life counterparts but their performances were still very acclaimed.
• Acclaimed Flop: The film received positive reviews (it has a 84% mark on Rotten Tomatoes) and was nominated for two Oscars at the 89th Academy Awards: Best Sound Editing and Best Visual Effects. Despite this, it had an underwhelming financial take, grossing only $121.8 million with a budget around $110-120 million.
• Box Office Bomb: On a budget of $110-120 million, this film sank hard, managing a domestic gross of $61,433,527 and an international gross of $60,356,846, making for a total of $121,790,373.
• Cast the Expert: Graham McGuinness plays the Coast Guard Lieutenant. He's an actual Coast Guard Helicopter Rescue Swimmer, stationed in New Orleans.
• Method Acting: Mark Wahlberg stayed in character on set in between takes.
• Playing Against Type:
  • Kate Hudson would normally show up as the Everybody Loves Blondes figure in a romantic comedy. A drama playing the concerned wife is different.
  • Mildly for Dylan O'Brien, who was best known for appearing in supernatural Teen Dramas.
• Real-Life Relative: Kurt Russell appears alongside his stepdaughter Kate Hudson (although he and Hudson's mother Goldie Hawn never married), in the only film they've ever done together. They only share one scene however, and no dialogue.
• What Could Have Been:
  • Originally, J.C. Chandor was set to direct the movie, but was fired by Summit Entertainment due to his different take on the material (The executives wanted a straightforward Disaster Film, while Chandor had teams go over court transcripts and planned to also make it about humanity's relationship with oil.) It wasn't until they hired Peter Berg that they got the movie they wanted.
  Lorenzo di Bonaventura (Producer): "I believe that the movie-star version of this movie is going to be a more profitable movie."
  • Emma Stone turned down a role, as the script wasn't fully written yet. Kristen Stewart was offered a role too, but couldn't take it due to a schedule conflict.

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