Did You Know?
Despite the film's reputation as one of the biggest box office failures of all time, Ishtar did, in fact, hold the #1 box office position in its first week of release. However, in its second week, with the release of Beverly Hills Cop II, the film quickly dropped to fourth place.
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Writer/director Elaine May worked on the editing for months, and she only turned in a print of the film when the studio threatened legal action.
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Stars Dustin Hoffman and Warren Beatty, both recent Oscar winners, were each paid $5 million, a sum that was considered impressive at that time and, in 2009, is still a considerable paycheck.
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The film's budget was $55 million; it bombed at the box office, making only $12.7 million, a loss of over $42 million.
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Although the film had an overwhelmingly negative reception when released, it underwent three successful screenings with preview audiences. Warren Beatty, Dustin Hoffman and Charles Grodin have all defended the film's quality in subsequent years, blaming its bad reputation on reports of production and budgetary problems which had been leaked to the press by studio head David Puttnam who disliked Beatty and was on poor terms with Hoffman as well.
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In one of Gary Larson's "The Far Side" comic strips, captioned "Hell's Video Store," the entire store is stocked with nothing but copies of Ishtar. Larson later apologized, saying "When I drew the above cartoon, I had not actually seen 'Ishtar.' Years later, I saw it on an airplane, and was stunned at what was happening to me: I was actually being entertained. Sure, maybe it's not the greatest film ever made, but my cartoon was way off the mark. There are so many cartoons for which I should probably write an apology, but this is the only one which compels me to do so."
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The film's reception was so awful it helped coin a new Hollywood term in relation to director Elaine May: "movie jail". The term referred to someone whose perceived failure as a director was so profound, they would not be allowed to helm a movie again for a very long time, if ever again. In fact, May has not directed a single new movie since Ishtar.
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