After it’s world premiere at the 2012 Cannes Films Festival, THE SAPPHIRES received a 10 minute standing ovation. Nearly a year on, the film’s feisty foursome have finally made it to the U.S with the movie’s New York premiere held last night.
Based on a true story, The Sapphires tells of four young indigenous Australian women scouted by a down-and-out Irish manager (Chris O’Dowd) who takes them on a singing tour to entertain the U.S soldiers fighting in Vietnam.
Estimated to have had a budget of $10 million, the flick made an impressive $15 million at the Aussie box office (atleast, it’s impressive when you consider the general lack of interest Australian’s have in home-grown films). However, thus far international markets have seen the quartet performed poorly.
The Sapphires lasted only five weeks in UK cinemas and did so badly in France it was dubbed ‘Le Flop’ by a French box office website.
It will no doubt be interesting to track it’s success in the U.S, with distribution managed by the influential Weinstein Company (Django Unchained, Silver Linings Playbook) suggesting potentially positive results.
Yet early reviews complain the accents “are hard to understand”, as well as the myriad of Australian slang (apparently America is not as adept at interpreting international colloquialisms as we are – how intelligent we, as a nation, must be considering toddlers ‘get’ the barrage of American lingo included in every Hollywood film…)
The Sapphires will hit U.S screens March 22nd.
