The past decade has seen some surprisingly high-profile films cancelled, shelved, axed or scrapped. Here they are – all 10 of the poor things.
Film history is littered with abandoned productions, false starts and projects that have withered on the creative vine. What is relatively unusual, though, is for a movie to get through weeks of shooting only for it to be axed at the editing stage.
When we consider how much work goes into a film production before a camera even rolls – casting, building sets, securing locations – the notion that a film could be scrapped at such a late stage seems almost inconceivable. Particularly given that, in the past, films have survived genuine tragedies – The Twilight Zone, The Crow – and still made their way into cinemas.
Over the past decade, however, we’ve seen a number of high-profile films shelved or scrapped. In some instances, they’ve been brought low by serious allegations made against an actor or director connected to them. In others, cancellations have happened simply because studios have calculated they can make more money by writing a film off than letting audiences actually see it.
What follows, then, is a roll call of 10 films that have been cancelled over the last decade and why the axe fell.
B.O.O.: Bureau Of Otherworldly Operations (2015)
What was it? A CG-animated supernatural comedy produced by DreamWorks Animation and featuring a starry vocal cast. Like Men In Black except with ghosts instead of alien visitors, it was about an agency dedicated to protecting humanity from spooks, and would have included Seth Rogen voicing the protagonist, one Jackson Moss, backed up by Bill Murray, Aubrey Plaza and Melissa McCarthy in supporting roles. The hard-working Frank Welker was to provide the voice of a dog named Lionel. Good name for a dog, that.
So what on earth happened? So far as we can tell, the film was at least half finished before the plug was pulled. Certainly, there must have been high hopes for B.O.O. at one stage, with an art book and even pieces of merchandise put into production in the middle of the 2010s. B.O.O. was originally pencilled in for a release in June 2015, before DreamWorks decided to shift that date to avoid competition with Pixar’s Inside Out (not a bad shout, given how well that animated tear-jerker did).
Then, under murky circumstances, B.O.O. was pulled from the schedules entirely; DreamWorks boss Jeffrey Katzenberg reportedly disliked the project from the outset, and with several other films from the studio struggling at the box office around the same time, B.O.O. was shelved indefinitely. Boo, indeed.
We wrote about the film previously, here.
The Long Home (2015)
What was it? An indie drama based on the book of the same name by William Gay. James Franco, who was a remarkably prolific filmmaker in the 2010s (he made three films in 2013 alone), was in the director’s chair. A period piece about bootleg booze and murder in the Prohibition era (a little like John Hillcoat’s Lawless, perhaps), The Long Home’s cast included Josh Hutcherson, Tim Blake Nelson, Giancarlo Esposito, Ashton Kutcher, Courtney Love and Franco himself.
So what on earth happened? In short: allegations that Franco indulged in inappropriate sexual behaviour, both during the production of The Long Home and elsewhere, emerged in the late 2010s. By this stage, the film had already been shot and its release scheduled for 2017. As the allegations about Franco began to emerge in 2018, it seems the decision was made to leave The Long Home languishing on a shelf; although no formal announcement about the film has ever been made, the silence surrounding it has been deafening.
Elizabeth, Michael & Marlon (2016)
What was it? In 2015, the author Zadie Smith wrote a short story based on the urban legend that, in the wake of 9/11, Michael Jackson, Elizabeth Taylor and Marlon Brando all clambered into one car and got the heck out of Manhattan. That story, wonderfully titled Escape From New York, later became fodder for a movie – Elizabeth, Michael & Marlon, written by Neil Forsyth and directed by Ben Palmer. It cast Stockard Channing as Taylor and Brian Cox as Brando, but rather controversially placed Joseph Fiennes in the Jackson role. The latter casting decision – which was baffling then and now – ultimately spelled the film’s doom.
So what on earth happened? It shouldn’t be surprising that the casting of a white, British actor in the role of one of the most famous Black American performers in pop history sparked controversy. Fiennes made a somewhat half-hearted defence of his role in an interview with Entertainment Tonight at the time, conceding that “I’m a white, middle-class guy from London,” before adding, “I’m as shocked as you may be.”
Not so shocked, it seems, that Fiennes thought of turning the part down.
Although filmed in 2016, the film’s controversy saw it shelved for about a year, when Sky Arts announced that a heavily edited version of Elizabeth, Michael & Marlon (lasting just 30 minutes) was to be aired as part of a series called Urban Myths. This prompted further outcry – such that Sky Arts scrapped the episode and issued a public apology.
“We have taken the decision not to broadcast Elizabeth, Michael & Marlon, a half-hour episode from the Sky Arts Urban Myths series, in light of the concerns expressed by Michael Jackson‘s immediate family,” Sky Arts said in a statement. “We set out to take a lighthearted look at reportedly true events and never intended to cause any offense.”
Gore (2017)
What was it? A biopic of the famed writer and intellectual, Gore Vidal. Kevin Spacey was cast in the role of Vidal. You can probably guess what happened next.
So what on earth happened? Filming on Gore – directed by Michael Hoffman and written by Andy Paterson – concluded in the autumn of 2017. This coincided with allegations of sexual impropriety on the part of Spacey, and Netflix – having sunk millions into its prestige drama – decided to cancel the production.
Batgirl (2022)
What was it? Proving that even comic book movies aren’t safe from a studio’s axe, Batgirl was announced in 2017 and had all the hallmarks of a breezily entertaining superhero spinoff. Leslie Grace was to play the title heroine (street name: Barbara Gordon, daughter of JK Simmons’ Commissioner), while Michael Keaton would have reprised his role as Bruce Wayne. With a budget of around $90m, directors Adil El Arbi and Bilall Fallah were busy in post-production when Warner Bros pulled the plug in 2022.
What on earth happened? Warner Bros boss David Zaslav happened. In the wake of Batgirl’s cancellation – and another movie, which we’ll get to later – Zaslav said, “It was difficult and it was painful. But I think it was the right decision for the company and it was necessary.”
The film’s directors appeared to be blindsided by the abrupt nature of the decision. In a report at the time, El Arbi and Fallah said that they only realised it was being axed when they logged onto a company computer and saw that “Everything was gone” from Warner’s server.
“We were like, ‘F*cking sh*t,’” El Arbi said. It’s a sentiment shared by many of us who were rather looking forward to seeing their superhero adventure
Being Mortal (2022)
What was it? A comedy-drama based on a non-fiction book by Atul Gawanade, Being Mortal: Medicine And What Matters In The End. Starring Aziz Ansari, Bill Murray, Seth Rogen and Keke Palmer, it was to be the directorial debut of Ansari, who also wrote the adapted screenplay.
What on earth happened? Being Mortal was said to be mid-way through its six-week shoot when it was suddenly shut down following allegations of inappropriate behaviour on the part of co-star Bill Murray. That was in April 2022. Aziz made attempts to get the derailed project back on track in the months that followed, but to no avail – by February the following year, it was announced that Searchlight Productions had opted not to continue, and so Being Mortal was effectively dead.
Better news followed in 2023, however. Ansari had begun work on a new production, Good Fortune, a comedy starring Keanu Reeves as a ‘clueless angel’. Keke Palmer and Seth Rogen, who were previously in the ill-fated Being Mortal, also have supporting roles. Despite Reeves somehow fracturing his knee at some point, Good Fortune’s production sounds far less clouded – it’s due for release in October 2025.
Scoob! Holiday Haunt (2022)
What was it? An animated prequel to 2020’s Scoob!, which related the adventures of a young Shaggy and his canine sidekick, Scooby-Doo. Holiday Haunt was originally destined to go straight to streaming, with its release set for December 2022.
So what on earth happened? As with Batgirl, Scoob! Holiday Haunt was cancelled as a “cost-cutting measure” after Warner merged with Discovery Inc in April 2022. It was a baffling decision from a creative standpoint, since the film was “practically finished” according to co-writer Tony Cervone, and $40m had already been spent on its production.
From a lizard-brained business perspective, however, cancelling Scoob! 2 and Batgirl was considered to be more lucrative than actually releasing them, since they could be labelled as a tax write-off. That’s likely what Warner Bros boss David Zaslav meant when he said, “It was the right decision for the company and it was necessary.”
Coyote Vs Acme (2024)
What was it? In terms of public outcry alone, this is perhaps the best-known cancelled film on the list. A mixture of live action and 2D animation, Coyote Vs Acme was billed as a courtroom comedy in which Wile E Coyote attempts to sue the Acme Corporation for its line of shoddy products. Will Forte and John Cena starred as the two human lawyers in the case, while the assorted Looney Tunes characters set to co-star alongside Wile E Coyote included Foghorn Leghorn and Bugs Bunny.
So what on earth happened? Once again, the modern hand of Warner Bros intervened. The film had already been completed by the autumn of 2023, and those who’d seen it said it was superb. But then Warner Bros decided it would be more profitable to cancel the film and claim $30m in tax relief instead, and Coyote Vs Acme faced oblivion.
The outcry from both the public and those involved in the film’s production was such that Warner Bros initially made noises about selling Coyote Vs Acme rather than shelve it, though to date, the film remains unavailable to view in any form. Most recently, co-star Will Forte told MovieWeb of the cancellation, “My thoughts were that it’s f—ing bull—. It is such a delightful movie. It deserves so much better than what it got. I don’t know, I can’t tell you possibly why the decision was made to not release it, but it makes my blood boil.”
The Mothership (2024)
What was it? Starring Halle Berry, The Mothership was a sci-fi adventure about a mother and her kids discovering an “extra-terrestrial object” beneath their rural home – an object that may or may not have had something to do with the family’s patriarch a year earlier. Directed by Matt Charman, the film was shot and being prepped for release in 2023.
What on earth happened? Netflix announced in February 2024 that there had been “lots of issues during production,” and that those involved in The Mothership “felt like it was the right thing to do” to shelve the film entirely. Halle Berry and director Matt Charman both remained quiet in the months after the news, though one storyboard artist who worked on the movie expressed their surprise and disappointment when Film Stories contacted them about it last year.
“I don’t understand why The Mothership was cancelled,” the artist told Film Stories via email, “because it had bags of everything a film needs and more. It was cosmic in conception, you were invested in the characters, it ticked along at a perfect pace trailing mystery and threat, and it shocked in the end. It seemed to me to have the makings of a classic.”
One of the problems appeared to be that, by the time reshoots were considered, the young actors who played Berry’s kids had aged out of their roles. With no cost-effective means of shooting those new films, Netflix decided to abandon a promising-sounding sci-fi film entirely.
Golden (2025)
What was it? A companion movie, of sorts, to the 2024 documentary Piece By Piece, Golden was announced as a biopic about the younger years of musician Pharrell Williams. Universal Pictures had a talented director at the helm – Eternal Sunshine’s Michel Gondry – and an impressive cast, including Brian Tyree Henry and Da’Vine Joy Randolph. The film was in post-production and due for a cinema release in May 2025 when in early February, Universal made the decision to scrap Golden entirely.
What on earth happened? In a quasi-official announcement, Williams and Gondry issued a joint statement to Variety, in which they suggested that Golden’s cancellation was an amicable decision. “When all of us got into the editing room we collectively decided there wasn’t a path forward to tell the version of this story that we originally envisioned,” the statement went.
This might imply that Gondry and his collaborators had botched Golden so badly that everyone involved agreed it would be less embarrassing to release it. Days later, however, came report of a test screening for a select audience in Pasadena, where those who saw Golden responded warmly. They were, the report said, “completely won over.”
Whatever the reason is for Golden’s scrappage – Universal hasn’t said as much, but it could be a Warner Bros-style tax write-off – it remains another promising-sounding film we may never get to see.
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