Wish Upon is a 2017 American supernatural horror film, directed by John R. Leonetti, written by Barbara Marshall, and starring Joey King, Ki Hong Lee, Sydney Park, Elisabeth Röhm, and Ryan Phillippe. The film follows a teenage girl who finds a magic box that grants wishes, but kills someone close to her each time it does.
The film was theatrically released on July 14, 2017, by Broad Green Pictures and Orion Pictures. It received negative reviews from critics and has grossed $20 million worldwide.
Video Wish Upon
Plot
Clare Shannon, a 17-year old, is haunted by the memory of her mother's suicide. Her father Jonathan, a former musician and compulsive hoarder who dumpster dives as a hobby, finds a Chinese music box and gives it to her as a gift. Clare deciphers one of the numerous inscriptions on the box as "Seven Wishes," and absent-mindedly wishes for Darcie, her tormentor and school bully, to "rot," at which point Darcie develops necrotizing fasciitis and is admitted into the ICU. That same day, Clare's dog Max dies in her house's crawlspace after seemingly being eaten alive by rats. Clare realizes that the box grants wishes, but does not understand that her wishes come with consequences.
Clare makes a second wish that a popular boy named Paul falls in love with her. As a result, her wealthy uncle dies. Upon hearing the news of his death, Clare then wishes she will be in the will. The relative leaves everything to Clare. Consequently Mrs. Deluca, a friendly neighbour, suffers a fatal accident. Clare enlists the help of her classmate Ryan Hui to decypher the symbols. A relative of Ryan named Gina helps discover the meaning of the symbols grants seven wishes WITH consequences. Clare's fourth wish is for her father to stop being a dumpster diver and he immediately has a personality shift. Soon after, Gina deciphers the meaning of the phrase which says "When the music ends, the blood price is paid." After she warns Ryan, she dies. Ryan finds Gina's body and confronts Clare about making wishes on the music box, which she denies.
Clare makes a fifth wish that she is popular, but Clare is soon unhappy with the consequent attention and that she loses her relationship with her friends. As a consequence of the wish, Meredith gets stuck in an elevator and, when the cable snaps, falls to her death.
Ryan reveals that after the seventh wish is granted, the music box will claim the soul of the owner. Attempts to destroy the box are unsuccessful. Furthermore, because June has stolen the box, Clare loses her popularity and everything else she wished for. Clare recovers the box and her sixth wish is that her mother never committed suicide. Clare's mom knocks on her bedroom door along with two younger sisters. Clare later rummages through her mom's paintings and sees a picture of the music box. She concludes that her mom was one of the previous owners of the music box and that it must have led to her original suicide.
When Clare realizes her dad pays the price for the sixth wish, Clare's seventh wish is to go back to the day her father found the box. Preventing her father from finding the box, and erasing all that has happened, Clare then asks Ryan to bury the box. Clare believes all is well but she is killed when her bully Darcie accidentally hits her with her car, in order to pay the final blood price. The music box can be heard after Clare's death, indicating that the seventh wish to reverse time would be balanced by her own death.
In a mid-credits scene, Ryan prepares to bury the music box but becomes intrigued by the inscription and starts to think.
Maps Wish Upon
Cast
- Joey King as Clare Shannon
- Raegan Revord as Young Clare Shannon
- Ki Hong Lee as Ryan Hui
- Josephine Langford as Darcie Chapman
- Sydney Park as Meredith
- Alice Lee as Gina Hsu
- Ryan Phillippe as Jonathan Shannon, Clare's father
- Elisabeth Röhm as Johanna Shannon, Clare's deceased mother
- Victor Sutton as August Shannon, Clare's wealthy uncle
- Mitchell Slaggert as Paul
- Shannon Purser as June
- Kevin Hanchard as Carl Morris
- Sherilyn Fenn as Mrs. Deluca
- Jerry O'Connell as Alex (uncredited)
Production
The film's screenplay was voted to the 2015 Black List. On July 27, 2016, it was announced that Wish Upon would be directed by John R. Leonetti. The film is produced by Sherryl Clark from her production company, Busted Shark Productions, and written by Barbara Marshall. On August 2016, Joey King was cast in the film's lead role, and on November 9, 2016, Ki Hong Lee was announced to have also joined. The film began production in November 2016 in Toronto.
Release
The film's teaser trailer was released on February 9, 2017. The first trailer debuted on March 22, 2017, and the second trailer was released on May 22, 2017. Wish Upon was released in theaters on July 14, 2017 in the U.S., and July 22, 2017 in the U.K.
Marketing
Broad Green Pictures is granting seven fan wishes submitted via the film's official website.
Reception
Box office
As of August 11, 2017, Wish Upon has grossed $13.8 million in the United States and Canada, and $6.4 million in other territories, for a worldwide total of $20.2 million, against a production budget of $12 million.
In North America, Wish Upon was released alongside the opening of War for the Planet of the Apes, as well as the wide expansion of The Big Sick, and was projected to gross $8-10 million from 2,100 theaters in its opening weekend. It made $376,000 from Thursday night previews at 1,659 theaters and $2.3 million on its first day. It went on to debut to $5.5 million for its opening weekend, finishing seventh at the box office.
Critical response
On review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, the film has an approval rating of 17%, based on 76 reviews, with an average rating of 3.8/10. The site's critical consensus reads, "Wish Upon is neither scary nor original, but its fundamental flaws as a horror movie may make it destination viewing for after-midnight camp genre enthusiasts." On Metacritic, which assigns a normalized rating, the film has a score of 32 out of 100, based on 24 critics, indicating "generally unfavorable reviews". Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "C" on an A+ to F scale.
References
External links
- Official website
- Wish Upon on IMDb
- Wish Upon at Rotten Tomatoes
- Wish Upon at Box Office Mojo
Source of the article : Wikipedia