Will Smith Says “After Earth” Flopping Destroyed Him

He was more disappointed than you were.

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Image via Complex Original
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Will Smith has had a successful career, smoothly transitioning from The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air to Hollywood A-lister. He’s starred in plenty of hits: Independence Day, Bad Boys, Men In Black. But all it took was one majorly bad film, 2013’s M. Night Shyamalan sci-fi flick After Earth, co-starring his son Jaden Smith, to break the star, Smith revealed to People

Smith was promoting his new film, Focus, co-starring Margot Robbie, when he talked about the earth shattering effects of After Earth’s expensive failure, it cost $130 million to get made and only brought in $60 million stateside.

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“After the failure of 'After Earth,' a thing got broken in my mind,” Smith told People. "[Afterward] I was like, ‘Oh, wow. I'm still alive. Oh, wow. Actually, I still am me, even though the movie didn't open number one. Wait. I can still get hired on another movie.’”

Enter Focus and the much buzzed about upcoming Suicide Squad where he will team up with Robbie again alongside Jared Leto and Cara Delevingne

Smith made it clear he’s no longer worried about material things like box office success, but rather something substantial: 

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“So when I went into 'Focus,' I completely released the concept of goal orientation and got into path orientation. This moment, this second, these people, this interaction ... It is a huge relief for me to not care whether or not Focus is number one or number 10 at the box office."

[via Huff Po]

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