July 25th, 2014 
James Shotwell 
Somewhere in the world right now Sylvester Stallone is pissed. Somewhere else, a recently fired Lionsgate employee is crying into a pillow about making a mistake that may have cost the iconic studio tens of millions in lost profits.
Wednesday night, a DVD-quality copy of the upcoming movie Expendables 3 leaked online more than three weeks ahead of the film’s official release date. According to Variety, the pirated film has been downloaded via piracy sites more than 189,000 times over a 24-hour period.
The leak began to spread like wildfire Thursday afternoon, which is around the time many of the biggest piracy blogs began to feature the film. With more than twenty days to go before the flick’s August 15 release it is likely the number of downloads will soar into the millions before Lionsgate has a chance to recoup any of the film’s reported $90 million dollar budget.
Variety reached out to Lionsgate for comment, but as of 9:45 A.M. EST today the studio has yet to respond. You can view the latest trailer for Expendables 3 below.
It needs to be said that leaks like this are extremely rare. Hundreds of people work on films like this, and even more have access to the final copy before its released for one reason or another, but the likelihood that an unreleased studio film leaks to the public this far in advance is almost a billion to one. The only other time I can recall this happening in recent memory was with X-Men Origins: Wolverine, and even then the copy that leaked did not have the final special effects.
I know it can be tempting to download movies, especially when they’re available online far in advance of their scheduled release, but if you want more movies like The Expendables it is of utmost importance that you PAY TO SEE THIS FILM. No studio is in the business of making films that don’t make money, and even though this leak is not The Expendables‘ fault, it is the fans of the franchise who will ultimately have to pay for the damage done.
- 2015’s Most Underrated Films - December 29, 2015
- Passing The Torch: The End Of An Era For UTG - December 1, 2015
- UTG PREMIERE: Before The Streetlights – “Private Browser” - November 26, 2015
Posted in 
Tags: 
Wow. Lost millions. Riight. Fact: millions will not be lost and people will still see in theatres. Your apologist scare article is not only stupid but pointless. If you really believe what this article says you are a moron that will believe anything.
Personally, I think this is very possible. I’ve read numerous articles about Wolverine: Origins and the potential negative impact the early leak caused. While it did end up making millions of dollars most of the articles I read cited it’s estimated the film lost between $1 million and 8 million, and that wasn’t even the final version of it. We don’t see a movie that makes $373 million (which is what Origins made in the box office) as “losing” anything even if the cost is in the millions though. The movie industry hasn’t suffered in quite the same way as the music industry has, so a leak here and there won’t have any tangible impact, but if suddenly every movie started leaking weeks in advance like most albums do nowadays I believe it would be a much different story.
I swear if I read one more article that states that Lionsgate is set to lose millions of dollars my head might explode. The people who are downloading the movie through torrents are probably a very small percentage of people who would have gone to see this POS in the theaters. I think Lionsgate will be just fine.
Imma go watch it right now!!!!!!!! BUT guess what imma stream it not download it…i think thats fair right? ;)
Thanks for leaking it recently fired Lionsgate employee! Now hopefully GotG will be leaked too soon before it hits theaters.
Well at least we know what the 3 meant in Expendables 3.
i seen the movie online,and is a fucking shit,bored as fuck
if i watch in piracy i will still wath in theathers bcoz this is not just a film it is just a festival of freinds brotherhood of old schol film i m downloading it and stil i will watch on theathers with my frends to enjoy he film in INDIA and in INDIA the film is releasing on 22 augest
Well, I don’t “want more movies like The Expendables”, they are terrible films!
That “lost” money is more likely attributable to the fact that the film was absolute garbage. The fact that it got terrible reviews, was available online and still made over 80% of what X-Men 3 did shows how neglible an impact filesharing has on cinema releases.
There is definitely that too. It’s hard to say for sure though because they can’t just go back and have a redo. It’s one of those things that you could say it was any number of issues.
I watched it and I have to say there is so much wrong with the movie its unbelievable, in my opinion its downright terrible for what went into its marketing, and the budget behind it.
I still liked it but it was easily the worst one yet, there’s more violence in the first five minutes of ex 2 than this whole movie (they are an explosive five minutes), that’s the only spoiler I will provide.
It wasn’t horrible but it wasn’t fun. You don’t expect logic but really, trying to keep an abandoned building from blowing up? They could have rappelled down the side in all the time it took to set up that ridiculous nonsense. Something tells me a real military unit would have left the guy(s) behind to protect the device rather than shooting their way down only to have to scramble back up.
The majority of people who pirate this film before it’s release are the same ones who would have pirated it after the movie’s release. There’s probably very little difference between those two numbers. This will not effect the movies box office at all. If it cans, it’s because the public has no interest, not because it was leaked early. Anyone who pirates this movie
LOL you really think they have nothing to worry about?? A pretty much complete version of the movie is out about a month early, DVD quality and you think they have nothing to worry about?? hahahahaha funny
The expendables is an incredibly bad franchise. If I had all that star power, I would at least hire a good screenwriter so the script is not a complete insult to human intelligence. They deserve what they got.
I watched the movie and I cant believe it its worse than the previous 2 combined , Lionsgate should get bankrupt for making such a disastrous movie, also if you combine the net worth of the star power in the movie it adds up to billions so I dont understand why Sylvester will be upset, I think he is just making movies with all the dead action stars just to keep himself busy
Net worth of individual actors:
Sylvester Stallone $275m
Arnold schwarzenegger $300m
Mel gibson $475m
Harrison ford $200m
Jason sratham $30m
Wesley Snipes $10m
Antonio banderas $45m
Jet li $55m
kelsey grammer $60m
dolph lundgren $15m
terry crews $20m
randy couture $17m
> $1.5 billlion