Benedict Cumberbatch's portrayal of Wikileaks founder Julian Assange in new biopic The Fifth Estate has officially been deemed a box office flop after grossing just US$1.7 million ($NZ2 million) in the US, making it the worst major debut of the year so far.
The thriller, directed by Bill Condon, charts the story of the controversial whistleblowing website, but it fell flat when it debuted in the UK earlier this month, taking a pitiful £502,000 ($NZ955,000) in its opening weekend, and now it's failed to draw audiences on the other side of the Atlantic, too.
The movie, which cost US$26 million to make for Participant Media and Steven Spielberg's DreamWorks Studios, scraped into the US top 10 at eight, despite opening in more than 1500 theatres nationwide.
Read: Assange wrote off 'debauched' Cumberbatch performance.
It provided little competition for Sandra Bullock and George Clooney's space disaster epic Gravity, which took US$31 million (A$32.15 million) in its third weekend of release to stay at number one, while Tom Hanks' kidnap drama Captain Phillips remained at two with US$17.3 million (A$17.94 million).
