For the third time this year, following strong openings from The Hunger Games and Snow White and the Huntsman, a movie with a tough female protagonist topped the box office in a major way.
Disney-Pixar’s Brave was right on target in its debut weekend, opening to $66.7 million — the fifth-best debut ever for a Pixar film, and a faster start than last year’s Cars 2, which opened with $66.1 million. Brave continued Pixar’s streak of number one debuts, as all 13 of the studio’s releases have reached the peak position during their first weekend of wide release.
“Girls kick butt,” says Dave Hollis, Disney’s EVP of distribution, about the rise of the female action protagonist at the 2012 box office. Still, he believes that gender had less to do with Brave‘s successful opening weekend than audiences’ trust in Pixar. “There’s a universal love of this brand,” he says, praising their “consistency [as] classic storytellers.”
Disney wisely marketed the film differently to boys and girls — much like the studio did when releasing another princess film, Tangled, in 2010. For that film, Disney created a campaign that focused as much on Tangled‘s humorous male character, Flynn Rider, as it did on the film’s main character, Rapunzel. For Brave, Disney targeted males with ads that emphasized the film’s rambunctious Scottish hijinks and mischievous red-headed triplets. Meanwhile, girls were targeted with ads that focused more on Brave‘s central character, Merida, and her quest to change her fate. Still, Hollis notes that there were numerous images that spoke to both males and females, such as shots of Merida riding her horse through the woods.
Despite rather tepid reviews (compared to the rest of Pixar’s catalog), the $185 million Scottish adventure earned an “A” CinemaScore grade from audiences, which were 57 percent female and 43 percent male. Thanks to good word-of-mouth, Brave will likely enjoy small declines over the ensuing weeks (although it will face direct competition when Ice Age: Continental Drift debuts on July 13), and if history is any indication, finish somewhere in the $200 million range.
http://insidemovies.ew.com/2012/06/24/box-office-report-brave-abraham-lincoln-vampire-hunter/
Link
Disney-Pixar’s Brave was right on target in its debut weekend, opening to $66.7 million — the fifth-best debut ever for a Pixar film, and a faster start than last year’s Cars 2, which opened with $66.1 million. Brave continued Pixar’s streak of number one debuts, as all 13 of the studio’s releases have reached the peak position during their first weekend of wide release.
“Girls kick butt,” says Dave Hollis, Disney’s EVP of distribution, about the rise of the female action protagonist at the 2012 box office. Still, he believes that gender had less to do with Brave‘s successful opening weekend than audiences’ trust in Pixar. “There’s a universal love of this brand,” he says, praising their “consistency [as] classic storytellers.”
Disney wisely marketed the film differently to boys and girls — much like the studio did when releasing another princess film, Tangled, in 2010. For that film, Disney created a campaign that focused as much on Tangled‘s humorous male character, Flynn Rider, as it did on the film’s main character, Rapunzel. For Brave, Disney targeted males with ads that emphasized the film’s rambunctious Scottish hijinks and mischievous red-headed triplets. Meanwhile, girls were targeted with ads that focused more on Brave‘s central character, Merida, and her quest to change her fate. Still, Hollis notes that there were numerous images that spoke to both males and females, such as shots of Merida riding her horse through the woods.
Despite rather tepid reviews (compared to the rest of Pixar’s catalog), the $185 million Scottish adventure earned an “A” CinemaScore grade from audiences, which were 57 percent female and 43 percent male. Thanks to good word-of-mouth, Brave will likely enjoy small declines over the ensuing weeks (although it will face direct competition when Ice Age: Continental Drift debuts on July 13), and if history is any indication, finish somewhere in the $200 million range.
http://insidemovies.ew.com/2012/06/24/box-office-report-brave-abraham-lincoln-vampire-hunter/
Link
