Disney (and others) at the Box Office - Current State of Affairs

[Agent H]

I don’t think anyone is saying it’s irrelevant. It’s more that the story is not the best for a modern day remake.

You’ve heard the term “didn’t age well?”

When I first saw the original I posted a fairly lengthy opinion on why a faithful remake wouldn’t resonate with modern audiences. It was posted in November 2024 in the now-closed Snow White thread.

We’re not “suddenly” saying this.

Perhaps irrelevant was the wrong term. But I truly don’t understand the insinuation that kids today would find the Snow White story as it was told in 1937 unenjoyable when for generations prior it didn’t seem that way. If it’s true it’s very depressing. As for the use of the term suddenly I have not read the entirety of that thread and I have thought this was a very strange thing to hear so much over the past month or so.

 

[TalkingHead]

You are right, there isn't much left. They've done like 25 of them now and that's the bulk of the low lying stuff.

Sleeping Beauty, Hercules, Tangled, P&tF, Brave, Coco, Frozen.. Encanto. I only bring half that up because of Moana... which I think is a terrible mistake.

Aristocats, Rescuers, Robin Hood, Sword in the Stone have direct to D+ energy.

I think Tarzan, Pochohantas and Hunchback are awkward for various reasons.

Edit - I'm dumb, Maleficent is sleeping beauty.

Since you’re the numbers guru, it’ll be interesting to see what kind of business Stitch will need to do to cover the eventual loss here.

 

[Chi84]

Perhaps irrelevant was the wrong term. But I truly don’t understand the insinuation that kids today would find the Snow White story as it was told in 1937 unenjoyable when for generations prior it didn’t seem that way. If it’s true it’s very depressing. As for the use of the term suddenly I have not read the entirety of that thread and I have thought this was a very strange thing to hear so much over the past month or so.

I think the Snow White story is wonderful. I read the story to my kids when they were young and it’s a fun story. It doesn’t take very long to read.

The dwarfs are great characters and the kids loved their antics at the Snow White character dinner.

But a full length film needs more story and character development than was contained in the original movie to fill the time and keep people’s interest.

We are talking about a very specific subject - whether the subject matter in the original film would translate to a modern movie.

 

[BlakeW39]

Plenty of kids grew up watching Snow White. Nostalgia for it is not limited to people who saw it in 1937.

Snow White was the 3rd highest selling VHS (not Disney VHS, in general) and either in or at least around the top ten highest selling Blu-rays depending on what source you look at, so probably those people. It also rereleased in theaters like twelve times all the way through to the 90s. Not sure what the streaming numbers are, admittedly, but the heavy switch to streaming is pretty recent, all things considered. Even if we presume no one streams it, that's pretty strong evidence people were watching it recently enough for young adults to have nostalgia for it.

I really don't understand why people suddenly act like we never moved past the "movies are in theaters then disappear" phase of movies when it comes to Snow White so only old people have watched it. Especially since you never hear this stuff for, like, Cinderella. 75 year old film is okay, but 88 years old will obviously only be watched by the elderly.


I do agree no one actually wanted this, though. Not because no one likes Snow White, but because I think most people knew the remake would turn out being garbage.

These are all fine points and I was hyperbolic in my comment. Obviously Snow White is not a film only known by or liked by old people. But I would postulate that the age of a film very much pertains to its relevance. 90s rennaisance era animated films like The Lion King, Aladdin, and Beauty and the Beast are much more culturally relevant than films like Snow White, Pinnochio, and Dumbo. I don't think this is the main reason for the film's financial struggles, but I do think it contributed.

 

[Vegas Disney Fan]

Oof, downright atrocious.

I saw Friday had a drop of 77%.

View attachment 850739

The rumblings of its boxoffice keep plummeting... whispers on the net now questioning if it will cross 80m domestic

"It likely wont even make back its advertising cost" has also entered the chat.

This is shocking for me, I expected this movie to struggle but this is far beyond even my worst expectations, I remember arguing over a year ago that Disney was in too deep to write this movie off but I’m starting to think they may have lost less had they just written off $250 million and got a tax write off.

My original guess (over a month ago) was a $100 million loss, after the predictions fell under $50 million for opening weekend I started thinking it would be a $200 million loss, now I’m starting to wonder if this could be a $300 million loss… and that’s based on a $500 million break even point.

Any hope of a big second weekend turning the tide seems to be lost.

 

[Agent H]

I think the Snow White story is wonderful. I read the story to my kids when they were young and it’s a fun story. It doesn’t take very long to read.

The dwarfs are great characters and the kids loved their antics at the Snow White character dinner.

But a full length film needs more story and character development than was contained in the original movie to fill the time and keep people’s interest.

We are talking about a very specific subject - whether the subject matter in the original film would translate to a modern movie.

I haven’t Seen the movie yet and probably won’t for several months so I don’t know if the new movie will have more character development and story than the old one. The only thing I see that could be significantly improved is the love story which I’ll admit is a little underdeveloped.

 

[Chi84]

I haven’t Seen the movie yet and probably won’t for several months so I don’t know if the new movie will have more character development and story than the old one. The only thing I see that could be significantly improved is the love story which I’ll admit is a little underdeveloped.

“A little underdeveloped” is an understatement. The Prince in the original doesn’t even have a name and has less than 3 minutes of screen time.

 

[TalkingHead]

These are all fine points and I was hyperbolic in my comment. Obviously Snow White is not a film only known by or liked by old people. But I would postulate that the age of a film very much pertains to its relevance. 90s rennaisance era animated films like The Lion King, Aladdin, and Beauty and the Beast are much more culturally relevant than films like Snow White, Pinnochio, and Dumbo. I don't think this is the main reason for the film's financial struggles, but I do think it contributed.

If so it’s evidence of how Disney under Iger has failed to leverage the company’s pre-1990s catalog.

 

[Agent H]

“A little underdeveloped” is an understatement. The Prince in the original doesn’t even have a name and has less than 3 minutes of screen time.

According to my research Disney France and Disney On Ice have referred to him in the past as prince Florian.

 

[Farerb]

According to my research Disney France and Disney On Ice have referred to him in the past as prince Florian.

They didn't give him a name originally just like The Evil Queen or Cinderella's prince or The Beast. Their names were invented by fans or marketing.

 

[Agent H]

They didn't give him a name originally just like The Evil Queen or Cinderella's prince or The Beast. Their names were invented by fans or marketing.

Cinderellas prince didn’t have a name originally? I thought it was always Prince Charming.

 

[Farerb]

Cinderellas prince didn’t have a name originally? I thought it was always Prince Charming.

He was never called Charming. It was Snow White who called her prince Charming. Cinderella never did.

 

[Agent H]

He was never called Charming. It was Snow White who called her prince Charming. Cinderella never did.

Yeah I do remember hearing something when I was a kid about how the prince was the same person as the prince from Cinderella and he was a dirty two timer. Yes I understand how crazy that sounds. They are obviously two different characters. In any case the one from Cinderella will always be Prince Charming to me.

 

[Farerb]

Talking about Princes - one interesting thing about the remake is that they gave the "not a prince" the plotline of Prince Phillip being captured by Maleficent (Evil Queen) and then gets free to save Aurora (Snow White). The truth is that Walt wanted to do it originally in Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs but it was dropped because of limitations. It was later revived for Sleeping Beauty.

Another thing that was revived in Sleeping Beauty was the Prince and Princess dancing on a cloud. It was originally meant for Cinderella and there's even a deleted song.

 

[WorldExplorer]

Talking about Princes - one interesting thing about the remake is that they gave the "not a prince" the plotline of Prince Phillip being captured by Maleficent (Evil Queen) and then gets free to save Aurora (Snow White). The truth is that Walt wanted to do it originally in Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs but it was dropped because of limitations. It was later revived for Sleeping Beauty.

Another thing that was revived in Sleeping Beauty was the Prince and Princess dancing on a cloud. It was originally meant for Cinderella and there's even a deleted song.

I can't find the source, but I believe at one point they also considered a thing where the Prince and Evil Queen were in conflict because Snow White's dad was actually the latest in a line of kings she forced to marry her and she was turning to his kingdom next.

Not sure where I read it, though.

 

[BrianLo]

Since you’re the numbers guru, it’ll be interesting to see what kind of business Stitch will need to do to cover the eventual loss here.

I don't know if the 150M budget figure I'm seeing is accurate. If so that seems pretty reasonable starting point for Stitch

Maybe starting at 775M to also cover the loss of Snow, on the high end 900M.

(In these ranges Stitch would be safely making like 200-250M, which seems like the loss Snow is heading for).

 

[BrianLo]

This is shocking for me, I expected this movie to struggle but this is far beyond even my worst expectations, I remember arguing over a year ago that Disney was in too deep to write this movie off but I’m starting to think they may have lost less had they just written off $250 million and got a tax write off.

My original guess (over a month ago) was a $100 million loss, after the predictions fell under $50 million for opening weekend I started thinking it would be a $200 million loss, now I’m starting to wonder if this could be a $300 million loss… and that’s based on a $500 million break even point, I’ve seen estimates over $600 million for the break even point, this thing has the potential to lose $400 million, that’s absolutely insane.

Any hope of a big second weekend turning the tide seems to be lost.

Your numbers are too high there. It has the potential to lose 200-250 million, which is less than production holding company will have ultimately rung up at the time of release (like 375M or so). That loss is still a "tax credit" as it were, but they don't need to bury the film to access it.

The only way it would have made sense to write it off is if the back end and box office can't cover marketing (from the point of deciding to cancel it) and distribution fees. That's almost impossible not to have covered, box office receipts would need to approach zero and they'd have to have a sheer disinterest of post market buyers.

The reason we've seen some of the D+ productions be written off is that the box office was empirically zero and there was more to gain by having the service own up to having overpaid for it. This film on the other hand is already in an isolated production subsidiary. Snow won't be overpaid for by D+, because its value is largely already being determined by the box office window.

 

[BlakeW39]

Because the “Snow White is a dated IP that no one really remembers or cares for” is a transparently pathetic excuse conjured up by a few posters here over the course of the last week.

Disney’s Snow White is a year older than Superman, and two years older than Batman. And it came out two years earlier than The Wizard of Oz, which did not seem to hurt the enthusiasm or awareness of Wicked Pt. 1.

Maybe the demarcation point for when IP is hopelessly old is 1938?

Huh, what a ridiculous comparison. Superman & Batman appear in countless TV shows, movies, and comic books on the regular basis. The date they were first created is completely irrelevant because they are not defined by their first appearances. At all. Comparing these characters to Snow White is just deliberately obtuse.

Snow White is definitely not an IP that no one remembers or cares for... but I do think Snow White's age has to do with why we'll see it become less successful than The Little Mermaid for instance, or any of the rennaisance remakes.

 

[erasure fan1]

You are purposely leaving off the rest of the post intentionally so you can get mad because you want to take the second part out of context and make it about something else.

Here is the post -


I didn't realize I needed to break it down further but here goes.

The 50/50 being talked about here is the voting block, which represents only ~150M total people who voted in the last election not the ~340ish M total people that live in the country, which is only about ~40ish % of the population that voted. Of that ~150M that voted, 50% voted for one candidate and 50% voted for the other candidate. Meaning that its only 20-25% of the entire ~340M people is who voted for the current occupant of the Oval Office. So that is not 50% of the country, its only 50% of a voting block.

So clearly the second paragraph is talking about how Zelger's post is being framed by many (I did not target you specifically because many here try to say the same thing) as her insulting half the country, when in fact her post is only about those that voted for a certain candidate which represents only 20-25% of the entire population.

No where did I claim anything about the other 75% of the population. You're trying to infer your own meaning into my post that clearly wasn't there.

Your digging.

I just dislike when people frame it as half the country being insulted when its really less than a quarter.

You are clearly talking about HALF the country. Not the voting population. And it's funny because you said that about me when I was asking the percentage of the vote. You are clearly being disingenuous. Or you don't want to just say sorry, I didn't phrase it right. Either way it doesn't matter because the agendas are clear around here. Here's my question. You said you never said anything about 75%. So if less than 25% of all people were offended. How many were not?

 

[Serpico Jones]

What a disaster. It almost makes me miss Michael Eisner!