Disney’s live-action remake of its popular Moana franchise looks to be on track to losing up to $100 million after its dismal start at the box office last weekend.
Despite coming in as the number one film over its debut weekend, the Dwyane Johnson-starring remake only brought in $43 million upon its debut, making it highly it will be able to break even with its $250 production budget.
The film, which is a near shot-by-shot remake of the ten-year-old animated movie that inspired it, also cost at least $120 million in marketing, bringing the flick’s final price tag to more than $370 million, according to Variety.
While the original might be ten years old, the animated sequel, Moana II, only came out two years ago and critics are saying that Disney should have waited a few more years to put out a live-action remake. Or, even given fans an animated Moana III and took a pass on the live-action version altogether.
It isn’t as if Disney fans aren’t interested in live-action remakes. In 2025, its live-action remake of Lilo & Stitch became a billion-dollar film. Other live-action versions of Disney classics have also done well. But there is usually more time between any sequel films and a live-action remake. In this case, this weekend’s Moana came out only two years after the animated Moana II.
On the other hand, the studio’s Snow White live-action attempt last year will rank up there as one of the film industry’s biggest losers of all time. The movie only brought in $205 million world-wide on a more than $400 million budget. But that film suffered from wave upon wave of bad publicity, misfired studio casting choices, accusations of wokeness, and a star that seemed to thrill at poking her audience in the eye over and over again before the film even came out.
Snow White ended up losing at least $170 million when all was said and done.
While Moana was not beset by a woke star’s big mouth, critics were not kind to the film, regardless. The film debuted to a disastrous 35 percent positive review rating, and industry analysts downgraded its opening earnings several times before it finally hit theaters.
Moana may not yet be a dead horse — or a dead sea horse, as the case may be. Despite this weekend’s drubbing, Disney has already announced that a third animated Moana sequel is in the works.
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