CaptainJackSparrow Posted September 30, 2013 Author Share Posted September 30, 2013 Had the Emperors New Groove and Atlantis changed spots, would they have done better? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cwhitty Posted October 1, 2013 Share Posted October 1, 2013 It feels like there are already 542 threads on this topic, but I'll bite. The Emperor's New Groove looked really strange at the time. Of course, it was well-received, had strong legs, and has grown a much wider following on home video; but when it was first released, it looked more crudely-designed and more slapstick than traditional Disney fare, which had a somewhat more dignified air to it (which was especially true in the '90s, when practically every non-Disney animated movie prior to The Rugrats Movie and The Prince of Egypt bombed in theatres). It also didn't help its case that it opened in the wake of a four-week run at #1 for The Grinch, which was also the highest-grossing release of the year. Atlantis was one of Disney's early-2000s attempts to go in an edgier, more male-oriented direction. The common assumption is that they saw the obscene amounts of money The Phantom Menace made at the box office and in merchandising, and figured that targeting boys in particular was the way to go. The thing they were forgetting, however, is that at least half of the Disney empire is built on princesses and "girly stuff," so they were shutting out a decent portion of the potential kid audience by making a movie aimed so squarely at one gender. Even their movies with princesses in the leading roles still had plenty of male characters to advertise; that wasn't the case with the ladies in Atlantis, which had a love interest, a token woman on the expedition team, and nothing else. The cherry on top was that it opened a month after a little movie called Shrek, which was bringing in family audiences left and right en route to being the biggest hit of the summer. Treasure Planet has a very similar explanation to Atlantis. It was for the boys only. Worse yet, it opened at the same time that the second Harry Potter movie was getting most of the kid business, and The Santa Clause 2 was a bigger hit than Disney had expected it would be. So as the last one to open, Treasure Planet was the odd one out. It also didn't do a whole lot to sell its story over its visuals. Big Fish didn't really flop; it just wasn't a big hit (in fact, the same applies at least somewhat to Atlantis and Emperor's New Groove after international numbers are factored in). The trouble was that it was a tough movie to sell in two minutes or less. The Haunted Mansion fell into similar territory as Big Fish as far as the performance goes. I would give a detailed analysis as to why it didn't make more money, but most of that analysis can be summed up in just one sentence: it looked like shit (and it was). I agree with the succinct analysis above but I do feel for Treasure Planet and New Groove one of the factors that affected them was the decline in quality of the Disney products and the changes in the marketplace with computer animated films. Tarzan was a big success but for me Mulan, Hercules and Hunchback are poor films. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lab276 Posted October 1, 2013 Share Posted October 1, 2013 Thanks for the analysis Webslinger. :)Can you explain to me why Hercules, while still profitable, didn't cross 100 mil?Tickets weren't expensive enough. Just an extra 5c and it would've made it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
