Low $55 million debut for Moana deepens Disney’s live-action remake woes
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Australian actress Catherine Laga’aia plays Moana, the intrepid daughter of village chief Tui, in the live-action remake of Moana.
PHOTO: THE WALT DISNEY COMPANY
LOS ANGELES – Walt Disney’s Moana debuted to US$43 million (S$55 million) in ticket sales in the United States and Canada over the weekend, a disappointing haul in a franchise that has otherwise delivered strong profits for the company’s film studio and consumer products division.
The opening sales are in keeping with that of a handful of other recent high-budget, live-action remakes of animated films from Disney, such as Snow White (2025), that ultimately became unprofitable laggards at the box office.
Moana, which cost US$250 million to produce, retreads the plot of the 2016 animated film of the same name based on the fictitious Polynesian island of Motunui. It stars American actor Dwayne Johnson in the role of demi-god Maui and Australian actress Catherine Laga’aia as Moana, the intrepid daughter of village chief Tui who leaves the island and battles a volcanic demon.
The poor performance of the live-action remake stands in stark contrast to the beloved original, which is the most-streamed movie in the US since 2020, according to Nielsen. The animated Moana 2, which came out in cinemas in November 2024, was a huge hit and generated more than US$1 billion at the box office.
The latest film holds just a 35 per cent approval rating with critics on review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes.
The ticket sales of Disney’s recent live-action remakes have broadly halved compared with the studio’s entries in the 2010s. The Little Mermaid (2023) and Mufasa: The Lion King (2024) took in US$569.6 million and US$723 million respectively.
While those sums are defendable, they are a fraction of what similar pictures such as The Jungle Book (2016), Beauty And The Beast (2017), Aladdin (2019) and The Lion King (2019) sold in movie tickets between 2016 and 2019.
Each of those films took in almost or more than US$1 billion. Lilo & Stitch (2025) was a notable exception and success, also achieving more than US$1 billion at the box office.
During the Covid-19 pandemic, Disney released several live-action remakes, including Mulan (2020), Pinocchio (2022) and Peter Pan & Wendy (2023) directly on its flagship Disney+ streaming service.
David Gross, author of a popular movie industry newsletter, wrote that “the average interval of time between the previous episode and the remake is 27 years. During that time, a new generation of kids watch the movie at home, and original fans get to enjoy it again. The audience expands”.
Releasing a live-action remake just 10 years after the original animated Moana, and less than two years after that film’s sequel, was too short a turnaround to cultivate new moviegoers, Gross argues.
To be sure, Disney films that generate low sales in cinemas can still find success later through pay-per-view or draw large audiences to Disney+. Despite critics’ poor view of the Moana live-action film, audiences on Rotten Tomatoes give it an approval rating of 90 per cent.
Still, Moana’s opening hampers the chances of a live-action sequel or spin-off entry in the franchise.
It is one of Disney’s lows this summer, along with the first Star Wars film in seven years – The Mandalorian And Grogu – which has generated the worst results for a movie in that universe since Disney acquired franchise owner Lucasfilm in 2012.
Disney has otherwise seen major success with recent films, including The Devil Wears Prada 2 and Toy Story 5 from Pixar Animation Studios. Bloomberg
