Sunday, December 13, 2009

Best Film Of 2009...

A nice start...





Time Magazine is out with their Top 10 List of Everything and in it is the Top 10 List of Films as well...

1. The Princess and the Frog
2. Up
3. Fantastic Mr. Fox
4. The Hurt Locker
5. Up in the Air
6. The White Ribbon
7. A Single Man
8. Of Time and the City
9. District 9
10. Thirst

So the top two were films from the Mouse. And the top one was from Disney's animation unit. Nice. I'll have my own comments/review of "The Princess and the Frog" later this week. But it's nice that the first hand-drawn film from WDAS in over half a decade has received glowing reviews and Time considers it the number one film of the year. Take that, Michael Eisner!

Now, work on "Rapunzel" steadily moves on...

26 comments:

Theme Park Fan said...

Sadly It only brought in 25 million this weekend a clear dissapointment to WDAS. I Hope Rich Ross doesnt get trigger happy and cancel future animation projects.. I am optimistic that this will have legs and get to 100 million but it looks like it may not cover production costs untill dvd and merchandise is factored in.

Honor Hunter said...

Rich Ross doesn't have the power to cancel further animation projects. He's mainly in charge of live action. Lasseter controls animation. The only person that can overrule him is Iger.

Don't worry too much about that opening. I'll talk more about it later this week.

Unknown said...

I do agree that it was a very sad opening weekend, but I have a feeling this is going to be like Cars for girls when it comes to merchandise. I went to the event at the Ziegfeld and there were already little girls running around in Tiana dresses. And while all the other princesses compete with each other, Tiana has a guaranteed fan base (African American girls) which guarantees that her merchandise will do well.

On another note, I'm a little disappointed that Fantastic Mr Fox was in the number 3 slot, because when I went to go see it, no one was laughing (neither adults nor kids) and most people were sleeping.

Kevin Bruehl said...

I'm confident that Princess will be successful. There is absolutely nothing racist about it, I can't stand people who say that Disney is full of evil stuff. Ask yourself, how would they know, and why would they be looking for stuff like that? Think about it. I saw Princess and the Frog at the Walt Disney Studios in Burbank early release, it was fantastic, love everything about it, especially Dr. Facilier, what I would give to voice a Disney villain.

Tom said...

Isn't 25 million not that bad?!?

Look at:

Home on the Range: 13 million
Brother Bear: 19 million
Treasure Planet: 12 million
Lilo & Stitch: 35 million (ok...)
Atlantis: 20 million
Emperor's New Groove: 9,8 million

I don't think Tiana did a bad job :)

Anonymous said...

@% Mil is what was estemated since the Christmas Holiday break hasn't started. All is right with the world

Unknown said...

I don't really understand box office figures - I can never tell whats good and whats bad until someone else tells me :P

But Disney should have more faith in their properties. I'm sure they do now with Lasseter et al. The value of PatF will show over time if they continue to promote it rather than dropping it quickly (ala the past ten years, one or two exceptions withstanding).

btw. Finally got to see Prep & Landing this evening - very nice.

Blake said...

sad stab at Michael Eisner. I love him.

Anonymous said...

Wow best picture of the year and it's only been out in theaters two days? I'm not going to see this film in theaters when I can get a better presentation at home on my HD TV and sound system. The suits have yet to realize that the presentation at home is better than the theater. The price of a ticket today is rediculous. The movie thaters are blurry or over exposed on large screens, yes even Sony 4K theaters too!

Anonymous said...

The list seems a little funky... Why are the top 3 films animation?

Mr.Thomas said...

Anonymous above me...
Maybe it has to do with their quality? Animation and live action are both just mediums used to tell stories. The fact that the top three are animated just has nothing to do with why they've been chosen on the list.

I do however think that it's cool that we have all three types of animation at the top. Hand dawn, CGI, and stop motion. :)

Doopey said...

Yes, $25 million is a weak opening. Tom, you are comparing it to all of the previous flop hand-drawn films (excepting Stitch), unadjusted for ticket price inflation (which would make the $25 mil look even worse). Princess and the Frog was supposed to move beyond the past disappointments, not be more of the same. But, it did get an audience CinemaScore of "A", which is pretty rare, so maybe it will hold up well over the holidays. And I agree with the "Cars" analogy posted above that the synergy that is generated will pay dividends down the road. Unfortunately, in terms of pure box office, I think the Chipmunks are going to squash it. It realistically needs to make at least $150-200 mil to be an unqualified box office success. Otherwise it reinforces the notion that only Pixar can make successful animation at Disney.

Doopey said...

To Anonymous regarding home theater: I'm sorry, but I just don't think there's any comparison between the average home theater and a quality movie theater, particularly one with digital projection,(unless you have some crazy-expensive custom system).

Anonymous said...

I guess I do Doopey. :p
A Blu-ray player and a backlit LCD with LEDs, it's amazing!!! I have a pretty awesome sound system too!

Anonymous said...

IMO Princess and Frog is a very good film but not one of Disney's truly great animated features...there are also several better films this year, including Pixar's "Up."

$25 million is a very weak opening...less than Bolt. Now, PAF is better than Bolt, and with word of mouth plus x-mas break, it should do better. Still it will be a struggle to make $150 mil domestically with $25 mil opening. Hopefully overseas take will compensate...this film deserves a better take.

- Tasman

Alex said...

I'm glad to see that Time was so enamored with the film. I've seen 'Up' 3 times and have seen 'The Princess and the Frog' once, so it's too soon for me to make a decision as to which I prefer. However, I would rate them as my top 2 favorite films of 2009 as well.

In terms of the box office debate, I think the biggest problem the film had was the fact that it has the word "princess" in the title, which pretty much cuts out half of the population in terms of appeal. I have faith that word of mouth will give the film legs at the box office. I don't think it will be on the list of the top 10 highest grossing animated films, but hopefully it will be considered successful by the end of its run.

Matt said...

I'm hoping word of mouth helps it out like The Blind Side.

Bob and Rob Professional American Writers said...

What a really good film. There's a good chance I'll see it again by the end of the week! The 25 mil, I'm thinking will hold up fine, as was mentioned above when the kids get out for the Holidays. Cheers, Bob

Theme Park Fan said...

It was originally scheduled to open on xmas but disney got scared off by the chipmunks squeakuel

Mr. Nice Guy No More said...

"sad stab at Michael Eisner. I love him."

Love him all you want, it was his doing that caused the quality of films to go in the toilet. Maybe you liked crappy films but most of us didn't.

Justin said...

Regarding Movie Theater vs. Home Theater, I think you just need to listen to some comments that Bob Iger has made and Rich Ross' track record. I think very soon you're going to see DVDs released only a couple of months after the movie is released in the theater.

Anonymous said...

I don't trust Time Magazine's Best 10... for anything. They put gave Brad Paisley the best album of 2009.

Thomas Phillip said...

Well correct me if I'm wrong but when Little Mermaid came out it wasn't exactly a box office smash; but it did have legs. 20 years after it's release it's become a Disney classic. I believe this will be the case with P&F.

Anonymous said...

the 25 million was the expected opening for the movie. It is actually the highest eraning animated movie for a December time slot. It should do well in the next couple weeks until possibly the Alvin movie which will cut into its family demographics. I think it should eventually do well.

PirateGuy 815 said...

It's so diassapointing that a quality film like this had to move its opening so a craptacular film like The Chimpmunks would beat it. I had the pleasure of sitting through the first one, and its the biggest waste of 90 minutes ever.

2.0 and Beyond said...

Justin said...
“Regarding Movie Theater vs. Home Theater, I think you just need to listen to some comments that Bob Iger has made and Rich Ross' track record. I think very soon you're going to see DVDs released only a couple of months after the movie is released in the theater.”


That’s already happening. And my cable company has some films available as on-demand selections while the film is still in theaters. ALso, if it hasn’t happened already, they will probably eventually sell the DVD’s at the theater while it’s still being shown.

Iger has been a big advocate of those kinds of moves. But I see is as eliminating levels of revenue for short-term quick returns.