Disney’s live-action Moana opens below hopes, turning a sure-thing franchise into Hollywood’s latest remake test

By Zuri Okafor | Entertainment

Disney’s live-action “Moana” is still the weekend’s top movie in North America. The problem for Disney is that “top movie” and “big enough movie” are not the same thing.

The Dwayne Johnson-led remake opened Friday with about $18 million from roughly 3,875 North American theaters, according to Saturday box office estimates reported by Variety, Deadline and The Hollywood Reporter. Weekend projections clustered around $42 million to $46 million domestically, or about $45 million at the midpoint. For most studios, that would be a respectable summer debut. For a Disney live-action remake carrying a reported $250 million production budget before global marketing costs, built from one of the company’s most streamed and merchandised modern franchises, it is a warning light.

The central entertainment story is not that audiences rejected “Moana” outright. They did not, at least not among the people who showed up. Deadline reported that the film earned an A- CinemaScore, including stronger marks from women and younger moviegoers, and a solid PostTrak definite-recommend score. The sharper issue is demand compression: Disney asked families to return to the same island, with many of the same emotional beats, less than two years after “Moana 2” became a billion-dollar theatrical event. This weekend suggests that even a beloved brand can run into a very practical consumer question: why now?

That question lands beyond one title. Hollywood’s summer has been shaped by franchise insurance — sequels, remakes, revived horror brands, superhero tracking and animated tentpoles designed to reduce risk in a theatrical market that still punishes expensive misses. “Moana” was supposed to be one of the safer bets: a known Disney property, a returning global star in Johnson as Maui, a new lead in Catherine Laga’aia as Moana, and a family audience that has repeatedly treated the original 2016 film like comfort food on Disney+. Instead, the opening is forcing a more uncomfortable conversation about the shelf life of live-action remakes when the original animated property has never really left the room.

The numbers changed the story fast

Before release, expectations were higher. Deadline’s preview coverage said the live-action “Moana” had been looking at a global opening around $130 million, with domestic tracking in the $60 million-plus range and some estimates as high as $75 million. The film was booked in about 3,900 theaters, with premium formats including Imax, PLF, 3D and 4DX. It had the kind of footprint usually reserved for an event movie.

By Saturday morning, the story had narrowed. Deadline reported that the film’s Friday-and-preview number came in at $18 million and that the weekend was now expected in the $42 million to $46 million range. Variety separately reported an $18 million opening day and a projected $45 million weekend. The Hollywood Reporter also placed the projected domestic opening at roughly $45 million, well short of the hoped-for $60 million-plus figure and below earlier tracking that had suggested a possible $75 million start.

Those estimates matter because scale is the whole business model here. Variety reported that the live-action version cost $250 million, compared with $175 million for the 2016 animated original. Deadline also reported a $250 million production cost before global prints and advertising. That means “Moana” needs more than a clean No. 1 ranking; it needs long legs in North America, meaningful international strength, and repeat family viewing to make the math feel comfortable.

The comparison to the original “Moana” is not flattering on opening weekend. Variety noted that the 2016 animated film opened to $56 million over its three-day domestic debut and finished with $642 million worldwide. The Hollywood Reporter put the original’s global total at $643 million and noted that it opened over Thanksgiving with an $82 million five-day domestic launch. Either way, the live-action version is starting below the first film’s three-day domestic debut despite nine years of franchise growth, Disney+ exposure and a larger production spend.

The tougher comparison is “Moana 2.” The animated sequel, originally developed as a Disney+ series before being reworked into a theatrical feature, became a major win for Disney. Deadline reported that it opened to a Thanksgiving five-day North American record of $225.4 million, with a $139.7 million three-day weekend, and ultimately passed $1 billion worldwide. The Hollywood Reporter likewise noted that “Moana 2” topped $1 billion globally after opening to $225 million over the five-day Thanksgiving frame. That success is exactly why the live-action remake looked logical on paper — and exactly why it may have felt too soon in practice.

This is not a simple “audiences hate remakes” story

The easy take is that audiences are tired of remakes. The real take is messier.

Disney has made enormous money translating animated classics into live-action or photorealistic versions. Variety cited “The Jungle Book” at $967 million worldwide, “Beauty and the Beast” at $1.26 billion and “The Lion King” at $1.6 billion. The Hollywood Reporter noted that “Alice in Wonderland,” “Beauty and the Beast” and “The Lion King” each opened above $100 million domestically. The model has worked — loudly.

But the model has become more uneven. Variety pointed to “The Little Mermaid,” which grossed $569 million worldwide, and “Snow White,” which grossed $205 million worldwide, as recent examples that did not generate enough business to justify their costs. The Hollywood Reporter drew the most direct domestic comparison: “Moana” is opening in the same general neighborhood as “Snow White,” which debuted to $42 million in March 2025 with a reported $270 million production budget and became a box office disappointment.

There is also a counterexample sitting right in Disney’s recent history. The Hollywood Reporter reported that “Lilo & Stitch” opened in May 2025 to $146 million in North America and later hit $1 billion globally, strong enough that Disney moved ahead with more activity around that property. Variety called that success an outlier in the recent remake cycle. That label is important. It suggests the market is not rejecting live-action nostalgia across the board; it is becoming more selective about timing, novelty and whether a remake feels like an event rather than a content-calendar reflex.

“Moana” may be paying for being both beloved and overpresent. Deadline’s analysis put the issue bluntly: families had just watched “Moana 2” in theaters, and “Moana” is arriving as the third family film in less than a month after the strong performances of “Toy Story 5” and Illumination/Universal’s “Minions & Monsters.” That does not mean families dislike the brand. It may mean the brand did not create urgency this weekend.

The audience that arrived liked it better than critics did

One reason this opening is complicated: the first wave of paying moviegoers appears more positive than critics.

Deadline reported an A- CinemaScore, with women and younger viewers grading the film especially well. It also reported that women made up 62 percent of the audience, led by women over 25 at 32 percent and women under 25 at 31 percent. The largest age demo was 18-to-24 at 30 percent, with 18-to-34 viewers representing 55 percent. Deadline’s PostTrak figures showed a 63 percent definite-recommend score overall, with stronger enthusiasm among women over 25 and women overall.

Those numbers point to a movie with a real fan base inside the opening-weekend audience. They also complicate the “flop” label while the weekend is still unfolding. A soft opening for an expensive film is a problem. A soft opening with positive audience response is a different kind of problem: less about immediate rejection, more about whether Disney can convert goodwill into midweek family traffic before the theatrical calendar gets louder.

Critics were less warm. Deadline reported that the live-action “Moana” had a 35 percent Rotten Tomatoes critics score as of Friday morning, while The Hollywood Reporter cited a 34 percent critics rating. The critical complaint, as summarized across coverage, is familiar for Disney remakes: too faithful, too safe, too close to the animated version to justify itself as a new theatrical experience.

That divide matters culturally. Disney’s live-action strategy has often relied on familiarity as a selling point: audiences know the songs, the characters, the iconography and the emotional map. But when the original is still constantly watched at home, familiarity can flip from advantage to burden. If a remake is too different, fans accuse it of breaking what worked. If it is too similar, families may decide they already own the experience.

The release date made a safe bet riskier

The calendar is doing “Moana” no favors.

Deadline reported that Disney likely chose this frame partly because the alternatives were worse. Universal’s “The Odyssey” arrives July 17, and Sony/Marvel Studios’ “Spider-Man: Brand New Day” is set for July 31, both positioned as massive late-July events. The weekend of July 24 would have placed “Moana” between two expected giants. Opening earlier gave Disney a cleaner family lane, but not an empty one.

The family market is crowded. Deadline projected “Minions & Monsters” for about $21 million in its second weekend after a roughly 43 percent decline, with a domestic total near $108 million by Sunday. “Toy Story 5” was projected around $18 million to $19 million in its fourth weekend, pushing past $400 million domestically and already past $800 million globally, according to Variety and The Hollywood Reporter. That is a lot of kid-ticket competition before “Moana” even gets to weekday business.

The broader summer box office is not collapsing. Deadline’s preview story noted that the domestic box office was on the verge of passing $5 billion and was running 13 percent ahead of 2025, while the summer frame was 12 percent ahead of the same period a year earlier. So Disney cannot simply blame a cold market. The market is alive; the question is why this movie did not become the weekend’s automatic family stampede.

One answer is that audiences are making sharper choices. Families paying for multiple tickets, concessions and premium formats do not treat every branded release as mandatory. If they have already paid for “Toy Story 5,” recently sampled “Minions & Monsters,” and still remember “Moana 2” as a very recent theatrical trip, the live-action remake has to work harder to become urgent.

Disney’s franchise machine is facing a timing problem

The “Moana” release also shows how streaming-era development choices can complicate theatrical strategy.

Deadline reported that the live-action “Moana” was announced by Johnson and Disney CEO Bob Iger during a 2023 shareholder meeting. It also reported that Disney later converted a planned Disney+ animated “Moana” series into the theatrical sequel “Moana 2,” which became a billion-dollar hit. That move solved one problem — Disney needed a major theatrical title, and it got one — but it created another: the live-action remake now arrived after the sequel had already refreshed the franchise in theaters.

That sequence is unusual. Many live-action remakes trade on a long nostalgia gap: parents remember the animated film from childhood, kids discover the story in a new format, and the studio sells the remake as a generational bridge. “Moana” did not have that kind of distance. The original is from 2016. The sequel is from 2024. The songs never left Disney+. The brand never had time to become dormant.

That is why this weekend matters for the entertainment business. Studios keep talking about IP as if audience awareness is the same thing as audience urgency. “Moana” proves the difference. Awareness is knowing Maui’s hook, singing along to the soundtrack, recognizing the ocean, buying the toy. Urgency is leaving the house this weekend because the theatrical version feels necessary. Disney has the first. This weekend suggests it may not have fully created the second.

The rest of the box office reinforces the lesson

The other new releases make the weekend look less like a one-movie stumble and more like a market sorting exercise.

Warner Bros. and New Line’s “Evil Dead Burn” opened with about $6.7 million Friday, including previews, according to Deadline, Variety and The Hollywood Reporter. Deadline projected a weekend near $15 million, with a B CinemaScore, while Variety noted that the film is pacing below the $25 million opening of 2023’s “Evil Dead Rise.” Horror has its own economics, though. Variety emphasized that “Evil Dead” movies are made cheaply enough that the bar for profitability is lower than it is for a Disney tentpole.

A24’s “The Invite,” directed by and starring Olivia Wilde, expanded wide and landed in the low single-digit millions. Variety reported a $2.4 million Friday and described the launch as promising given a reported $12 million acquisition spend after Sundance. Deadline projected a weekend around $4.3 million to $5.1 million depending on estimates. Again, the lesson is scale. A modest adult comedy can be healthy at numbers that would be alarming for a $250 million family remake.

That is the box office reality studios keep relearning: opening-weekend rank is not the same as success. The cost structure defines the story. “Moana” will win the weekend, but it is being judged against a global franchise budget, a Disney remake legacy, and the recent billion-dollar performance of “Moana 2.” “The Invite” can be judged against a much smaller spend. “Evil Dead Burn” can survive on horror margins. Disney’s remake machine does not get that luxury.

What to watch next

The next test is whether positive audience scores translate into legs. A- CinemaScore family movies can recover some ground if parents treat the opening as optional but the film becomes a weekday or second-weekend outing. Disney will also look overseas, where Deadline’s preview story expected a broad international footprint, with Japan and Italy arriving later. A domestic underperformance is not automatically fatal if the global result is strong enough.

Still, the opening has already changed the conversation. “Moana” was not supposed to be the summer’s philosophical test of remake fatigue. It was supposed to be the dependable one: a proven character, a returning star, a gigantic Disney+ footprint and a theatrical brand with recent billion-dollar heat. That is what makes the softness so instructive.

For Disney, the lesson may not be “stop remaking animated movies.” The company has too much history proving the opposite can work. The lesson is more specific and more useful: do not confuse constant availability with fresh demand. A franchise can be loved, streamed, quoted, merchandised and still not feel like an urgent theatrical purchase when the calendar is crowded and the last installment is barely in the rearview.

For Hollywood, that should land as a practical warning. IP is not a magic canoe. It still has to catch the wind.

Sources

• Deadline: “‘Moana’ Paddling To Underwhelming $42M-$46M U.S. Opening, But Lands A- CinemaScore – Saturday Box Office Update” — https://deadline.com/2026/07/box-office-moana-1236979144/
• Variety: “Box Office: ‘Moana’ Makes $18 Million on Opening Day” — https://variety.com/2026/film/box-office/box-office-moana-evil-dead-burn-the-invite-toy-story-5-1236805237/
• The Hollywood Reporter: “‘Moana’ Failing to Make Box Office Splash With $45M Opening” — https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/movies/movie-news/moana-box-office-disney-opening-evil-dead-burn-1236644503/
• Deadline: “‘Moana’: Disney Live-Action Take Looks To Welcome $130M+ Global Opening – Box Office Preview” — https://deadline.com/2026/07/moana-box-office-weekend-forecast-1236976125/