RECORD BOX OFFICE. Moana 2 brought in a tidal wave of moviegoers over the Thanksgiving Day weekend. The film blew predictions out of the water. Its five-day opening set a new record for Thanksgiving moviegoing. The previous best was $125 million for Frozen 2 in its second week of release in 2019. Pictured is Moana, voiced by Auli‘i Cravalho, and Pua the pig in a scene from Moana 2. (Disney via AP)

From The Asian Reporter, V34, #12 (December 2, 2024), page 1 & 14.

By Jake Coyle

The Associated Press

NEW YORK — Christmas came early at the box office this year.

Moana 2 brought in a tidal wave of moviegoers over the Thanksgiving Day weekend, setting records with $221 million in ticket sales, according to studio estimates on Sunday. That, combined with Wicked and Gladiator II, made for an unprecedented weekend in cinemas and a confluence of blockbusters more like what’s often found in late December.

Expectations were high for Walt Disney Co.’s Moana 2, but the film — originally planned as a series for Disney+ before it was redirected to the big screen — blew predictions out of the water. Its five-day opening set a new record for Thanksgiving moviegoing. (The previous best was $125 million for Frozen 2 in its second week of release in 2019.) Moana 2 added $165.3 million internationally; with $386 million worldwide, it’s the second-best global launch of the year.

At the same time, the sensation of Wicked showed no signs of slowing down. The Universal Pictures musical brought in $117.5 million over the five-day weekend, pushing its two-week global total to $359.2 million. Not accounting for inflation, Wicked is now the highest grossing Broad- way adaptation over Grease. (That 1978 film grossed $190 million, but factoring in inflation would put it past $900 million.)

Gladiator II, meanwhile, also held well, dipping 44% from its opening weekend. Ridley Scott’s sequel to his Oscar-winning best picture original collected $44 million in its second weekend. While its steep price tag of $250 million will make profitability challenging, Gladiator II has swiftly gathered $320 million worldwide.

Those three films drove the overall box office to a record $420 million in overall Thanksgiving weekend ticket sales, according to Comscore — more than $100 million more than ever before. For an industry that has been battered in recent years by the pandemic, work stoppages, and the upheaval caused by streaming, it was a triumphant weekend that showed the still-potent power of Hollywood’s blockbuster machine. Before Wicked, Moana 2, and Gladiator II arrived in theaters, ticket sales were running about 25% behind pre-pandemic levels.

Moana 2 was the nexus of a strategy shift for Disney. When it first began development, it was fashioned as a series for streaming. But when Bob Iger returned as chief executive, he reconsidered the balance between theatrical and streaming. The original Moana, after all, was the most streamed movie on Disney+ in 2023, with the added benefit of $680 million in box office in 2016. Only in February this year did Iger announce the release of Moana 2, with Auli‘i Cravalho and Dwayne Johnson returning as the voices of Moana and Maui.

"It just shows you that the big screen and small screen are not adversarial. They can be complementary and additive," says Paul Dergarabedian, senior media analyst for Comscore. "Whoever made that decision to go big screen globally with Moana 2, that was one of the greatest decisions ever."

And it helped lead a resurgence for Walt Disney Co., whose last two animated November releases — Strange World and Wish — fizzled in theaters. Moana 2 may become the third $1 billion-grossing movie for the studio in 2024, along with Inside Out 2 and Deadpool & Wolverine. Though reviews for Moana 2 have only been 65% "fresh" on Rotten Tomatoes, audiences gave it an "A-" CinemaScore.

Moana 2 is also part of a major rebound for family moviegoing. According to David A. Gross, a film consultant who publishes a newsletter for Franchise Entertainment, family moviegoing in 2024 is going to account for approximately $6.8 billion in ticket sales, roughly the sums of 2022 and 2023, combined.

After such large debuts, Moana 2 and Wicked are likely to continue to drive moviegoing through December. The only question will be if this year’s Christmas movies — historically a much bigger holiday period for theaters — can come anywhere near the Thanksgiving lineup. Among the movies aiming for that holiday corridor are Disney’s Mufasa: The Lion King, Paramount’s Sonic the Hedgehog 3, and Searchlight’s A Complete Unknown, with Timothée Chalamet as a young Bob Dylan.

Final domestic figures will be released December 2, 2024. Estimated ticket sales for Friday through Sunday at U.S. and Canadian theaters, according to Comscore, are:

1. Moana 2, $135 million

2. Wicked, $80 million

3. Gladiator II, $30.7 million

4. Red One, $12.9 million

5. The Best Christmas Pageant Ever, $3.3 million

6. Bonhoeffer: Pastor. Spy. Assassin, $2.4 million

7. Venom: The Last Dance, $2.2 million

8. Heretic, $956,797

9. The Wild Robot, $670,000

10. A Real Pain, $665,000