The Disney Grooming Syndicate’s Snow White is officially toast, a massive box office bomb that no longer has any serious chance of reaching $100 million domestic.
After its third weekend in release, Snow Woke lost 450 theaters, dropped 58 percent from the previous weekend, and grossed just $6.1 million for a total gross of just $77.4 million.
Snow White also lost to a Christian television show. Over the weekend, the second part of The Chosen: Last Supper grossed $6.7 million on 1500 fewer screens than Snow White.
All in with promotion costs, Disney is easily dealing with a Snow White budget in the $350 million range. That means breakeven is somewhere around $700 million worldwide when Snow White will be lucky to squeak over $200 million worldwide.
How bad is this?
Well, thus far, Disney’s lowest-grossing live-action remake is Dumbo (2019) and it grossed $115 million domestic and $353 million worldwide.
All the way back in 1996, the live-action adaptation of 101 Dalmatians grossed $136 million domestic and $321 million worldwide. That equals $652 million in today’s dollars.
Snow White star Rachel Zegler’s ignorant, smug mouth sure didn’t help, but Snow White tanked because it sucks, and it sucks because Disney thought a timeless and perfect fairy tale people have enjoyed for hundreds of years required “fixing.”
If that’s not insane enough, as of 2021, when you figure for inflation, Disney’s original 1937 version of Snow White has grossed $1.546 billion. Why would any sane person mess with a movie that has made over $1.5 billion? Disney’s mixture of arrogance and stupidity is off the charts.
Also notable this weekend was the smashing success of Minecraft, which more than doubled Snow White’s domestic three-week gross in just three days.
But-but-but the experts told me people don’t want to go to the movies anymore. They told me the appeal of the movie is not the problem. The problem is that people’s habits are changing. They are staying home now.
But-but-but if people no longer want to go to the movies, why did Minecraft’s $157 million domestic opening and $350 million global opening break records? Why did it earn the biggest opening weekend in history for a video game adaptation?
Hey, I’m just asking questions.
Maybe, since the experts have assured us that Rotten Tomatoes decides the fate of movies, Minecraft would have earned stellar reviews. Oddly enough, it didn’t. With a 47 percent rotten rating, Minecraft didn’t do much better than Snow White’s 40 percent.
The formula for box office success is simple: make movies that appeal to people. I’m not saying it’s easy to make those movies, but the formula is the formula, because that’s the formula for everything anyone is looking to sell.
Snow White was not made for Normal People or Snow White fans. It was made for green-haired Womyn’s Study majors looking for $350 million in affirmation rather than what Normal People want from the movies, which is escapism, something to think about, and a good time.
Human nature is human nature and not even $350 million in propaganda can convince Normal Women that the idea of a prince coming along to lift you out of a terrible situation and then the two of you living happily ever after is something other than awesome.
John Nolte’s first and last novel, Borrowed Time, is winning five-star raves from everyday readers. You can read an excerpt here and an in-depth review here. Also available in hardcover and on Kindle and Audiobook.
