So I'm watching TV, and I see this ad for probably the 10th time this week. It's for Nicole Kidman's new movie - The Invasion - which from what I can tell from the ad, is a remake of Invasion of the Body Snatchers.  They give Nicole some advise - just don't show any emotion, and they (aliens) can't find you. So I guess I should just give the same advise - don't react to the Pixar-is-going-to-Hades articles. I know it's difficult - it was for Nicole in the ad I saw. I also noticed her costar was Daniel Craig, the new James Bond, and I thought how perfect, cause he showed no emotion as James Bond, this will be perfect for him. The point is here's a movie I have no interest in seeing, but I know these things about it because of marketing - any disappointment for Pixar can directly be traced to the sandbagging Disney Marketing crew. There, I said it, and now the aliens will be able to find me. Here, let me try to save myself: I agree - Pixar is a major disappointment, and they're trapped in a downward death spiral. That oughta hold 'em off for a while.

I was getting ready to read more JHM venom against Pixar after reading the title but was pleasantly surprised to read this article bring up interesting points.  

After being a boxofficemojo watcher lately, I actually had been thinking the same thing about the downward turn Disney movies' box office tallies took after The Lion King, but I thought it was more because it seemed the suits who were running Disney at the time (e.g. Katzenberg and friends?) thought they figured out the formula of making a lot of money and decided to stick their noses into the creatives' business, thinking that they had better ideas than the artists themselves.  Of course, the suits get stuck thinking in that cookie-cutter way and maybe forced the artists to make movies they wouldn't have made themselves.

I really don't see this happening with the new regime for Disney and Pixar.  Wall-E already seems like a completely different movie; and even Ratatouille felt like a departure from the last two.  And as you mentioned, the Princess of Mars and 1906 don't seem like they'll be lumped in with past Pixar movies.

As for WDAS, they seem to be headed back to their roots with the fairy tale movie (Princess and the Frog and Rapunzel), and given that everything's been satirical lately, this will likely be seen as something "fresh."

>>> what do you think that Disney & Pixar officials should be doing in order to help this CG operation avoid the same pitfalls that tripped up WDAS back in the late 1990s? Change this animation studio's upcoming productions back into "must-sees" ? <<<

As I've mentioned earlier, I'm not worried about Pixar.  As for improving WDAS, I think Dick Cook and co. reducing the number of films released per year is a start.  That way, every Disney film starts to become a "must-see," since they'll only be putting out a few per year now.  And for now, WDAS should start with just making sure they make good movies and get the brand name back up there.  I have high hopes for their next four films (which I hope Jim will have more info for us soon).

Now come on, Jim...

Going from 339 million to 188 Million (for a movie that's still in theatres) is nowhere near the fall that Disney experienced (312 to 99) so I think it's a little bit of a silly comparison to make.

There can be tons of arguments to explain Ratatouille's current box-office takings, such as a hard-to-market film, over-saturation at the marketplace, a huge number of blockbusters this summer, and ever-changing movie-going habits, but 188 million is still a large take, even if it doesn't quite match up to the other Pixar films, and possibly more importantly, The Incredibles, Cars, and Ratatouille are definitely stronger films than Pocahontas, Hunchback, and Hercules.

The fact, is, I think the article would have had the same point without the comparison drawn to Disney - and people will only give you more flak for drawing such comparisons (particularly through their love of Pixar).

To answer your question, I believe that the same commitment to story-telling, especially fresh and 'risky' approaches, is the most important thing to focus on for Pixar. And they already seem to be doing that with Wall-E.

Even though Wall-E too might be bound for 'only' another 188 million, I don't know any studio that wouldn't mind having the highest-grossing G-Rated film of the year, and 7th highest box office rating (as Ratatouille is currently doing).

I hope you all took the Pixar survey. I did. I made sure to mention something that Floyd Norman mentioned previously. STORY! The CG animation; 3D effects and even traditional animation don't meant anything without a great story.

Then again this has been an odd summer movie season. Ratatoullie is a great film. The problem is, every film this year has been great. The studios need to at least cooperate somewhat as far as scheduling their grade A+ releases...because this year they over saturated the market and all the studios lost out financially.

Ummmm....I'm a little confused by the charts.  Only the first one makes sense.  Why does the second one with Lion King and Hunchback leave out Little Mermaid?  And why does the second one have films way out of order (Chicken Little before Mulan)?  If the charts are meant to show consecutive films doing poorer, then why are the charts missing big films and out of sequential order?  The point with Pixar is made, but the rest seem a bit....Fox Newsed (Or CNN'ed or any show that takes just the facts to make the point they want to make)

I would be interested in the numbers on Ratatoullie if Transformers hadn't opened right after it followed the next week by Harry Potter. Cars didn't make the big bucks right away, it took some time, but I don't think it's competition was as stiff.

That being said, I've recommended Ratatoullie to several folks with children who said they didn't want to go see a movie about rats in the kitchen. So I guess that the story concept can be an important part of a movie's success. Who knew?

Not really looking forward to the garbage robot thing, but I'll probably see it.

gee. toon tuesday used to have fascinating backstory.

and PS - Officially heart curmudgeon

ADD: I just checked out the "Buy N Large" site. Ouch.  MIYAZAKI's "Spirited Away" made some nice little comments on consumerism without pushing your face in it. It doesn't look (at this point anyway) that Wall -e is going to be as subtle.  Oh well, the Republicans it loses in the US will more than be made up for in additional European grosses.

>>If only to kick my butt whenever they feel that I've posted something that reflects badly on their favorite animation studio...

To be clear, its the warping of facts and numbers to support your opinion that, I at least, have a problem with.  Is Pixar my favorite animation studio?  I don't know.  I enjoy many offerings from several different studios.  It's the continual negative tone of pretty much ever Pixar piece that I find annoying and tiresome.

Now on to the article that I was expecting to annoy me because it was about Pixar, but did in fact did not....yes I was surprised too.

I have often wondered why Lion King was so popular.  As a film, I didn't think it was better than Aladdin or B&TB, but it cleaned up.  My opinion is that the year gap between Al and LK built up some anticipation.  Disney had come off a 3 picture hot streak and then they said "no movie for you in '93"...they teased movie goers a little....

Following LK as the shift began to multi animated releases from Disney a year (counting the Return to Neverlands...Piglet's Big Movie etc and Pixar) I think there were too many animated films being released with Walt Disney Pictures at the head, in a single year.

What was an event film (I worked at the Disney Store in the early 90s...tons of promotions for each film) had now turned into an animated offering every 6 months (every 3-4 months towards the end)

Now Pixar is releasing a film a year and Dreamworks is releasing 2 a year.  One wonders how these films would be received if they came out every other year.  To build some excitement...to create a desire to see their offerings rather than "hey its summer time lets see what studio X has out"........

On a side note.  I would like to see Pixar do an animated film that visually, is way different than anything they have done before.  Right now it feels like all the characters from all their films live in the same world.  Monsters Inc would have been a great opportunity to make the monster world wacky and crazy and really neato....instead it looked like our world...which was kinda boring.  I live in my world...show me a world I have never seen.  Get crazy Pixar!  

http://www.raymation.net

The Republicans it loses?!? I forgot Dems shop only at Mom and Pop stores or grow their own food and goods. I nominate you post for most ridiculous, uninformed post ever, congrats.

Finding Nemo is an anomaly, if Disney is looking to repeat that, they will be looking for a long time. I think Disney is more concerned with money, and the folks at Pixar are more worried about putting out good stories, Lassester is the closest thing Disney has to Walt right now. Cars is responsible for more money than you gave it credit until recently Jim, hopefully Ratatouille does well on home video.

No offense Jim, but I'm getting sick of reading about Pixar....

   What do you like most about Pixar films?

     X* The ones made before "Cars"

       * Quality of the animation & artistry

       * Story

       * Characters

       * Cutting edge technology

   What does Pixar mean most to you?

     X* Great Family films, before "Cars".

       * Quality

       * Authenticity

       * Storytelling

       * Animation

       * Family Entertainment

       * Universally appealing films

Now that Ratatouille has dropped out of the box office top 10 I think that domestically it should just about hit its 200 million mark. But I expect the film to rake in about 270 million overseas. It seems to me that audiences abroad, especially Europa, are more attracted by the quality of a film, the reviews and positive word of mouth. Cars is the only Pixar film to gross less overseas than domestic, most likely because Cars sucks. Ratatouille does not. Moreover, I think the only bad apple in Pixar's run is Cars. Cars is probably the single most important reason for the "meager" box office returns Ratatouille has been collecting, not Ratatouille in itself.

I have to agree with Jim on his thesis that a Pixar/Disney production should be a happening, something to look forward to. Making great movies is probably the only real way to achieve such a status for your films. And Pixar is working really hard to recover from Cars. Not by betting on short term money, but by investing in, as Iger said, a character that will enrich the Disney legacy.

Ratatouille will do good overseas, Pixar will stubbornly create original content and people will go and see good films when they are released. And let's not go about yelling that Pixar's mission statement is flaying just because they do a little bit of research into how they are perceived.

One last thing: The succes of The Simpsons Movie says nothing about traditional animation being embraced by audiences or not. It tells us that The Simpsons is an extremely healthy brand, built on quality.

>> But given that audiences today are clearly not responding to "Ratatouille" with the same enthusiasm that they once showed for "Monsters, Inc." and "The Incredibles" ... The people at Pixar are reportedly now wondering what they have to do in order to make their latest releases seem less like those buses that the 2000 Year Old Man referred to.

But for now, in the wake of "Cars" and "Ratatouille" not exactly wowing Wall Street and/or the movie-going public, the folks at Pixar and Disney are now trying to get a better handle on what film fans actually want & expect from this CG studio....there are also some questions here that (to be blunt) reek of a corporation that's trying to refine its mission statement. <<

Hmmmm.  So Pixar's having a tough time of it with this new Brad Bird film, eh?  You don't say!  Huh.  That's very interesting.  Thank you for bringing that to our attention.  We'll have to look into that one...  (nods head, sits quietly)

(Don't worry folks, whenever my crazy father-in-law goes off on one of his political rants, I just say something like the above and it appeases him just enough to where we can switch subjects and have a nice dinner together.  Works every time.  Here's hopin'...)

This is almost becoming humorous now ... and pathetic ... I'm not sure which more ... I think pathetic ...

I think what the Pixar chart shows is that Nemo was a case of catching lightning in a bottle.  The grosses of the films before and after are all relatively the same.  THAT'S what we should be expecting from a Pixar film, not the once-in-a-lifetime grand slam that was Nemo.  It's like comparing all 20th Century Fox films to Star Wars.

There are, I think, too many variables involved, some of which have been mentioned, for one to pin down R's low returns to just "a trend" or "the competition".

In fact, given the sequelitus going on, where every "blockbuster" is either a remake or a sequel (or the 3rd, or even 5th! in a series (that 5th having the additional attention of its 7th book a few weeks later)), this more shows that simply NOBODY is in the mood for something new.  They're mentally and emotionally not ready for "new commitment" because they're still content going back to the properties they've already invested themselves into.

Since Nemo seems the anomaly, lets look at 2003: Nemo was, literally, without competition.  It came out as the early summer release for kids with no other sigificant competitor around.  Matrix's sequel had run 2 weeks, Bruce Almighty (just had a sequel of sorts) was really in a different market, X2 had run its course, and Pirates was still 6-8 weeks away from surprising the world in Disney's favor for a second time that year.

In short, it was a relatively sparse summer, with little for kids to do other than go back to Nemo.  Only THEN can you figure into it that it's a great movie and great story and therefore the parents won't say "no" to going back.

This year?  The blockbuster competition is just HUGE.  There was not a single weekend between May and early July, with that one little gap prior to the Simpsons (which also contributed to its huge opening) that didn't have the blockbuster *sequel* opening.  All sequels, all the time.  No original thought left.  As such, nobody's in the mood to see anything original - the audience itself has been conditioned this year (and for the past 3) to only accept sequels now.  Consider how many other huge epics falter in the face of yet another sequel.

2006's top movies?  only 3 weren't sequels and one of those was still based on the biggest selling book of the century so far.  Another opened in a Christmas season without much competition at all.  The 3rd?  Cars.

2005?  remakes and reinventions were the name of the game, with 4 in the top 10.  The only real original films were Madagascar and Mr. and Mrs Smith (at the bottom of the top ten).  Narnia rode on the strength of the original material.

So really, the trick is to either lower your expectations, OR really plan in advance to dodge a "year of the sequels".  However, that is now extremely hard for Pixar and WDAS to do when the Narnia series is now committed to being the May summer "sequel" opener, hinting to other studios to continue to follow suit with every franchise they can get away with.

Disney's at as much fault as anybody else, but its really down to that: we've been conditioned to invest into a franchise for the sequels, and with Pixar being generally anti-sequel (they fought toy story 2 tooth and nail until they got creative control back, just like with 3, and now Lasseter's gone and dropped the video sequel market), it actually is implying that there's little point in making an emotional investment in Pixar's characters anymore because you won't see them after this.

Unless you go to a Disney park, of course.

And personally, I know Disney was looking for the May blockbuster to take Pirate's place, but Narnia I sold *because* it was a Christmas release, where the Christian message became a kind of second service and thus it drew in a huge crowd going to it specifically because of the religious allegory.  Granted, the allegory is a lot weaker in the remaining books until Last Battle (based entirely on Revelation), but like with this summer sequelitus infection, it's a matter of trying to look for what the people will be in the mood for when you release it.

This year, they're in the mood for sequels, conditioned that way by all the hype coming into it (Pirates and Potter having that hyping start over a year ago), so Rat had to fight not only its "we're not Disney...oh, wait, now we are" image, but also the expectations of an audience satiated with seeing characters they know to the point they've no interest in seeing anybody new.

So too, a movie series with Christian connections: better to do it in December or in March/April, when the Christian audience is "thinking" about being Christian.  Would Gibson's "Passion" have done as well as a summer release, rather than coming out in Lent?

I highly doubt it.

I think that the only thing to be done with Pixar is to leave them alone to continue to make the same quality films that they have been making.

While churning out franchise sequels and comic-book adaptations does tend to deliver a return on investment, Hollywood studios across the board are faced with the overall declining trend in movie theater patronage. Thanks largely to the growth of DVD and other home-based entertainment, people just aren't going to the movies.

The MPAA reports that admissions have been plummeting since 2002. (There was a slight increase in 2006, but still the numbers have had a 5-year downward trend.) Don't be fooled by MPAA reports that tout a growing box office. This dollar-amount increase can be attributed to the rising cost of a movie ticket, NOT an increase in actual ticket sales.

Disney & Pixar and other studios CAN control two things: quality and marketing. There was a time when Disney mastered both. Think back to "new golden age" of Ashman/Menken films. Disney managed the appropriate level of pre-release hype, product merchandising and cross promotions. The hype was suitably met with quality films that people were happy to have seen.

All of this changed after "The Lion King." With the success of that film, Disney went nuts with marketing and promotion for the features that came after it. But "Pocahontas," "Hercules" and the rest were not up to the high standards set by the Ashman/Menken films. So Disney Stores and other retailers were left with Quasimodo pencil cases and other assorted junk that nobody wanted.

Disney then apparently just gave up, turning out total junk like "Atlantis" and "Emperor's Groove," and blaming the 2-D format for their failure.

The Disney machine simply needs to concentrate on producing quality films -- films that are not vetted by the consumer products division -- and get a handle on promoting them. Not every animated feature needs to be a "Lion King"-level event.

When do we get to fill out the "Jim Hill Media.Com Opinion Survey"?

Although that might reek of a guy who desperately needs to redefine his website's mission statement.

I'm not even going to respo... Oh wait, already doing that.. Jim.. Dear Jim.. Jim.. Call up your "buddies" at WDFA, demand information about "Bolt", "Rapunzel", "The Froggy Princess", and report back to us. Sick of hearing about anything Pixar, sorry.

"It seems to me that audiences abroad, especially Europa, are more attracted by the quality of a film, the reviews and positive word of mouth. Cars is the only Pixar film to gross less overseas than domestic, most likely because Cars sucks."

I guess you can have your high opinion of European moviegoers (they loved "Waterworld" and "The Island", after all), but the reason "Cars" had a lesser showing worldwide is obvious. It's a love letter to Route 66, which not only has little specific relevance to most of Europe, it has no meaning since so few countries are even big enough to have ever had a road that long.

Oh, and I'd comment on the article itself, but I haven't been able to read Jim's articles for about two days, since one of his advertising banners doesn't seem to like my browser and never lets the page load.

Okay, I took the survey and I think that Jim's got the point of it wrong.  I don't think anyone at this Emeryville-based Animation Studio (I'm just going to call it that from now on.  I'm a journalist!) needs a survey to tell them what to do.  But in the post merger world, they do need to re-work the Web Site.  I think that's what the survey is really and truly about, not getting "back on track".

Sequels pay off....

Thats why Jim does these little jabs at PIXAR.  I imagine his hit rate doubles or triples with these articles.

Acroyear did a nice market analysis comparing previous box office releases from 05-06. This is what is missing in all of Jim's articles. This story is really about  box office competition and this has been one of the most competitive markets at theatre in recent memory. Overall, for being an original, non-sequel, Rapatouille is doing just fine.

But also its apparent that Jim has no decent industry contacts outside of Disney so this really slants the tone of his articles, he needs to be compliant and useful to Disney's political flacks and corporate infighting.  It seems like he's a one trick pony and he can't afford to lose the limited inside contacts he already has.

Of course Mr. Hill is going to continue writing Pixar-bashing number crunchers, because you want him to.  Personally, the constant blitz of numbers isn't the kind of thing I want to read about.  I really enjoyed the article on the ridiculous dog park idea.  But look at the differnce in the number of comments.  Heck, scroll on down to see my one pitiful comment on one of his book reviews just a little while ago.  The number of hits and comments tell Mr. Hill what to write about.

Just do like the first comment on this article said:

Just nod and smile. . .nod and smile. . .

I have to defend Jim here a bit (*gasp! huh??*).  Sure, it could be less biased-sounding to keep us Pixar defenders at bay, but if you dig deep, I really did think the article raised a legitimate point - which is, in this time of multiple CGI animated movies, what can Pixar do to continue to stand out of the already crowded field and make "really-for-real" blockbusters every year?

The simple answer is what JasonS posted.  "The Disney machine simply needs to concentrate on producing quality films."  Pixar's already on this path, so though it's true that they may not produce mega-blockbusters every year, they aren't selling out with cheapquels and they are keeping their golden goose alive unlike other franchises out there (*ahem, Shrek*).   If you make good movies, the audiences will come.

Now will Jim believe these answers and no longer write unnecessarily negative articles about Pixar's box office numbers?  Doubt it.  But this article I think is harmless and I think if Jim didn't write so much about Pixar's shortcomings in the past (and being based on false premises), that he'd get more appropriate comments than the ones he's getting now.  

Something to chew on....

As I was browsing around BoxOfficeMojo I realised something. BOM.com has these neat features where you can look at all the different numbers and compare them and stuff. Well, I was looking at The Simpsons and pressed a button labeled, "SIMILAR MOVIES". As you can tell by the name this button compares the $ amounts with other SIMILAR movies (ie, movies you SHOULD compare this movie to). Here is the list:

The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie  $85,417,988

Rugrats Go Wild  $39,402,572

Rugrats in Paris: The Movie  $76,507,756

South Park - Bigger, Longer and Uncut  $52,037,603

The Rugrats Movie  $100,494,675

Beavis and Butt-Head Do America  $63,118,386

What's missing from this comparison? Why the movie that Jim loves to compare it to... Ratatouille!

Why is Jim the only one to compare the two?

Next we might be getting a comparison of the Mona Lisa & a childs paint-by-number picture.... they're both paintings, right?

Animation is the only thing these movies share in common, and yet we hear the comparisons... at least when it makes Pixar look bad. It's interesting how when you compare RAT to the other movies on this list however, RAT is an astounding success! Pity we don't ever hear that.

I wonder where RAT (and other, non-Nemo Pixar movies) stack up all time in the animation field?

I think what happened to Disney after Lion King is that they saw the success that Lion King had and expected that to be the standard rather than an exception. They got over-confident in believing that they knew how to make a blockbuster film and stopped learning from their mistakes and improving their product. Once things started to turn south Disney panicked and the suits started dictating changes. This started a downward spiral.

What Pixar needs to do (with Disney since it is the corporate head) is to realize that $200 million a year is still a very good return on investment, even if it is not $340 million. In other words, DON'T PANIC! Continue to analyze your films and figure out what works and what doesn't. Don't rest on your laurels believing that you have the magic formula, but constantly re-evaluate yourself to find out what works and what doesn't. Don't over-extend yourself and start releasing movies that aren't ready yet. Box office numbers may continue to fall, but as long as they are making money there is nothing to worry about.

"what do you think that Disney & Pixar officials should be doing in order to help this CG operation avoid the same pitfalls that tripped up WDAS back in the late 1990s? Change this animation studio's upcoming productions back into "must-sees" ?"

As has been mentioned by many, they need to let Pixar continue to produce quality films.  Nemo was an anomoly.  If Pixar continues to produce quality films, they will occasionally get another anomoly.  The key is continuing to make good movies.  The "lows" will still be decent and the highs will be astronomical.

The differences between Pixar's falloff after Nemo and Disney's after Lion King are:

1-  Disney didn't keep making good movies.

2-  Pixar's fall-off is much less severe to begin with, because they are still making good movies.

The other thing to remember is that unlike any other studio, Disney and Pixar animation are bonafide brand names.  Nobody goes to see the next Paramount movie, Universal movie, or even Dreamworks animated movie.

But Disney and Pixar are brand names and with that comes the advantage of past success helping future releases, but also past failure hindering future releases.

Mermaid did well at the box office but it didn't even hit $100 million.  Why?  Because the public had lost faith in the Disney brand.  Mermaid had to fight through that and bring that faith back.  This paved the way for better success for Aladdin, Beauty and eventually Lion King.

But then came Pocahontas, which is not considered one of Disney's better efforts.  Yet it did very well at the box office because a Disney movie was an event, like Jim said.  But it wasn't an event for any of the reasons Jim mentioned.  It was an event because of the quality of the previous Disney films.  After a run of less than stellar efforts, Disney lost that brand value with the public and really has never gotten it back.  Anytime they gained a little momentum with a Tarzan or Mulan, there was an Atlantis, Treasure Planet or Home on the Range to squash it.

Pixar has also become a brand, and a Pixar movie is still an event because they don't disappoint.  Sure, maybe the marketing needs to be tweaked, and it's good to see Disney is working on that.  But as long as the movies remain quality, the Pixar brand will draw people in for the next helping, and Pixar will not experience the kind of falloff Disney did.

sorry Jim that first chart (at the moment) is completely invalid. how can you compare Ratatouille's worldwide gross with the rest of the Pixar films when it largely hasn't been released outside America?

in my opinion just can't see how Ratatouille won't overhaul cars at the end of the day. it's already almost halfway upto to the amount of the domestic gross and is still to be released in europe (we get it in the autumn, when it's free from the big summer films). add to the fact that your charts seems to indicate that the worldwide gross equals and in many cases exceeds domestic gross (as you'd expect) and I don't think the great backlash you're trying to put across will turn out to be that great.

okay just re-checked my facts, even then it's a third of the domestic so for me the point still stands.

1. A good film is its own best investment in the long run. It ensures a long life as a library title and source of merchandise and spinoffs (like rides).

2. Don't start animation until the story's locked down. Worse case scenario, if a release date is pending, you start on a scene like the street crossing in TS2. And if you're shooting live action on location, have someone check a weather report first. Otherwise, the budget's just going to balloon out of control and there's going to be greater pressure to perform.

I don't think Wall-E is going to have any serious trouble making a profit, unless this current brainwashing with sequels and remakes discourages people from embracing experimental stories.

The hook here is that Pixar's next film will feature robots. ROBOTS. a popular choice in merchandise and movies, as we're currently seeing with Transformers. And judging from the two spoiler images alone, it'll be interesting to see what they can come up with with futuristic machinery. There's plenty of imagination to go around there.

Also, since Wall-E is going to have little to no dialogue, at least in the first part of the film, that will be an easy sell overseas. Little pressure to translate into a different language, giving audiences in UK, Japan, France, etc. plenty of opportunities to absorb the story placed in front of them.

The film itself will be a CHALLENGE. When you're being challenged, instead of having everything explained for you, you become more involved in the project.

There's currently no sequels or remakes reported for release next summer (someone might want to check on that), so yes, Wall-E has a great shot at success.

This article is so hypocritical it's idiotic.

At least you put in the asterisks to note that Ratatouille is still in the theatres and making money...and yet you go on to judge its performance even though we still have no idea how much it will end up with.

THIS MOVIE HASN'T EVEN BEEN RELEASED IN MOST MAJOR COUNTRIES.  How can you possibly judge the overseas performance so far when it has yet to be released in big countries (and ones where it will likely do well) like the UK, australia, italy, germany etc?  Especially when it just came out in france with Pixar's second biggest opening ever there?

And where's the admission that the 150-170M estimates were way on the low side?  Domestically it looks like Ratatouille will make 200M no problem, beating most of the low expectations people had for this.  And if any Pixar flick has a shot at making more overseas than at home, this is it.  I still think this movie will have no trouble beating Cars' overseas numbers and still has a shot at beating it overall worldwide.

Not to mention the main difference between the pixar chart and the disney one - while many of the disney releases barely broke even or lost money, even a movie with as so called "bad" performance as Ratatouille will be incredibly profitable.  Is making 200M domestic and 200M (incredibly conservative estimate) overseas on a movie that reportedly cost 150M really a "problem"?

And to add a little perspective, at this point it looks pretty inevitable that Ratatouille will end up ahead of every other CGI movie ever made by another studio with the exception of the Shrek flicks.  Seriously, that's a "problem"??

"Little pressure to translate into a different language, giving audiences in UK"

That's funny. I didn't even know that they spoke a different language in the UK. Blimey!

I think Ratatouille definetly has a chance at breaking Cars' numbers with the overseas admissions factored in when it has run its course, but it still won't reach anywhere near Lion King or Nemo-status.

Also, it looks like the folks at Disney are already coming up with great ways to market Wall-E, but it still looks like it will be a tough movie to market and draw crowds in the midst of 2008's summer blockbusters and sequels.  With Indiana Jones 4, Narnia 2, The Dark Night, Iron Man, Kung Fu Panda, The Incredible Hulk, The Love Guru, The Mummy 3, and Hancock (a Will Smith/ Charlize Theron fantasy-drama scheduled for release July 2, the Wednesday RIGHT AFTER Wall-E is released. Could be seeing the same pattern as this year but instead of Transformers coming out right after Ratatouille, Hancock would come out right after Wall-E).  

But with the topic of Pixar keeping everything fresh and all with their movies... they're already making 2 live-acton/CG movies that are in the works, but what about a computer-animated musical, intertwining some fun flashy musical numbers like the Broadway-style Disney movies of the early 90s did, but with the refined animation techniques and storytelling abilities of some of the great minds of Pixar? Happy Feet was one of the first animated movies in a while that you could call a musical, and that had pretty big box-office numbers (even for a non-Disney/Pixar CG movie, and it went on to win Best Animated Movie at the Oscars- Cars won best animated movie at the Golden Globes though), but suffered from a flabby story. I think a Pixar movie-musical coming out in the winter holiday season could make some serious cash at the box office. If Pixar really is the #1 animation studio in the world, and now they are even integrating live-action into their movies, why not go all the way and make a musical or two? If Pixar wants to keep taking risks with newer and fresher movies to raise the bar and make every one of their movies a "must-see," CG musicals are very scarce if even existent. Computer animation is still new, and I really feel that movies like "Shrek" have moved the genre too much into this "everything has to be a satire of some sort" type mode that almost all of the studios seem to be in right now, which is really stalling the entire genre.  Pixar is THE computer-animation studio- they've done the superhero genre successully with "The Incredibles" (and to some extent Buzz Lightyear from "Toy Story"), have tackled monsters with Monsters Inc and with the upcoming 2009 film, "Up," have made and are making movies about machines (which is a tough genre, giving life and emotion to something inanimate) with "Cars" and next year's "Wall-E," and have also made films about different types of animals- "Ratatouille," "Finding Nemo," and "A Bug's Life."  Pixar is the unchallenged champion studio of CG, and their movies in the next few years already seem promising. But, I just think if the folks at Emeryville tried their hand at a musical or two, there would be huge results (as if any given Pixar movie DOESNT already get huge results, :P).

Pixar pixar pixar.