Meltdown passes Chicken Little

[All Aboard]

Over the weekend, the relatively little hyped Ice Age 2: The Meltdown surpassed Chicken Little's total domestic gross. It took the film 15 days to do it. Through Sunday, IA2 is pacing roughly 50% ahead of Chicken Little - the much ballyhooed animated feature that was supposed to put Disney back on the map.

Clearly, I am dredging up an old conversation, but it baffles me how there are those who still believe that Chicken Little performed as well as Disney needed it to, and that it wasn't the catalyst for Disney changing course and pursuing a purchase strategy of Pixar rather than relying on their own ability to produce successful animated features.

I have no doubts that internally Chicken Little was deemed a failure and the Disney lost faith in the prospects of future films. They put them on ice and entertained the purchase of Pixar.

Any other opinions?

 

[civileng68]

Well, I'll put on my flame suit and say my bit.


I liked Chicken Little but, I didn't like it NEARLY as much as I thought I would.

 

[tmt martins]

relatively little hyped You have got to be either kidding or live in Hundred acre woods.

This movie has been in and on everything everyminute of the day.BK had toys 2 months ago.Stars were on both Jay L and Toothys' shows.

Now I'm not saying one was anybetter then the other ( I liked them Both).But I think it got a lot of airtime .

 

[Disney Gator]

relatively little hyped You have got to be either kidding or live in Hundred acre woods.

I've got to laugh at this too, "relatively little hyped"? This movie has been everywhere and on everything. Say what you want about the quality of the 2 movies, but to say Ice Age 2 hasn't been hyped is just ridiculous.

 

[FigNewton]

Well he didn't say it wasn't hyped, he said "relatively little hyped." That's just a comparative though he isn't clear on what he's comparing it to.

I will agree though, that even "relatively little hyped" doesn't seem accurate to me. I was seeing commercials twice on some commercial breaks, not to mention the various other promotions. Personally I though it was hyped more than Chicken Little.

 

[DaveO]

Unfortunately I think the Disney brand has lost its appeal. I thought CL was much better than IA2. IA2 seemed to be an exact copy of Dinosaur right down to the almost live action animation scenes with the water. My kids enjoyed CL much more.

Dave O.

 

[YoHo]

the reference was in comparison to Chicken Little. Chicken Little was hyped significantly more and with a larger lead time then Ice Ag: The meltdown.

boxofficemojo doesn't have approx. marketing costs for either.

 

[thelionqueen]

the reference was in comparison to Chicken Little. Chicken Little was hyped significantly more and with a larger lead time then Ice Ag: The meltdown.

boxofficemojo doesn't have approx. marketing costs for either.

I disagree! Ice Age merchandise and marketing was out nearly 1 year before the film even began previewing. It was on fruit snacks back in October 2005! Now I am a Disney fanatic, and I look for new Disney movies, and I didn't see hardly any hype on Chicken Little until about 1 month or so before release.

If you'll remember, Valiant and Chicken Little were suppose to be released within 6 weeks of eachother. Disney "pulled the plug" and money from Valiant Marketing and began focusing more on CL, because they thought it was more worthy (which it definitely was..did you see Valiant don't get me started). They put all the marketing money into CL because they realized too late that the close release of 2 very similar movies (both with birds/chickens/etc) was a bad move..REALLY ??

Anyway, I thought Chicken Little was enjoyable, but no so much so that I even bought it on DVD. IA2 however was GREAT!! I always think of Katzenberg/Eisner when I see a huge hit from Dreamworks. Another BRILLIANT move Eisner

 

[DancingBear]

Except Ice Age is not a Dreamworks production.

 

[Disney Gator]

the reference was in comparison to Chicken Little. Chicken Little was hyped significantly more and with a larger lead time then Ice Ag: The meltdown.

boxofficemojo doesn't have approx. marketing costs for either.

Not even close. Ice Age 2 was promoted months and months ahead of time. It was advertised in a lot more ways than CL also. I remember seeing ads for CL only a few weeks before it opened. Ice Age 2 may be a better movie than Chicken Little, but let's at least get our facts straight here.

 

[KMovies]

Ice Age 2 is a sequal ... therefore, it wouldn't need as much "hype" to generate sales. People knew what Ice Age 2 was since they had already seen Ice Age 1. Regardless, it was a heavily "hyped" film. Chicken Little would need more advertising since it didn't have the "built in" audience that a sequal has.

Chicken Little was successful, not as much as others such as Shrek, Ice Age and Madagascar. Much more than Hoodwinked.

Valient, while released by Disney, wasn't made by Disney. Chicken Little was made by Disney.

We'll have to see how other product such as Barn Yard and Over the Hedge do - it may be that Chicken Little performs better than those.

 

[All Aboard]

We'll have to see how other product such as Barn Yard and Over the Hedge do - it may be that Chicken Little performs better than those.

Well, if those are the benchmarks at which Disney is aiming, then they are sure to be "successful."

 

[Tink's Tormentor]

Let's be real though.. I saw previews for IA2 last year, before Dukes of Hazzard movie and before Charlie and the Chocolate Factory... There were signs for IA2 in theaters in the summer of 2005... So, IA2 was being hyped even before the winter came in....

 

[All Aboard]

I'll be more clear. Hype and marketing are not the same thing. IA2 was never intended to be more than just another good animated film for Fox. Disney billed Chicken Little as the third coming of Feature Animation. It was Eisner's opportunity to show them Pixar boys that he didn't need them. IA2 never had anything like that riding on it. Yes, both films were advertised heavily. BK had IA2 toys, McDonalds said "no thanks" to CL toys. Disney Channel ran Disney 411 and Movie Surfer segments every 10 minutes. Yes, they were both marketed. But CL was billed as so much more. Or, at least Eisner thought.

In the final analysis, Disney pushed back release dates of all future animated films, set aside any hopes of continuing to release animated features by temselves, even abandoned the partnership with Pixar option and wrote a check instead. Now, the Pixar guys have been called in to "fix" Meet the Robinsons.

Yep, Chicken Little was successful alright.

 

[MJMcBride]

Chicken Little was hyped significantly more

This is just wrong. Ice Age 2 was one of the most hyped animated features I have ever seen. Plus, it was a sequel to a highly successful (and good) movie.

 

[tink2020]

I definitely agree with a lot of previous posters. Chicken Little was not hyped NEAR as long around here. I remember seeing Ice Age 2 cardboard cutouts, posters, etc at the theaters AT LEAST a year before it came out! I haven't seen it yet so I can't comment on the quality, but I did love Chicken Little. But mostly I just wanted to chime in on the "little hyped" bit

 

[raidermatt]

I don't even go to the movies that much and I saw Chicken Little previews months before. I saw posters months before. I saw TV commercials well in advance (complete with R.E.M. accompaniment). I saw "teaser" type stuff for Ice Age 2 long before it opened as well, but nothing of substance until it came close to its release date. Disney certainly had the advantage in "free press" as well, as there were numerous stories about Disney's move to 100% CGI, and how Chicken Little would be the first film from the revamped studio.

Then there's all the "synergistic opportunities", that probably don't even factor into CL's direct budget, like the way he showed up in the DL 50th commercials.

AA is right, in that its really a dead issue. Clearly CL did not perform as Disney had hoped, and clearly that was a contributing factor in the decision to pull the trigger on the Pixar purchase and essentially turn over the animation division to them. That's not to say that under the circumstances, it wasn't the right thing to do.

But I'm curious about this idea that CL was "little-hyped". Not that I agree with that notion, but beyond that, for anyone who does believe that was the case, how can you not call Disney to the carpet for short-changing CL in that way? Its performance was critical to Disney. And even if you believe the Pixar deal would have been made regardless, a better performance would have given Disney greater leverage and therefore more advantagous purchase terms.

Why could Fox out-promote Disney, and why is that ok?

As for IA2's performance, I haven't seen it, so won't comment directly on it. But yes, it clearly did benefit from being a sequel to one of the better non-Pixar animated films to come out in the last 5 or so years.