Disney backs out of third Narnia movie
Can the Narnia franchise stay afloat?
I missed this news over the holiday, but it seems that fans of “The Chronicles of Narnia” got a lump of coal from Disney just in time for Christmas.
The House of Mouse announced last week that it would not exercise its option to co-produce and co-finance the third Narnia movie with Walden Media.
“The Chronicles of Narnia: The Voyage of the Dawn Treader” was scheduled to start shooting in early 2009 with Michael Apted (“Amazing Grace,” “The World Is Not Enough”) directing. But Disney’s decision has put the future of “Dawn Treader” in jeopardy.
According to Variety, Disney cited “budgetary considerations and other logistics” as the reason for the decision. The choice comes after the second Narnia movie, “Prince Caspian,” made far less than its predecessor despite mostly strong reviews.
“Prince Caspian” grossed a disappointing $419 million worldwide, compared to $745 million for the first film, “The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe.”
I’m not sure what Disney execs expected when they decided to release “Prince Caspian” in the middle of an extremely busy May blockbuster season, right in between “Iron Man” and “Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.” In contrast, “The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe” was released in early December 2005 and faced much less competition.
What’s so annoying about this is that Disney screwed up and unless Walden Media can find another studio to partner with in this bad economy, fans of this franchise are going to miss out.
And you thought the White Witch was bad.
-BAM
If you enjoyed this post, please consider to leave a comment or subscribe to the feed and get future articles delivered to your feed reader.
Yeah, releasing this in the summer was a bone-headed move. May was packed with family films. If they had released it this holiday season, like they did with the first one, they would have been the beneficiaries of the Harry Potter move. Oh well, hopefully they will still get it made.