Frozen Gives Disney Animation Its Biggest Opening Ever

Gotta say, given the relative lack of marketing for Frozen I did not see this coming. That’ll teach me to underestimate the power of kid’s movies over a holiday weekend.

Frozen had its fair share of bad buzz leading up to its release. There was the kerfluffle over character design, which was only heightened by the fact that it hit when Merida’s controversial makeover was still fresh in everyone’s memory. In a similar vein the film found itself in the crosshairs of constant (justified) complaints about Disney’s lack of diversity. There wasn’t much by way of trailers or posters, which made it look like Disney didn’t trust the film’s quality. And what Disney did put out has been overly reliant on that damned obnoxious snowman.

But Frozen pulled a fast one on us. Not only do critics love it (84% on Rotten Tomatoes), it’s raked in the dough as well: Cartoon Brew reports that Frozen annihilated the Mouse House’s previous record for biggest opening, at least as far as animated films are concerned. These numbers aren’t final because the weekend’s not yet over, obviously, but so far Frozen has made $66.7 million over the three-day weekend (Friday-Sunday) and $93 million over the five-day holiday break (Wednesday-Sunday). Compare that to previous record holder Wreck-It Ralph, which opened with a gross of $49 million. Or how about we stack Frozen up against Tangled, which opened on Thanksgiving weekend 2010; it earned a mere $68.7 million over the five-day stretch.

I was planning to see Frozen eventually, but now I’m planning to give it  a shot sooner rather than later. I know some of our readers were planning to avoid the film because of the way it changed the source material (because Disney movies never do that, right?), but now I’m speaking to the people who’ve seen Frozen: What do you think? Is it good, or is the massive gross just a matter of parents needing to take their kids to see any old thing? Are the songs catchy? That was my biggest problem with Tangled—how dare a Disney movie have no songs that are stuck in my head for 48 hours after seeing it? It’s just not right.

Oh, and by the by: As of this weekend, Disney’s #1 opening film of all time is co-directed by a woman. Just thought you’d want to know.

(via: Cartoon Brew)

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