Elemental Goes From Flop to Hit

By the time the tracking-based estimates for Elemental began to circulate last May a note of pessimism about such films was penetrating through the noise of the usual claquing, especially about the productions of that studio that just a few years ago had looked as if it could do no very great wrong, Disney--the more in as Ant-Man 3 had disappointed, and Guardians of the Galaxy 3 had just opened to underwhelming numbers. The way the live-action remake of The Little Mermaid opened also did not help--and nor did the recent record of Disney animation (Disney having the prior year seen two big-budgeted animated movies, one of them from Pixar, make Deadline's list of the year's top five money-losers).

When Elemental arrived it did not defy the low expectations held for it, opening to just under $30 million. Still, the movie turned out to have Top Gun-like legs, more than quintupling its domestic take, while doing very well overseas, pulling in almost 69 percent of its box office gross from the international markets. The result is that where, more optimistic than most, I think (partly on the grounds that "concept-heavy" movies of this kind often find a warmer reception internationally than domestically), I suggested a likely range of $250-$450 million for the worldwide gross, and hewed toward the middle of that range more than the top, the movie overtopped that upper bound to pull in just a little less than a half billion dollars.

Admittedly this is not a prepossessing number for a Disney animated film by pre-pandemic standards (let alone coming out of the celebrated Pixar)--but we are told that it assures the film's profitability (at least, by the time that post-theatrical revenues like home entertainment, where Disney does well, are added in). The result is that, with the bar admittedly not very high, this one can be counted as a much-needed win for the studio.