The discontent of French cinema bosses against Disney is not about to fade.
After deciding, this summer, to directly launch its live-image version of "Mulan" on its Disney + platform, then to shift the new Marvel, "Black Widow", in May 2021, the studio with the big ears announced Wednesday morning that “Soul”, the highly anticipated new baby from its Pixar subsidiary, would not hit theaters on November 25 as planned but would be available directly on Disney + on December 25.
Beyond the fact that these three films with strong potential come in addition to the successive postponements of other big feature films by several American studios, this deprogramming means that 2020 will remain like a year without a big Disney cartoon for Christmas.
Too bad for "Soul", an animated phantasmagoria which tells the dialogue between a man and a soul ("soul" in English "), was directed by Pete Docter, veteran of the studio, director, among others, of" Up "and of "Vice Versa", and especially artistic director - number 1 in fact - of Pixar since the departure of John Lasseter.
As a result, there are only two Disney films left in theaters to date - but until when?
- before the end of the year: “Free Guy” with Ryan Reynolds on December 9, and “Death on the Nile”, according to Agatha Christie, by and with Kenneth Branagh on the 16th.
According to the American magazine Variety, it is obviously the fact that the majority of American and English cinemas are closed because of the Covid-19 pandemic which pushed Disney to withdraw “Soul” from the poster, but also the maintenance by a competing studio, Universal, of another animated film with great potential, "The Croods 2", on December 2 for a worldwide release.
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These cascading carryovers hardly seem surprising on Disney's part.
Unlike other studios, the group has its own streaming platform.
Dragging films like "Mulan" or "Soul" into it allows you to win new subscribers, but not to amortize films with colossal budgets.
But Disney, largely at the head of world box offices for three years thanks to large machines resulting from its “Star Wars” or “Avengers” licenses, has accumulated colossal revenues and can afford to launch several films at a loss.