I was being facetious with my first question, but I think you're right.
Reading the article just highlighted more fail, too. Because they decided, based on this movie not doing well, that it was the "Princess" in the title which killed the box office on it. On what were they basing that on, since it's pointed out in the article that most of their biggest box office hits were with female protagonists?
I wonder if they did a survey. If not though, why assume it was a matter of gender and not a matter of race? I'm not saying that's the real reason, but it seems to me to be the bigger difference from other animated movies (not counting the non-3D-ness) and thus the more obvious guess.
Of course, racism is a far bigger can of worms than "girly stuff is bad".
why assume it was a matter of gender and not a matter of race
I would bet folding money if PatF suffered for some reason other than the timing of the release, it was due to race rather than gender, but I doubt Disney is willing to come out and say "We'll never make another cartoon about a black person" when they can instead use this as an excuse to purge themselves of the icky girly-ness instead.
I admit, that also came to mind, but they know they would get FLAYED if they said anything like that. Whereas you can make sweeping sexist stances and statements without fear.
But this is Disney, and they're insane. They made this big announcement after I think it was Brother Bear came out that obviously 2D animation was dead, and that's why the movie did badly at the Box Office, and they wouldn't make any more. It obviously never occured to them that the movie was bad.
In this case, I think it had more to do with the fact that the advertising for The Princess and the Frog did not actually highlight the actual music (which was great) or the more interesting 2D animation employed in the film.
And if they didn't phrase it like that but simply stated that race might have been a factor, they'd essentially be calling their consumer base racist, which, not a good move.
It was a traditionalist Disney movie that probably features the same story as all the others. There was nothing unique to The Princess and the Frog, apart from "here, we made our usual story with more pigmentation and accents, shower us with cookies".
(It will probably have a great mileage on video, though.)
People are bored with the Disney princess formula.
Oh, and if this one tanks, it's probably because fairytale subversions have also been done to death. God forbid they create a new story without the crutch of some familiar one from many years ago.
Because there just aren't enough fairy tales where boys are the heroes? And it wasn't all about the prince coming to rescue her from the tower?
I...oy.
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I can't even.
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I was being facetious with my first question, but I think you're right.
Reading the article just highlighted more fail, too. Because they decided, based on this movie not doing well, that it was the "Princess" in the title which killed the box office on it. On what were they basing that on, since it's pointed out in the article that most of their biggest box office hits were with female protagonists?
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Of course, racism is a far bigger can of worms than "girly stuff is bad".
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I would bet folding money if PatF suffered for some reason other than the timing of the release, it was due to race rather than gender, but I doubt Disney is willing to come out and say "We'll never make another cartoon about a black person" when they can instead use this as an excuse to purge themselves of the icky girly-ness instead.
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I admit, that also came to mind, but they know they would get FLAYED if they said anything like that. Whereas you can make sweeping sexist stances and statements without fear.
But this is Disney, and they're insane. They made this big announcement after I think it was Brother Bear came out that obviously 2D animation was dead, and that's why the movie did badly at the Box Office, and they wouldn't make any more. It obviously never occured to them that the movie was bad.
In this case, I think it had more to do with the fact that the advertising for The Princess and the Frog did not actually highlight the actual music (which was great) or the more interesting 2D animation employed in the film.
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*sigh*
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Yes, because that's certainly an underserved demographic: white, teenage males. :-P
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(It will probably have a great mileage on video, though.)
People are bored with the Disney princess formula.
Oh, and if this one tanks, it's probably because fairytale subversions have also been done to death. God forbid they create a new story without the crutch of some familiar one from many years ago.
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