Disney's live-action Moana opened to $4.5 million in previews and is tracking for a $40 million weekend

Disney opened its live-action Moana on Thursday night, and the first number back is not the one the studio wanted. The remake took $4.5 million from previews that started at 2 p.m., and by Friday afternoon the trades had the three-day domestic opening landing somewhere between $40 million and $45 million. Three weeks ago this movie was tracking for $85 million. By midweek that had been walked down to the low $60s. Now it is looking at a weekend in the low $40s, and a couple of trackers have it slipping into the high $30s.

For a movie that cost a reported $250 million to make, that is a gap you can see from orbit.

The number in context

A $4.5 million preview night is not a catastrophe by itself. It is actually ahead of where Snow White ($3.5 million) and Dumbo ($2.6 million) started, and both of those opened in the mid-$40 millions. The problem is the company Disney was hoping to keep. The Little Mermaid did $10.3 million in previews on its way to a $95.5 million opening. Aladdin did $7 million and opened to $91.5 million. Moana is pacing with the remakes nobody brags about, not the ones that made the strategy look smart.

The screen count is not the excuse. Moana is playing in 3,875 theaters. It has the real estate. What it does not have, apparently, is the urgency.

Moana 2 is sitting right there

The obvious drag is timing. Moana 2 opened 19 months ago and did enormous business. For a lot of families, the well-being of Motunui got sorted out over Thanksgiving 2024, in a movie with the original voice cast and no live-action uncanny valley to negotiate. Asking those same families to buy tickets again this fast, for the same story with different faces, is a big ask. The tracking collapse suggests plenty of them said no.

Critics did not help. Reviews landed around a third positive on Rotten Tomatoes, the softest reception for a Disney live-action remake in a while. The reported audience response has been warmer than the notices, which is the one thread Disney has to pull on this weekend.

What the studio is watching tonight

Opening weekends this shape live or die on the Saturday. If the CinemaScore and the PostTrak exit numbers come in strong, word of mouth can push the three-day toward the top of the range and give the film legs into next week. If they come in soft, the low $40s is the ceiling, not the floor. The trades were explicit that the estimate is still moving, which is a polite way of saying nobody wants to commit to a bomb in print before the Saturday grosses are in.

The math that matters

A $250 million production budget, before you count marketing, puts the break-even north of $600 million worldwide by the usual rule of thumb. Disney remakes tend to lean hard on overseas and eventually on streaming, so a soft domestic start does not sink the thing on its own. But the entire pitch for remaking Moana this soon was that it was a sure thing: a beloved, proven property with a built-in audience that would show up on reflex. This weekend, the sure thing came back light.

Thomas Kail, making his feature directing debut after the Hamilton film, drew the assignment of turning one of Disney's best-loved recent animated movies into flesh and CG water. Catherine Laga'aia plays Moana in her first film role, and Dwayne Johnson is back as Maui. Disney dated it for July 10 on purpose, to line up with the franchise's tenth anniversary. The anniversary is intact. The victory lap will have to wait for the actuals.