Disney Celebrates "Pirates" By Firing a Bunch of People
Filed under: Disney
You'd think that with Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest smashing all sorts of box office records and Cars crossing the $200 million mark ... Disney-ville would be a pretty pleasant place to work at right now. Alas, no. Fresh off the cash cow arrival of Jack Sparrow's second adventure, Disney announced that they'd be cutting back on their cinematic output ... and they'd be firing a whole bunch of people.According to Variety, Disney plans to cut back from about 18 movies a year to something more like 8, and all of their future releases will be "Disney-branded," which probably doesn't bode well for the folks at Touchstone and/or Miramax. Apparently this is some huge move intended to make the Mouse House more profitable in the long run, although to me it feels more like simple corporate greed. (Especially with the inevitably massive Pirates 3 waiting in the wings.)
Despite the stunning success of Pirates2 and the solid returns from Cars, the studio also spent/lost some solid coin on titles like Stick It, Annapolis, Stay Alive, The Wild, and Glory Road. What Variety neglected to mention is that Disney also unleashed Eight Below and The Shaggy Dog this year, both of which (amazingly) turned a profit. (Perhaps part of their new business plan should be to only make movies that deal with pirates and/or dogs.)
So yeah, it's pretty ironic: Less than a week after releasing one of the biggest hits of all time, the studio decides to cut down on production and fire a bunch of employees. Makes you kinda wonder what one's motivation should be if they work as a Mouse House office drone. ...
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
7-12-2006 @ 3:55PM
Elliott said...
I for one, am shocked! Outraged! How could a great movie like "Stick It" not be profitable?!?
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7-12-2006 @ 4:13PM
Tejas Kotak said...
I realize that some of Disney's movie's didn't do too well, but those that did really shovelled in a lot of cash. And let's not forget, Disney still makes a small, but still exsistant, profit from selling the older movies on DVD and VHS.
This is nothing but corporate greed, I bet Walt would really hate the guys running his company right now...
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7-12-2006 @ 5:18PM
Liz said...
Maybe they're trying to cut down the absolute shit movies they make. They may increase their profits, but I think that they truly believe they're going to have more hits like "Pirates" and they just want a bigger cut of the cash flow. But some of the movies they made that were really successful (Finding Nemo, Monsters Inc., Toy Story) were made in correspondence with Pixar, and those were the big money-makers in their respective years. Sounds to me that their only big money maker after they put this into effect is going to be the 3rd Pirates, which isn't going to be enough to keep the company on top.
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7-12-2006 @ 5:58PM
Mickymse said...
Actually... I think I kinda like the sound of this. Part of the problem Disney has run into in some aspects of its business -- like animation -- is that there is simply far too MUCH supply coming out. Sticking with the animation part of the biz, they are also competing with much more supply being put out by their competitors.
Done right, this move should allow them to do really A-mazing marketing campaigns for fewer movies, drum up more anticipation for Disney releases, and hopefully return us to a time when watching a Disney film was a special experience for the whole family.
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7-12-2006 @ 8:51PM
RyaN said...
Well maybe this will mean a small amout of really good movies rather than 1/4 Good 3/4 Shit.
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7-12-2006 @ 10:57PM
Finished.Law.School said...
I hope they fired the people responsible for the remake of Adventures in Babysitting and Herbie, among many other flops Disney has shat upon us...
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