News: Disney Says No to Narnia
With all the hype surrounding Twilight, and Harry Potter, we’ve all forgotten about the little books that could, The Chronicles of Narnia. This shift in popularity may be the cause for its primary financial backer deciding to pull out of the franchise. According to THR, Disney will not co-produce or finance the next adaptation from the book series, The Chronicles of Narnia: The Voyage of the Dawn Treader.
While declining to elaborate, Disney and Walden Media confirmed Tuesday that for budgetary and logistical reasons the Burbank-based studio is not exercising its option to co-produce and co-finance the next “Narnia” movie with Walden.
It is rare for a studio to pull out of a planned trilogy in midstream, but the number-crunching showed a franchise on a downward trend. “Lion” roared to $292 million domestically and another $453 million internationally in 2005. This year, “Prince Caspian” grossed a healthy $141 million in North America and another $278 million internationally, but that was well off the “Lion” take.
Is this the recession talking or was the last movie just sub-par? Prince Caspian came out the same summer as Iron Man, The Dark Knight, and Indiana Jones, so although it made plenty of money it didn’t quite match up to it’s competition.
What happened to the Narnia craze? Was it ever really there?
Monday, January 5, 2009 1:41PM
[...] cut and dry in terms of who’s worth it, and who’s not. You notice how easily Disney dropped the Narnia franchise after it’s sequel Prince Caspian didn’t live up to expectations. [...]
Thursday, January 29, 2009 10:01AM
[...] we previously reported, Disney decided against continuing their financial relationship with the Chronicles of Narnia [...]
Monday, August 24, 2009 12:04PM
[...] fans or critics alike. The burn from it’s reception was so bad that Disney actually decided not to produce a third film, leaving the franchise without a studio home. Enter the Walden Media/ 20th Century Fox [...]