Two sides to Chicken Little’s numbers

Reuters reports on this weekend’s box-office figures:

“Chicken Little,” the first fully computer-animated movie produced by Walt Disney Co., exceeded industry expectations by selling $40.1 million in tickets in North American in its first three days of release, the company said on Sunday.

Film industry observers had expected the new box office champion to pass the $30 million mark, despite scathing reviews.

The film is considered a key test of the ability of Disney, whose fortunes were built on hand-drawn cartoons such as Bambi and The Little Mermaid, to succeed in the world of computer animation without help from the blockbusters made by its production partner Pixar Animation Studios Inc.

FWIW, Chicken Little‘s $40.1 million opening weekend is considerably lower than all the Pixar wide-release opening weekends except for A Bug’s Life (1998, $33.3 million) and the original Toy Story (1995, $29.1 million). Toy Story 2 (1999), Monsters Inc. (2001), Finding Nemo (2003) and The Incredibles (2004) all opened between $57.4 million and $70.5 million.

Chicken Little‘s first weekend is also lower than the opening weekends for all the DreamWorks / PDI cartoons except for Antz (1998, $17.2 million). Shrek (2001), Shrek 2 (2004), Shark Tale (2004) and Madagascar (2005) all opened between $42.3 million and $108 million.

Chicken Little‘s first weekend is also lower than the opening weekend for Fox / Blue Sky’s Ice Age (2002, $46.3 million), but it is slightly higher than their follow-up film Robots (2005, $36 million).

So Chicken Little made less on its opening weekend than every other major CGI feature since 1998 except for Robots.

However, Chicken Little also made more on its opening weekend than any of the hand-drawn Disney animated features since The Lion King (1994, $40.9 million). And FWIW, only two Disney cartoons had opened with over $30 million since then: Tarzan (1999, $34.2 million) and Lilo & Stitch (2002, $35.3 million).

So, as opening weekends ago, Chicken Little is Disney’s biggest success in over a decade. Which is kind of scary, really.