Culture

Disney’s "A Christmas Carol" Is #1 - $31m Opening Weekend

by amyellensoden | November 9, 2009 at 12:26 pm

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Disney's new animated version of "A Christmas Carol" hit theatres this weekend and is already #1 at the box office having generated $31 million throughout its opening weekend. The film stars Jim Carrey as Scrouge and has many other celebrity leads such as Colin Firth, Bob Hoskins, Robin Wright Penn, and Gary Oldman.

Disney's holiday film, directed by Robert Zemeckis, brings "A Christmas Carol" to life in a way that is both innovative and appealing to wide-range audience. Zemeckis uses performance-capture technology to create an animated effect that replicates a human being's appearance to a certain extent. This explains the animated Scrouge's strong resemblance to Jim Carry himself.

Zemeckis has previously used this kind of animation technology in his film "The Polar Express," another holiday hit which did exceedingly well at the box office back in 2004. More recently, he produced the pseudo-animated remake of "Beowulf" using the same technology in 2007.

“A Christmas Carol,” a 3-D adaptation of the Charles Dickens holiday tale, is Disney’s sixth top debut this year. The company ranks fifth among the six major studios in U.S. ticket sales in 2009 with $1 billion as of Nov. 5, according to Box Office Mojo, a California-based researcher. “Up,” from Disney’s Pixar Animation Studios, is the top 3-D movie in the U.S. this year with $292.9 million.

Promotion for "A Christmas Carol" includes many screenings in 3D and IMAX format that will definitely be popular with younger audiences over the Christmas holidays.

While the numbers aren't astounding for "A Christmas Carol's" opening weekend, there ire still several weeks until Christmas and the film will likely generate a great deal of revenue in the weeks ahead throughout the holiday season.