Seems the last official weekend of Summer Vacation will see a re-release of Disney Pixar’s big hit Toy Story 3.
Lee Unkrich, director of Toy Story 3, announced on Twitter that Pixar’s billion-dollar movie will re-release in American theaters this weekend for the Labor Day holiday. Fans of the film may be pleased to hear the news, but what is the point, really?
Avatar grossed $750 million in its 34-week domestic run – $77 million of which came in its first three days. The first five days of the Avatar: Special Edition re-release has only mustered up $4.8 million domestically. Basically, the greed of James Cameron did not pay off.
So clearly re-releasing Toy Story 3 this weekend is PURELY for the cash. That’s no surprise.
But will this re-release actually pay off?
With summer vacation drawing to a close, its likely that the busy days of summer are winding to an end and families looking for that last event before returning to the routine of schoolwork may take their kids out for a good time at the theater.
Theatrical runs are a natural creature. They have their youth, and those eager to see a film jump fast. There is a waning period where the stragglers finally get around to it and they pull it from the theater in favour of the next big thing because really no one is going to see the release anymore and the theaters are near empty at screenings.
So why bring it back again this soon after it ends its theatrical run? Well if they anticipated this, they would just tell the cinemas to sit on their prints a little longer and the re-release would cost them virtually nothing.
Worst case scenario, they spend a small stack of money to re-ship the prints, put up a couple TV spots saying this is your last chance to see it on the big screen and give it two more weeks in the theater.
ANY money they make is MORE money, so why not?
It will still be out on DVD and Blu by Christmas.
