UPDATE: 2025/03/23 07:58 EST BY BRENNAN KLEIN

Snow White Falls $2.5 Million Short Of Saturday Projections

This article was originally written Saturday AM and has been updated Sunday AM with up-to-date box office projections (in bold), a full chart, and further analysis.

Snow White reviews have been middling to negative, earning it a 44% Rotten Tomatoes score.

Per Variety, as of Sunday morning, Snow White is projected to gross a 3-day total of $43 million at the domestic box office by the end of its opening weekend. This is more than enough for it to claim the No. 1 spot for the weekend, pulling significantly ahead of fellow new releases The Alto Knights and Magazine Dreams. Its debut is roughly half of what 2023's The Little Mermaid made in its opening weekend ($95.5 million) and just about matches the underwhelming debut of 2019's Dumbo ($46 million). Below, see the full Top 5 for the weekend:

There has been quite a bit of movement elsewhere on the chart, because in addition to Snow White claiming the throne, the previous weekend's No. 1 title, Novocaine, has fallen 57%, dropping directly from the top of the chart to No. 4. The previous weekend's No. 2 title, the Bong Joon Ho sci-fi movie Mickey 17, has tumbled down with it, most likely landing at No. 5 in its third weekend, though it is still neck-and-neck with a roughly equal total to the Jack Quaid movie.

These precipitous drops have buoyed the previous No. 3 and No. 4 titles, the Steven Soderbergh spy thriller Black Bag and the Marvel Cinematic Universe outing Captain America: Brave New World. By dint of slimmer drops of 42% and 24% in their respective second and sixth weekends, they have each climbed up the chart by one position, filling out the Top 3.

Black Bag stars Michael Fassbender, Cate Blanchett, and Pierce Brosnan.

Although the chart has been shaken up considerably, only one title has dropped out of the Top 5 entirely. That would be the animated feature The Day the Earth Blew Up: A Looney Tunes Movie, which dropped from No. 5 to No.7 with an estimated $1.7 million haul that sees it falling roughly 44%.

Meanwhile, the weekend's other new releases have debuted outside of the domestic Top 5 entirely. The Robert De Niro mob movie The Alto Knights has cratered with a $3 million debut that hardly makes a dent in its reported $45 million budget and sees it debut at No. 6. Meanwhile, the long-delayed Magazine Dreams, which stars Jonathan Majors, had a quiet $700,000 bow in 800 theaters that places it outside the Top 10.

What This Means For Snow White

It Is Comparing Negatively With Other Live-Action Remakes

Movies typically need to earn back two-and-a-half times their budgets, because theaters keep half of ticket sales and advertising costs are not factored into production budgets. Because the Snow White budget is reportedly between $240 and $270 million, this means that its break-even point is most likely $600 million or more. It could even be significantly higher, given its massive global marketing campaign. Given the precedent set by Disney's previous live-action movies, that break-even point may ultimately prove unattainable. Below, see how it compares with every theatrically released Disney live-action remake that isn't a sequel, prequel, or reimagining (like Maleficent):

Ultimately, the data does not spell very good news for Snow White, due to its inflated budget. The previous Disney live-action remakes that have grossed more than $600 million all had opening weekends of $90 million or more, a total that Snow White has fallen far short of during its domestic debut. Additionally, the diminishing returns of The Little Mermaid, which was also adapted from one of Disney's iconic princess musicals, indicate that it may not have been able to hit that break-even point even if it had earned twice its current opening weekend projections.

Our Take On The Weekend Box Office

There Are Some Important Signs Of Overall Improvement

Even though Snow White may not turn a profit in theaters and is comparing unfavorably to its peers, its opening weekend is still significant in positive ways. For one thing, it is the second highest-grossing debut of the year so far, behind Captain America: Brave New World ($88.8 million). Additionally, its estimated gross is almost exactly equal to the cumulative domestic total earned by the entire Top 10 over the previous weekend ($45.49 million), which was the lowest-grossing weekend of the year. This at least indicates that theaters in general are recovering somewhat after a grim beginning to the month.

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Source: Variety