How Disney Is Failing Mulan (And Its Audience)

How Disney Is Failing Mulan (And Its Audience)

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Disney’s $30 release of the live-action Mulan on Disney+ fails the film’s drive for representation in cinema and its intended audience.

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How Disney Is Failing Mulan (And Its Audience)

The live-action remake of Mulan will release on Disney+ instead of in movie theaters, which does a disservice to the film, what it represents, and fans hoping to see it. Mulan will hit Disney+ in the US and all international markets with access to the platform on September 4, 2020, for an additional fee of $29.99 on top of the $6.99 monthly subscription fee. That model, which will also see Mulan released in territories where cinemas have reopened but do not have Disney+ yet (like China, primarily) comes after the COVID-19 pandemic canceled Mulan’s original March 27th release.

The decision to release Mulan on Disney+ is being announced as a positive for Disney’s direct-to-consumer release plans and the future of the company, but it has disastrous consequences. Ironically, in a move designed to bring a stalled movie release to audiences, Disney may well have made Mulan less accessible and limited its reach within key demographics that need the movie most.

In short, Mulan releasing on Disney+ behind two different paywalls is counterproductive for a movie that was previously heralded as a watershed moment for representation in cinema. It could also mean that fewer people in key groups end up seeing it on release.

Putting Mulan Behind Two Paywalls Is A Mistake

How Disney Is Failing Mulan (And Its Audience)

Though there are invariably some complaints that the price of a cinema outing are unfairly inflated (particularly for a family with children, whose costs tend to run far beyond the price of the seat), a significant portion of cinema tickets is still hugely affordable. That affordability at the ticket booth at least is the only way cinema has been able to survive the pivot to VOD that has long been heralded as an inevitability.

Disney+ in itself is relatively inexpensive, given the size of the catalog and the promise of future tentpole releases like the MCU shows, but tacking on a $30 cover price changes the field of play entirely. As per Motion Pictures, physical sales of blu-rays are dramatically down year-on-year, halving in the five years up to 2018 according to the MPAA and part of the reason is the prohibitive suggested retail cost of on-release blu-rays. Owning films, outside of streaming platforms, is becoming an outdated model and Disney is fighting against a fast-flowing tide.

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The difference, of course, is that Mulan will be housed on Disney+ once purchased, rather than there being a physical copy, but even that has to overcome the significant barrier that the majority of consumers overwhelmingly do not buy digital movies. Whether the cost is too prohibitive, which it is here (particularly with the promised free release of the same film on the same platform further down the line), or for some other reason, bolting an outdated, unpopular purchase model onto a modern delivery system (even one doing as well as Disney+ is) fails the film by limiting who will buy it.

This approach will stop the more casual family audiences who may have caught it in the cinema, half-expecting a true-to-tone adaptation of the 1998 Disney animated classic from buying. And comparing the possible reach to the likes of Frozen 2 on Disney+ is an unfair parallel; that film was released as part of the subscription package and has a far more broad younger family appeal than a live-action Mulan. This version of Mulan won’t include Mushu, the original’s most marketable character (at least for this key demographic), and has positioned itself as a sort of Disney war epic. That is a remarkably difficult sell to the key younger family demographic even without asking $30 for it.

Disney Has Failed One Of Mulan’s Key Reasons For Existing

How Disney Is Failing Mulan (And Its Audience)

Next, there’s the issue of representation, which for a long time was the crux on which all of Mulan’s marketing leaned. This wasn’t just another live-action adaptation of a beloved Disney classic, it was to be a huge win for diversity and representation in cinema. As the first Disney release with an entirely Asian cast, Mulan goes even further than Aladdin (thanks to that unfortunate Prince Anders footnote).

Asian families and children were set to have their Black Panther moment, as Mulan would claim a huge victory for inclusivity and you cannot underestimate the value of a movie like this releasing across every multiplex and theatre in the world. Because, of course, the importance of inclusivity and diversity in art extends beyond the identities involved in making it. Now, a broad audience does have access to Mulan through Disney+, but putting it behind a paywall at that sort of price compromises the film’s agenda of visibility. It is no longer just like all other live-action Disney films, which is the important unspoken part of this type of project because Mulan has now been taken off the same playing field. That comes at some cost.

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Will Disney’s Mulan Release Strategy Work?

There is absolutely an upshot to the Disney+ release of Mulan, because China does not have Disney+ yet and that is arguably the biggest box office concern for Disney. Prior to the lockdown, the Chinese territory was on track to outperform the U.S. market, which is precisely why so many of the creative decisions (the removal of Mushu and the editing out of a kissing scene) have been geared directly towards that audience. It’s being marketed far more as the real story of Mulan.

While that’s absolutely a positive, the Chinese box office opened up sluggishly after the country’s lockdown and local releases outperformed US market imports initially. Mulan should buck that trend, but the market may not have recovered entirely by the time it is released and Disney may be faced with releasing it to a market not yet entirely on its feet without the safety net of a simultaneous Disney+ PPV release. In that respect, waiting to release Mulan worldwide after the cinema release path is a little clearer may have made more sense.

Ultimately, how Disney reports Mulan’s reception in numerical terms will define how successful the release is. As long as they control the numbers, they control the perception. Given the lack of concrete information on how well Artemis Fowl did – beyond the terrible reviews – it seems unlikely there will be reports and certainly not a box office “take” that includes VOD sales.

There are undoubtedly still potential fans out there eagerly awaiting the release of Mulan and they will no doubt pay the required $30 cover price to see it on release. And even with the pandemic making pre-coronavirus box office projections a hard sell now, it could still be a profitable movie, particularly if sales in China go well, but it’s the loss of the casual and family dollars where Disney might see the biggest loss. And even if they don’t, those audiences and the film itself have still been failed by inaccessibility.

Link Source : https://screenrant.com/mulan-movie-2020-disney-plus-release-bad-reason/

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