‘Catastrophic': The power struggle behind Disney Pixar's disastrous box office bomb, Elio

News.com.au

14 hours ago

A secret battle behind the scenes at Disney Pixar has been revealed for the first time after the company suffered its biggest ever movie bomb following the release of Elio last month.
After numerous delays behind the scenes, the animated film hit cinemas in June where it grossed a disastrous $20.8 million in the US, the lowest opening frame at the box office in Pixar's history by a large margin.
To make matters worse, the film reportedly cost upwards of $200m to produce.
Now it's come to light that the movie released in cinemas is vastly different to the film that was originally screened for Pixar executives by the movie's original director, Adrian Molina.
In the original cut of the movie, Elio, 11, was seen to be passionate about fashion and environmentalism, with numerous scenes detailing his flare for hobbies not traditionally seen as masculine. It's reported that there was also a scene in Elio's bedroom with pictures that alluded to him having a male crush.
However, all of these were removed after Pixar bosses reportedly pushed for the character to be more 'masculine'.
The nightmare began in 2022, when then-director Adrian Molina screened his cut of the movie to test audiences.
While many complimented the film's content, Pixar heads became nervous when 'no one' put their hand up when asked if they would see it in cinemas.
Molina eventually stepped down and two new directors were hired to change the direction of the then almost entirely complete movie.
'It was pretty clear through the production of the first version of the film that (studio leaders) were constantly sanding down these moments in the film that alluded to Elio's sexuality of being queer,' an anonymous Pixar employee told Hollywood Reporter.
'I was deeply saddened and aggrieved by the changes that were made,' former Pixar assistant editor Sarah Ligatich, who provided feedback during Elio's production as a member of the company's internal LGBTQ group PixPRIDE, told the publication.
Ms Ligatich said that a number of creatives working on the film stepped down after the new directors shared their first revised cut of the movie.
'The exodus of talent after that cut was really indicative of how unhappy a lot of people were that they had changed and destroyed this beautiful work.'
'Suddenly, you remove this big, key piece, which is all about identity, and Elio just becomes about totally nothing,' added a former Pixar artist quoted in the same article. 'The Elio that is in theatres right now is far worse than Adrian's best version of the original.
'I'd love to ask Pete and the other Disney executives whether or not they thought the rewrite was worth it. Would they have lost this much money if they simply let Adrian tell his story?'
According to Hollywood Reporter, tensions within Pixar have only increased in recent years following a string of disappointing commercial releases. The once bulletproof studio has been forced to rely on sequels to well-known films after their original stories began to loose steam at the box office.