'Moana' debuted just 10 years ago. Why Disney is remaking it as a live-action movie

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Set us as preferred In 2016, Walt Disney Co.’s “Moana” became a box office hit, captivating audiences with catchy earworms from Lin-Manuel Miranda and a spunky young heroine who rejected the label of princess.Now, just 10 years later, it’s the latest Disney animated film to be given the live-action treatment.Burbank-based Disney has long reached into its vault in search of animated classics to redo in a live-action format.But a decade is the shortest time between one of the company’s original animated movies and the reimagined film.

(2025’s “Lilo & Stitch,” which originally debuted in 2002, is the next closest with a gap of 23 years.)Why go back to “Moana” so soon? The Polynesian wayfarer is extremely popular.Hollywood Inc.

More than 30 years after the first film came out, the “Toy Story” franchise has continued to resonate with audiences, making it a juggernaut for Disney.The 2016 animated film grossed more than $643 million at the global box office, then spawned a 2024 sequel that made more than $1 billion worldwide.The original is the most-watched movie in Disney+ history with more than 1.5 billion hours of viewing.“Every once in a while in Hollywood, we make a film that is more than a film,” actor Dwayne Johnson, who reprises his role as the demigod Maui, said onstage during the movie’s premiere Tuesday at the Hollywood Bowl after a Polynesian dance performance.

“I think you could feel it already tonight, with our culture and with what we have represented.But also not only our Polynesian culture ...

it’s also a shared culture around the world.”The latest “Moana,” out this weekend, will join a cadre of family films at the multiplex.That includes Disney and Pixar’s “Toy Story 5,” which has now racked up more than $774 million worldwide, and Universal Pictures and Illumin...