The Lion King” roars less loudly than the original

The prequel to “The Lion King”, a cult film from 1994, recorded the eighth best start of the year with just under a million admissions. Behind, “Vaiana 2” stays the course and “En fanfare” approaches two million spectators.

Prequel of a popular monument which had a double enormous success in theaters (10.2 million admissions for the initial version of 1994 and 10 million for that of 2019), Mufasa : The Roi lion was inevitably expected to be a major event at the end of the year. Logically, the Disney animated film takes the lead after having delighted 890,000 young travelers in five days in 683 cinemas. If this is the eighth best initial score of the year, we are very far from the 2.56 million entries for the live version of the Lion King in 2019. Barry Jenkins' film will also be far ahead of the final assessment of family productions of the period by Vaiana 2, which has just entertained 653,000 additional young spectators, bringing its total to 5.7 million tickets sold in less than four weeks.

It weakens even less for A fanfare, which moved 190,000 new music lovers. This brings its cumulative number to 1.25 million entries and consolidates its prospect of exceeding 2 million. Barely ahead, the schoolboy comedy Under nuts got off to a good start, having made 192,000 fans laugh in 280 theaters at the end of the first weekend. It is located near the Segpa (210,000 entries) but clearly behind Segpas on skis (475,000 entries), Hakim Bougheraba's previous achievements. As across the Atlantic, Kraven the Hunter here suffered a setback, only managing to gather 123,000 followers on 407 screens. Never before has any superhero in the Marvel universe started so low in France.

Sarah Bernhardt, la Divine, by Guillaume Nicloux, with Sandrine Kiberlain in the title role, found its audience, attracting 117,000 curious people in 315 theaters. It is at the same level as Bonnard, Pierre and Marthe (118,000 entries) and above Madame de Sévigné (90,000 admissions), two other French biopics released in 2024. Sixth in the national ranking, it takes third place in Paris. Finally, note the very good performance of Conclave, which recorded 556,000 admissions in less than three weeks, and the exceptional career of the animated film Flow, the cat who was no longer afraid of water which exceeds 500,000 entries during its eighth week.