Every Disney live-action remake, ranked from worst to first

Yahoo

21-03-2025

For the past three decades, Disney has been steadily transforming its library of classic animated movies into live-action features. So it was inevitable that Snow White would join the ranks of the remakes, to be followed by Lilo & Stitch this summer, and Moana next year. There are five other animated remakes currently in development, and at some point, Disney's going to run out of movies to make twice!
To mark Snow White's arrival in theaters on Friday, we've ranked every Disney live-action remake. There are some caveats, however. This list is limited to the actual remakes, rather than prequels, spinoffs, and sequels. The so-called live-action Lion King is also excluded, since it wasn't live-action at all. It was just made with some very realistic CGI, and it belongs among animated films rather than in this roundup of live-action Disney remakes. With that in the mind, here is the official Gold Derby ranking, from worst to first.
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Rotten Tomatoes: 27 percent Metacritic: 38 percent Worldwide box office: N/A Streaming: Disney+
Where's the Robert Zemeckis who made Back to the Future and Who Framed Roger Rabbit? Because there's very little of that guy in Disney+'s live-action remake of Pinocchio. While very technically proficient, and even visually impressive at times, this film simply goes through the motions of the story without recapturing any of its soul.
Tom Hanks is largely wasted as Geppetto, and Wicked's Cynthia Erivo has what amounts to a cameo as the Blue Fairy. Most of this film relies on the performance of Benjamin Evan Ainsworth as the voice of Pinocchio, with Joseph Gordon-Levitt as pal and conscience Jiminy Cricket. We'll say this for Pinocchio: Pleasure Island's true nature is still unsettling in the remake.
Rotten Tomatoes: 46 percent Metacritic: 51 percent Worldwide box office: $353.3 million Streaming: Disney+
Dumbo is Tim Burton's most recent film for Disney, and quite likely his last, according to the director himself. Some of his other remakes took bold swings that improved upon the original Disney cartoons. Dumbo wasn't one of those movies, and it's vastly inferior to the 1941 film. Heck, we'd pick Operation Dumbo Drop over this one!
Burton had a great cast to work with, including Colin Farrell, Michael Keaton, Eva Green, and Danny DeVito. However, the human side of the story completely overshadows Dumbo in his own movie. There are also plenty of baffling dramatic choices, including an ending where the circus decides to forgo the use of animal performers in favor of people dressed up as animals. This is supposed to be 1919, not the 2020s.
Rotten Tomatoes: 39 percent Metacritic: 50 percent Worldwide box office: $320.7 million Streaming: Disney+
Casting Glenn Close as Cruella de Vil was a truly inspired choice, and John Hughes' script stays pretty close to the plot of the 1961 film and Dodie Smith's original story. House's Hugh Laurie pops up in a fun turn as Jasper, one of Cruella's henchmen. This remake didn't win over critics, but audiences loved it.
Where the movie really loses something special is due to the decision to keep the animals from speaking English as they did in the original cartoon. The animal actors are very expressive, but it's just not the same. The film also unforgivably erases the heroic actions of the animated feature's sole feline character, Sergeant Tibbs. That alone deserves a very loud hiss.
Rotten Tomatoes: 65 percent Metacritic: 61 percent Worldwide box office: N/A Streaming: Disney+
The familiar rivalry between Peter Pan (Alexander Molony) and Captain Hook (Jude Law) gets a little touchy-feely in Peter Pan & Mary, the last of the Disney+ original live-action remakes... at least for now. Law does seem like he was the right choice to play Hook, but he loses some of the character's wonderfully over-the-top villainous swagger when the one-handed captain reveals his real connection to Peter.
As for Wendy (Ever Anderson), she and her brothers join Peter on a trip to Neverland to explore the promise of never having to grow up. This film trips all over itself while trying to avoid the racist stereotypes of the 1953 original, and it's just not as much fun to watch.
Rotten Tomatoes: 67 percent Metacritic: 48 percent Worldwide box office: N/A Streaming: Disney+
Disney+'s first-ever original movie was the remake of Lady and the Tramp, and it's largely faithful to the 1955 animated film. While previous live-action adaptations shied away from talking animals, this film let Lady (Tessa Thompson) and Tramp (Justin Theroux) keep their voices. And it wouldn't have worked without them.
It was unintentionally hilarious that Oscar winner F. Murray Abraham plays the man who lovingly serves spaghetti and meatballs to Lady and the Tramp, And this film did pay more of its attention to its human cast, including Thomas Mann and Kiersey Clemons as Lady's owners. It's good enough as a movie, but it doesn't outshine the original.
Rotten Tomatoes: 80 percent Metacritic: 63 percent Worldwide box office: $70 million Streaming: N/A (available to buy/rent on most digital platforms)
This film has the distinction of being the first live-action remake of a Disney animated film, as well as writer and director Stephen Sommers' warm-up for The Mummy movies a few years later. Rudyard Kipling's The Jungle Book doesn't try to ape the plot of the 1967 film, if you'll pardon the expression. Instead, it primarily tells the story of Mowgli (Jason Scott Lee) after he's reunited with his childhood friend Katherine "Kitty" Brydon (Game of Thrones' Lena Headey), while also dealing with treacherous treasure hunters who disrupt the jungle.
It's a solid adventure flick with a great cast, including Cary Elwes, Sam Neill, John Cleese, and Jason Flemyng, as well as real animals instead of CGI creations. The only knock against this Jungle Book is that it isn't very faithful to either the Disney film or Rudyard Kipling's stories.
Rotten Tomatoes: 84 percent Metacritic: 67 percent Worldwide box office: $542.4 million Streaming: Disney+
Unlike some of the other live-action remakes, Cinderella doesn't try to reinvent the original story of the 1950 toon. Director Kenneth Branagh may not have gone with Disney's talking mice, but Ella (Lily James) still gets her chance to dance with the prince (Richard Madden), thanks to her Fairy Godmother (Helena Bonham Carter).
Cate Blanchett hammed it up as Lady Tremaine, Ella's evil stepmother, but that was exactly what the role needed. This isn't the most spectacular Disney remake, but there's nothing wrong with it either.
Rotten Tomatoes: 51 percent Metacritic: 53 percent Worldwide box office: $1.03 billion Streaming: Disney+
There's one thing that anyone can say after watching Alice in Wonderland: 'That was definitely a Tim Burton movie.' Lewis Carroll's famous story, originally adapted by Disney in 1951, was completely reimagined for this film, and Mia Wasikowska had a star-making turn as Alice Kingsleigh, a young woman who finds herself transported to Wonderland.
As part of the story's remix, the Mad Hatter (Johnny Depp) became more of a heroic figure, and Alice was called upon to free Wonderland from the Red Queen (Helena Bonham Carter), restore the White Queen (Anne Hathaway) to power, and defeat the Jabberwocky (Christopher Lee). As she says in the movie, Alice does six impossible things before breakfast. About the only thing she couldn't do is make the sequel, Alice Through the Looking Glass, as fun or as successful as this one.
Rotten Tomatoes: 72 percent Metacritic:66 percent Worldwide box office: $69 million Streaming: Disney+
Mulan was beset by numerous factors beyond the control of the filmmakers, including the COVID-19 pandemic, fan reaction to some of the creative changes, and even remarks by the movie's leading lady, Yifei Liu, when she came out against pro-democracy protesters in Hong Kong. And you wouldn't believe the kerfuffle that happened when Mulan's commanding officer and love interest, Li Shang, was cut from the film.
Taken on its own terms, the Mulan remake has some incredible visuals, good action, and a scale that few Disney live-action movies have achieved. Die-hard fans of the 1998 original might have been discontented with Mulan, but this still ranks among the best of the remakes.
Rotten Tomatoes: 67 percent Metacritic:59 percent Worldwide box office: $569.6 million Streaming: Disney+
The Little Mermaid sinks or swims with its Ariel, and Halle Bailey holds up her end of the bargain by singing her way through the remake. There are parts of this film that are visually dazzling, but it still can't compare to one of the greatest animated features ever made.
There aren't many major changes between the two versions of The Little Mermaid, but this one does reveal that Ariel is related to the sea witch Ursula (Melissa McCarthy), which ultimately doesn't make a difference in the outcome of the story. But if you've ever loved the songs and music of 1989's The Little Mermaid, they're all back again for the current generation along with new songs by Alan Menken and Lin-Manuel Miranda.
Rotten Tomatoes: 54 percent Metacritic: 56 percent Worldwide box office: $758.5 million Streaming: Disney+
In a departure from the previous Disney remakes, Maleficent casts the villain of the original as the (anti)hero. Unlike Maleficent's delightful and unrepentantly evil turn in 1959's Sleeping Beauty, Angelina Jolie's take on the character is presented as a woman who was violated by her former suitor, Stegan (Sharlto Copley). He ripped the wings from her body so he could become a king and marry another woman. To get her revenge, Maleficent crashes the christening of his daughter, Aurora, and places the familiar curse on the infant that will strike on her 16th birthday.
When Aurora (Elle Fanning) becomes a teenager, things diverge even further from the original tale when Maleficent develops maternal feelings for her. But not even Maleficent can break her own curse. Unfortunately, the success of this film emboldened Disney to make a sequel, Maleficent: Mistress of Evil, which couldn't live up to its predecessor.
Rotten Tomatoes: 57 percent Metacritic: 53 percent Worldwide box office: $1.05 billion Streaming: Disney+
The animated Aladdin is one of the best movies from Disney Animation. Guy Ritchie's remake can't match the 1992 version, but it's still pretty good. And audiences responded to it by making it one of the top-performing Disney remakes.
No one could compare to the late Robin Willims, but Will Smith was an intriguing choice to bring something new to the part of Genie. This was only the second film of Mena Massoud's career, but he did an admirable job as Aladdin. Yet the real breakout here is Naomi Scott as Princess Jasmine, who's so assertive that she basically banishes two guards who were holding her into oblivion for the duration of her power ballad.
Rotten Tomatoes: 71 percent Metacritic: 65 percent Worldwide box office: $1.27 billion Streaming: Disney+
Disney's 1991 Beauty and the Beast was Oscar-nominated for Best Picture and pretty much perfect the first time. Director Bill Condon wisely didn't rock the boat with his 2017 remake, which largely recreates the big moments from the first film and all of those amazing songs by Howard Ashman and Alan Menken.
Emma Watson lights up the screen as Belle, and Dan Stevens was a worthy Beast to her beauty. Luke Evans chowed on scenery as the wonderfully over-the-top Gaston, Belle's would-be suitor and the film's true villain. The only real shock in this movie was that someone in the prince's court was transformed into a toilet for decades. What did they do to deserve that fate?! And thankfully, the toilet doesn't have any musical numbers.
Rotten Tomatoes: 94 percent Metacritic: 77 percent Worldwide box office: $967 million Streaming: Disney+
Jon Favreau's remake of The Jungle Book didn't make the same choices that Stephen Sommers did with his 1994 film, and the result was a movie that was a lot closer in spirit to the Disney original. Favreau cast a real kid, Neel Sethi, to play Mowgli, while letting an A-list ensemble of celebrities voice the CGI animals.
Bill Murray, Ben Kingsley, and Idris Elba are particularly compelling as Ballo, Bagheera, and Shere Khan, but the rest of the voice cast — including Scarlett Johansson, Lupita Nyong'o, Giancarlo Esposito, and Christopher Walken — are all terrific. This is easily Disney's best live-action remake, and it has yet to be topped.
Based on the decidedly mixed reviews for Snow White, Favreau's The Jungle Book will remain on top for the foreseeable future.
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