Type Division Products Motion pictures Headquarters Paris, France Founded 21 April 2008 | Industry Film Website nature.disney.com Founder Walt Disney | |
 | ||
Genre Natural documentary films Key people Jean-Francois Camilleri (executive vice president and general manager) Parent organizations The Walt Disney Company, Walt Disney Studios Films produced Monkey Kingdom, African Cats, Born in China, Bears, Chimpanzee Profiles | ||
Disneynature is an independent film unit of Walt Disney Studios that produces nature documentary films. The production company was founded on April 21, 2008 and is headquartered in Paris, France. Disney veteran Jean-Francois Camilleri, who also serves as senior vice president and general manager for Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures France, heads the unit.
Contents
The nature films are budgeted between $5 million to $10 million and would be handled by Disney Studio's distribution and marketing. Many of its films are released on Earth Day.
Background
Disney had a background in making nature films from 1948 through 1960 producing the True-Life Adventures series which won several Academy Awards. Environmentally, Disney's Animal Kingdom in Orlando has nursed back to health endangered sea turtles, took white rhinos back to Africa and did a Cotton-top tamarins, a Colombia only monkey species, census. Also since 1995, the Disney Wildlife Conservation Fund has doled out more than $11 million to 650 projects in 110 countries.
March of the Penguins came out in 2005 distributed through Warner Independent Pictures in the US on a $8 million budget but gross almost 10 times at the US box office and won an Academy Award. Jean-Francois Camilleri had Buena Vista International France acquire the film for the French market getting a 20% ownership stake it its French version while Buena Vista Pictures Distribution bid for the film in the US but lost. Disney CEO Bob Iger, considering Disney's past efforts, felt that Penguins "should have been a Disney film worldwide". Thus the film influenced Disney to start the banner.
History
Disneynature was announced on April 21, 2008, a day before Earth Day, with a starting slate of seven films under Camilleri. No decision was made on whether the studio would donate the films' proceeds to conservation causes. A multi-film production agreement was also made with Alastair Fothergill, BBC's "Planet Earth" series producer, with three scheduled films, "Earth" (2009), "Big Cats" (2011) and "Chimpanzee" (2012). The other announced slate films and their release year were The Crimson Wing: Mystery of the Flamingos (December 2008 starts worldwide rollout), Oceans (2010), Orangutans: One Minute to Midnight (2010) and Naked Beauty: A Love Story that Feeds the Earth (2011).
The Crimson Wing: Mystery of the Flamingos was the first film produced for Disneynature. The first film released domestically under the new label was Earth. Earth opened on April 22, 2009 in the US. In 2012, a Disneynature TV pay cable channel was launched in France and is currently carried by France Telecom.
Disneynature has recently expanded to China with the production of Born in China. The production was made possible due to an expansion of Disney's relationship with Shanghai Media Group starting in 2014. Growing Up Wild was the company's first compilation film, released in 2016, and direct-to-video HD and video on demand.