'Brave' Also Expanding To Wide Release For Labor Day Weekend

Scarlett Johansson's Black Widow will be sharing the multiplex this weekend with another red-haired heroine making a last-minute push for box office dollars. Disney's doubling down on old releases for Labor Day, giving Pixar's Brave a one-week-only wider opening.

The animated adventure has dwindled to just 450 theaters by last weekend, but will be bumped up to a 1,700-theater wide release for this weekend. The film will play on both 2D and 3D screens. More after the jump.

Disney/Pixar has employed similar release tactics in the past, giving Cars 2 more theaters over Labor Day last year and doing the same for Toy Story 3 in 2010. It's paid off quite well for them so far — Cars 2 raked in $1.8 million that weekend, up from $234K the previous week, and Toy Story 3 went from $1 million the week prior to over $2 million on Labor Day weekend. Since its June release, Brave has grossed $230 million domestically and $442 worldwide, which ranks Brave somewhere in the middle of Pixar's box office performances.

Dave Hollis, Disney's exeuctive VP of distribution, explained that the idea was to give audiences one last shot at seeing Brave and The Avengers in theaters. "We wanted to try it again and use messaging that says, 'Get it while you can, one last time before these films head to video,'" he said. Brave will hit DVD and Blu-ray on November 13. And if you really like revisiting Pixar movies on the big screen, keep an eye out for Finding Nemo 3D when it opens September 14.

[Source: LAT]