The problem with Disney live action remakes is they're trying to appeal to a younger audience. If Cameron Diaz can't be Cinderella, what's the point?
First things first. It's Diaz.
Second it's Disney so yeah they're trying to appeal to younger audiences, that's kind of their thing.
Third she's 52 years old. Nobody wants to watch premenopausal Snow White live with 7 CGI dwarves and try to score Josh Brolin as the prince.
Lastly, if you fall asleep at 52, at least in America your ass is going to a retirement home. The only prince coming to save you is the sweet release of death.
They are making movies to cater to a zeitgeist curated by a vocal minority via censorship, harassment, and emotional manipulation.
If they stayed true to the source material for live action or CGI remake, they would do fine. What they have been making is live action reimagining through a minority contempory lens that alienates the majority of their fanbase.
The worst part of their new direction is the pandering. Don't just make an established character that was white a minority or alter the story to conform to some new philosophy, that is just lazy and everybody sees it. They need to come up with new stories with new new characters from a marginalized minority, like Moana or Lilo and Stitch. Nobody will honestly care about seeing a world through a minority charactersls view. Viewers didn't care with Pocahontas or Mulan because they were an honest attempt at making an origional and good movie that happens to feature an American minority.
Don't make Cinderella black, make an original story about a black character like Black Panther. Don't make an empowered feminist, make an empowered feminist and tell her origional story like Mulan. Tell us new stories and make them appealing because they are interesting.
Also don't beat a dead horse with a sequel that can never be as good as the first one because their story is told and trying to capitalize with "but wait, there's more" after the book is closed.
They are going after low-hanging fruit one person asked for and wonder why few are satisfied.
That's my point, it can't be done.
Why would Disney appeal to an older audience? Well, they do since they bought all that other stuff(Fox, Marvel, NatGeo, etc) they have no reason to with their animated ones. The ones they make now continue to be the same themes, generally. But with live action remakes they are trying to speak to both young and older audiences and it doesn't work as well. They should stick with the CGI remakes.
They should try to appeal to the older generation because, for one, kids aren't exactly known for their distinguished taste. The main reason is that is who these movies were sold to. You want to hype up some OG Disney you have to get OG Disney fans excited. Disney can do what they want but if they focused on appealing to the children that fell in love with the content the rest would follow.
They are just bad at it. They try but they must not have enough research plus they are a corporation so they just care about making money. Most of the new stuff sequels and all are trash. I liked the lion king CGI version and the CGI in Avatar, but haven't seen the second one yet, so I can't judge. I like what they are doing in Marvel. That is what appeals. If they redo every 2D cartoon movie growing up into decent CGI and to the T of the story, we might have a good set of newer movies. That is how they can appeal. The other new stuff not so much. They have a lot of improving to do, there.
This shower thought was taken back to its home planet and never seen again.