New Delhi, July 13 -- LOS ANGELES - The debate over which audience a live-action remake actually serves arrived with force this weekend, when Disney's Moana landed at the domestic box office with $43 million, a figure that almost nobody in the industry can agree on how to read.

critics on Rotten Tomatoes gave the film a 34 percent approval rating while general audiences handed it a 90 percent score. The gap is nearly four times wider than the historical average between press and public opinion on the same film, and it sets up a test case for whether fandom can carry a live-action Disney adaptation past a $250 million budget ceiling.

"Along the Way," the new song Lin-Manuel Miranda wrote for the adaptation, features a dialogue between th...