Predicting 20 Highest Grossing Movies Of 2019

2. The Lion King ($1.7 Billion)

Release Date: July 19

There's pretty much no box office prediction for Disney's "live-action" The Lion King remake that seems excessively optimistic, because this thing is going to be huge.

The Lion King might well be the most cherished of all the Disney animations, and if Jon Favreau's The Jungle Book can get within a whisker of $1 billion, there's no reason why this far more popular story can't get close to doubling it.

There's definitely a danger of Disney putting too much water in the beer with Dumbo and Aladdin both releasing before The Lion King - and possibly not being much good, or fatiguing audiences regardless - but it really feels like people will turn up en masse for what's being marketed as a real event movie.

With a much-loved story that everybody knows - including international audiences - there's virtually no chance of it pulling less than $1.5 billion. And if it's good enough, it could even get close to topping ours (and everybody else's) #1 pick...