Disney's Pirates at the Multiplex

It doesn't get any better for Disney (NYSE: DIS  ) than it does today. Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest opens at a movie theater near you. The first film rocked the box office, moving $653.9 million in ticket sales worldwide.

The unlikely success prompted Disney to sign up the franchise's three picture-pretty stars for a complete trilogy. The final installment will wrap up shooting later this summer, for a 2007 release.

A live-action success good enough to inspire a no-brainer trilogy is good for any studio. It's even sweeter for Disney, since the film is based on a long-standing Disney theme park attraction that seemed to have been overlooked in recent years.

Disney has even updated the ride at its Disneyland and Magic Kingdom parks this year to include the likeness of some of the film's characters. Done right, it becomes the perfect cycle of a hit film driving park attendance, and park attendance driving ticket sales at the multiplex.

The perfect match of celluloid and theme parks is one of the reasons why I thought that CBS (NYSE: CBS  ) was nuts to sell its Paramount Parks chain to Cedar Fair (NYSE: FUN  ) earlier this year. Meeting up with Six Flags (NYSE: SIX  ) CEO Mark Shapiro in May, I got the feeling that he, too, wants to transform his regional chain into a more relevant entertainment empire.

Disney has already turned to some of its oldest attractions, like The Country Bears Jamboree and The Haunted Mansion, to inspire full-length feature flicks. Those didn't resonate with filmgoers as successfully as Pirates has. Over at BoxOfficeMojo.com, users predict that that this weekend's film will generate $109 million in domestic ticket sales. If their aim is true, the film will have generated more "booty" in a three-day weekend than Time Warner's (NYSE: TWX  ) Superman Returns has produced in a full week.

A summer blockbuster for a crew of seafaring swashbucklers? Yo, ho, yo, ho, a Disney pirate's life for me.

Disney and Time Warner are active recommendations for Motley Fool Stock Advisor newsletter service subscribers, while Cedar Fair has been singled out to Income Investor readers. Try either newsletter free for 30 days with a quick click on the preceding links.

Longtime Fool contributor Rick Munarriz is still a kid at heart, smitten by the right kind of animation. He owns shares in Disney and units in Cedar Fair. The Fool has a disclosure policy. He is also part of the Rule Breakers newsletter research team, seeking out tomorrow's ultimate growth stocks a day early.