This feels like a huge whiff to me, Unity needs to focus on games and just make money there. Games is a bigger market than movies at this point and there is plenty of room to grow there, especially if they can continue to make it easier for individuals/small groups to make a game in their spare time.
But a prestigious flagship does lift the whole company; skills/assets can trickle down to games; and they have been positioning themselves as a rival to Unreal for some time now.
Weta develops metric tones of tech internally, including employing some of the top graphics researchers at various points in their careers. There is tons of tech talent in VFX and animation shops. Hell, I work with libraries open sourced by Pixar as part of my day job at a FAANG.