Alternate Takes 12.19.09: Disney Animated Classics, Part 2

Posted by Shawn S. Lealos on 12.19.2009

With Disney returning to traditional animation for its upcoming The Prince and the Frog, Shawn S. Lealos looks at what he considers the best films in Disney's back catalogue in Part 2 of a 2-part Alternate Takes special edition.



Welcome to Week 82 of Alternate Takes. I am your host Shawn S. Lealos and you have now entered my world.

As usual, some comments:

Hook is a fantastic movie but I'm glad people hate on it, otherwise Hook would be remade again by now and lose the love of the first one. Robin Williams + Dustin Hoffman + A unique Peter Pan Story = Win - Posted By: The Dutch - I agree it is a unique story but I hate, hate, hate, hate the Lost Boys in that movie. It keeps it from being anything I care to watch again.

JM appreciated the inclusion of The Jungle Book. M:-X believes The Sword & The Stone and The Black Cauldron are both criminally overlooked while Guest#3628 believes Oliver and Company, and The Fox and the Hound are both underrated. .

While I'm stoked to see Disney return to 2D, princess & frog seems to have all the lame humour (read: for grandparents) that made their most recent 3-D films flop so badly. Are we returning to greatness... no. We're returning to home on the range. 3-D isn't the problem, but switching to 2-D is a step in the right direction.

Like this column... calling the top five...
5. Alice in Wonderland
4. Lady and the Tramp
3. Cinderella
2. Pinocchio
1. Snow White

...Lady and the Tramp might be Sleeping Beauty... which has wonderful animation, but the story is basically snow white. I probably would have bumped Bambi up to the top 5, and included Icabod & Mr. Toad or Fantasia instead of 101, but solid column sir. - Posted By: Bill21GigaWatts (Guest)

Thanks for reading. You got all five of this week's list right, although the one you thought might be switched out was off. There is just something about the original Alice in Wonderland that is too acid trippy to add to this list. As for 3D, I don't agree that it needs to end. I love 3D because it makes the movies look great (see Up for a movie that is amazing thanks to the technique). It's not the technology (and this movie is taking a break from CGI, not 3D actually) but the storytelling. They need to take a lesson from Pixar and make story their number one concern.

I don't envy having to pick the top 10 for list. My favorite though has always been The Fox and the Hound. The Lion King is up there along with Robin Hood, Lilo & Stitch, and Aladdin. But then there's Snow White, Cinderella, Alice in Wonderland as well. Better you than me haha. - Posted By: chAd_b - Two of your three are in my Top 5 but five of them are eliminated due to being out after 1970.

The Dutch said his top 5 would be 5. Fantasia 4. Pocahontas 3. Cinderella 2. Aladdin 1. The Lion King. Three of those were made after 1970, and can't make this list but one of them did make my Top 5.

Why did you choose before 1970? That leaves out a couple I would think of as Classic Disney, like The Fox and the Hound, The Aristocats, Robin Hood.... I would probably go before 1980 to be considered a classic. - Posted By: August - I have a selfish reason for 1970. I was born in 1970 and have a hard time calling a movie made after I was born a classic. The Fox and the Hound was made when I was 11, so that makes the choice even tougher.

HOWEVER

Because of the requests for movies made after 1970, I am going to extend this theme for one more week. Following this week's Top 5 Classic Disney Animated Films, next week I am going to do an added column with the Top 5 Disney Animated Films made AFTER 1970 (not including Pixar).


Onto this week's column...

Pixar has spoiled us. Ever since Toy Story, we have followed Pixar everywhere they have led us. Their new CG style animation is amazing in every aspect and the look is getting even more beautiful as time goes on. 3D animation makes their films look even more amazing. I can't imagine watching something like Wall-E in 3D because the thought blows my mind. Dreamworks continues to compete at the box office although their animation is not quite up to the level of Pixar.

But at the end of the day, it is not the animation that makes Pixar great but instead is the story. They are making animated flicks that have fantastic stories and are miles ahead of the cartoons Dreamworks feeds us. But this is not a new advance in animated films, Disney has been doing the same thing for years. I am amazed that everyone who preaches the excellence of Pixar seems to have forgotten about how amazing movies like Beauty and the Beast and The Lion King look. Disney can make, with hand drawn traditional animation, a movie that rivals any studio when it comes to beauty and style.

Disney is back at the traditional animation game with their latest movie The Princess and the Frog. Everyone is talking about the return of traditional animation and wonders if anyone will care about it. I say that the style of animation is secondary to the story, so if the story rises to the level, people will come. I will never count out Disney when it comes to quality and over the next two weeks I will be looking at the best classic Disney movies in their catalogue. I will limit this list to movies made before 1970. Instead of my usual five movies, I will be counting down ten of them, and this is the TOP 5.

5. LADY AND THE TRAMP (1955) Directed by Clyde Geronimi, Wilfred Jackson, Hamilton Luske Written by Ward Greene, Erdman Penner, Joe Rinaldi, Ralph Wright, Don DaGradi It is not the most popular Disney feature, or even its most prestigious, but Lady and the Tramp is the one that has stuck in my head throughout the years. It is the one that I hold the best memories of from my childhood. Out of all the cartoons from when I was a kid, this was the first one I sought out when I started buying movies. It remained so endearing that, when I worked at a pizza place with a small theater in the restaurant, this is one of the movies played for the kids on Saturday afternoons. Lady and the Tramp, Disney's fifteenth movie is a love story between two dogs, a pampered cocker spaniel named Lady and a street savvy mutt named Tramp. The two are joined by other dogs including the always memorable Scottish Terrier Jock and soon everyone's lives are turned upside down when Lady's owners have a baby of their own. This leads to the dilemma of Aunt Sarah coming to babysit while they vacation, bringing along her two Siamese cats, Si and Am ("We are Siamese if you please. We are Siamese if you don't please"). Lady is treated badly, muzzled, and then rescued by Tramp. The two share the iconic spaghetti dinner before they are captured by the dog catcher. Finally there is the attack by the rat on the baby, which leads to Lady and Tramp racing to the rescue, only to be accused of the attack. Lady and the Tramp leaves behind the princesses, fairy godmothers and Prince Charmings to give us a story similar to live action rom-coms. Lady could just as easily have been Audrey Hepburn and Tramp Cary Grant. It is one of the best classic Disney movies for boys and girls alike and remains one of my all-time favorites

4. SLEEPING BEAUTY (1959) Directed by Clyde Geronimi, Les Clark, Eric Larson, Wolfgang Reitherman Written by Erdman Penner, Jow Rinaldi, Winston Hibler, Bill Peet, Ted Spears, Ralph Wright, Milt Banta The sixteenth animated film from Disney remains one of its most popular. I rank it at fourth because I somehow always confuse it with the third, more famous, movie on my list. I guess it is the entire princess motif of the two movies, the evil witches/step mothers, the plot to keep them from finding their true loves, the entire "happily-ever-after" conclusion. Princess Aurora is born and betrothed to the young Prince Philip. At her christening she is visited by the three good fairies bless her with the gift of beauty and song. Before they can give her their final blessing, the witch Maleficent appears and curses Aurora to die when she touches a spinning wheel on the eve of her sixteenth birthday. Thankfully, the third good fairy blocks the death curse by changing it to a deep sleep in which she will remain until she is awakened by true love's kiss. The recent Disney movie Enchanted borrows much from this movie, as well as an opening animated sequence which is a copy of the original Cinderella tale. True love's kiss is a motif that has lived throughout the echelon of Disney classics since this movie was released. The movie, taken from both the Tchaikovsky ballet and the Brothers Grimm fairy tale, is the type of story Disney became known for over time. The film hit a chord with moviegoers and became the second highest grossing film of 1959, behind only Ben-Hur. It is all well worth it. It is easily one of the greatest fairy tales ever created.

3. CINDERELLA (1950) Directed by Clyde Geronimi, Hamilton Luske and Wilfred Jackson Written by Ken Anderson, Perce Pearce, Homer Brightman, Winston Hibler, Bill Peet, Erdman Penner, Harry Reeves, Joe Rinaldi, Ted Sears By far, the most famous Disney Princess is Cinderella. She preaches the typical Disney lesson of perseverance and faith will lead you to your Prince Charming and your Happily Ever After. Cinderella is a hard story to take as, just like Bambi, the beautiful young girl loses her beloved parent at a young age when her father died. Cinderella is left with her stepmother and two hateful step sisters and becomes nothing more than a housekeeper for her new family. The King is determined to find a wife for his son, Prince Charming, and every eligible maiden is ordered to attend a ball. While her stepmother attempts to keep Cinderella from attending the ball, her woodland friends help her make a gown and she sets off for the ball. Her stepsisters attack her and leave her gown torn and ripped, dashing her dreams of escaping her life of servitude. Lucky for her, she has a Fairy Godmother who transforms her appearance for the ball. Cinderella attends the ball and captures the heart of Prince Charming before the clock starts to strike midnight, forcing her to retreat before he sees her true self, leaving behind only her glass slipper as evidence. The King decrees that they will search the kingdom to find who the slipper fits and that woman will become the Princess. The rest of the movie involves some very exciting sequences where Cinderella is once again stopped from reaching her dreams but, thanks to the magic of Disney, she achieves her dreams and lives Happily Ever After. The movie is magical and sixty years later still provides the same experience for a new generation of little girls dreaming of finding their Prince Charming.

2. SNOW WHITE AND THE SEVEN DWARFS (1937) Directed by David Hand, William Cottrell, Wilfred Jackson, Larry Morey, Perce Pearce, Ben Sharpsteen Written by Ted Sears, Richard Creedon, Otto Englander, Dick Rickard, Earl Hurd, Merrill De Maris, Dorothy Ann Blank, Webb Smith Disney's first animated feature length film remains many critic's choice as their best. In 1998, the American Film Institute called it the greatest animated film of all time. Adapted from the fairy tale by the Brothers Grimm, Walt Disney risked everything to make the foray into feature animated films. He hoped to expand Disney's prestige by making feature films as well as the Mickey Mouse and Silly Symphonies shorts they had become known for. His brother and business partner Roy Disney tried to talk him out of it. His wife tried to talk him out of it. The Hollywood movie industry laughed off his attempts. He had to mortgage his own house to help finance the film, which ended up costing almost $1.5 million. It was all worth the fight. Snow White and the Seven Dwarves may not feature the best Princess (Cinderella) or best baddie (Maleficent) but it features the most fun, entertaining story involving a Disney Princess. Snow White was originally meant to focus around the Seven Dwarves. This makes sense as Disney was all about the talking animals and woodland creatures and mythical dwarves fit that mold perfectly. However, after some work it was decided that the main focus be between Snow White and the Queen. Disney also chose to limit the comic approach to the film and build the intensity and plausibility of the situation. The film received a standing ovation at its premiere, an event attended by Hollywood royalty such as Charlie Chaplin, Shirley Temple, Douglas Fairbanks Jr., Judy Garland, Clark Gable, Milton Berle and John Barrymore. Walt Disney and the Seven Dwarves appeared on the cover of Time magazine and the New York Times said "Thank you very much, Mr. Disney." None other than Sergei Eisenstein called it the greatest film ever made. While "Heigh-Ho" is the best remembered song, AFI lists "Someday My Prince Will Come" as the #19 song in its 100 Years... 100 Songs lists. There are great animated films, but few ever reach the level of brilliance of Snow White and the Seven Dwarves.

1. PINOCCHIO (1940) Directed by Ben Sharpsteen, Hamilton Luske, Norman Ferguson, T. Hee, Wilfred Jackson, Jack Kinney, Bill Roberts Written by Aurelius Battaglia, William Cottrell, Otto Englander, Erdman Penner, Joseph Sabo, Ted Sears, Webb Smith I'm a dude; there is no way my Number One movie is going to be about a Disney Princess. I choose the second film in Disney's animated feature catalogue, Pinocchio, a movie I believe contains a perfect story. Pinocchio is a puppet created by Geppetto, a lonely man who makes a wish on a falling star that his puppet could be a real boy. The Blue Fairy visits and she makes Pinocchio come to life with the promise that he will become a real boy when he proves to be brave, truthful and unselfish and be able to tell right from wrong by listening to his conscience. Unlike the Princess movies that led up to my first choice, this is not a movie about finding your Prince and living happily ever after. It is about the life lesson that the only way to find happiness and achieve your dreams is to be a good person. When Pinocchio is led astray and bows to temptation, he is punished. He gambles, drinks, smokes and causes mischief all resulting in a curse at Pleasure Island turning boys who make jackasses of themselves into real donkeys. Pinocchio escapes but finds that Geppetto went in search of his boy only to be swallowed by a whale. Pinocchio is a movie unlikely to be made today. The themes are adult in nature and the punishment is severe. Kids today seem to be coddled at every turn and a movie showing a kid who acts like a jackass being turned into a jackass is not something that seems to fit into today's society (even though it is a true statement). Everything Pinocchio does is selfish and immature and the one person who loves him the most is the one who pays the dearest price. When Pinocchio sacrifices his own life, the movie becomes a perfect morality tale and Pinocchio remains the greatest Disney classic of them all.

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