Tuesday, August 18, 2009

The Princess and the Frog

I was writing this up on the review section of Facebook's "Flixter" application and realized it seemed more like a blog entry. With that I realized with all my ties to the Walt Disney Company, I should really start to blog about my opinions. Everyone wants to read about what I think, right? If not then you probably aren't reading this now anyways. Anyways, here's my thoughts on Disney's highly anticipated upcoming feature "The Princess and the Frog."



I just finished watching some rough shoots of the animation in this film (www.dailymotion.com/video/xa4jo7_the-princess-and-the-frog-roughshoo_shortfilms). My goodness, Disney is really pulling out all the stops on this one. The animation is just beautiful. This is the most important thing the Disney company has done in years. Let me explain...

Like pretty much everyone else alive in America at this point, I grew up with Disney. For decades they were known for their overall quality. Walt Disney created the Animated Motion picture and the company just kept on going with innovation after innovation. But then something happened. Computer animation began taking over and everyone, including the suits running th
e Disney Company, lost faith and/or interest in traditional animation. To add insult to injury, at a time when 2-D animation was almost dead and Disney needed something to really wow audiences to keep alive the very art form that began the company... They released "Home on the Range."




Home on the Freaking Range.

Seriously think about this. The life of the "Disney Animated Feature Film" series up until this year began with arguably their most impressive "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs," grew up and peaked during the "Disney Renaissance" (that's the term most Disney geeks are familiar with that refers to animated features from 1989-1999- that is Little Mermaid to Tarzan, Lion King being the crowning achievement in my opinion) and ended with... *sigh*... Home on the Range. A family movie featuring silly talking and singing animals that was so cliche in nature, I'm not sure if even Dreamworks would have produced it (they definitely would have, but I'm trying to make a point here).

Talk about dying not with a bang, but a whimper. But things are looking good. "The Princess and the Frog" looks to be the saving grace of our once beloved art form. Hopefully by the end of this year I'll be able to say "Disney's traditional animation didn't die. It was just resting."

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