Nants ingonyama bagithi baba! It's been nearly two decades since that glorious savanna sunrise, and once again
The Lion King is
at the top of the box office. It's a good chance to revisit what made the original the capstone of the
Disney Renaissance, starting with the music. Not the gaudy show tunes or the Elton John ballads, but the soaring, elegiac score by Hans Zimmer which, despite winning an Oscar, never saw a full release outside of
an unofficial bootleg.
Luckily, it's unabridged and high-quality, allowing one to lay Zimmer's
haunting,
pulse-pounding,
joyful tracks
alongside the original video (
part 2,
3,
4), revealing the subtle leitmotifs and careful matching of music and action.
In addition, South African collaborator
Lebo M wove traditional Zulu chorals into the score, providing
veiled commentary on
scenes like this; his work was later
expanded into
a full album,
the Broadway stage show, and
projects closer to his heart. Speaking of expanded works, there were inevitable sequels -- all of which you can experience with
The Lion King: Full Circle (
download guide), a fan-made, three-hour supercut of the original film and its two follow-ups.
Want more? Look...
harder... [more inside]
posted by Rhaomi
on Oct 1, 2011 -
22 comments
The Ropes at Disney's - 1943 Employee Handbook. The good old days when women got twice as much sick leave, the Penthouse club was accessible by "men only! - sorry gals...", and a violation of the U.S. Espionage Act could get you fired.
posted by madamjujujive
on Sep 26, 2011 -
52 comments
To paraphrase a character in the film, The Black Hole walks "a tightrope;" if not between "genius" and "insanity," then certainly between "genius" and "banality". If you're looking at this movie as a Manichean exercise between darkness and light, then you can -- for at least a few hours -- entertain the "genius" part of that equation.
posted by Trurl
on Sep 25, 2011 -
106 comments
Stephen Strange was an arrogant doctor, until a car accident damaged his hands, leading him try every cure possible. Eventually he made his way to the East, where the story progressed, and now he's
Doctor Strange, master of magic! His thrilling tale is
set to be the first Marvel superhero movie since
Marvel was purchased by Disney. But there has been much history behind the latest movie, including a period when
Guillermo del Toro was involved and wanted to include Neil Gaiman,
a draft script by Alex Cox (1990, 5.1 mb PDF;
review), and
a draft script by Bob Gale (January 21, 1986, 3.5 mb PDF;
review). Along with these incomplete attempts, there was
the 1978 Dr. Strange TV movie, which you can watch online (
full movie with Portuguese subtitles, or
YT playlist). If you'd like another take, head to 1992 for the direct-to-video movie
Doctor Mordrid. Depending on who you ask,
it's a more or
less entertaining/accurate take (warning: spoilers) on Dr Strange. Modrid is
also online.
posted by filthy light thief
on Aug 9, 2011 -
34 comments
Donald in Mathmagic Land is a 27-minute Donald Duck featurette released on June 26, 1959. As Walt Disney said, "We have recently explained mathematics in a film and in that way excited public interest in this very important subject."
(Wiki)
posted by twoleftfeet
on Aug 9, 2011 -
49 comments
Weekend At Kermie's: The Muppets' Strange Life After Death. Elizabeth Stevens asks:
What if, in 1990, instead of recasting Kermit—something that had been done to Mickey and Bugs Bunny before him—the Muppets had continued on Kermit-less, as "The Simpsons" did after Phil Hartman died. Recall Susan’s words on "Seasame Street" about Mr. Hooper in 1982: “Big Bird, when people die, they don’t come back.” Let’s say Robin showed up saying his uncle Kermit had passed away? Or, if that was too dark for Disney, what if Kermit had left show business to go off to start a family with Piggy? Someone else could lead the gang of weirdoes.
It would’ve made more artistic sense than what happened
.
posted by zarq
on Jul 14, 2011 -
67 comments
It was bound to happen eventually. After
a quarter-century,
26 Academy Awards, and an unparalleled streak of
eleven artistic and commercial triumphs, Pixar's latest project,
Cars 2, is
Certified Rotten. Critics have
assailed the film as a slick but hollow vehicle for Disney's
$10 billion-dollar Cars merchandising industry "lifestyle brand," replacing the original's serviceable tale of small-town redemption with
zany spy games,
hyperactive chase sequences, and even more
lowbrow aww-shucks potty humor from
Larry the Cable Guy. But it's not all bad news! Along with
a fun new Toy Story 3 short, preceding today's (3-D) premiere showings is a first look at next year's
Brave --
a darkly magical original story set in ancient Scotland featuring the studio's first female lead (and
director).
Evocative high-res concept art [mirror] is available at the official website, and
character sketches have leaked to the web, with the apparently striking teaser trailer sure to follow. Also, be sure not to miss the sneak peak of
Brave's associated short,
"La Luna"!
posted by Rhaomi
on Jun 24, 2011 -
263 comments
Dr. Fuchs’s Donald was no ordinary comic creation. He was a bird of arts and letters, and many Germans credit him with having initiated them into the language of the literary classics. The German comics are peppered with fancy quotations. In one story Donald’s nephews steal famous lines from Friedrich Schiller’s play “William Tell”; Donald garbles a classic Schiller poem, “The Bell,” in another. Other lines are straight out of Goethe, Hölderlin and even Wagner (whose words are put in the mouth of a singing cat). The great books later sounded like old friends when readers encountered them at school. As the German Donald points out, “Reading is educational! We learn so much from the works of our poets and thinkers.” [more inside]
posted by cgc373
on Apr 6, 2011 -
16 comments
"I've always loved the music from the Saturday matinee serial, and I figured a short that was animated to this music could be a really cool piece. I designed the character mixing all the traits from my favorite Superman actors from the past, and then looked at the work of Hugh Ferriss for inspiration on the background design." -
Superman Classic (yt) - A Superman fan film by disney animator by Disney animator
Robert Pratt.
posted by Artw
on Feb 9, 2011 -
7 comments
The intro to Duck Tales in
Arabic,
Bulgarian,
Cantonese,
Czech,
Danish,
Dutch,
Finnish,
French,
German,
Hebrew,
Hindi,
Hungarian,
Icelandic,
Italian,
Japanese,
Mandarin,
Norwegian,
Polish,
Portugese,
Russian,
Slovak,
Slovenian,
Spanish,
and
Swedish. (MLYT)
[more inside]
posted by inedible
on Dec 31, 2010 -
50 comments
Early in 1903, the
success of the New York production of the musical adaptation of L. Frank Baum's
The Wizard of Oz got composer Victor Herbert and librettist Glen MacDonough thinking. They thought that it might be possible to duplicate that success by applying a Christmas theme to Baum's story and then sprinkling in a few Mother Goose characters. Later that year the resulting show,
Babes in Toyland, was a rousing
success. Thirty years later it was made into a
movie starring two of the greatest motion picture actors of the era, Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy, produced by
Hal Roach. But this post isn't about either of those productions; it's about the
worst production.
[more inside]
posted by Toekneesan
on Dec 17, 2010 -
22 comments
Unlike many cinematic exports,
the Disney canon of films distinguishes itself with an impressive dedication to
dubbing.
Through an in-house service called
Disney Character Voices International, not just dialogue but songs, too, are
skillfully re-recorded, echoing the voice acting, rhythm, and rhyme scheme of the original work to
an uncanny degree (while still leaving plenty of room for
lyrical reinvention).
The breadth of the effort is surprising, as well -- everything from
Arabic to
Icelandic to
Zulu gets its own dub, and their latest project,
The Princess and the Frog, debuted in
more than forty tongues.
Luckily for polyglots everywhere, the exhaustiveness of Disney's translations is thoroughly documented online in
multilanguage mixes and
one-line comparisons, linguistic kaleidoscopes that cast new light on old standards.
Highlights:
"One Jump Ahead," "Prince Ali," and
"A Whole New World" (
Aladdin) -
"Circle of Life," "Hakuna Matata," and
"Luau!" (
The Lion King) -
"Under the Sea" and
"Poor Unfortunate Souls" (
The Little Mermaid) -
"Belle" and
"Be Our Guest" (
Beauty and the Beast) -
"Just Around the Riverbend" (
Pocahontas) -
"One Song" and
"Heigh-Ho" (
Snow White) -
"Bibbidi-Bobbidi-Boo" (
Cinderella) -
Medley (
Pinocchio) -
"When She Loved Me" (
Toy Story 2) -
Intro (
Monsters, Inc.)
posted by Rhaomi
on Nov 12, 2010 -
31 comments
Right Wing Radio Duck "Donald's life is turned upside-down by the current economic crisis and he finds himself unemployed and falling behind on his house payments. As his frustration turns into despair Donald discovers a seemingly sympathetic voice coming from his radio named Glenn Beck. "
posted by Arthur Phillips Jones Jr
on Oct 2, 2010 -
52 comments
Toy Story 3 hits theaters today, and it's already winning
universal acclaim as an enchanting and heartbreaking wonderwork, employing
understated 3D and a
"real-time" perspective that
deftly capitalizes on the nostalgia and can't-go-home-again angst of a generation that grew up with the series.
It has a strong pedigree, with 11-year-old predecessor
Toy Story 2 the rare sequel to equal its forebear, 1995's
Toy Story (itself the first CGI feature in history).
And it joins a lofty stable of films: over the last 15 years, Pixar has put out an unbroken chain of
ten commercial and critical successes that have grossed over $5 billion worldwide and collected
24 Academy Awards (including the
second-ever Best Picture nom for animation with
Up), a legacy that
rivals some of the greatest franchises in film history.
But there's rumbling on the horizon. Although the studio has been
hailed for its originality (of the 50 top-grossing movies in history, only nine were original stories -- and
five of them were by Pixar), two of their upcoming projects are
sequels, both of them based some of their least-acclaimed films (
Cars 2 in 2011 and
Monsters, Inc. 2 in 2012). And while 2012 will also bring
The Bear and the Bow Brave, the first Pixar flick to feature a female protagonist
[previously], fellow newcomer
Newt has been
canceled. With
WALL-E/Up/Toy Story 3 guru Andrew Stanton focusing on
his 2012 adaptation of
John Carter of Mars and with
forays into live-action already in development,
does this mark the end of the golden age of Pixar? Or is this latest entry lasting proof that even the toughest case of sequelitis can be raised to the level of masterpiece?
[more inside]
posted by Rhaomi
on Jun 18, 2010 -
227 comments
Joshua Glenn and anti-middlebrow blog
Hilobrow present their generational periodization scheme: from the
Prometheans born in 1844-53 and the technologically transformative
Plutonians born in 1854-63, to the hiply earnest
Revivalists (those who were teenagers in the 90s) and the
Throwbacks (my generation, and an article that horrifyingly includes pictures of tweens and the Mickey Mouse Club).
[more inside]
posted by The Devil Tesla
on May 27, 2010 -
67 comments
