Personally, I don't get the origin of this argument. I think it's like comparing apples to oranges.
I personally love both, but I would have to go more towards the theme parks because as I said in the SB thread, I think it's something you're actually surrounded in more and an actual experience that can't be acheived in a film.
Mikey wrote:Have anyone forgotten when we watch (good) Disney films, we get the awe of visual beauty and action with good art, hour-long, cohesive, sense-making stories with good story-telling, and get involved in the characters that are seen throughout that story, feeling for them when they are happy, frightened, and sad, while being made happy, frightened, and sad ourselves.
Meanwhile in the parks, you just get the visual beauty, limited movement, yes, with good art, not much more than 15 minutes at the most, often just 3 minutes, and not really full or cohesive, sense-making stories, and the characters just pop up once in a while to delight or frighten us, but there's not much for us to get to know them or feel for them.
I think you're giving a bit of a disservice to the parks when you just say all they have is visual beauty and nothing else, especially to the story people at WDI. True, there are attractions here and there like Dumbo and the Mad Tea Party that are random midway rides with no story, but to say they're just popping out random rides for everything is untrue. Many of the major attractions do actually have stories, and just because they're shorter than a running time of a motion picture I don't think makes them any less better.
First off, you can feel emotions while on the rides. However, unlike a film, you're not feeling along with a character, but more like you're the main character of the story or it's happening directly at you. You get surprised by the pirate's cannonfire, scared when you drop down that falling elevator into the Twilight Zone or seeing a ghost materialize, laughing along with Figment as you go into discovering your imagination. These are emotions you're experiencing firsthand by yourself by having it all out there in front of you in an environment that surrounds you, rather than just along with a character or a moment of a film.
And while they may not be out there directly or as evident as a movie plotline, Imagineers do layout rides to tell a cohesive story or write backstories for each attraction explaning it's history. For instance in Pirates of the Caribbean at Disneyland, we first journey through the modern bayous of New Orleans, before plunge down into the grotto of skeletons. At first, it seems like the skeletons are all motionless and dead lying on the beach. But as we journey further, they seem to take on slightly more active positions, such as drinking rum, looking at a map, or playing with treasure. The Imagineers then go for a dramatic effect, as we hear ghostly voices, segwaying us into traveling back in time to the past. The grotto closes tighter and tighter around the boat for an iris in effect until we suddenly find ourselves out in this huge open harbor town, and back in time to the pirate days. We travel through the town, and by each scene, we see the pirates take hold of the town more and more, before they finally climax it by setting the entire town ablaze, and we find ourselves admist pirate crossfire. We then travel up the ramp, and as we hear "Dead men tell no tales!" echoing once again like in the cavern, as we see skeletons lying around and decay more and more as we go up, signaling our arrival back into the present day bayou.
The Haunted Mansion could be said to have a similiar three act show, using its backstory as a retirement home for ghosts that the Imagineers invented. The Ghost Host introduces into the mansion, and as we journey through, we first see small illusions, such as the stretching and morphing portraits. However, as we continue through, we see more and more ghostly activity proceed, involving floating objects, a corpse trying to break free, and ghosts pounding and bending doors outward. Madame Leota then proceeds as a curtain to the "second act" as she proceeds to call out to the spirits to materialize before us. In the next scene, they promptly do so by materializing in very hazy and transparent states. As we then journey into the attic, and then out into the graveyard, we find ourselves in the third act, where the ghosts are growing even more active by singing and carrying along. Now instead of us observing them from a distance, we're in the midst of all their activity, before we finally climax the ride by having one of the residents hitchhiking home with us.
Not to mention the progressive story of the family for the Carousel of Progress, and all the numerous storylines behind Indiana Jones Adventure, the Big Thunder Mountain Railroad, and all the biographies the Imagineers created for the bear performers in Country Bear Jamboree.
Also, in the other thread, you brought about original characters in theme park attractions and them having to know the characters fast. Well, that's what many attractions do, mostly thank to the genius of Marc Davis and his character ideas. When you look at a character in an attraction, you immediately read the character right away - we know the Redhead is a floozy, we know Big Al is a horrible singer who wants to steal the spotlight, we know the Ghost Host is a welcoming but also very imposing and dark presence. The same argument can to films sometimes as well. There are many animated characters where we immediately know their character from just their first minute introduction, and they stay that same characterization throughout the entire film.
I'm not trying to put down one over the other, but I just feel like you give such a disservice, especially to the story people and wonderful concept artists, by saying they're merely nothing but pretty rides to look at. Imagineers come up with very clear storylines, especially in what they explain in the rides narrations and the layout and feelings of their scenes and characters. And as I said before, what we're comparing is like apples and oranges - theme parks and motion pictures. Both very different mediums in which you can both effectively tell a story.
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