The Disney Essence: Fact or Fiction?

[Jay]

This is kind of random but with all the talk of Disney themed food, does anyone remember the Disney Villain candy that Nestle made? It had Cruella, ShaNayNay(aka the Old Peddlar Woman), Hades and Jafar on them and they were little bit sized Nestle bars. They came out around Halloween time and I loved them and always got them but they stopped making them a few years ago. I have been looking online but I don't see anything about them haha. Does anyone remeber this?

[Super Aurora]

It makes sense that after young children watched the Disney films and became animators, and they wanted to work not for any studio, but Disney's, that there is something about Disney, that they choose them, and they want to create the kind of feeling they got from Disney movies in new films.

most people choose to join Disney animation studio cause it look great on their resume so when they do do to something else, they have something to back them up. What do you think why majority of animators from other studio started out in Disney to begin with and then move on to something else?

Don Bluth, Chris Sanders, Jeffery Kazenberg(I know not animator but has huge hand in it), Richard Rich etc etc. many of these people started out in Disney but either quit or move out. Most people start out in Disney for reputation achievements, but move on for better income or their own dreams.

[Disney Duster]

But weren't most of those people fired or they had big problems with Disney? They had arguments or something, they didn't like the people?

And some of them went on to make features that were like the kinds Disney made...but they didn't capture Disney you know what and discerning people could tell they weren't Disney.

Chris Sanders may not have been the most Disney, I do admit. But I see how Disney tried to turn his thing to be more Disney. If Stitch had more heart/soul, it was less wacky and violent, and Lilo didn't look like a muppet it would have been a little more Disney.

[estefan]

But then you also had people like Tom Ruegger, Seth MacFarlane, Bruce Timm, Paul Dini, Richard Williams and John Krisfalusi, who were more heavily influenced by Looney Tunes or Hanna-Barbera rather than by Walt Disney. And all of them have good, successful careers without working for Disney (Williams being the notable exception and even his non-Roger Rabbit accomplishments are worth noting).

[Disney Duster]

Wait, what do you mean? Those people didn't work for Disney. Right. Yes, they are making their own great animation that is un-Disney like, it doesn't have Disney magic, but it has it's own greatness. That's fine.

Though Seth McFarlane likes Disney and puts lots of Disney jokes in Family Guy including one episode where for a few moments they were in a universe "drawn by Disney" and everything was quite different, though more like Brave Little Toaster or a bad Disney knock off but that's just it, you can't capture Disney unless you work there or draw a Disney character or really love it and are aiming for accuracy in really capturing it.

[Goliath]

Doesn't UD have an 'ignore'-option to block certain member's posts?

[Super Aurora]

But weren't most of those people fired or they had big problems with Disney? They had arguments or something, they didn't like the people?

Only one I remember recalling got fired was the guy who jokely suggestion a disney porno animation feature. Forgot his name. Correct me if I'm wrong but I think the ones I listed just left or quit. Chris Sanders had that issue with American Dog/Bolt. Kazenberg left because he didn't get the position he wanted after Frank Wells died. Forgot about the others. But again it goes back to what I stated before. The wanted do their own thing that they didn't/couldn't do in the Disney company or make their own income or better money.

And some of them went on to make features that were like the kinds Disney made...but they didn't capture Disney you know what and discerning people could tell they weren't Disney.

I don't think they were trying capture Disney's "magic" Dreamworks' first animation feature was Prince of Egypt. They didn't try to attempt "Disney formula" and it became a huge success. Same goes to most of their films following after.

Chris Sanders may not have been the most Disney, I do admit. But I see how Disney tried to turn his thing to be more Disney. If Stitch had more heart/soul, it was less wacky and violent, and Lilo didn't look like a muppet it would have been a little more Disney.

Chris wanted to make a good movie, and he succeed with Lilo and Stitch. Then he wanted to do American Dog, but despite his previous movie doing highly successful, the Disney exec were retarded assholes and didn't allow Chris to make his next ambitious movie. Thus he left. he made "How to Train Your Dragon which became great success.

Chris prove you don't need to abide to "Disney Formula" in order to become successful and make a great movie.

And I still don't see why you say Stitch had hardly any heart and soul....Stitch is not that much different from The Beast. Wacky? As if Aladdin, Emperor's New Groove, Hercules, etc didn't have wackiness? I'd argue they had even more than Lilo and Stitch.

Wait, what do you mean? Those people didn't work for Disney. Right. Yes, they are making their own great animation that is un-Disney like, it doesn't have Disney magic, but it has it's own greatness. That's fine.

You don't need Disney "magic" to make great movies/tv series. I'd argue some of their stuff is way better than many of the Disney movies.

That was the point estefan was trying to make

Though Seth McFarlane likes Disney and puts lots of Disney jokes in Family Guy including one episode where for a few moments they were in a universe "drawn by Disney" and everything was quite different, though more like Brave Little Toaster or a bad Disney knock off but that's just it, you can't capture Disney unless you work there or draw a Disney character or really love it and are aiming for accuracy in really capturing it.

Seth wasn't trying to "capture Disney magic"....he was making parody spoof.

Doesn't UD have an 'ignore'-option to block certain member's posts?

This forum is lacking many things.

[Duckburger]

Seth McFarlane actually dislikes the Disney company as a whole. Even going as far as having a Family Guy character listing the divisions of the company to evade, Disney, ESPN, ABC, Touchstone, etc. He apparantly wanted to work for Disney until he graduated from college, then suddenly changed to wanting to work for Hanna-Barbera. Maybe he got rejected? Probably not, though.

And I've read numerous articles on the animation guild blog that basically say that the Disney Animation Studios is the worst animation company to work for these days. Not knowing how long you're going to have work. After finishing the film, immediately being ousted from the company. A lot of people also get fired while working on a film, which probably ruins some people's determination to work hard and put a lot of effort in it. So, the animation building is not the happiest place on earth, that's for sure.

[estefan]

Wait, what do you mean? Those people didn't work for Disney. Right. Yes, they are making their own great animation that is un-Disney like, it doesn't have Disney magic, but it has it's own greatness. That's fine.

You don't need Disney "magic" to make great movies/tv series. I'd argue some of their stuff is way better than many of the Disney movies.

That was the point estefan was trying to make

Yeah, that was one of my points. It will also to counter Duster's generalisation that all children who grew up to be animators were inspired by Disney animation and nothing more. Heck, you can throw me into that equation as well. As much as I'm a big fan of Disney and I wouldn't mind working there, shows like Animaniacs and the Road Runner shorts are a bigger inspiration for me and that's the sort of animation I would most like to work on and a style I think is severely lacking in today's animation (though Despicable Me brought it back very well).

And I imagine a lot of young, inspiring animators today and watching the works of Pixar, DreamWorks, Aardman and Henry Selick and being inspired to become animators from those.

[Super Aurora]

And I've read numerous articles on the animation guild blog that basically say that the Disney Animation Studios is the worst animation company to work for these days. Not knowing how long you're going to have work. After finishing the film, immediately being ousted from the company. A lot of people also get fired while working on a film, which probably ruins some people's determination to work hard and put a lot of effort in it. So, the animation building is not the happiest place on earth, that's for sure.

Exactly.

Yeah, that was one of my points. It will also to counter Duster's generalisation that all children who grew up to be animators were inspired by Disney animation and nothing more. Heck, you can throw me into that equation as well. As much as I'm a big fan of Disney and I wouldn't mind working there, shows like Animaniacs and the Road Runner shorts are a bigger inspiration for me and that's the sort of animation I would most like to work on and a style I think is severely lacking in today's animation (though Despicable Me brought it back very well).

And I imagine a lot of young, inspiring animators today and watching the works of Pixar, DreamWorks, Aardman and Henry Selick and being inspired to become animators from those.

Exactly. I also love to start my own animation studio. But Disney wasn't the influence behind it for me. It was Bruce Timm's Batman:TAS, Superman:TAS and few of the anime I grew up with.

[Disney Duster]

I wasn't saying that all the animators in the world were only because of Disney.

I was saying the ones at Disney watched the Disney films and would want to try and make that magic, just in new movies.

Except, it seems, a few people who left.

And then Don Bluth and the others, I don't think they were trying to remake Disney magic, but actually just be better than Disney, and they even tried to fool people once into thinking a film was Disney by showing the Disney logo before their film at a test screening.

But it would be stupid of them to want to be the same as Disney if they weren't working there, so I hope they were trying to do their own thing, even if they liked Disney so much it was rather inspired by Disney.

And I think you all missed how I said other studios have their greatness and can be considered greater than Disney on some films, it's just Disney has its own greatness too, that is different, with its own feeling, called Disney magic.

[Elladorine]

Don Bluth left Disney in 1979 because he didn't feel they were "Disney" anymore, and that he could be more "Disney" by leaving them to form his own studio. I guess he tried to take the Disney essence with him since in his opinion, they themselves had lost it.

And yeah, I've heard it's a hard place to work for these days. I imagine it has been ever since the old hand-drawn layoff (through which one of my friends lost his job over). The films may remain magical to some, but I'm sorta glad I never followed through on my old dream to work there because it isn't so magical behind the scenes.

[Goliath]

It's funny, given the direction this thread has taken, but my first post in this thread was actually *in support* of 'the Disney essence'. I argued that it was not just nostalgia, but I should've explained it better.

I watched many, many different cartoons and animated films when I was a child, from many different studios, and I liked all of them. But -and this is crucial- whenever I watch most of them nowadays, I'm bored to tears by them. The only value I put on them is nostalgic value. I do recognize some of them have great quality in them --but, for children. Some of them make good children's entertainment. Others, I can't believe I ever watched them. But as an adult, I keep coming back to Disney. Why is that? Maybe that's what Disney Duster means by "Disney essence". Most of their cartoons and animated features still resonate with me.

However, I do not believe that everything Disney (or even Walt himself) touched 'automatically' gets filled with that "Disney essence". Especially when Disney tries to be a copy-cat instead of a leader, it results in bad products, like all of their CGI-efforts until now, and most of their animated tv series of the last 10 years.

There definitely has to be a "Disney essence". Why else would *I* care about Disney? I mean, if you look at my other interests, tastes or general worldview and personality, you would never have guessed I'm a fan of Disney's. Right?

[Disney Duster]

Wow Goliath. Thank you.

That was all so well said, and brought up a lot of good points and good ways of trying to describe what the essence could be.

If you are saying that Disney still resonates because it's not just for kids, in that case I'm sorry but I would not agree, but if you mean there must be something in it that isn't necessarily "adult", but "Disney", something unique, that resonates in adults and kids, I would agree.

Most recently a site said something about a magical headiness in the early Disney features. The word headiness makes me feel that could be a good word to describe this essence. Though I would say Walt's were more heady, and I think the essence was captured in later films.

I just remembered, that moment with Stitch surfing for the first time, I think that was one of the more Disney feeling scenes.

Also, on the subject of telling Disney films from non-Disney films without seeing the logo, I remember when Atlantis came out, it was shortly after Titan A.E. I could tell very much the difference between Disney's sci-fi fantasy and Titan A.E.'s just sci-fi thing, and by that I mean just looking at the clips in the commercials. But my friend couldn't tell, they said it looked like a different studio's animation. So, I think bigger fans of Disney, not just the general public, can more tell the Disney style and essence.

I hope they never lose it. And I hope we never lose it, or never stop trying to see it's there.

[Goliath]

If you are saying that Disney still resonates because it's not just for kids, in that case I'm sorry but I would not agree, but if you mean there must be something in it that isn't necessarily "adult", but "Disney", something unique, that resonates in adults and kids, I would agree.

Once again, I don't understand you, and I don't know why it would be 'wrong' to say that Disney still appeals to me because it's not just for kids. That's actually a compliment to Disney. One of his PR-people had Walt once saying: "we don't make movies just for kids", or something to that extent.

[Super Aurora]

Also, on the subject of telling Disney films from non-Disney films without seeing the logo, I remember when Atlantis came out, it was shortly after Titan A.E. I could tell very much the difference between Disney's sci-fi fantasy and Titan A.E.'s just sci-fi thing, and by that I mean just looking at the clips in the commercials. But my friend couldn't tell, they said it looked like a different studio's animation. So, I think bigger fans of Disney, not just the general public, can more tell the Disney style and essence.

Main difference is easy to tell. Don Bluth has a very consistent animation art style you can tell right off the bat. It's very easy to distance. Where as Disney vary their art style a bit (but not by TOO much).

Also Titan A.E. IS a sci-fi. Where as Atlantis is more of an adventure/mytho genre.

[Disney Duster]

Goliath, no I meant that it's more than *just* that it's appreciated by older people, too.

Super, yea, but I could tell Atlantis was Disney too, even in it's varying style.

So Escapay, that first possible answer you posted, did you mean that the Disney essence is one real thing, but it changes, perhaps just superficially, still keeping a core? Because I could understand that, but I was talking about the core, the very thing of Disney that doesn't change. Maybe I could understand the idea of the Disney essence changing but still being the Disney essense...but I'm pretty sure something would have to stay the same to be called the Disney essence in two forms. A spirit.

It just can't be something that changes into something else entirely, because then it's not that thing anymore, it's something else. The old thing would be no more, if that was the case.

[Lazario]

Has anyone mentioned the Disney songs, specifically, in support of a Disney essence? From my childhood, I remember vividly memories of how Disney songs, quote audio clips, and books on tapes really brought the imagination to life. And that's what the movies do too, in my opinion.

[Goliath]

The Disney Essence? Fact:

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[Lazario]

Terrible music in that clip. I'd have liked it better if they had, for example, put the clips in some kind of chronological order and used music clips from several different songs. Or tried to take the songs from different sorts of eras. Like "Whistle While You Work" for the 30's, "When You Wish Upon a Star" for the 40's, "A Dream is a Wish Your Heart Makes" for the 50's, "(The) Bare Necessities" for the 60's, "The Age of Not Believing" for the 70's, maybe... "Why Should I Worry?" for the 80's, and "A Whole New World" for the 90's.