farerb wrote:I know that you like Pocahontas, but it is really not in the same level of success as the earlier four Renaissance. Not then and definitely not now. I only say what I see on the internet and the way people talk about Mulan, they like it almost as much as the fab four, probably some like it more. You know someone had to take those Millennials to see the film so their parents are also familiar with Mulan.
The only film that might be more popular is Lilo & Stitch, but that doesn't seem so to me.
I didn't say that about Pocahontas because I like it otherwise I would have mentioned Hunchback as well since I love that film even more but I'm not deluded enough to think it's nearly as iconic. People give Pocahontas a bad rep but in fact it's way better known than most people would like to accept. If you look at the top ten best selling VHS of all time, take a look at what film makes the list.
https://www.video2dvdtransfers.co.uk/bl ... vhs-tapes/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_b ... ted_States
If you look at the full wiki list, it even beats arguably more popular classics like Cinderella, The Little Mermaid, Bambi, and 101 Dalmatians (the second highest grossing Disney animated film of all time after Snow White). People like to say that they watched Pocahontas in theaters, were disappointed and never gave it another look, but you don't become the 9th highest grossing VHS tape of all time with anecdotes like that being true. Clearly there very much was an audience for this film for it to sell as well as it did on home video, rivaling the rest of the Big Four (and even greatly exceeding The Little Mermaid which barely makes the list). For that to have occurred, people didn't just ignore it or go out of their way to snub it afterwards. I know Disney considers it a "disappointment" now, but financially it was still the fifth highest grossing film of the year (so was Hunchback one year later btw. Sorry, I have to include my Hunchback plug lol) and if you look at the top ten grossing WDAS animated films from the 90s AND the 2000s, Pocahontas is very much present on that list alongside Beauty and the Beast, Aladdin, The Lion King, Hunchback, Tarzan, Tangled, etc. There was an infographic I posted not too long ago here illustrating that.
And Disney clearly didn't feel it was even that much of a disappointment for them to pretend it didn't even exist because they had other projects planned for it as far back as the 90s. When they were setting up The Lion King for Broadway, the higher ups were already talking about making Pocahontas their third Broadway stage show as I read in an article once. Somewhere along the way those plans were scrapped and Aida took its place instead (I've heard rumors that Disney felt it would be incredibly difficult to cast so many Native American actors in the all the different parts since there aren't that many in Broadway so this was one reason it was replaced with Aida. They knew that there would be a lot of controversy with this film especially if white actors played Native Americans. Aida was mostly safe from this because there was no shortage of black performers to play the Nubians and for the Egyptians, they could contrast them with white actors. Even in today's day and age, we have high-budget Hollywood films where white actors play Egyptians even if there's more criticism now so clearly that wasn't an issue in the late 90s). I'm assuming the only reason Disney wouldn't try and commercialize this film as a live-action feature is because they know that this film would be under extreme scrutiny and it's better to avoid that can of worms altogether.
When Let It Go became a world-wide phenomenon, it was discussed that this was the first time a Disney song had reached such an apex of popularity since Colors of the Wind because Colors of the Wind was the last Disney song to constantly get the same amount of airplay. Not even Tarzan's You'll Be in My Heart, which was the last Disney Oscar winner for best song since Colors of the Wind and before Let It Go, was given that much attention and media hype. When people mention famous or favorite Disney songs, Colors of the Wind always comes up (Kristen Bell and Idina Menzel mentioned it just recently in a Frozen 2 interview alongside other Disney classic songs that nobody would argue the popularity of from films like The Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast, Aladdin, etc.) In the Aladdin Broadway musical, when Genie is riffing on classic Disney numbers from the 90s, Colors of the Wind is one of the chosen songs. It was picked because Disney knew that audiences would recognize the song and the film it came from like Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast, Aladdin, and Lion King, whereas they clearly didn't feel that songs from Hunchback, Hercules, Mulan, etc. would be as instantly recognizable.
Another thing to keep in mind, besides the fact that Pocahontas is still today the widest attended movie premiere in history and had a huge and lucrative marketing campaign rivaling that of The Lion King and the other Disney movies before it (the last Disney movie to get this treatment before Frozen was Hercules), is the fact that for Disney, an American company, Pocahontas is a very American symbol. Kids are taught about her in school at a young age so virtually every American knows her name. There's a reason that when Donald Trump wants to target Elizabeth Warren or Native Americans in general, the only name that comes to mind is Pocahontas because that's the one Native American figure virtually everybody knows. So she's already an iconic character like Snow White, Cinderella, or Tarzan in the sense that with or without the Disney movie, everybody has heard of her. And the fact that Pocahontas was such a high-profile film, regardless of how much people like it today or not, adds to this. In my high school history class, when we learned about Pocahontas, pretty much everybody could relate to her, not from what they may or not remember from reading about her in their history textbook since elementary school, but from the Disney movie. I remember various girls got really upset when they learned that Pocahontas married John Rolfe in real life and all of them remarked "but what about John Smith?" And another good portion of the class was pretty smug because they had seen Pocahontas II: Journey to a New World so they felt smart just for knowing who Pocahontas had ended up with. Disney gets the blame for the American myth of the Pocahontas and John Smith romance a lot as well as turning her into a princess, but there were plays about their love story that existed more than one hundred years ago. And in the Lennox princess figurine collection, Pocahontas and John Smith both were there alongside other fairy tale and historical royal figures and this was completely without the Disney connection. Pocahontas being a Disney Princess certainly helped raise her exposure and I remember reading the stats of someone who worked in the Disney Store during the early 2000s when the franchise came out and according to him, Pocahontas sold more dolls than Mulan (although both were dead last compared to the rest of the classic princesses).
And beyond America, Pocahontas is vastly popular in many different countries. I've read many anecdotes from our European friends on this forum about how in their country, Pocahontas is considered to be on the same level as the Big Four (to the point that one user described it as the Big Five) or at least as highly liked and well-remembered. On TV Tropes, there's a whole listing for Pocahontas on the fact that it's much better regarded in Europe than in America. I don't know if that's because Pocahontas was connected to England because I have no idea if they teach her in school to British children (for example, one of my British professors told me that in Britain they gloss over the American Revolution and basically act as though one day the 13 colonies decided they wanted to become separate and Britain was fine with it) but I think the film in general has an appeal to Europeans because of the bittersweet ending which is very European in nature. This and the visuals and music in general, not to mention the Romeo and Juliet style plot, would all be better regarded in Europe than in a country like the US which prefers more broad humor in their films (both animated and live-action) and frankly cares more for zippy scenes with endless action and funny zingers being constantly said by all the characters because if there's even one slow moment with emotion or a pause, that's enough to put the audience to sleep. Keep in mind that Part of Your World was nearly cut for this reason and we actually did lose If I Never Knew You to this. Going back to England though, I may not be aware of how much children there are aware of Pocahontas as a historical figure, but I do know the film is popular enough there. I posted a study in one of the Disney Princess threads here a while back which analyzed the Disney Princess films and how many people had watched or not watched them. Snow White was the clear #1 by a wide margin while Aladdin was #2 and followed closely by Cinderella and Sleeping Beauty both. Next came Beauty and the Beast, then Frozen, and then The Little Mermaid. Not that far below The Little Mermaid was Pocahontas. It beat Tangled and Brave by a substantial number of viewers and completely swept aside Mulan, Moana, and The Princess and the Frog. So Pocahontas clearly has been seen by more British people at least and doesn't rank that far below the genuine Disney classics that everybody knows and have clearly entered the public consciousness.
Also from what I've seen of Japan and their merchandise, they're much warmer to Pocahontas. It's not an instant favorite like the Walt classics, the Big Four, Stitch, Tangled, or Frozen, but they don't outright ignore it either and they absolutely adore Meeko! From what I've seen in the Middle East and their Disney Channel, Pocahontas is a pretty popular film and character and she gets promoted alongside the classic six Disney Princesses and Rapunzel a lot, moreso than the other "princesses."
The Internet and social media is mostly dominated by young people. It's the same reason that if you're into American politics, you'll notice that on social media, everybody is lambasting Joe Biden as the Democratic nominee and thinks he is unfit for service. Based on the Internet alone, one would assume that Biden must have marginal support yet he's the top contender nationwide because like it or not, the whole country/world is not represented by people on the Internet and there are many other viewpoints and perspectives out there that do not belong to millennials and younger. Hence the "ok boomer" meme.
Parents taking their kids to a movie theater doesn't mean they remember or care about the movie years from now. My mom falls asleep during Disney movies that she gets bored in and probably couldn't remember most of what she did see the very next day, and certainly years later, she's not going to remember the name of that same movie. That's true for a lot of American soccer moms and soccer dads who use these films as babysitting fodder to put on the TV to keep their kids occupied so they can get a moment to breathe for themselves. I was just reading a blog about Disney movie reviews and the writer mentioned that his mom was not a fan of Disney movies but she remembers Mulan as that "one movie with Eddie Murphy." Mulan also doesn't have nearly the same amount of exposure in the Disney Parks either which is another outlet for typical American and non-American families exposed to Disney. Pocahontas at least, beyond making regular appearances in the Animal Kingdom, has major parts in California Adventure's World of Color and the Magic Kingdom's Fantasmic. She also very nearly got a ride in Disneyland unlike Mulan who I've never heard of Disney even considering giving an attraction (the same goes for Hunchback and Hercules, unlike you count the stage shows and parades). This not including the former shows that Pocahontas had in the Disney Parks not to mention she got her very own Disney on Ice show back in the 90s. Very few Disney films get their own Disney on Ice show dedicated entirely to them and not a wide selection of films.
When the recruits were training, I was half-expecting them to break into song.
They just have to sound good enough to convince people not to be mad and dish out money to see it first.
Not comment.
His relation with Aladdin seems sometimes off while I can't remember one scene when it happened in the original. That is called a DOWNGRADE, not an upgrade.
