D52 Week 38: Fantasia 2000!

Hard to believe it's only been eight months since I took a look at the original Fantasia (my first full-fledged D52 review, from an apparently happier time in my life!), and yet, here we are. Fastest fifty-nine years EVER! Of course, it wasn't the first time a sequel had been proposed: in the 80's, your friend and mine Wolfgang Reitherman proposed something called Musicana, "an ambitious concept mixing jazz, classical music, myths, modern art and more, following the old Fantasia format". And then this was ditched, because Recyclerman was physically unable to do anything potentially interesting by that point in that career. Why, the mere THOUGHT of doing that eventually killed him, so it was shelved. But then, in 1990, Roy Disney entered the fray, feeling the need to prove that he is every bit as much a Disney as his Uncle Waltie; and so, following in his footsteps, he produced a Fantasia film that ended up heralding the end of a period of critical acclaim and commercial successes for the studio. Just as Fantasia begets Dumbo and Melody Time, Fantasia 2000 begets Treasure Planet and Home on the Range. Thanks a lot, dudes.

Still, that shouldn't affect one's opinion on the quality of the Fantasiae themselves. After all, we should be fair, and impartial, right? So, come join me in being an impartial fairy, as I take a segment-by-segment look through Disney's first package-style film in quite some time! (It's easier to not be dreading a package film when I know that it won't be succeeded by, like, six more.)

D52 Week 37: Tarzan!

And thus, the period somewhat arbitrarily known as the Disney Renaissance comes to an end, forever. With this most momentous of occasions, one very important question comes to mind: What is it about nature-based settings that predominately feature animal characters that brought out this weird urge in Disney to hire famous pop singer-songwriters, to contribute awkward quasi-ethnic songs? There's something very 1990s about slow pop ballads set to tribal chanting and percussion, isn't there?

Yes, Tarzan is, in many ways, a good note for this era to go out on. It's really pretty! There are some genuinely interesting characters! The action scenes are nicely done! The biggest problem with the film can be summed up quite simply: Phil Collins. The again, the biggest problem with most things Phil Collins is involved with can be summed up in the same way. A Disney film doesn't have to be a musical to succeed, but if it's going to lean heavily on its soundtrack - and they often do - then those songs should be, y'know, organic and entertaining at best, unobtrusive at worst. Phil Collins manages none of these things. (Of the many petty things Trey Parker and Matt Stone have pettily been pissed off about over the years, losing to Phil Collins might be one of the most reasonably petty of them all.)

D52 Week 36: Mulan!

Y'know, the Disney Renaissance experience seems to be really hampered when you watch all of these movies back-to-back (as are a lot of cumulative Disney experiences, apparently). How wonderful it must've been to be moviegoers in the 90s - I wasn't allowed to see movies at that time, period, so I wasn't one - and have a new gorgeously drawn Disney film almost every year! Why, that's almost just long enough to forget enough about the previous one to feel like the new one's, well, new! Whereas, when you watch them all back-to-back, it's a little wearying. That barely concealed sadistic side of us all seizes on the repetition to come gradually more to the forefront, practically begging to see even ONE movie that doesn't end in unearned happy lovey-dovey romancings. For all the intriguing new directions they go in on a visual level, and all the surprisingly well-cast characters that pop up, it still always seems to boil down to the same rusty old story mechanisms, creaking away, until the end of time itself. Is this literally the only type of plot they could dream up at this time? Seriously, dudes??

And so, we come to Mulan, a film where our heroine mentions on precisely one occasion that she thinks her commander is hot, and he can't bring himself to murder her for being a woman. Clearly, They Should Totally Be Together, forever!!! ♥

D52 Week 35: Hercules!

I can't help but wonder if I would've enjoyed this movie more had I not been overexposed to James Woods' episodes of Family Guy while living in one of the few states even worse than Montana!

After the grimness of The Hunchback of Notre Dame, I suppose it's only logical to have some palette-cleansing silliness. (And when you think of silly stories, the first thing that comes to mind is Greek mythology, right???) As such, like Aladdin a few years back, we get an ostensibly serious figure who ends up being voiced by a Particularly Unlikely Celebrity whose fast-talking mannerisms surely take forever for whichever fool(s) ended up being responsible for animating them. Of course, regardless of how James Woodsed out I might be for one lifetime, Robin Williams as the Genie makes his Hades seem reigned-in and relatively tame by comparison, in that he actually has, y'know, an actual concrete characterization and stuff. (Not that I'm implying that Ed Sullivan impressions don't count as characterization in and of themselves, but-- oh, actually, I TOTALLY AM.) And, yeah, again, there's kind of a romance somewhere in there, with a lady who's forced to get close to the Big Bad against her will - which is also more tolerable than some of the previous examples of this. Despite trying a couple of interesting things, Hercules is pretty much one of the more formulaic entries from the Renaissance era, but at least it's formulaic in a competent way, I guess!