Week 24 brings us to 1984
There were two Disney movies that year:
Love Leads The Way
Where Toys Come From
Both movies are not available.
However as noted when I started this venture I will also include Touchstone Pictures and Pixar. This is the year of Touchstone!
Touchstone was created for a couple of reasons, all surrounding "times were a changing". In the late 70's, early 80's, Disney was criticized a bit for releasing movies that had some parts in it that were not "Disney like" for the family. Trenchcoat; Tron; Tex;The Black Hole (which got Disney it's first PG rating) Note: They did release a PG film called Take Down with out any ownership attatched to it. At the same time, the Disney name attatched to films with more of an adult subject were hurting at the box office. Disney execs started believing it was because people associated Disney with "kid movies", thus pulling adults away from these films. So in 1984 Ron Miller came up with Touchstone films. Touchstone acted more as just a label, it did not work separately from Disney. It was more of a type of Disney film. As time moved on the Touchstone label would be used less. If it was a combination of Touchstone, Hollywood Pictures (another Disney label), most often they would use just the Disney Association. This is mainly because as we got in to the mid 90's Disney was recognized for more quality than "kid movies", be it G-PG-Pg13 (aka Pirates of The Caribbean).
Ok, there was the boring history lesson. There was a lot more to it but I gave the Cliff Notes.
This year we move right into Touchstone with the movie Splash.
I feel funny giving a synopsis because most everyone knows the story, so real quick- Allen Bauer meets a beautiful girl, not knowing she is a mermaid who he met when he was a boy. Love and hijinks soon ensue.
The review pretty much is--- does it hold up over almost 30 years (gosh 30 years)?
It does hold up well. It does not look dated. Tom Hanks and John Candy are just Fanatastic as the Bauer brothers (John Candy holding a Penthouse magazine right away lets you know this is a Touchstone movie). Eugene Levy as the Villan is great. Daryl Hannah as Madison the mermaid (not to be confused with Zoolander's Merman), is spot on. She looks gorgeous and does not have that many lines to push her acting ability (was that mean?). Also wanted to note Dody Goodman as the secretary Ms. Stimler is really funny, pretty much playing the same part she did in Grease. All in all Ron Howard could not have done better job casting this movie.
The film does hold up well, however I do not remember the ending being so bad. I think magic was involved I am not sure, and just an awful song at the end. Another thing is, now that the The Little Mermaid was made, you cannot help but compare the story lines and they are kind of similar.
Quick note or an editorial: I think John Candy was a comic genius. I wish the Academy of Motion Pictures would honor him (his family), like they do each year for a certain individual for career achievements. I think they forget how hard it is to make people laugh.
Fact and not so fun facts:
The obvious that most people know..the fountain in the movie you can see in Hollywood Studios. It is kind of between Muppet 3D and Pixar place.
Considered for the role of Madison: Brooke Shields; Tatum O'Neal; Michelle Pfeiffer; just to name a few.
Tom Hank's role was turned down by John Travolta and Michael Keaton. In fact Hanks says that he was the 11th choice for this film.
The mold for the fountain was used for an ice sculpture in Herbie Goes Bananas.
Ok this is getting long. A very good movie which, I think died in the last 5 minutes. I think the sex jokes may go right over the kids heads but still maybe for 10 and up. I would give it 4 out of 5 Mickeys.
Next week: a hint-One of my favorite Disney movie that I think a lot of people have not seen.
Plus I will throw in my quick review of Brave (so excited).
That was long this week, I hope you stayed with it.
As always thanks for your time.
Have a great week.
There were two Disney movies that year:
Love Leads The Way
Where Toys Come From
Both movies are not available.
However as noted when I started this venture I will also include Touchstone Pictures and Pixar. This is the year of Touchstone!
Touchstone was created for a couple of reasons, all surrounding "times were a changing". In the late 70's, early 80's, Disney was criticized a bit for releasing movies that had some parts in it that were not "Disney like" for the family. Trenchcoat; Tron; Tex;The Black Hole (which got Disney it's first PG rating) Note: They did release a PG film called Take Down with out any ownership attatched to it. At the same time, the Disney name attatched to films with more of an adult subject were hurting at the box office. Disney execs started believing it was because people associated Disney with "kid movies", thus pulling adults away from these films. So in 1984 Ron Miller came up with Touchstone films. Touchstone acted more as just a label, it did not work separately from Disney. It was more of a type of Disney film. As time moved on the Touchstone label would be used less. If it was a combination of Touchstone, Hollywood Pictures (another Disney label), most often they would use just the Disney Association. This is mainly because as we got in to the mid 90's Disney was recognized for more quality than "kid movies", be it G-PG-Pg13 (aka Pirates of The Caribbean).
Ok, there was the boring history lesson. There was a lot more to it but I gave the Cliff Notes.
This year we move right into Touchstone with the movie Splash.
I feel funny giving a synopsis because most everyone knows the story, so real quick- Allen Bauer meets a beautiful girl, not knowing she is a mermaid who he met when he was a boy. Love and hijinks soon ensue.
The review pretty much is--- does it hold up over almost 30 years (gosh 30 years)?
It does hold up well. It does not look dated. Tom Hanks and John Candy are just Fanatastic as the Bauer brothers (John Candy holding a Penthouse magazine right away lets you know this is a Touchstone movie). Eugene Levy as the Villan is great. Daryl Hannah as Madison the mermaid (not to be confused with Zoolander's Merman), is spot on. She looks gorgeous and does not have that many lines to push her acting ability (was that mean?). Also wanted to note Dody Goodman as the secretary Ms. Stimler is really funny, pretty much playing the same part she did in Grease. All in all Ron Howard could not have done better job casting this movie.
The film does hold up well, however I do not remember the ending being so bad. I think magic was involved I am not sure, and just an awful song at the end. Another thing is, now that the The Little Mermaid was made, you cannot help but compare the story lines and they are kind of similar.
Quick note or an editorial: I think John Candy was a comic genius. I wish the Academy of Motion Pictures would honor him (his family), like they do each year for a certain individual for career achievements. I think they forget how hard it is to make people laugh.
Fact and not so fun facts:
The obvious that most people know..the fountain in the movie you can see in Hollywood Studios. It is kind of between Muppet 3D and Pixar place.
Considered for the role of Madison: Brooke Shields; Tatum O'Neal; Michelle Pfeiffer; just to name a few.
Tom Hank's role was turned down by John Travolta and Michael Keaton. In fact Hanks says that he was the 11th choice for this film.
The mold for the fountain was used for an ice sculpture in Herbie Goes Bananas.
Ok this is getting long. A very good movie which, I think died in the last 5 minutes. I think the sex jokes may go right over the kids heads but still maybe for 10 and up. I would give it 4 out of 5 Mickeys.
Next week: a hint-One of my favorite Disney movie that I think a lot of people have not seen.
Plus I will throw in my quick review of Brave (so excited).
That was long this week, I hope you stayed with it.
As always thanks for your time.
Have a great week.