Slashdot's take on the state of Disney Animation

[cjb-nc]

There's an interesting article over on Slashdot (News for Nerds).

Even hard-core House of Mouse apologists have to admit that Disney's Feature Animation division has lost its way. After a half decade of pathetic failures (Atlantis) and epic disasters (Treasure Planet), the company shut its fabled Orlando 2D animation studios last year and announced that it was jumping on the computer animation bandwagon. A big motivation for the move to CGI was, of course, the Magic Kingdom's tenuous relationship with Pixar--the source of all of Disney's recent animated hits. But Disney is overlooking a better example of just what its toon team has been doing wrong...right under its nose. Howl's Moving Castle, which opened this weekend to rapturous critical acclaim, is the third masterpiece from Japan's Studio Ghibli that Disney has released theatrically. Today's New York Times has a feature by A.O. Scott [reg required, blah blah] calling Miyazaki the "world's greatest living animated-filmmaker"; meanwhile, last Thursday, I wrote a column for SFGate.com on why Disney animation, 3D rendered or not, is doomed to irrelevance if it fails to (re)learn some basic lessons from Miyazaki and his cohorts at Ghibli. What do you think? Is Disney destined to fade to black, or can a little Ghibli flavor (mmm....Ghibli) get it back on track?

http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=05/06/13/1050257

I thought it was interesting, especially in some of the feedback/comments, to see how one segment of the disillusioned teen/young adult market feels about Disney these days.

 

[ToTBellHop]

This doesn't really belong in this forum, but I do agree with that...something does need to change (i.e. they have to start making movies people will pay to see...).

 

[Melerella]

Very interesting article!

I personally think, that all Disney movies are great. I agree that there have been some that didn't do well, and I think it's because they put so many out at once. But that's not a fault.

I would say that Ghibli doesn't even comes close to the status of Walt Disney...but reporters have to get their stories sold...

And I'm 18 and personally, I wish I lived in Disney World..so in my book Disney is still number one..= )

Great post ! :wave:

 

[stitchcastle]

The Studio Ghibli films truly are amazing and I have to admit, better than a good lot of the recent Disney animated films.

Miyazaki is the new Walt i guess...

 

[bgraham34]

It is an interesting read. I have never seen any of those films that Disney released but I have heard nothing but good things. I still love 2d animation and want Disney to go great at that again.

 

[speck76]

One can say from a "fanboy" perspecitive that Disney should focus on traditional animation....blah blah blah, but the fact is, of the 19 CGI-animated films that have been released in the US, the average gross is over $170Million in the domestic market....and most double if not triple their domestic gross overseas.

Sure, story is important, as is total content.....but not a single CGI film has failed.....and not every CGI film has been great with story or content.

Many Disney and tradition fans keep saying that Dreamworks is going to fail with their next film....this started before Shrek 2 was released....well, Shrek 2 (#1 animated film of all time, #3 film of all time), Shark Tale grossed $160million domestic, $340million overall, and now Madagascar is almost to $130million domestic, yetto be released overseas....

Even Robots is up to a $240million total gross.....

Last fall was a great market test, as Shark Tale, The Incredibles, The Polar Express, and Spongebob were all released within a few weeks of each other....

The numbers say a lot:
The Incredibles $261million domestic / $370million international ($631million total)
Shark Tale $160million domestic / $180million international ($340million total)
The Polar Express $163million domestic / $120million international ($283million total)
Spongebob $85million domestic / $51million international ($137million total)

It would be nice if we lived in a world where the story and content were more important than the format used, but we don't. Black and White movies have a certain essence to them (just watch Schindler's List, or old Abbott and Costello movies), but I don't see any studio rushing to make movies in this format, or many people wanting them. Until CGI movies are rejected by the general public (which, to date, they have not been) this format will be used for all major features. Will this happen? Will people turn from this format, probably.....eventually the market will flood, and story/content will become more important, but it has not happened yet, and probably will not for at least another 2 years (When Disney, Pixar, Dreamworks, and others all get into the game whole-hog). When that happens, will studios turn back to traditional animation, or will they move on to "whatever is next in technology"...probably the latter.

 

[DisneyFan 2000]

So explain the success of movies such as Lilo and Stitch... You seemed to ignore that part (Brother Bear was also a success, despite Disney denying it).

 

[wannab@dis]

So explain the success of movies such as Lilo and Stitch... You seemed to ignore that part (Brother Bear was also a success, despite Disney denying it).

You missed the point.

Why even MAKE the 2D with x% of success when you can make a 3D movie with a current 100% sucess rate. Sure, at some point, a movie will fail, but all have been profit makers. Until the percentage of success levels out, 2D is not a good investment.

 

[speck76]

So explain the success of movies such as Lilo and Stitch... You seemed to ignore that part (Brother Bear was also a success, despite Disney denying it).

Brother Bear grossed $85million domestic....$250million overall

Lilo and Stitch grossed $145million domestic....$270million overall

While these certainly did better than Home on the Range ($50million domestic, $103million overall), they still pale in comparison to the CGI films.

Perhaps we are looking at this the wrong way.

Animation was on its way out even before Walt died. More of his projects were becoming Live Action, and less were being focused on Animation. The proejcts the followed his death are certainly not the best of the Animated films ever released.....the 70's were a bust, the 80's even worse.

The Eisner Era began in 1986 with The Great Mouse Detective....a film that grossed $25million in its first release......

The "renaissance" began with An American Tale in 1987, made by Don Bluth and Universal, the film was the first animated film in years to get huge attention, and grossed almost $50million....

In the summer of 1988, Disney/Amblin released Who Framed Roger Rabbit, and the hybrid film caught major attention, and made over $300million worldwide...

It really picked up with Oliver and Company and The Land Before Time, which met head to head over Thanksgiving of 1988.....
The Land Before Time (Don Bluth and George Lucas) blew away Oliver and Company the opening weekend (and set an opening weekend record for animated films) and grossed about $50million, of which Oliver and Co. ended up surpassing with $53million (in its first release, it was re-released in 1996 and grossed $25 million)

That was the bar setter......animated films were never huge-grossing films...it was only heating up...

The release of TLM in 1989 broke the records set by The Land Before Time in 1988....but even TLM only made $84million in its first release......

The Rescuers sequal failed, but Beauty and the Beast made $145million in its first release....more importantly, it got the nomination for Best Picture.......

Aladdin far passed $200million, and TLK went way over $300million.....but that never happened again.

To keep the bubble from bursting, WDFA tried new things....Dinosaur (almost $200million) did well, Atlantis and Treasure Planet were DOA.......

Now, the films are making $50-$150million, and while not up to the level of the mid-90's films, is still more than the 80's and earlier.....

Another problem....the costs....films like TLM only cost about $30million to make.....the new animated films are up to and over $100million. The new technology involved and the extremely long production time make these films very risky.....and with the long production time, the public's tastes can change. CGI films take about 1 year less to produce....and, they have ALWAYS been successful.......unlike tradition films.