NOTES:
* Well. Maybe I do. Just a little.
** Unless the immediate above is true.

The Danes last blog post..20081119.ChurchLies

Annnd… I think you’re right. Maleficent is the very best of Disney villains. Actually, most Disney villains ring pretty hollow. Gaston is just a big nothing. Prince John is more pitiable than anything. The Wicked Steps are mere obstacles. Hook? Ursula (the Maleficent knock-off)? Scar? Bah, I say!

Of the remainders, I really do like Shere Kahn. He has the right mix of raw power, regal hubris, and sinister nobility to make a good villain.

I never caught Fantasia 2000. I really like the idea of the Fantasia movies, but I rarely have the imagined patience it would require to sit through a dialogueless film. For the same reason, I rarely watch Daft Punk’s Interstella 5555, even though it’s beautifully imagined and conveys a moving story. In theory, i should be watching it once a year or so. But I don’t.

The Danes last blog post..20081119.ChurchLies

The Dane, isn’t it a miracle when anyone agrees with you? :) I think it’s safe to say I’m generally more likely to agree with Mink, but then she and I have a long and glorious history of disagreement over Pixar movies.

Another difference between Snow White and Sleeping Beauty: the female protagonist’s singing voice and how long one can listen to it without running screaming from the room. Also, Maleficent is pretty much the best Disney villain ever. And the whole pink/blue aesthetic conflict? Love.

My top 5 Disney films:

1. Beauty and the Beast
2. Fantasia
3. Fantasia 2000
4. Sleeping Beauty
5. tie: The Little Mermaid and Robin Hood (and maybe Pete’s Dragon)

Yep, I like the ones with the best scores (in my humble opinion).

As to Nightmare‘s debatable status as a Disney film, I agree. For the similar reason, I have a hard time thinking of Pixar’s films as being “Disney” either. And though they handle American distribution for Ghibli, the Japanese company is so far and away a better producer of animated stories that I can easily think of five films by the brand that are better than anything Disney’s ever attempted.

The Danes last blog post..20081119.ChurchLies

And, as you surely know, #5 is highly debatable, seeings as Disney put it out under Touchstone because they feared it would be a little too dark and creepy.

Like I said…

1. The Incredibles.
2. The Jungle Book.
3. Beauty and the Beast.
4. Sleeping Beauty.
5. Nightmare before Christmas.

Though, Nightmare is only there because I was desperate for a fifth film. There isn’t a clear frontrunner for the fifth position so I juggled Snow White, Atlantis, and Monsters Inc. and Nightmare just fell out. I’m only very confidant in my Top 4.

@Rich/Ben – This would be a good Top 5 list for your next (?) podcast.

The Danes last blog post..20081119.ChurchLies

@Carissa: It seems unfair to lump “partially intended for kids” and “Disney/Pixar” together. Disney has a remarkably comprehensive branding strategy, and there are plenty of movies directed at a similar audience to Disney’s that don’t fit the Disney “formula”.

The Danes last blog post..20081119.ChurchLies

In response to Mink: sure, it’s impossible to look at a film without certain genre expectations and conventions. But you can choose which genre standards you want to evaluate it by. So, for the moment anyway, I look at WALL-E as part of the post-apocalyptic genre, rather than as part of the Disney/Pixar genre. I think, overall, I’m resistant to using target-audience as my primary genre for viewing things, even though I know that’s how studios and publishers primarily conceive of them. Maybe that’s WHY I resist it. I think it’s a higher compliment to Disney/Pixar if I don’t dismiss the flaws in one of their films simply because it’s at least partially intended for kids. I think it’s a tribute to the strengths that WALL-E does have (namely, the first half hour, which I’d happily watch over and over again) that I’m able to view it according to the standards of the post-apocalyptic genre.

I agree with The Dane (yep, this is a historic moment) that it’s not the happy ending that’s the issue so much as the fact that that happy ending is there to serve an agenda, rather than being inherent to the story itself. It’s kind of like Aaron Sorkin movies and TV shows: I often agree with the guy’s politics, but I can’t stand how he beats us over the head with them. WALL-E is much more subtle than Aaron Sorkin, I’ll give it that.

The Danes last blog post..20081119.ChurchLies

When Mowgli retreats from his legacy and throws himself into an uncertain-yet-hopeful future, the non-child viewer knows that he’s leaving fast friends for a new world fraught with pain and heartache as much as it’s filled with potential for joy and fulfillment. As a high-schooler, I would shout “No! You fool!” as Mogli falls drunkenly into the vixen’s trap, as she plainly seduces him not for who he is but for what he can gain her. When a guy picks a chick [he doesn't even know] over his buddies, something’s gotta be wrong…

When we leave the Parr family at the end of The Incredibles, they are no longer par (or average). We know their secret and they have found some sort of compromise between being themselves honestly and hiding their true selves for the sake of their identities (ironically enough). From the final shot, we see that despite their renewed bond of family and the hope that through teamwork they’ll be able to overcome new adversaries, that new adversaries will continue to plague them. They are confident sure, but in the end, their future is left up to hopeful speculation (it’s entirely possible that Dash dies five minutes after the credits role).

Contra this, WALL-E ends in unmitigated optimism. As is typical the Disney formula you cite. Blech. An optimism unearned is a hollow venture. This is why I had absolutely no problem with the overflowing joy and optimism for the future we were greeted with in the finale to Slumdog Millionaire. It fit and it was well-earned by the demands of the story itself.

The Danes last blog post..20081119.ChurchLies

And contra Matt, I didn’t see Batman not getting to be the hero. In fact, he comes off more the hero in The Dark Knight than he has in any of his cinematic endeavors. He sacrifices himself more wholly for Gotham and his ideology than he’s had to in the past and the film’s conclusion is a nearly note-perfect (the monologue may have been a trifle overcooked) expression of this theme.

@Nick – WALL-E‘s moral is pretty much tacked on last minute to the much-better story about the robots and is pretty much just another saccharine overdose of pop American idealism.

Get back to What Matters. Quit it with all the waste: ecological, social, and spiritual. Return to WALL-E’s world, which will of course replace the former world of Wally Worlds (Wally World being the cutesy nickname for Walmart). Choose love and society and relationship and caretaking over the mindless consumerism of the past.

The message is good and fine, but its delivery overhanded.

They had this great movie going and then somewhere along the line remembered that it would be marketed to children and somehow our culture has had it drilled into its subconscious that stuff for kids must have pedagogical value. Offhand, I’ll point my finger of blame at Wertham.

The Danes last blog post..20081119.ChurchLies

Also, I don’t think Carissa is saying WAll-E is more depressing thematically… she’s saying it is less true to reality, and as such depresses her more.

Imagine that you have two sons. One decides that he is going to work at McDonalds until age 40, and then run for President of the United States. The other gets a job at a factory, and wants to work his way up to middle management. Which one is technically more “hopeful”? The first, really. But he is so unrealistic it is depressing, whereas the other is more realistic and so brings more hope despite his less hopeful perspective.

What does The Dance think about The Dark Knight?

Ben Bartletts last blog post..To live quietly

Nick Keutzers last blog post..Erratic Conversation

The Dark Knight – a depressing film where the hero isn’t even allowed to be a hero and even when the villains lose, they win. The only bright side is humanity not destroying itself…and they even had to debate that.

WALL-E – an uplifting film where even the robots show humanity and humanity itself is able to bring itself back from the brink of a kind of extinction with only a little bit of help after years of stagnation. The hero lives and the film even shows us how the world rebuilds itself during the credits. Depressing? Not on your life.

Matts last blog post..Re: The "ABC" game

The Danes last blog post..20081119.ChurchLies

t