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Can Hayao Miyazaki Save Disney's Soul?
IronicGrin writes "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?"
PS: Here's an excellent series of articles about what went wrong with Disney feature animation.
just like they abused their relationship with Pixar. IIRC, the announcement that they were closing their 2d animation studio came right before Pixar announced that after their current contract was up they would be bolting from Disney? Why? Because that asshat Eisner assumed that Disney was invincible and Pixar would come crawling to Disney no matter how much they were abused.
I still don't think Disney learned their lesson. Eisner didn't have one creative bone in his body, all he did was bleed dry whatever he could(and took a lions share of cash for himself) while Disney's main properties languished. I suspect the same will go for this relationship.
Monstar L
Of course I could be completely wrong and anime would be more than just a fad, in which case this would be a good move for Disney. I guess that's the gamble.
There's no emoticon for what I'm feeling! -- CBG, "The Computer Wore Menace Shoes"
It's sad to see the state that Disney is in. My fiance is an animator, so we've had our fair number of trips down to Orlando. She knows a number of animators, most of which have been fired.
A lot of the animators have started up their own studios though. I think Firefly Studios is one? Regardless, I think the Disney that Walt had imagined is long gone and far from coming back. They need to stop pumping out sequels and start creating movies with good stories.
It doesn't matter what medium the movie is delivered in; it's the story that delivers.
The greatest experience we can have is the mysterious.
- Albert Einstein
Setting aside the fact tht TS and FN were not, properly, Disney films, I don't think that the hits are the problem. Someone at Disney has given up on animation. There have been pretty good films (not ohmygodgottaseeita100times good), and the young audience doesn't really care that much about the nuances of story line.
The best example recently is the Heffalump movie. It's a little-kid movie, not the traditional epic, but its great for little kids (I'd say under 5, maybe up to 7 or 8 depending on the child). We saw it with my 2 year old in the theater. When it came out on DVD, we got it. So, if you were head of marketing, and you had a fairly big DVD release, how would you handle the marchandising? Lots of Roo and Lumpy stuffed animals, right? Midshare, get the kids playing with them. Give them something tangible to reinforce the whole Pooh franchise, right?
WRONG! Not only do most of the retail outlets have nothing in the Pooh line except - maybe - a stuffed Pooh bear that isn't tied to the release at all, but even the freakin' Disney Store online doesn't have a Lumpy. None. Nada. Zilch. Now, they did have two Lumpys in the local Disney Store . And those were left over from the shipment after the theatrical release, when the original (meager) shipment of Lumpy and Roo sold out in about a day and a half. Flew off the shelves, according to the DS worker.
No, in my opinion somebody at the top has purposely set the 2D animations up to fail.
Is it just my observation, or are there way too many stupid people in the world?
There's much irony in the fact that in his heroic years, Disney used to be a victim of intellectual property rights abuse. First, he was "outlawyered" by his coworker Charles Mintz who basically stole rights to Oswald, The Lucky Rabbit, leaving Disney seemingly without any chance. To get out of this predicament, Disney had to hastily invent another character and thus Mickey was born. But even then, major Hollywood studios have had a virtual monopoly on sound and Disney had no option but use a patent-infringing system known as Cinephone to create the first Mickey Mouse cartoon.
One might expect that being a victim of abuse, Disney should never be abusive to the others. However, in real life it's almost always the opposite. When you are a victim, you don't dream about the perfect world, where nobody is a victim - you dream of the world where YOU are no longer a victim. I think this could partially explain this company's attitude to patents, copyright and trademark. "There was no mercy for me - why should I have it now for anyone?"
Disney's contract with Ghibli requires them to not edit it. Localization in the dub is allowed, as long as the story doesn't take a big hit, but nothing else.
Rumor is, Miyazaki even sent them a genuine katana with a note to that effect attached to drive the point home.
"Lion King" (which was not originally planned to be such a big hit!)
The Lion King wasn't planned to be a big hit but it was, of course it wasn't really their movie at all, just a prettier version of someone elses, likely.
The rock, the vulture, and the chain
As far as I am concerned, Disney has always been about seducing children to the dark side. After all, Mary Poppins was a witch who took her charges to a meeting of her coven. Then there are films like "bedknobs and broomsticks". Or clips like Mickey as the sorcerers apprentice. Can anyone think of a Disney film that has promoted faith in God... didn't think so. The trouble is that our whole culture has become so hedonistic and pagan, that the devil no longer *needs* Disney, he has video games teaching children to cast spells and make pacts with demons before most of them can read.
"Sic Semper Path of Least Resistance"
Disney need to do a serious focus group research with today's kids. I have a number of relatives aged 10 to 13. These kids were never taught to hate Disney, but they absolutely think it's lame.
They highly favor Yugiho/Pokemon over Mickey mouse for example. Is it me or are Japanese the only ones creating fucked up anime-ish characters for kids? Americans play their character creation process too safe, fearing political correctness. In the end American characters are boring.
If the earliest Mickey Mouse cartoons went into the public domain, the character itself would also become public domain. Although more recent Mickey cartoons would still be copyrighted, anyone could start making their own new Mickey Mouse cartoons. Or t-shirts, or watches, or lunch boxes... One would only need to be careful to derive their Mickey drawings etc. from the public domain works, rather than later versions.