Classic Animation

[viridian]

susyhomewrecker said:

I liked that movie too, even though it creeped me out with the rats in the cages. My favorite non-Disney movie was "An American Tail" with the Russian mice. (Ha.) I absolutely HATED "All Dogs Go to Heaven." Talk about traumatic! I think my parents took me thinking "oh, how nice, all dogs go to heaven!" without realizing that the dogs had to DIE first.

The funny thing is that the same guy, Don Bluth, directed all three movies. Talk about diminishing returns; starting out with The Secret of NIMH and An American Tail, then comes the incredibly smarmy All Dogs Go to Heaven or crap like Rock-a-Doodle.

Actually, those late-80s movies remind me of a pet peeve in 2D animation: overly bright colors. For me, part of the charm of the classic Disney movies are the softer, blended colors. I hate the look of the modern Winnie-the-Pooh cartoons, in comparison to The Many Adventures of Winnie-the-Pooh. The muted colors of the older films are just sweeter looking, somehow.

[Mugsy]

Lots of great stuff being mentioned here. My kids, now 13-21, grew up watching a lot of this stuff. I actually got verklempt during the original Land Before Time, with the dying mother and the searching baby dinosaur. And that song!?!?! Teary, or what?

Love the original Winnie-the-Pooh stuff. "And the rain, rain, rain came down, down, down". Pooh getting his big butt stuck in Rabbit's door because he ate too much honey, Pooh sticks, and Eyore the Gloomy Donkey.

I thought the train crash and the waltzing paintings in Anastasia were breathtaking.

[susyhomewrecker]

I knew NIMH, American Tail, & All Dogs... were his movies. Rock A Doodle? I had no idea! HAHAHA.

I remember when the first Land Before Time came out. I loved Petrie, the pterodactyl, but by the time they made any of the sequels, I was in, like, fifth grade and didn't care. I caught part of LBT 26 or whatever they're on now on TV a few months ago, and it was BAD. Has anyone here seen any of the others? Are all 40 sequels so bad?

[Deleted]

I remember when the first Land Before Time came out, I loved it. But even at a fairly young age I knew all those sequel were just plain wrong. I saw the second and third ones I think but they were nowhere near as good as the first.

[CyberCathy]

I loved The Secret of NIMH. I read the book once upon a time, too. The crow (Jeremy) cracked me up.

I still sing the one song from An American Tail - "There are no cats in America! And the streets are paved with cheese!" I haven't seen the movie since it came out, but I still remember that song.

[kore]

I had also watched The Secret of NIMH quite a few times as a kid. I was also scared of that owl.

Now, for American Tale, I saw it once, but what I do remember is Madeline Kahn as a mouse that says "Wewease the Seecwret Weapon!"

[viridian]

cybercathy said:

I still sing the one song from An American Tail - "There are no cats in America! And the streets are paved with cheese!" I haven't seen the movie since it came out, but I still remember that song.

Haa! One of the IT guys at my office has the last name Moskowitz, and I want to call him Mouse-kowitz SO badly. That song was the first thing I thought of when I met him.

[PearlySweetcake]

Ok, they weren't movie-length, but since they were shown in movie theatres along with newsreels and such, I'm including them here....

A shout-out to the Warner Bros. boys Chuck Jones, Tex Avery, and the other denizens of Termite Terrace! Disney may have had the cutting-edge animation, but the WB cartoons had the snarky humor, celebrity impersonations and inside jokes (dare we say meta?). Best of all, they could take twelve hours of Wagnerian opera and reduce it down to a seven-minute rabbit hunt.

"Bwoon Hiwlda, you are so wuvwly...."

"Yes, I know it, I can't help it....."

[kore]

pearlysweetcake said:

Ok, they weren't movie-length, but since they were shown in movie theatres along with newsreels and such, I'm including them here....

A shout-out to the Warner Bros. boys Chuck Jones, Tex Avery, and the other denizens of Termite Terrace! Disney may have had the cutting-edge animation, but the WB cartoons had the snarky humor, celebrity impersonations and inside jokes (dare we say meta?). Best of all, they could take twelve hours of Wagnerian opera and reduce it down to a seven-minute rabbit hunt.

"Bwoon Hiwlda, you are so wuvwly...."

"Yes, I know it, I can't help it....."

"That's Opera, Doc" is one of my favorites. I tend to break into an Elmer Fudd voice and sing some of it when I'm releasing stress at work.

"North Wind Blow! South Wind Blow! Thunder! Lighting! Kill the Wabbit, Kill the Wabbit!"

My other favorite is the one with the Witch & Bugs. It's a version of Hansel & Gretal.

The two kids aren't afraid of the Witch and act like brats. At one point they tell the Witch as a cut-down "Ehhhh, Ya Mother Rides a Vacuum Cleaner!"

[dandesun]

Secret of NIMH was just a good movie. My family and I always refer to the fact that "girls just love sparklies." Especially since most of us are girls... and we like things that are sparkly. I seriously wanted to live in that rosebush. It was so cool!

American Tale was also well done. I, too, often sing 'Oh, there are no cats in America and the streets are paved with chee-eese!' Plus, for some reason, I am often called on to recite the lady mouse that Madeline Kahn plays. "We'll have a wawwy! You know, a wawwy... a wawge gathewing of all the mice..." and "I want to hewp those wess fortunate than mysewf... well... that's evewybody."

Disney does have quite the reputation for villains. And I'm really glad that they've taken some care in the last decade to bring out villains at the parks more often. The adults love the villains. One of my friends collects villain specific pins and whenever we go to the signings the villains like to drag him around and show off their specific pin to the other villains... who point out their own... and then a big villain cat-fight usually incurs.

I also concur with the difference between the newer Winnie-the-Pooh cartoons and the older. The older have that warm tone with the muted colors. It makes the difference between a cartoony atmosphere and one that you would actually want to find your way into.

Now... my personal favorite Disney flick is The Great Mouse Detective because, dammit, I love me some Sherlock Holmes and I think that was the first one I saw where I was a teenager and actually realized all the 'grown up' humor in it. But honestly, I'm fairly easy to please... I was raised a Disney kid by my parents who were raised as Disney kids... and my kids will get the same treatment, I'm sure.