Walt Disney and Bob Clampett recycled
April 7th, 2009 by Scott Marks
Former student and current Facebook friend Julie Mynatt sent me this meticulously researched and assembled comparison reel showing how later day Disney raped the bones of Uncle Walt. Go to YouTube and search “Disney Deja Vu.” You’ll be surprised to see just how much of this stuff there is.
The Jungle Book (1967) was Walt’s swan song, the last animated feature he personally oversaw from beginning to end. Disney gave the green light to The Aristocats (1970) which turned out to be the studio’s first animated feature to be released after his death. You’ll notice that none of the reused footage appears in a film that Disney signed off on. He would never let reused animation sully a production he personally supervised. Honestly, I have never seen The Aristocats or Robin Hood (1973). They opened at a time in my upbringing when it was hip to reject cartoons in favor of trying to sneak into R rated pictures. Even with the voices of Phil Harris and Pat Buttram, these clips may have forever scared me off these two pictures.
Legend has it that without Walt to guide them, Robin Hood quickly went over budget and the studio had to cut corners. That is what probably motivated the tracings of cels past. The same can’t be said of Robert Clampett. Clampett was the star student who didn’t apply himself. Instead of spending the entire week on a homework assignment, Clampett wrote seven of the ten assigned pages and the night before it was do plagiarized the rest. While the folks at Disney were working under sudden budget restraints, Clampett was just plain lazy. He’s still my favorite animator in the Warner Bros. stable, but some of what follows is uncalled for.
WARNING: Much of what follows is politically incorrect. It reflects past thinking, not contemporary society. I hope…
Tags: bob clampett, disney cartoons, Looney Tunes, merrie melodies, recycled animation, reused animation, robert clampett, robin hood, the aristocats, the jungle book, Walt Disney, warner bros., warner bros. cartoons, warner brothers cartoonsFiled Under Rants
Review: BOLT / Byron Howard and Chris Williams (2008)
December 12th, 2008 by Scott Marks
Bolt (2008)
Directed by Byron Howard and Chris Williams
Written by Dan Fogelman and Chris Williams
Starring the voices of: John Travolta, Miley Cyrus, Susie Essman, Mark Walton, Malcolm McDowell and James Lipton
Running Time: 96 min.
Aspect Ratio: 1.85:1
Rating: 
Bolt is The Truman Show gone to the dogs. Bolt (John Travolta) is the canine superstar of a TV action series that houses such convincing special effects that the pooch actually thinks his super powers are real. Studio reps won’t let Penny (Miley Cyrus), his human co-star, adopt Bolt and one day the dog finds himself trapped in a parcel being shipped from Hollywood to New York. Believing that his mistress is in danger, Bolt embarks on a cross-country journey with the help of an alley cat with abandonment issues called Mittens (Susie Essman) and an adoring fanboy in hamster’s clothing, Rhino (Mark Walton), who makes the trip in an exercise ball.
For the first reel Bolt is silent and we are not allowed access to his thought patterns. Gradually we begin to hear him think, then speak. When around other pets, Bolt becomes quite vocal. That’s logical. When he begins speaking in front of people, that’s stupid. And while we’re on the subject of logic, if Bolt truly believes his super powers to be real, why didn’t he break out of his studio trailer long ago?
With references to everything from Hollywood or Bust and Oliver Twist to The Defiant Ones and Travolta’s own The Boy in the Plastic Bubble, the movie geek, if not the animation connoisseur, inside me was pacified. How does Pixar manage to make it all look so realistic? One expects sub-par product from DreamWorks, but Disney? With the exception of some beautifully realized pixel-sculpted pigeons, Bolt and friends look strangely synthetic as though their flesh were Vulcanized.
The action scenes are designed for people with no attention span. Instead of instantly informing us that Bolt is a TV star, the filmmakers hit us with the prolonged, hyper-edited and violent chase sequence that opens the picture. This would have gone down better had they presented it as satire and limited it to one scene. Before it’s over, the film becomes exactly what it was commenting on in the first place.
The character animation is appealing for the most part, however the lead bad guy bears an uncomfortable resemblance to Aladdin’s Jafar. The voices also tend to fit. Miley Cyrus dubs a teenage girl. How can you go wrong? Bolt is adorable until he opens his mouth. John Travolta’s voice does not fit the character as rendered by the computer artists. Not for so much as one second did I buy him as either the warm fuzzy Bolt or his televised alter ego. It’s simply Travolta pitched a few octaves higher. And for you Bob Hope fans, James Lipton, old Ski Schnoz’s former producer and gag writer, in addition to acting as our conduit Inside the Actor’s Studio, appears as “The Director.” I didn’t realize it was Lipton until I saw his name during the closing credits.
Honestly, I half expected to take the title literally and bolt. If it’s 2 pm on Christmas afternoon and the kids are all juiced up on eggnog and you’ve had enough Christmas cheer for this season, dump ‘em off at the mall and point them in the direction of Bolt.
And for all my Jewish readers, after you’ve finished devouring your Christmas helping of lox and corned beef, take your kids and throw your box office gelt to Defiance. More on that later…
Tags: bolt, bolt review, cgi, computer generated animation, disney animation, john travolta, Miley Cyrus, Molly Cyrus, Movie Review, Walt DisneyFiled Under Reviews, Theatrical
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