Introduction for Animated Features Discussion

The discussion that unfolds in the following series of posts I'm almost embarrassed to be committing the time necessary with which to follow through. I'll be discussing mostly the Disney Animated Feature canon, since in America any discussion of feature-length animated cinema starts with Walt Disney, and as it may not ultimately end with Disney, the mouse's shadow is very large.

Categorizing things is something humans do daily, and weirdos like me take to incredibly boring lengths. This is just something that intrigues me, since to me the object in question--films--are powerful pieces of art painstakingly created, numerous in amount, and not created in a vacuum.

This exercise--this Feature Length Animated Movie discussion (the Disney anecdotal narrative history)--is really just a small warm up of what I'd really like to do for The Wire/The Corner and ultimately, The Simpsons. Long-form anecdotal narrative criticism and discussion of the Simpsons has been on my mind for a number of years, and this tiny thing (which will ultimately sprawl all over) is me testing myself to see if I can stomach such tripe; silly written nonsense for nobody but fans.

Somehow this exercise is also my way of unpacking what from pop-culture means something for me, as Disney was a familiar and familial entity in my upbringing.

Actually I've been slowly churning this discussion in my brain for a number of years, and started making notes back in Austin. The way I see it, there are distinct eras, epochs if you will, in Disney's canon, and the animated feature industry in America wouldn't have developed without the Disney entity and it's disgruntled former workers.

The distinct eras are, as I call them: the Golden Age (or more precisely, the Dictator Walt Age); the Second Age; the Lean Years; the Dark Years, which corresponds to the Age of Don Bluth; the New Renaissance; the Post NR Era; the Emergence of Pixar; and the Age of Pixar.

We are fully entrenched in the Age of Pixar, but if Cars 2 is any indication, we might be on the cusp of something else. I say that because at this time Disney isn't the film company that stirs up the imagination and excitement in us snooty fans of cinema. Pixar carries that mantle now.

See, this shit is already boring and embarrassing me.

Well, I've gone this far, so, if the next few days, I'll blather on about cartoons, rebelling animators, fights, xeroxes, and wholesale copying of cells for later movies (many dancing and fighting scenes from Robin Hood are directly taken from Jungle Book and Aristocats). Blah blah blah, notice how skateboarding effected the design of Tarzan? Or did you know that Walt bought the rights to The Little Mermaid at the same time as he did Through the Looking Glass and Snow White? And that Lilo and Stitch is a random, genuine, and excellent entry from the summer of 2002 that's mostly overlooked because of the stinky holiday 2002 release, Treasure Planet? Or about how the mostly secretive company is now sharing their research papers?

That's the kind of useless strands I have floating around my skull. Pulling them together here for a few posts is what's on the docket.