A few days ago, The Walt Disney Company returned to their traditional animation roots with The Princess and the Frog, the new film by Ron Clements and John Musker (the directorial duo is best known for two Disney classics, The Little Mermaid and Aladdin). In honor of the release, I figure I will take the high road and not blog on the normal Disney criticism of racist undertones, and celebrate 2-D animation. I mean, Pixar has yet to make a bad movie, but we all long for some more traditional animation to come our way, so I decided to embed the Ub Iwerks directed, Walt Disney written and produced short Steamboat Willie. It is the film that brought the iconic Mickey Mouse character to prominence, and was the third to feature Disney's mischievous rodent lead, the first being the less popular Plane Crazy, released earlier in the same year, 1928. As always with Disney animation, an aura of controversy seems to follow this film, although the renown and changing times seems to downplay the one time censored parts. During the big musical number, many of the scenes are considered to display cruelty to animals, including a bizarre scene where Mickey plays sow nipples as an instrument. What happened to Disney, Iwerks and their animation properties after the success of this film needs not be explained, as the Disney corporate name is one of the biggest in the world, let alone the entertainment industry itself. However, it is to be noted that the film is part of the Library of Congress' National Film Registry, as well as being one of the top 50 cartoons, as voted by members of the animation medium.
As for owning the film, it has been released on DVD uncut twice in the Walt Disney Treasures collection. The first is a compendium of old Mickey Mouse cartoons in Mickey Mouse in Black and White, as well as being a special feature on The Adventures of Oswald the Lucky Rabbit, due to it being one of Iwerks' seminal works. Even easier though, unlike other popular Disney works, this film is available all over the Interwebs without Disney issuing out copyright lawsuits all over the place due to the fact that as it has fallen into the public domain. So without further adieu, here is a legal showing of Steamboat Willie.
Usually, I do not blog about anything else on my Short Film Sunday posts, but I have been seeing a lot of blogs featuring a recent interview with Sigourney Weaver. I would post a source, but basically every movie site online has posted it, despite the fact that I can no longer find the video of the session. Anyhow, Weaver was being interviewed for her role in Avatar, when the topic changes to her thoughts on the possibility of Ghostbusters 3, where she drops some huge spoilers. She mentions that her character, Dana Barrett's, son will become ghost buster for this installment, and that Bill Murray will be playing a larger role than she would, but this time as a ghost, thus meaning that Dr. Peter Venkman dies in the movie, or in the space between Ghostbusters II and the upcoming sequel, if it ever comes to fruition.
Also, in about an hour from the time this is posted, Adult Swim is going to air a new Space Ghost interview with Zoe Saldana on her role in Avatar. The advertising blitz has began, and the return of Space Ghost to my late night lineup is a damn good start to it.
No comments:
Post a Comment