Old Hat

and new duds

Mickey Day by Ronald Searle

Animators who came of age during the fat times of the past few years (especially the binge watching/pandemic Netflix boom) have a harder time adjusting to the shifts and swings of employment than older artists who remember the seasonal and projects-end layoffs that were standard for most studios throughout much of the last century, and this one.
Humans have a tendency to believe that good times will go on forever. It's as true in animation as in economics.

Disney 'Old Man' Frank Thomas was having none of that. Once, during one of the earliest layoffs, I wrote him to say that many people were worried about their job security.
"We never had any!" Frank said crisply. "My goodness, when a feature ended you had to call the Shorts department and ask if they had anything on a Goofy film or something so you wouldn't get laid off! I made myself 'indispensable' so they wouldn't fire me, but there was never any guarantee!"

No movie, no series, no play is guaranteed success. It’s why so many show business people are very superstitious. It’s a mystery when you have a ‘hit’ and it can’t be predicted.

The continued existence of the Walt Disney studio after 100 years is a sort of miracle. It nearly met its demise more than once, but always, somehow, managed to survive.

Unfortunately in its centennial year, Disney appears to have lost touch with its own history. In this Super Bowl Commercial they pay tribute to 100 years of Disney history while ignoring 80 years of it.

They can’t even include a clip from SNOW WHITE AND THE SEVEN DWARFS? How about one of Walt Disney? And Eric Goldberg drawing Mickey at his animation desk is the only acknowledgement of the artists who actually made their films?

When Disney and Pixar merged, it was Pixar who was the junior partner, the dubious spinoff with an untested product. Disney, the grand old lady of animation, now has to re-establish its reputation with CGI films that will bring back the old magic, since they don’t appear to want to make hand drawn films any more. And they must compete with itself, or rather with Pixar. It’s a pity to lose the hand drawn animation, but CGI can be made faster than hand drawn films (it is NOT cheaper), and that means more films can be made per year. A studio’s entire future no longer rides on one picture. It’s good for the bottom line, not necessarily good for art.

Pixar had a solid run of hits, then a few misfires. Every studio has them sooner or later. Ultimately, it’s not about the studio but about the people who staff them and the attitudes of the producers who hire the people. If you regard your staff as trained professionals and value their contributions, and LET them contribute to the project, the pictures will be good. If you consider them to be easily replaceable cogs in a machine, subordinate to technology and technicians, and artwork as a product that is made by a machine, it is not surprising that resulting films might have a mechanical feel to them. Don’t even get me started on AI.

Disney Features also became a victim of corporatitis. Artists became subordinate to executives who sometimes had no background in art, and who were sometimes more interested in merchandising opportunties than in a film’s story.

A disturbing trend today is to see films billed as “From the Producers Of” rather than the director of, or star of, a previous film. Did anyone ever go to see any film because of the producer (excluding Walt Disney, George Lucas and Stephen Spielberg?) Executives and managers now often consider themselves ‘the creatives’. (what’s wrong with being ‘the artist?’)

Walt Disney was an artist-producer. He was not a good artist, and he knew it, and he knew to hire good artists to make his films. His gift was story. He knew how to appeal to an audience, and make films that people came to see. His brother Roy was brilliant at finance. Without Roy, Walt would have run the studio finances out very quickly.
Animation IS the artists' work. It can't be saved by, or with, technology. It stands and falls on the performances of its artists and the quality of its story.

The late Sue Nichols told me, many years ago, that ‘people think in story’.

So Disney's resolution SHOULD be to somehow resurrect their old spirit and get back to making fun, wholesome entertainment for a mass audience. The medium is unimportant.

All they need to do is get in touch with their roots. Tell us a story.