Honey, I Blew Up The Kid

Hang on to your big bunnies, for today we revisit the tormented family of inventor Wayne Szalinski for a trip back to the well in 1992’s Honey, I Blew Up The Kid.

I don't know anything about giant babies - let me call in a buddy of mine...

According to most sources, the unexpected financial success of 1989’s Honey, I Shrunk The Kids took Disney by surprise. Prior to release, they had worried that the family-friendly riff on science-fiction horror movies of old was too intense to be successful. Yet the company underestimated a viewing audience already weaned on dark children’s movies of the 1980s (including some of the studio’s own efforts.) Luckily for them, a script was already making its way around the lot, called Big Baby (how’s that for a literal title?) that could be nominally re-worked into a quick-and-dirty sequel.

This time around, the Szalinski family is living in a Las Vegas suburb, Vista Del Mar (which looks suspiciously like Henderson,) apparently having had enough of the dick who lived next door. Father Wayne (Rick Moranis) is working for a big evil corporation, Sterling Labs, under the despicable, business-suited visage of Dr. Charles Hendrickson (John Shea, distinguished from his villainous Lex Luthor in TV’s Lois And Clark only by a pair of glasses,) exemplifying the need to hire lawyers when one invents a world-changing shrinking machine. Wayne’s wife, Diane (Marcia Strassman,) has gotten more tanned and more bland in the time between films; son Nick (Robert Oliveri) is still something of a geek, but seems much more into guitars and girls than science; daughter Amy (Amy O'Neill) goes to college and disappears after the first two minutes. The kid of the title is two-year old Adam, played by one-shot child-acting twins Daniel & Joshua Shalikar, who displays a tendency to break out of his play-pen and furiously reject attempts at naptime – in other words, your average toddler.

Giant hipster baby has raided the vintage stores

Within the first five minutes of this movie, you know we’re in trouble. The first film opened with a very stylish set of animated opening credits that fit the retro-50s vibe of the mad-scientist genre (the sequence looked a lot like the work of Ren & Stimpy creator John Kricfalusi, so I checked if he worked on them; he didn’t, but future Pixar director Andrew Stanton did.) This movie, on the other hand, begins with animated titles that look more akin to late-70s comic strips, like Moranis did a guest appearance in Ziggy. While Honey, I Shrunk The Kids featured a small number of ramshackle inventions put to use around the Szalinski home, the sequel immediately takes this concept over-the-top; all over the new Szalinski home are robot housekeepers, electric-shaver helmets, and open-air neon toasters (??), among other gizmos. Maybe Szalinski blew whatever money he made from his invention on parts to build all this new junk?

Housekeeper-bot becomes self-aware at 2:14 a.m. Eastern time, August 29th.

Like the inventions, Wayne’s negligent parenting is taken up several notches this time around. Whereas the shrinking accident in the first movie occurred while he and Diane were out of the house, little Adam is zapped by Sterling Lab’s big impressive enlarging ray (or whatever it’s called) while his father’s in the room - he’s just too damn wrapped up in the experiment to pay any mind to his child (noted, older son Nick was there too, in one of the two moments where he appears interested in science again.) Later, while testing out his newly-rebuilt shrinking machine, Szalinski accidentally test-fires it on a pair of motorcycle cops, who are then almost run over by a giant car. How wacky! With all this in mind, while we’re supposed to automatically dislike the snake-like corporate villain Hendrickson, his insistence that Szalinski is too incompetent to be trusted with his own inventions perhaps has some merit. When Lloyd Bridges shows up (sure, why not?) as the eccentric company president, Clifford Sterling, and promptly fires Hendrickson, I couldn’t really picture audiences standing up and cheering it as a victory.

Bastard or hero?

I couldn’t review this movie without pointing out that it was Keri Russell’s first film role – and here she is, in all her frizzy-haired, white-denim shortall-wearing glory. Playing a kind-of valley-girl remnant whom Nick has a crush on, Russell delivers an unmemorable performance – though one can’t blame the young actress when she’s given such uninspired material to work with.

Fifty Shades Of Szalinski

In a way, this film has a lot more in common with some of Disney’s Dexter Reilly films of the 60s and 70s than the movie it follows. And while those films were amusing, they were comedies, not adventures. Watching Honey, I Blew Up The Kid, one simply has a hard time getting past the fact that it’s so different from its predecessor. It’s not like the first film was any kind of masterpiece, but it was most definitely an adventure film, with elements of science-fiction, horror, and comedy. The sequel, on the other hand, is played entirely for laughs. The jarring disconnect in tone can be heard in the music for the films: the first movie’s dynamic and whimsical score by James Horner is succeeded here by a broad and plodding score by film, TV and theme park workhorse Bruce Broughton. Whereas the silliness of the shrinking machine concept led to sequences of action and peril in the first film, here characters usually end up staring up at the rotoscoped (or off-screen) Adam and delivering some kind of big-baby pun. What was a gimmick has devolved here into a one-note joke.

I use "joke" lightly...

After the middling success (and critical pummeling) of this movie, a direct-to-video sequel, Honey, We Shrunk Ourselves, appeared in 1997 – with only Moranis returning from the original cast. I won’t be reviewing that movie, since I don’t hate myself that much. Nor will I be watching any episodes of the short-lived Honey, I Shrunk The Kids TV series that premiered that same year, replacing Moranis with not-Tom Hanks Peter Scolari. More memorable for me was the Honey, I Shrunk The Audience attraction that debuted at EPCOT in 1994 (later duplicated in Disneyland’s 1998 re-do of Tomorrowland,) which the entire cast of the first sequel returned for. We may discuss that in more detail at some point, but for now I think we’ll have to say goodbye to the Szalinski family, and one of the strangest franchises Disney ever produced.

Honey, I ended the franchise!

Honey, I Shrunk The Kids

In 1986 the new leadership at Disney, headed by Michael Eisner and Frank Wells, helped to spearhead an unprecedented number of new advertising campaigns. One such undertaking was the so-called “Together at Disney” campaign, fronted by an infamous TV commercial wherein the young children of a working family tearfully comfort one-another, as their parents are both too busy with their careers to spend time with them. The business-suited Mom and Dad notice this, guilt spreading over their faces, and promptly decide to cure their family’s ills with a vacation - at Walt Disney World! The commercial naturally concludes with a montage of the family all having a wonderful time together (at Disney) – eating ice cream, wearing Figment hats, meeting Mickey, etc.

Putting this aside for now, let’s traverse 3.2 miles worth of over-grown suburban backyard to review 1989’s Honey, I Shrunk The Kids.


Like Lord Of The Flies, but with giant cookies

Created under the working title of Teeny Weenies (seriously) and developed by Stuart Gordon, writer and director of Re-Animator (seriously,) the movie was helmed by first-time director (and last-minute replacement for the ill Gordon) Joe Johnson. A special-effects technician who’d worked on the original Star Wars trilogy (among many other films,) Johnson would go on to a successful career directing such films as Disney’s The Rocketeer, Jumanji, October Sky and 2011’s Captain America. While ostensibly a family adventure film, Honey, I Shrunk The Kids often skirts the line of the horror genre (albeit a domesticized horror,) with its mad scientist, experiment gone wrong and peril from giant insects.

Doing Ray Harryhausen proud

The entire concept behind the film is pretty silly, but many factors help to sell the gimmick well. The cast is uniformly on-point, particularly the four lead kids. The young actors commit to the terror that their characters face, convincingly screaming for dear life when facing scripted peril. Rick Moranis, ever the jovial every-nerd, keeps the movie grounded. His character, amateur inventor Wayne Szalinski, provides a warm and identifiable center to the film, and could’ve come across as a more sinister character in the hands of a different actor (he did shrink and then try to eat his son - sure it was an accident…) One wonders how differently the character (and movie as a whole) would’ve turned out had Gordon’s original choice of Chevy Chase portrayed Szalinski.

Beauty, ay?

At the other end of the warmth scale is familiar character-actor Matt Frewer as Szalinski’s neighbor, “Big Russ” Thompson. Waking up on the wrong side of the bed, the character spends his first waking moments yelling at a side of his neighbor’s house for waking him up early, and then spends an inordinately long morning loading his RV for the family’s fishing trip. First of all, shouldn’t he have woken up early to get on the road anyway? Was he planning on arriving at the lake after dark? And secondly, how the hell much stuff does this family need for a fishing trip? Thompson literally spends hours checking massive stockpiles of microwaveable foods and then loading armful-after-armful of supplies into his camper. How’s his family supposed to fit in there?

OK kids, we're ready to hunker down in the bomb shelter...

When he’s not packing the contents of the local Wal-Mart into his RV, Thompson is tormenting his eldest son “Little Russ” (no comment,) played by Thomas Wilson Brown, for quitting the high-school football team and not living up to his own athletic glories. Am I to believe that wiry beanpole Matt Frewer was once a star football player? To top it off, when he has to cancel the fishing trip, he lies to his friend that his wife is on her period, rather than admit his kids are missing(!?). While his anger at Szalinski is understandable (he did put his sons in mortal danger, after all,) it’s hard to sympathize with a character that’s been antagonizing everyone around him for the better part of 90 minutes. When he offers Szalinski a peacemaking handshake at the end of the film, I was rooting for Moranis to tell him to fuck off.

Domestic bliss

While Thompson may be a domineering bully to his kids and wife (Buffy The Vampire Slayer's Kristine Sutherland,) the Szalinski family is portrayed as quietly coming apart. Diane Szalinski (the late Marcia Strassman) is absent from the beginning of the film, staying with her mother following an argument with Wayne, and then going to work at her realtor job. Wayne, meanwhile, leaves the running of the house to his teenage daughter, Amy (Amy O’Neill,) while working tirelessly on his shrinking machine, and pointedly dismisses his young son, Nick (Robert Oliveri.) The fact that the bright young Nick was trying to get his father’s attention with a small model of the very shrinking machine Wayne created is telling.

Vindicate me, dammit!

Coming back to the commercial described earlier, there was much hullabaloo in the 1980s regarding the effects of double-working families on traditional parenting (the associated debate stretches back decades, of course, but gained a much wider discussion thanks to popular talk shows of the time,) and Disney joined the ranks of studios willing to mine the topic for commercial benefit. It wasn’t until my most recent viewing of Honey, I Shrunk The Kids (like many my age, I watched the movie a lot when I was a kid – I mean come on, it had Tummy Trouble on front of it!) that I realized the title of the film was a confession. When the children are physically shrunk in size, it’s merely a physical manifestation of the fact that the Szalinski children were already marginalized by their parents, while the Thompson kids were emotionally belittled (see what I did there?) by their father. It also creates a convenient story-telling device for Diane and Wayne to put aside their own issues for the welfare of their children, and for Russ to consider how his behavior affects the relationships with his friends and family.

Perhaps when the whole ordeal was over, the families went for a visit to Disney World. Problem solved!

Wayne Szalinski, you've just un-shrunk your kids - what are you gonna do now??

Released the same weekend as Tim Burton’s seminal Batman, the movie was a surprise hit - a clear family-friendly counter-programming success (being a decent alternative for those who couldn’t get into the sold-out superhero film surely helped.) Before long it has started its own decade-spanning franchise, with two sequels, a TV show, and a 3D attraction at EPCOT – so parents could take their own neglected children to an attraction about reformed parents! Next time, we’ll take a look at the Szalinski family's next adventure, in which Wayne blows up his toddler (it’s not like it sounds – that would’ve been much more entertaining than what we ended up with.)

Throw me a frickin' bone...

Cars

I suppose it's about time I got around to reviewing one of the movies created by the fine people at Pixar Animation Studios - and there's no better place to begin than with everyone's favorite, Cars!

Air McQueen

What's that you say? 2006's Cars isn't the best or most popular Pixar film? The heck you say!

Perusing the inter-webs, there seems to be a loose consensus (but no mandate, by any stretch) that many find the film to be too predictable, with a pedestrian storyline and broad characters. These are charges that I don't necessarily disagree with, but the other leading theory behind Cars' unpopularity is the blandness of its central gimmick, that of a world inhabited exclusively by living vehicles. To this I proclaim "CHALLENGE!" I would argue that, up until the point of Cars' release, all of Pixar's films were possessing of central gimmicks that were of questionable originality.

• Living toys? Seen that in cartoons and TV shows plenty of times.
• Intelligent bugs? Yawn.
• Monsters scared of children? Big deal.
• Talking fish? Is that even a gimmick?
• A family of superheroes? Comics had been doing that for decades.

But the secret of Pixar's popularity was never its gimmicks (besides, perhaps, the fact that Toy Story was the first entirely computer-animated film,) but in the execution. People love the Toy Story franchise because of its clever writing and sharply-drawn characters, not because it's about toys coming to life; the gimmick is a source for gags, not heart.


Get to da choppa!!

And that seems to be where many people find Cars comes up short: with the all-important "charm factor" (an especially essential part of the film-going experience when discussing Disney.) Though I don't dislike the film, I do sense that at some point the filmmakers let themselves coast on automotive-themed gags and puns, more so than in most of their other movies. I also think, however, that a lot of displeasure with the film may simply come down to taste. Many viewers simply never warmed up to Lightning McQueen and Mater like they did to Woody and Buzz, or Marlin and Dory (although I'll never understand anyone who prefers A Bug's Life to Cars - especially considering that fact that these "cars" may actually be highly-evolved bugs anyway - but I digress.)


Ha ha, get it?

Something that I've always admired about Cars is the way it builds its world. I'm not talking about the humanity-free version of Earth the film exists within, but the town of Radiator Springs. Once McQueen (voiced by Owen Wilson) reaches this central setting, the whole thing seems to click. Each of the oddball residents of "the cutest little town in Carburetor County" reveals a different aspect of the town itself. There's the slightly-unhinged old-timer who nevertheless retains knowledge of the town's past (Katherine Helmond's Lizzie,) the hospitably simple blue-collar worker (Larry The Cable Guy's Mater, a character who retroactively gives the comedian a reason to be a thing,) the town's military nut and its anti-establishment hippie (Paul Dooley's Sarge and George Carlin's Fillmore, respectively) who still manage to get along despite their clashing ideologies, and the immigrants running their business with a passion that outweighs their profits (Tony Shalhoub and Guido Quaroni as Luigi and Guido,) to name a few.


Round up the usual suspects

Dare I suggest that Radiator Springs could represent some sort of American microcosm?

It's possible, as Cars tells a story that is very much rooted in the American southwest. Radiator Springs, a singularly unique creation in the Pixar canon, is itself an amalgamation of a hundred different roadside towns that have gone to dust after decades of neglect and isolation. The fact that this "town of crazies" may actually exist somewhere along the remnants of Route 66 (as flesh-and-blood humans, of course) is an idea that is alien to many film-goers, both worldwide and in the United States.


The truth is out there...

Herein, I believe, lies the misunderstanding that Cars has with its audience: the big beating heart of the film is not the story of Lightning McQueen finding love and peace in a small town (an old idea lifted form 1991's Doc Hollywood, among others,) but in the story of Radiator Springs and it's forgotten souls, left stranded out in the middle of a nowhere created by progress (represented by the interstate system.) That those who haven't packed-up and left town have instead stayed and remained hopeful is the real heroism on display, not in the frenetic racing scenes. This story is explicitly spelled-out in the "Our Town" sequence, and the fact that it's presented in a song-montage relatively late in the film makes me wonder if many viewers take this entire plot as mere window-dressing, a backdrop for McQueen's story to unfold in front of. This is a presumption that gets everything as ass-backwards as Mater's rear-view driving; it's actually McQueen's simple morality-play that leads to the bigger story as the film plays out.

Desolation row

When all is said and done, the years seem to have been good to the film: Pixar has gone on to make many better and many worse films. Despite one of those cinematic turds being the films' own sequel, the franchise lives on through its popularity with children, racing enthusiasts, and the success of an astonishingly-realized themed land at Disney California Adventure. One can hope that future installments take into account that the true heart of the matter lies not under the hood, but out on The Mother Road.
 

The Many Adventures Of Winnie The Pooh

We’ve got a lot more live-action films to cover than animated ones, but let’s go ahead anyway and follow up my Candleshoe review with another film from 1977 that wasn’t Star Wars ... The Many Adventures Of Winnie The Pooh!


They call me mellow yellow...

An undercover package film, The Many Adventures… (or should I call it TMAOWTP? That looks like the sound Marvel puts in its word bubbles when the Hulk passes wind) is made up of three previously released short features: Winnie The Pooh And The Honey Tree from 1966, Winnie The Pooh And The Blustery Day from 1968, and Winnie The Pooh And Tigger Too from 1974,) with new connecting sequences and a closing section added for the film's release. Any variances in animation in the 11-year span of these films are minimal, displaying an incredible level of consistency from the Disney animators. The only real difference sharp-eared viewers may notice is that the voices of Christopher Robin and Roo change between segments; Christopher Robin is voiced initially by Bruce Reitherman (son of director Wolfgang Reitherman,) and later by Jon Walmsley and Timothy Turner, while Roo is initially voiced by Ron’s little brother and recovering Tranya addict Clint Howard, and later Dori Whitaker (who also voiced the baby rabbit in Robin Hood.)

You know, we're not the only ones destroying trees. What about beavers?
You call yourself an environmentalist, why don't you go club a few beavers?

Coming near the end of Disney’s Xerox era (or at least the part of it where you could easily see the telltale scratchiness - that is unless you're watching the overly digitally-noise-reduced Blu-ray ... but I digress,) the movie displays a certain rough-and-ready texture, but here it's entirely fitting for the children’s storybook-styled setting. The voice cast seems to be having a good time with their characters, especially Junius Matthews as the neurotic Rabbit. The affable narration is provided by none other than Bagheera himself (and TV’s Mr. French,) Sebastian Cabot, who often interacts with the characters within the film. And who doesn’t want to try out their own terrible Sterling Holloway impression after listening to his dulcet tones bring the tubby yellow bear to life? As for Tigger vocal performer Paul Winchell – well, I have a bone to pick with him regarding The Aristocats - but we’ll get to that another day…

Do you wanna know how I got these scars?

Speaking of Tigger – man, what a turd. Always full of energy and violently manhandling Pooh against his will, Tigger bursts into people’s homes and sings about himself in the third-person, acting like that old hanger-on friend who gets drunk on boxed wine before showing up at a party you're throwing. Not to say that Pooh is really much better – just look at the way he cheerily invites himself into Rabbit’s home for lunch and promptly eats all his food. Then the fat lard goes and gets himself stuck in the entryway! No one but Rabbit seems too upset about this, like Pooh’s the loveable Biggest Loser contestant who just can’t seem to make any progress. I haven’t seen the 2011 sequel yet, but I’m hoping to see Rabbit set up a honey-scented bear trap inside his hole.

Okay, that was mean - I apologize … silly old bear.

Dat ass...

Unlike the HiddenQueen and others I’ve spoken with, I never really watched this movie growing up – except for the “Heffalumps and Woozles" sequence, which I always saw as part of the Disney’s Halloween Treat television special. While fairly trippy, the song and accompanying visuals can’t really hold a candle to the “Pink Elephants on Parade” segment of Dumbo (or most of Fantasia) in the "WTF" department. However, just recalling it amongst the other spooky sequences from Disney’s Halloween compilation still makes me shiver. As I said though, Pooh wasn't a character I grew up with an affinity for; I never even had a Pooh bear when I was little – I was a Glow Worm man, myself.

Hallucinations brought on by Trader Joe's recalled Hunny

All kidding aside, The Many Adventures of Winnie The Pooh, like the A.A. Milne stories Disney milked adapted, is gentle and humorous fun. The “story within a book” intertitles are clever and keep things interesting; and the individual sections are relatively short and easy for younger children to follow, so it’s an appropriate movie to put on to keep the little ones entertained. And all kids know and love Pooh, Piglet and Tigger, regardless of any prior exposure to the movie – Disney seems to have mastered the art of merchandising osmosis directly into the toddler brain.

Spend $1,000.00 on plush and receive free shipping this weekend!

Candleshoe

Today we’ll look at a young Jodie Foster in the disjointed-but-fascinating 1977 film Candleshoe.



Blimey!

 

We are introduced to scrappy young hooligan Casey Brown (played by a smirking 15 year-old Foster) through a protracted opening sequence in which she and an anonymous group of punks steal their way through various Los Angeles streets and alleyways. After this, Casey is shown to live with some rotten foster parents, who are more than happy to send her away with a pair of tough-looking goons for a handful of cash. Foster is very convincing in the role of the young con-artist, whose “tough-cookie” routine could’ve become tedious in the hands of a less-talented actress.


The '70s called: it wants it's collar back...

Casey soon finds herself in the employ of conman Harry Bundage (played by Rumpole of the Bailey’s Leo McKern,) who wants her to impersonate a wealthy old woman’s long-lost granddaughter in order to find treasure supposedly hidden at her estate, Candleshoe. Upon their first meeting, Bundage slaps Casey around for “sassing him.” This whole first sequence, from the opening credits through Casey and Bundage’s meeting, feels like the filmmakers were going for a serious, almost gritty film – like Taxi Driver for a family audience - but after this point, the rest of the film pulls back and becomes decidedly more tame. Even composer Ron Goodwin’s music, which begins as pure-'70s funk, soon changes to a bouncier orchestral score more appropriate for the stately countryside setting.

Class act

 

At Candleshoe, Casey is soon accepted into a pieced-together family composed of governess Lady St. Edmund (Helen Hayes, in her final film role,) butler Priory (respected English actor David Niven) and a collection of children adopted from a local orphanage (played by … various kids.) While investigating clues to uncover the treasure, Casey learns that Priory is the only staff member still employed at the estate; it is he and the children alone that maintain the upkeep of the property. This allows Niven to do his own Kind Hearts And Coronets act, posing as various gardeners, servants and family friends to fool the near-sighted governess.
 

Mrs. Magoo

At this point, one can’t help but feel sorry for Hayes’ Lady St. Edmund, who’s being deceived by everyone she knows (several of whom are actually Niven in disguise.) I was expecting the story to become a game of wits between Foster and Niven’s characters at this point, for Priory must surely be after the gold himself. It turns out, however, that he and the children are doing it all to spare the elderly woman's feelings. This, of course, soon makes Casey see the error of her ways and confess her crimes, etc. etc.

 

Candleshoe is odd in that it continually twists and turns, jumping between gritty larceny tale, picaresque character drama, slapstick comedy and family-friendly adventure. This may help keep the film from slipping into boring predictability, but the effect is disarming. For example, during the film’s climax, the family is threatened by Bundage and a group of menacing thugs – and from what we’ve seen of McKern’s character thus far, a very real sense of danger is felt. However, the ensuing fight immediately becomes one of Disney’s patented “wacky live-action fights,” with 6-foot bruisers screaming in agony after 8-year old children kick them and drop bags of flour on their heads.

 

The film was directed by Norman Tokar, a prolific American director credited with many television shows (including 93 episodes of the sitcom Leave It To Beaver,) and a dozen live-action films for Disney. Many of his films for the studio are considered amongst its lesser-known gems, including Those Calloways and The Apple Dumpling Gang. While watching Candleshoe, I couldn’t help but note how often the film seemed to be striving to be better than it needed to. Many of the shots are thoughtfully composed, and the use of color and shadows was subtle and interesting (a rarity in earlier Disney live-action films, where the mandate seemed to be “light the room brightly, center everything, and shoot.”)

 

There was one moment in particular where the editing struck me as unusually fine for a film of this caliber: a scene of a horse running along a hillside cross-fading to a shot of a young man sitting and counting a stack of money. I had to stop and re-watch this transition several times, for the galloping horse merged perfectly with the position and motion of the character’s moving hands. These two shots were lined up so precisely that the composition could not have possibly been a coincidence, and this effect comes across smoothly and subtlety, without drawing attention to itself. I was so impressed I had to show this below (as unwieldy as I can, unfortunately – my apologies that the screen-caps don’t line up as well as they do in the film):
 

Taking all this into account, it’s a shame that the potential for a really well-made film is somewhat squandered, for no other reason than the fact that Candleshoe is a “Disney live-action family film.” Wonderfully-lensed location work is jarringly mixed with random and unnecessary rear-projection footage; any menace or real threat is quickly deflated with banal physical comedy; complex character development is eschewed for tidy morality. One can almost sense Tokar straining under the limitations of not only a merely decent script, but those of an extremely specific and restrictive genre; unfortunately he would helm only one more film for Disney, 1978’s barely worth-mentioning Cat From Outer Space, before his death in 1979.

 

There’s a scene near the middle of the film where Niven and Hayes’ characters, in the midst of packing up the mementos and trappings of the estate’s illustrious past, stop to dance to a waltz that was once performed in the home’s now empty ballroom. As the camera pans back to show the extent of the barren hall, the music takes on a distant, echoed quality, and the sounds of unseen revelers from galas long-passed are heard on the soundtrack. In many ways, Candleshoe (the estate and the movie itself) can be seen as a metaphor for Walt Disney Productions at this moment in time: a place full of staunchly focused caretakers and optimistic youths, all pushing ahead despite pressures from the world outside. They carry on simply because they love the place and the kindly old soul who dwells there - while still feeling the reverberations from past glories, echoing on and on.
 

The last dance

All the same, one feels a palpable desire by those behind-the-scenes to strive for something more than merely what’s expected. A change would have to come soon, as the world had changed outside the walls of Walt’s quaint old studio. Disney would soon find itself taking a darker and more mature turn in the coming decade.

 

Make Mine Music

Looking now to a largely-forgotten era of Disney’s animated feature output, we’ll take a look at 1946’s Make Mine Music, Uncle Walt’s 8th animated film.

Make my day, Make Mine Music...

Never heard of it, you say? HISTORY! World War II had broken out in Europe, causing revenue from the overseas sales of Fantasia, Dumbo and Bambi to vanish. This came after Walt had decided to put much of the profit from Snow White And The Seven Dwarfs (that wasn’t put toward the films mentioned above) into the construction of a grand new animation campus in Burbank. Added to this was the US military’s decision to utilize the Walt Disney Studios as a source for training and propaganda films following Pearl Harbor – free of charge, of course – effectively draining much of the studio’s already minimal operating budget. To keep the studio running during the 1940s the features department turned out a number of inexpensive “package films,” consisting of several short sequences that could be worked on by different animators. These Whitman’s Sampler-esque films were released to mixed creative and financial results.

While some of these efforts yielded hidden gems (more on these in future reviews – I know you can’t wait,) for the most part I consider myself lucky to be watching these movies on DVD – so I can skip ahead if need be.

I'm going back some day, come what may, to blue bayou...

Okay, no, I wouldn’t do that to my loyal reader(s). But honestly, this was my second time viewing Make Mine Music, and I was having trouble keeping my eyes open. In all fairness, some of the sequences are better than others – “Blue Bayou,” featuring a pair of delicately animated egrets gliding through a gorgeously-realized background is a visual feast (likely because it was originally being animated for Fantasia, intended to accompany Debussy’s Claire de Lune.) “All the Cats Join In” is a fast-paced and fun segment, following bobby sock-wearing teenagers jiving to the music of Benny Goodman. The finale sequence, “The Whale Who Wanted to Sing at the Met,” with its clever concept and memorably sad ending, could even have been expanded into its own feature.

Everybody dance NOW!

But slogging through “Without You: A Tone Poem” (set to the droning vocals of Andy Russell,) and the seemingly endless “Peter and The Wolf” is a true test of patience. This last opinion is an unpopular one, as many have seen “Peter and the Wolf” separated from the rest of the film on home video compilations or repeated on The Disney Channel - and it’s therefore the most popular portion of the movie. But for me, the whole sequence - where we’re introduced to each character, the instrument that represents them, and then are walked step-by-step through the thread-bare story of a young Russian hunter - begs for judicious editing. Plus, Sterling Holloway’s twee narration only makes me wish he would get to voicing Winnie the Pooh already.

In Soviet Union, Mine Makes Music!

 

The worst offender, however, is “Johnnie Fedora and Alice Bluebonnet” - a saga of two hats in love (!?!). Accompanied by a syrupy ballad moaned out by the Andrews Sisters, that this short made it beyond the story-pitch stage and into a feature film mystifies me. It seems like it should’ve been a simple one-off short that could play to empty movie houses while the audience went to the bathroom. Are we supposed to care about hats with eyes, especially when they don’t even speak? This idea was developed much better by Pixar in the Saschka Unseld-directed 2013 short The Blue Umbrella – which didn’t have an Andrews Sisters death-rattle playing against it.

Who gives a shit?

For better or for worse, that’s the nature of these “package films;” much like the facts of life, you take the good and you take the bad.

A whale of a tale

 

A couple of interesting (?) post-scripts:
•The entire first sequence of the film, the hillbilly hoot’n’holler “The Martins and The Coys” was cut from the 2000 North American DVD. I suppose because it could insult cousin-marryin’ Ozark-dwellers who likely didn’t own DVD players at the time? I watched my European copy with the (quite entertaining) sequence intact, since owing two copies of Make Mine Music must be my lifelong ambition.

•One segment from this film ended up being represented in a Disney theme park. The “Casey at The Bat” sequence, dramatizing Ernest Thayer’s 1888 poem about a star athlete who dramatically strikes out (SPOILERS) is the inspiration for the baseball-themed Casey’s Corner restaurant at the end of Main Street at Disney World’s Magic Kingdom. So the next time you find yourself chomping down on an over-priced macaroni & cheese hotdog in the Florida heat, remember you’ve got Make Mine Music to thank.

Or Cokes ... just drive in and get a Coke, if you're thirsty.

Shrek?

Today we’ll be reviewing one of the new Disney classics – a film that revolutionized the art of animation as we know it. I’m talking, of course, about Shrek.

You heard me...

Released in 2001, the film was the brainchild of Jeffrey J. Katzenberg, the former creative head of Walt Disney animation under (and sometimes above, if rumors are to be believed) head-honcho Michael J. Eisner. After the success of The Lion King, Katzenberg attempted to use his new-found clout to push ahead with an ambitious fairy-tale/musical/action-adventure animation/live-action hybrid that he’d been working on since middle-school. Eisner, however (still furious that all merchandising rights to The Lion King and any other lion-related films and TV shows had been signed over to MGM in exchange for use of their logo at the Disney-MGM Studios in Florida) wouldn’t hear of it: he unceremoniously dismissed Katzenberg, and had all unopened cans of Diet Coke poured into the gutters to ensure his prompt departure.


Mr. and Mrs. Katzenberg

Katzenberg, to his credit, decided to walk through the studio and say goodbye to his former co-workers, and had inspiration upon noting several of the animators sitting at a large computer, working on the rendering model of a character from an upcoming film called Toy Story. Why not throw all notions of complicated live-action and animation hybrids out the window, and make his ambitious story come to life with computer animation? After creating a distraction involving the announcement of a Dole Whip shortage, Katzenberg absconded with the computer in question, and it was this on this Pentium P5 workstation that Katzenberg created his opus, Shrek. Forming a new studio, DreamItDoItWorks BFD, Katzenberg quickly partnered with fellow Hollywood heavyweights Steven J. Spielberg, David J. Geffen, George J. Lucas and David J. Lynch to help create his epic.


Damn, Gina!

The film tells the story of Shrek (voiced by Dana Carvey,) a lonely ogre who wishes for nothing more than to find love. While fishing in his swamp one day, he is befriended by an ass named Donkey (voiced by Martin Lawrence,) who persuades him to journey to the kingdom of the diminutive Lord Farquad (the always fun William Shatner) in order to find love. Farquaad, sympathizing with Shrek, sends him on a mission to save the beautiful Princess Fiona (Reese Witherspoon) from a fearsome dragon.


Here there be monsters...

Journeying to the faraway land of Mordor, Shrek and Donkey make their way through the winding halls of the castle, along the way doing battle with a fearsome purple dragon. Soon, the pair rescue the captive Princess, but their way is blocked by the dragon, which launches into a catchy song about the wonders of imagination, for some reason. Luckily for them, a souped-up 1993 Mazda RX-7 smashes through the castle wall, and they are rescued by the valiant Dominic Toretto and his sidekick, Captain Jack. Little-known fact: a last-minute addition, Dominic’s sidekick would one day inspire his own spin-off franchise.


Partners in crime

To make a long story short, Shrek, Donkey and Fiona are safely delivered to Farquaaad’s kingdom, where it turns out the unscrupulous ruler wants to marry the Princess himself! Shrek, however, has fallen in love with Fiona, and so gathers his fellow fairy-tale creatures together to crash the wedding and defeat the #Lyin’Lord.


Woodland creatures to the rescue!

In a final twist (added to the film following tepid test-screenings, and overseen by stand-in director M. J. Shyamalan,) it’s revealed that under full moonlight, Fiona turns into a donkey herself, and so she and Donkey zoom off into the night with Dominic, as Shrek screams out his rage to an unsympathetic moon.

There are many things that work well in the film. The animation, though primitive by today’s Pixar-fueled standards, makes the characters really come to life. It was quite the coup for Katzenberg to snag up-and-coming director J.J. J. Abrams, who brings a sense of dynamic dynamism to the tale; that he never directed an animated movie again is a shame. The music by Talking Heads front-man David Byrne is at turns sweeping and intimate, and makes surprising use of the Casio CZ-1 keyboard for many of the more intense sequences. The songs, among them “Ogre and Ogre Again,” “It’s a Farquaaaad Way to Go,” “Journey into Imagination,” and the ballad “For the First Time in My Nethers” are memorable, though the soundtrack was never made available on CD or iTunes, ensuring it never got the attention it deserved.

It was perhaps fortuitous that weeks before Shrek’s release, Eisner and Katzenberg came to an understanding after a weekend alone together at Eisner’s cabin in Aspen, agreeing to let Disney buy out DreamItDoItWorks BFD. The deal was spearheaded by recently-promoted Disney COO Robert J. Iger. Iger, as we all know, would one day become the go-to guy for corporate acquisitions after later becoming Disney's CEO, overseeing the company’s purchases of Jim Henson Studios, Marvel Entertainment, Lucasfilm Ltd, Imagine Entertainment, Good Humor Foods and the Vivid Entertainment Group.


A proud heritage

 

Thanks to this last-minute deal, the little movie that could can now stand proudly among the rest of Disney’s animated canon, shoulder-to-shoulder with other timeless classics like Make Mine Music, Home On The Range and The One With The Dinosaurs. And we can now enjoy all the classic theme park attractions that the film (and it’s 17 sequels) have produced; “Shrek 4D,” “Studio Tour With Vin Diesel,” “Escape From Gringots, featuring Minion Mayhem 6D” and “Race Through New York With Jimmy Fallon” amongst them. I'm really looking forward to sharing these experiences with my family when we visit Walt J. Orlando World Studios next year.

I’ll close this review with a quote from DreamItDoItWorks BFD co-founder David J. Lynch: