With the Fall just beginning, I finally have found a few evenings at home where I can get caught up on all the writing I wanted to do this year. I grouped three entries about Disney movies I watched over the past few months here for ease and just so I would get them done.
Pocahontas
I was inspired to watch Pocahontas after my first day of my summer trip to Disneyland (which was the second leg of the same trip that resulted in all of the watched Britney Spears videos), We saw World of Color at Disney's California Adventure and they play "Colors of the Wind" and that song makes me a little weepy so when everyone went to bed at like 10 I watched Pocahontas on my Kindle in a hotel bed in Cypress, CA.
I remember watching Pocahontas in the theater with my mom and brother. There was probably sodas in cans and a backpack with microwave popcorn. My mom was always frugal and loved popcorn. I remember one of my cousins having all of the stuffed animals for Meeko and Percy and Flit. I remember when I was in 8th grade we visited Jamestown and standing on the real beach where John Smith landed and being in total awe of how they had really captured the setting.
For some reason, I always really liked Pocahontas. I told people when I lived in Florida that Pocahontas was my favorite princess to be different. I even bought the DVD while there. I like her strong will and her spirit of adventure. She is loyal but headstrong. In the weirdest way, I see a lot of traits I have embodied in her in the best combination,
Bambi
Bambi gets a bad rap as being a little boring and a lot sad. I knew this going in. In fact, I decided that I would watch Bambi while Jake and Jake's Amanda watched Saw 1, 2 & 3. Great juxtaposition right? I know I have seen Bambi before. I remember Flower and Thumper and Bambi but there is so much I didn't know about this movie.
First, technically I had never really understood what a multi plane camera was until watching Bambi. It is crazy to realize that this movie was made in the early 1940s and the technology that went into from there.
Second, the impact that the artist Tyrus Wong had on the creation of Bambi is something that isn't much discussed but is really interesting. Wong was a Chinese immigrant whose impressionist paintings were responsible for the overall look of the movie. It made me take an even closer look at the movie at the movie as an early art piece instead of just a movie.
Finally, while Snow White had a dead mother I would argue that Bambi really sets the tone for the Disney "dead mother" trope. Snow White was release in 1937 before the untimely death of Walt's mother but Bambi was released just 4 years after Flora's passing due to a leak from a gas furnace. While Dumbo centers on the love of mother for son, Bambi can be seen as Walt's first film in which he starts to come to terms on film
Bolt
Truth be told, I checked this BluRay from the library 3 times. I finally watched it on the last time because it was overdue and Jake had gone out with friends so I decided to get it out of the way. I don't really like John Travolta and syrup sweet Miley was always a bit annoying so I pretty certain this would be a dud like all of the other computer animated films before it.
Turns out that Bolt is actually quite cute. Maybe I just have a soft spot for dogs, Jenny Lewis songs and animated Las Vegas. It could also be that they finally got the animation right in this movie just in time for them to go back to hand drawn. The story is cute and it made me want to just snuggle my dog and never let her go. I rooted for the animals to find home because Homeward Bound ruined me for life. While it doesn't have the lasting power of most other Disney movies probably because of the glut of Disney dog flicks, of the four computer animated films I would show this one to the nieces and nephews over the the other three.
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