The Magic Kingdom Project: Zootopia 2016

The Tackling of Bigotry in the Era of Trump

One of the cornerstones of the decades of Disney animated films has been crafting adorable talking animal characters that not only capture the hearts of audiences but also lend themselves to an endless stream of profitable merchandise. Whether it was a cute baby circus elephant in Dumbo, a family of jazz-loving felines in The Aristocats, or two dogs forming an unlikely romance in Lady and the Tramp, Disney consistently fell back on its tried and true formula of placing animals at the forefront of its animated narratives.

While an array of loveable animal characters had essentially kept the studio afloat in previous eras, Disney hadn’t exactly seen success with animal-centric animated features in the 21st century. After films like Brother Bear, Home on the Range, and Chicken Little left little impact on audiences, Disney began to focus more heavily on human narratives, with The Princess and the Frog and Bolt standing as the final creature features for almost a decade.

When John Lasseter was installed as the new Chief Creative Officer of Walt Disney Animation Studios in 2006, he keenly understood Disney’s legacy of hugely popular animal stars, particularly given Lasseter considered Dumbo to be the studio’s greatest film. Lasseter consistently pushed the animation department to pitch possible projects involving animals as the stars of the show. As fate would have it, one of those pitches would subsequently become one of the most successful releases in its entire history.

In early 2013, Tangled co-director Byron Howard pitched Lasseter several possible projects involving animal characters, including an animal adaption of The Three Musketeers, a 60s-theme caper about a maniacal doctor who turned children into animals (yikes), and a space adventure starring a bounty-hunter pug. Howard was inspired by Robin Hood, with all three concepts centring on anthropomorphic animals who talked and acted like humans. While workshopping the ideas with Lasseter, Howard cracked the key conceit to his pitch; what if animals lived in a modern world designed by animals for animals?

Lasseter suggested Howard should combine the 60s theme with an animal narrative, which led to the development of Savage Seas, an international spy thriller starring a James Bond-like arctic rabbit named Jack Savage. Working with screenwriter Jared Bush, the project was developed for almost a year before being presented to the wider Disney team for feedback, who felt the film’s strongest element was its opening act, set in a city created by and for animals.

As such, Howard dropped both the 60s setting and the espionage angle and reworked the project as a contemporary police procedural called Zootopia, starring a police duo of Nick Wilde, a cunning fox, and his sidekick Judy Hopps, a wide-eyed bunny. In late 2014, Howard realised the film’s plot worked better with Judy at the helm.

THE STORY

In a world of anthropomorphic mammals, rabbit Judy Hopps from rural Bunnyburrow fulfils her childhood dream of becoming a police officer in urban Zootopia. Despite being the academy valedictorian, Judy is delegated to parking duty by Chief Bogo, who doubts her potential because she is a rabbit. On her first day, she is hustled by a con artist fox duo, Nick Wilde and Finnick. Judy abandons parking duty to arrest Duke Weaselton, a weasel who stole a bag of crocus bulbs known as Midnicampum holicithias. Bogo reprimands her, but an otter, Mrs. Otterton, enters Bogo's office pleading for someone to find her husband Emmitt, one of fourteen predators who are missing. When Judy volunteers and Assistant Mayor Dawn Bellwether praises the assignment, Bogo has no choice but to give Judy the case, stipulating she has 48 hours to find Emmitt Otterton and that she must resign if she fails.

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In May 2015, Jason Bateman and Ginnifer Goodwin were cast respectively in the roles of Nick and Judy. Bateman was offered the role without the need for an audition, with the filmmakers confident he would bring his trademark dry wit and wiliness to the character, especially given Bateman had played roles similar to Nick his entire career. Goodwin was put through an exhaustive audition process before being cast in the key role of the naive but brave wannabe cop. Moore felt Goodwin brought centred sweetness and a great sense of humour to the part, with the actor able to perfectly balance Judy’s sweet nature with her blunt determination to succeed.

MY VERDICT

With its daring bid to craft an animated film targeted at children that subtly (and not so subtly) shines a light on topics like racism, bigotry, and sexism, Zootopia may well be the most subversive film Disney has ever released. Very rarely do you get a “children’s film” that dares to tackle issues like racial prejudice, gender inequality and social xenophobia. Zootopia sends a clear message of the resulting pain that comes from prejudging others based on their heritage, which is undoubtedly a message of even greater pertinence four years later. 

Zootopia may feature a cast of animal characters, but its core centres on very human issues. Even small moments like a mother bunny moving her young child closer to her when a perfectly innocuous tiger sits beside them on the subway pack a hefty punch of relevance. The world of Zootopia is indeed a utopian society, with its various species all living in perfect harmony. But Zootopia shows that it only takes a crack in society to cause utter chaos. And the fact that the crack appears by the fault of the city’s police force feels terribly relevant in 2020.

But the true success of Zootopia lies with how the film expertly juggles its important message with boundless entertainment to avoid children being consciously aware they’re actually learning something from an animated film. They’ll be too delighted by the stunning designs, thrilling sequences, and the glorious and instantly-iconic characters, namely due to the enchanting voice-over work throughout.

Lead by the genius pairing of adorable Goodwin and slick Bateman, their evolving friendship is beautiful to behold, and delivers one of the film’s most powerful messages – never judge a book by its cover. Ultimately, this dichotomous reaction to the film is the mark of a truly great animated film; one that works successfully for both young and old alike, for a multitude of different reasons.

On a technical level, Zootopia is another sublime piece of animated cinema, with impressively detailed world-building and spectacular character designs. You could truly watch this film on mute and just enjoy the visual delights the animation team have cooked up. But then you’d miss the supreme laughs and touching emotion of the glorious screenplay, which should have received an Oscar nomination for Best Original Screenplay. Frankly, I could easily make a case the film was snubbed of a Best Picture nod too.

Everything here just works so wonderfully well and the film is ultimately elevated by its brave insistence on offering a children’s film with more substance than practically any other Disney animated film. What a remarkable moment it was to see a piece of Disney animation that actually had something to say about society. Subversive is not a trait we normally see from a studio who rarely wants to rock the boat. But Zootopia definitely rocked it. We needed a film like Zootopia in 2016, but we need it more than ever in 2020.

Is Zootopia a Disney Classic?  With a pertinent message to convey but the intelligence to hide it in animation, Zootopia stood as a perfect blend of entertainment and information. It had all the laughs and thrills to keep your kids happy, but with a subtle yet powerful subtext to hopefully teach the next generation to learn from the mistakes of the past. Zootopia is a masterpiece of animation in both style and substance, easily making the film a modern-day Disney Classic.

The Magic Kingdom Project: Big Hero 6 2014

The Fusion of Disney With Marvel

In 2008, the release of Iron Man launched the Marvel Cinematic Universe in spectacular fashion. After years of DC Comics heroes like Batman and Superman dominating the cinematic landscape, Marvel was suddenly everywhere you looked and The Walt Disney Company wanted a piece of the action. In late 2009, CEO Bob Iger purchased Marvel Entertainment for a staggering $4 billion and the studio subsequently acquired the distribution rights for future Marvel Studios films. After the acquisition, Iger encouraged the entire company to explore Marvel’s properties for adaptation concepts, particularly more obscure characters unfamiliar to mainstream audiences. While the live-action department began looking at lesser-known properties like Ant-Man, Doctor Strange, and Guardians of the Galaxy, animation director Don Hall stumbled across Big Hero 6, a late-90s Marvel comic created by Steven Seagle and Duncan Rouleau that centred on a young Japanese superhero team.

In late 2011, Hall pitched the concept to Disney’s Chief Creative Officer John Lasseter, who loved the idea of combining Disney animation with a Marvel Comics property, especially one that could be marketed towards a younger audience. In June 2012, Walt Disney Animations officially announced it was adapting Big Hero 6 into an animated feature, with Hall enlisted to co-direct with Bolt director Chris Williams. Lasseter felt Williams was perfect for the project, given Bolt was inherently rooted in the superhero genre. While the film would ultimately keep key characters and elements from the original comic series, Hall and Williams wanted their adaptation to feel entirely fresh and unique. As such, they instructed head of story Paul Briggs to only read a few issues of the comic to get a feel for the overall scope of Seagle and Rouleau’s comics before creating his own original narrative and concept. By the end of the screenplay’s creation, screenwriter Robert Baird would actually admit to never having read a single Big Hero 6 comic. Despite Disney making continual inroads with building the interconnected Marvel Cinematic Universe, Hall and Williams decided early in production to essentially ignore the broader Marvel world and allow Big Hero 6 to exist as a stand-alone film without any reference or connection to any other Marvel films or characters. To further this film’s distance from its fellow Marvel films, which were generally set in real-life locations like New York or California, Big Hero 6 would be set in the fictional city of San Fransokyo, a futuristic mashup of San Fransisco and Tokyo. The setting of San Fransokyo allowed the animation team to blend Eastern and Western cultures in a style that paid tribute to both traditional Disney animation and the Marvel comics’ Japanese origins. While it was not specifically mentioned in the film, the filmmakers’ created an alternate history for the birth of San Fransokyo, in which the city of San Francisco was largely rebuilt by Japanese immigrants after the devastating 1906 earthquake, with the architecture evolving over time to something more akin to the neon-drenched streets of Tokyo.

THE STORY

Hiro Hamada is a 14-year-old prodigy, a high school graduate, and robotics genius living in the futuristic city of San Fransokyo (a portmanteau of San Francisco and Tokyo). He spends much of his free time participating in illegal robot fights. To redirect Hiro, his older brother Tadashi takes him to the research lab at the San Fransokyo Institute of Technology, where Hiro meets Tadashi's friends, Go Go, Wasabi, Honey Lemon, and Fred. Baymax, the inflatable healthcare robot that Tadashi created, and Professor Robert Callaghan, the head of the university's robotics program. Amazed, Hiro decides to apply to the university. To enroll, he signs up for the school's showcase and presents his project: microbots, swarms of tiny robots that can link together in any arrangement imaginable using a neurocranial transmitter. At the fair, Hiro declines an offer from Alistair Krei, CEO of Krei Tech, to market the microbots, and Callaghan accepts him into the school. As the Hamada family leaves to celebrate Hiro's success, a massive fire suddenly breaks out in the showcase hall and Tadashi rushes in to save Callaghan, the only person left inside. The building explodes moments later.

Two weeks later, Hiro, mourning Tadashi's death, inadvertently reactivates Baymax. The two find Hiro's only remaining microbot and follow it to an abandoned warehouse. There they discover that someone has been mass-producing the microbots. A man wearing a Kabuki mask attacks them with the microbot swarms. After they escape, Hiro suspects that the fire that claimed his brother may not have been accidental and in fact started by the man in the kabuki mask to cover the theft of the microbots. Seeking vengeance, Hiro equips Baymax with armour and a battle chip containing various karate moves and they track the masked man to the docks. Go Go, Wasabi, Honey Lemon, and Fred arrive, responding to a call from Baymax, and the masked man chases the group. The six escape to Fred's mansion, where they decide to form a high-tech superhero team to combat the villain.

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Unlike most animated films of the 21st century, Hall and Williams had little interest in casting A-list celebrities to voice the characters. The process of finding the right actor to voice Hiro was complicated, due to the character often displaying typical snarky and jaded emotions of a teenage boy, which an audience could easily find unlikable. After auditioning dozens of young actors, Hall and Williams found their Hiro in Ryan Potter, who was able to take the edge off the character in a way that made him authentically petulant but somehow still appealing.

Given the total lack of emotional expressions of Baymax, it was key to find the right actor to make an audience feel the robot’s emotions through nothing more than his voice. After television actor Scott Adsit auditioned for the role, Hall and Williams knew he was the perfect choice for the character, with Adsit able to create an endearing voice that still sounded robotic and mechanical. Adsit also brought more humour to the role than originally intended, with the actor ad-libbing through numerous recording sessions, gifting the filmmakers with numerous choices for the final dialogue.

MY VERDICT

This film is equal parts old and new. The design of San Fransokyo is pretty unique, pulling on the best that both cities have to offer. The human characters, while slightly cliched in places, are still really strong. However, the best thing about this whole movie is BAYMAX, the robotic doctor who will attend to your every need, whether physical or mental. Aside from being an ingenious creation that I hope one day might be available to everyone in the real world, he is equal parts hilarious and positively whimsical. Whenever he says a line in that robotic monotone, or, in fact, does anything, I either crack up or feel incredibly warm and comforted.

Is Big Hero 6 a Disney Classic? In the six years since its release, the popularity of Big Hero 6 has barely diminished. Baymax merchandise is still a regular feature of Disney theme parks and toy stores. The film was given a hugely popular spin-off animated series. And many fans have been clamouring for a necessary sequel, which surely must be on the horizon. However, it’s probably a little too early to call this one a Disney Classic. Yet.

The Magic Kingdom Project: Frozen 2013

The Cultural Phenomenon

Let. It. Go. Three little words that will now either make children squee or older people rampage all over where they happen to be at the time screaming ‘SHUT UP!!! SHUT UP! SHUT!! UP!!”, such is the life those three innocuous words have taken on for themselves since 2013.

With box office figures, soundtrack sales, and merchandise revenue not seen since the early 1990s, Frozen was the cultural sensation Disney had been chasing for the better part of two decades. While it inevitably became nauseatingly overexposed, it still stands as one of their finest achievements.

The seeds of what would become Frozen had actually been permeating at the studio since the dawn of feature animation in 1937. After the staggering success of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, Walt Disney began searching for further fairy tales adaptations for future animated features. In the early 1940s, Walt began developing a live-action/animation co-production with film producer Samuel Goldwyn to be based on several fairy tales of poet Hans Christian Andersen including The Little Mermaid, Thumbelina, The Little Match Girl, and The Snow Queen.

But when the U.S. joined World War II efforts in 1941, all future Disney animated features were placed on hold including the planned Disney-Goldwyn production. By the end of the war, Walt became intently focused on producing an animated adaptation of another fairy tale in Cinderella, causing the co-production with Goldwyn to fall apart. Goldwyn ultimately went on to produce Hans Christian Andersen as a live-action musical told in song and ballet without Disney’s involvement, which was consequently nominated for six Academy Awards.

In the 1950s, the studio again approached the idea of an adaptation of The Snow Queen, but couldn’t quite determine how to make the titular character relatable to modern audiences, nor did they have the funds to authentically produce an animated film set in a land of snow and ice. As such, the project was shelved indefinitely and wasn’t touched again until the late 1990s when veteran animator Glen Keane attempted to bring the project to life.

After working on story ideas for over a year, Keane ultimately quit the project in 2003 to work on his passion project Rapunzel Unbraided, which eventually became 2010’s Tangled. Over the next five years, numerous animators and screenwriters attempted to salvage the languishing project including Paul and Gaëtan Brizzi, Dick Zondag, Dave Goetz, and even Mulan voice actor Harvey Fierstein, but none were able to truly make the concept work.

During Disney’s contract renegotiations with Pixar in 2004, then-CEO Michael Eisner suggested Pixar director John Lasseter would be perfect to tackle the project when the new deal was finalised. But, as we know, the deal fell through and Eisner soon departed the Disney studio. When Lasseter was installed as the new chief creative officer of Walt Disney Feature Animation in 2006, he decided the project still had potential as a future animated production and set about finding the right director for the task.

In 2008, Lasseter convinced his close friend animator/director, Chris Buck to return to Disney from Sony Pictures Animation to potentially direct The Snow Queen. After working as a key animator at Disney since 1978, Buck had departed the studio in 2005 to direct Surf’s Up for Sony Pictures, but was keen to return to Disney after Lasseter took control of the studio. Under the working title Anna and the Snow Queen, Buck’s initial adaptation closely mirrored Andersen’s original fairy tale and was planned to be traditionally animated, but, yet again, it fell apart, and the project was shelved in March 2010.

After the tremendous success of Tangled in November 2011, Lasseter dusted off The Snow Queen project once again, but went a step further by officially announcing a new title for the film, Frozen, on December 22, and confirming its release date as November 27, 2013. Due to the box office disappointments of The Princess and the Frog and Winnie the Pooh, Lasseter also confirmed Frozen would now be fully computer-animated. This was also due to the complexities of its intended animated sequences, which would not be logistically possible with traditional animation.

With less than two years to complete the production, Buck was now under pressure to find a way to adapt The Snow Queen into something more palatable for modern audiences. At this point, the Snow Queen was still the villain of the piece, as she is in Andersen’s original tale, who kidnapped Anna from her wedding and intentionally froze her heart in a bid to usurp Anna from the throne.  Yet there was still something lacking from the narrative that Buck couldn’t quite crack. In desperate need of assistance, Buck enlisted Wreck-It Ralph co-writer Jennifer Lee in March 2012, who provided the breakthrough the film needed.

THE STORY

In the Scandinavian kingdom of Arendelle, Princess Elsa possesses magical powers that allow her to control and create ice and snow, often using them to play with her younger sister, Anna. After Elsa accidentally injures Anna with her magic, their parents, the King and Queen, take both siblings to a colony of trolls led by Grand Pabbie. He heals Anna, but alters her memories so that she forgets about Elsa's magic. Grand Pabbie warns Elsa that she must learn to control her powers, and that fear will be her greatest enemy. The King and Queen isolate both sisters within the castle, closing the castle gates to their subjects. In an effort to protect her sister from her increasingly unpredictable powers, Elsa ceases all contact with Anna, creating a rift between them.

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For the key role of Elsa, Buck and Lee turned to Broadway veteran Idina Menzel to bring the character to life. Menzel had unsuccessfully auditioned for the role of Rapunzel in Tangled, with her original audition performance passed on to the Frozen team by the casting director of Tanged, Jamie Sparer Roberts. For the role of Anna, the filmmakers considered television actress Kristen Bell, but wanted to test her chemistry with Menzel before officially casting either actor. The pair were invited to a table read of the screenplay at the studio, where they performed the entire script before singing a duet of Bette Midler’s “Wind Beneath My Wings,” as none of the film’s music had yet been composed. The performance left the entire production team in tears, with Menzel and Bell perfectly creating a sisterly bond, despite never having met before the audition. For the remainder of the cast, Buck and Lee enlisted several noted Broadway performers including Jonathan Groff as Kristoff, Santino Fontana as Prince Hans, and Josh Gad as Olaf.

MY VERDICT

If you were the parent of a youngster in 2013, you probably shudder at the memory of Frozen mania. The film was likely all your child ever talked about. You were probably labelled the world’s worst mum or dad when you couldn’t find any of the sold-out Elsa or Olaf merchandise. “Let It Go” was possibly the only song allowed to be played in your car for weeks on end. I get it. Life was hell for parents post-Frozen. The phenomenon surrounding this film was unlike anything Disney had experienced in decades. And you bore the brunt of it. You have my sympathies.

But there’s a very simple reason Frozen became such a pop culture sensation; it’s a bloody great film. It’s easy to forget how dazzling this film was, since it was also tremendously overexposed. Disney cashed in on this film like few others, and that likely means most have forgotten what a remarkable piece of animation Frozen actually is. By drawing on the spirit of the Renaissance and infusing the film with brilliantly designed Broadway sensibilities, the entire production team crafted a film that truly recaptured the Disney magic. Essentially, Frozen is an animated musical, in the same style as The Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast, and Aladdin. By enlisting two composers intimately familiar with the Broadway stage and casting actors with musical theatre backgrounds, Disney played to the strengths of what makes Broadway musicals so wonderfully entertaining and emotionally resonant. While we all eventually became sick of hearing the songs, they are (mostly) brilliant pieces of music composition, and, yes, I include “Let It Go” in that summation. Just think back to the first time you heard and saw that song performed and remember how utterly breathtaking that moment was. Outside of Lilo & Stitch, Frozen is the only Disney animated film to present a narrative centred on the complicated relationship of two sisters, which proved to be the best thing about adapting Andersen’s original fairy tale. After years of animated films with gushy love stories, it was so decidedly refreshing to see something like Frozen present the notion of true love being that of two siblings and the love to thaw a frozen heart did not come from a romantic connection but a familial one. It was a sharp detour from a studio that rarely sought to offer insight into love being anything other than something elicited through romance. Once again, we find Disney presenting a tale where a hero or heroine longs to be “normal” like everyone else and fearfully attempt to suppress who they truly are. It’s only when Elsa embraces who she is that she realises the very powers she was hiding are actually her true strength. That’s why “Let It Go” is such a spectacular moment. It’s the culmination of years of suppression finally being unleashed and Elsa’s breakthrough realisation of how foolish she’s been to hide from her identity. Is it any wonder many have used this song as a metaphor for members of the LGBTQ+ community coming out of the closet? And, as a small add on, let’s face it, it’s a far better song than Hakuna Matata.

Is Frozen a Disney Classic? It’s hard to ponder another Disney animated film as outrageously popular as Frozen. We’d never quite seen anything capture pop culture quite like the phenomenon which followed the film’s release. With merchandise out the wazoo, a Broadway musical, theme park rides, several spin-off short films, and an equally successful sequel, it’s a film that simply refused to die. The legacy of Frozen is solid as ice, making it a true Disney Classic in every conceivable way.

The Magic Kingdom Project: Wreck - It - Ralph 2012

 The Combination of Disney and Pixar 

When Pixar animator/director John Lasseter became the Chief Creative Officer of Walt Disney Animation Studios in 2006, he went searching for new projects to push the studio into new territory outside their traditional princess fairy tale fare. In his hunt for something unlike anything Disney had previously produced, he stumbled across a promising project that had been stuck in development hell for over 15 years.

In the late 1980s, Disney began developing an animated action-adventure set inside the chaotic world of video games, with the film intended to focus on a video game hero who longed for something more from his monotonous, repetitive life. The project was redeveloped and unsuccessfully workshopped several times for the better part of a decade. While the film was initially developed under the working title High Score, it became known as Joe Jump in the late 1990s, and then Reboot Ralph in the mid-2000s.

Despite several earnest attempts to bring the project to life, the pitch was consistently rejected by Disney’s executive team, who felt the central character was missing something special to allow audiences to truly warm to a video game hero. When Lasseter uncovered the project in 2008, he immediately approached veteran television director Rich Moore and invited him to try and crack the right idea to bring the film to life.

Moore had graduated from California Institute of the Arts (the feeding ground for the next generation of Disney and Pixar animators and directors) with a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in 1987, where his fellow classmates included future Oscar-winning Pixar directors Andrew Stanton and Brenda Chapman. Three years later, Moore was one of the original three directors of The Simpsons, directing 17 episodes throughout the show’s first five seasons. In 1999, Moore oversaw the creative development of Futurama and went on to direct five episodes, including the iconic “Roswell That Ends Well” episode.

After Lasseter offered Moore the opportunity to join Disney to write and direct the video game project, the director was initially hesitant to accept the proposal. Moore felt his style wouldn’t exactly fit with Disney’s legacy of animated princess fairy tales and cutesy animal capers, nor was he convinced the video game world would lend itself to an animated feature. Moore felt video game characters were little more than pre-programmed robots who do exactly what they’re designed to do, which didn’t exactly sound like an entertaining idea for a film.

But Lasseter was quick to put Moore’s mind at ease, promising the director he was free to develop any style of film he felt fit the project and from his own point of view. While pondering the idea of a video game character stuck in an endless loop of performing the same tasks over and over again, Moore had a breakthrough; what if a video game character made the drastic decision not to follow his programming anymore? In March 2009, Moore pitched the concept to Lasseter, who immediately approved the new direction for the project.

From here, Moore was joined by Phil Johnston, Jim Reardon, and Jennifer Lee to assist with fleshing out the story further. Reardon was Moore’s CalArts classmate and one of the two other directors on the early seasons of The Simpsons. Johnston was an up-and-coming director and screenwriter, who suggested his former Columbia University classmate Lee for the project. Lee was initially hired for a temporary eight-week contract, but was eventually asked to stay on to co-write the full screenplay with Moore.

The quartet began work on the project, which focused on a frustrated video game character named Fix-It Felix Junior, who had no interest in interesting his father’s mantle as the star of an 8-bit arcade game, Fix-It Felix. After standing up to his shocked father, Felix would leave the safe confines of his game to explore other virtual game worlds in search of a place of his own, all while being hunted by Fix-It Felix‘s resident bad guy, Wreck-It Ralph.

But Moore soon realised Ralph was far more interesting and entertaining than Felix himself, leading to a total reimagining of the project to build the film around Ralph instead.

THE STORY

In the fictional arcade game, Fix - It - Felix Jr, the antagonist, Wreck - It - Ralph, has grown tired of his role as a “bad guy”, and longs for recognition and respect. So he plans to “go Turbo”, leave his game, steal a medal from another game called Hero’s Duty, and hopefully return to his own game as a hero.

MY VERDICT

This film is a Disney film wrapped in Pixar clothing. Since their debut in 1995 with Toy Story, Pixar has been crafting things that often delve into worlds beyond the human realm and showcase the very human attributes of inanimate objects like toys and racing cars or sentient animals like tropical fish, rats, and insects. By taking us inside a video game to examine the complex emotional psyche of a computer-generated bad guy, Wreck-It Ralph deftly follows the Pixar formula to success. The premise sounds absurd, but its strength proves to be the surprising level of depth with which the protagonist is blessed. On his surface, Ralph is nothing more than your typical jughead villain, but, almost immediately, we are invited inside his complicated mind that longs to change his programmed trajectory in life. Bad guys are rarely gifted with thoughts outside of villainy, but Ralph never asked to be crafted in such fashion and surely he’s right to question his place in the world. Ralph’s heart is consistently displayed on his sleeve, creating an endearing level of sympathy from an audience from the moment we meet him. At its heart, Wreck-It Ralph is a film that highlights the complicated progress of attempting to change characteristics fundamental to our very being. Ralph is a bad guy. Vanellope is a glitch. Their bond ultimately forms over their mutual desire to evolve beyond who they truly are. But only when they embrace these attributes do they find their hidden inner strength. It’s a sharp and refreshing revelation that’s often so lacking in Disney animated films of the past.

It’s the emotional core of Wreck-It Ralph that truly plays to the best of Pixar’s canon of animated masterpieces. Blessed with the charming voiceover performance of John C. Reilly, Ralph is so infectiously warm and beautifully relatable that it’s hard not to feel for the poor guy throughout his difficult journey to inner enlightenment. Likewise with Vanelloppe, surprisingly voiced by Sarah Silverman who I often find insufferable, who just wants to be like all the other racers, which undoubtedly hits hard with any of us who have ever equally desired to be “normal.” Their unlikely friendship ultimately creates one of the greatest duos in Disney history and is a reminder of the power that can occur when two “outsiders” find strength in numbers.

Finally, you could not ask for a more PERFECT funny villain voice than Alan Tudyk as King Candy. His voice sounds like Ed Wynn as the Mad Hatter, which he uses to be equal parts hilarious and menacing.

On a visual scale, Wreck-It Ralph is one of the most dazzling pieces of animation the Disney studio has ever crafted. The intricate and expansive world designs of both Sugar Rush and Hero’s Duty are simply stunning, particularly the candy wonderland found in the game Vanellope calls home. Some may sneer at the subtle (and not-so-subtle) product placement found in Sugar Rush, but it adds a level of necessary authenticity to the video game and most of these references are played for laughs anyhow.

A richly entertaining, gorgeously crafted, and surprisingly heartwarming piece of animation, Wreck-It Ralph continued Disney’s new renaissance period in terrific style. Loaded with laughs and sight-gags, adult viewers will likely spend an endless amount of time pointing out all the video game cameos and references, but these only seek the compliment the original delights of this remarkable film. While Wreck-It Ralph may echo the Pixar formula, it’s still unique enough to stand on its own two feet.

Is Wreck-It Ralph a Disney Classic? With all of these more recently released Disney animated films, it’s difficult to say if any have yet truly earned the status of a Disney Classic. But the critical and commercial success of Wreck-It Ralph is hard to ignore, as is the fact it’s one of only three Disney animated films to receive a sequel. It’s a film that’s so supremely rewatchable, making it easy to call Wreck-It Ralph a modern-day Disney Classic.

The Magic Kingdom Project: Winnie the Pooh 2011

The Closing of an Era

Throughout its seven decades of animated films and shorts, Walt Disney Animation Studios had created some of the most indelible icons in pop culture history. While it was all started by a mouse named Mickey, Disney’s cavalcade of animated stars had ballooned to dozens upon dozens of adorable animals, brave heroes, and nefarious villains. But if there was one character to challenge Mickey’s status as the face of the studio, it was undoubtedly that chubby little cubby all stuffed with fluff, Winnie the Pooh.

Since making his debut in the 1966 short film Winnie the Pooh and the Honey Tree, Pooh had quickly become one of Disney’s most beloved characters, with enduring popularity that only seemed to grow stronger with each new generation of young fans. More importantly, Pooh merchandise was a major cash cow for the studio. With a staggering estimated worth of $5.5 billion, Winnie the Pooh was one of the most valuable franchises in the world.

Winnie the Pooh had remained a constant figure at Disney since the early 90s, with several animated television shows and a host of smaller-scale straight-to-DVD and theatrically-released feature films produced by DisneyToon Studios, which had collectively grossed over $200 million at the worldwide box office. After taking creative control of Disney’s animation department in 2006, John Lasseter felt it was wise for the studio to take advantage of Pooh’s perpetual popularity with a feature film produced by Disney’s A-list team of animators, particularly after the traditional animation department was revived and needed new projects to develop.

In November 2008, Lasseter approached animator/director Stephen J. Anderson and screenwriter Don Hall with the idea of producing a new Pooh feature film. Anderson had been with Disney for over a decade as a supervising animator on films like Tarzan, Brother Bear, and The Emperor’s New Groove, while also making his directorial debut with 2007’s Meet the Robinsons. Hall had also been with the studio since the late 90s, significantly contributing to the creations of films likes The Princess and the Frog, Home on the Range, and Chicken Little.

The pair were both hugely enthusiastic at Lasseter’s concept and immediately accepted the project. In early 2009, Anderson, Hall, and Lasseter spent hours viewing every Pooh short film, television series, and feature film to assist with their creation of the new film, which would simply be titled Winnie the Pooh. Later that year, Anderson, Hall, and key members of the production team spent several days in Sussex, England to explore Ashdown Forest, which was the inspiration for the Hundred Acre Wood in A.A. Milne’s original Winnie the Pooh stories. The team took photographs, video footage, and drew sketches of the countryside to provide references for the film’s animation.

Upon their return, Anderson and Hall enlisted legendary veteran Disney animator Burny Mattinson to serve as the lead storyboard artist on Winnie the Pooh. Mattinson had been with the studio since 1953 and worked as a key animator on the 1974 Oscar-nominated short Winnie the Pooh and Tigger Too. Mattinson is still a member of the studio to this day and is officially recognised as the longest-serving employee of The Walt Disney Company. With his guidance and personal experience, the team began crafting the narrative of Winnie the Pooh.

THE STORY

While out searching for his beloved “hunny,” Pooh and his friends would embark on an adventure to locate Eeyore’s missing tail. During the hunt, the group believes Christopher Robin has been kidnapped by a mysterious monster called The Backson and set out to rescue their dear friend.

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For the voice cast, the natural choice for Pooh and Tigger was legendary voiceover artist Jim Cummings, who had been voicing both characters since 1988 and 2000 respectively after the retirement of the characters’ original voice actors, Hal Smith and Paul Winchell. This was also the case with Piglet, who would be voiced by Travis Oates. Oates had taken over the role after the death of original voice actor John Fiedler in 2005. For the role of Owl, the filmmakers enlisted comedian and late-night talk show host Craig Ferguson, while Tom Kenny was hired for the role of Rabbit. Apparently, Kenny is best known for voicing the title character in the SpongeBob SquarePants television series and films.

While Peter Cullen had the character of Eeyore since 1988, the actor was currently busy voicing Optimus Prime in Transformers: Dark of the Moon at the time of production. The filmmakers instead chose veteran Pixar animator Bud Luckey to voice the role. Luckey had been with Pixar since 1990 and had worked as a key animator on films like the Toy Story trilogy, Finding Nemo, and Ratatouille. Luckey had also provided the voice of Rick Dicker in The Incredibles and Chuckles the Clown in Toy Story 3. After his death in 2018 at the age of 83, Lasseter dedicated Incredibles 2 in his memory and called him the “one of the true unsung heroes of animation.”

Rounding out the voice cast were Kristen-Anderson Lopez as Kanga, who was also the composer of the film’s original songs with her husband Robert, and child actors Jack Boulter and Wyatt Hall (who is also the son of director Don Hall) as Christopher Robin and Roo respectively. Anderson and Hall enlisted legendary comedian John Cleese to narrate the film, with the filmmakers feeling his native British accent would add a touch of authenticity and sophistication to the film.

MY VERDICT

This film is special for two reasons. Firstly, it is the second shortest animated film in Disney history, beaten only by Dumbo at 62 minutes. Secondly, and more importantly, it is the true final hand drawn animated film in Disney history. Like the Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh in 1977, it’s a charming, brief little film that is far more than a distraction for the little ones. It’s a refreshing change of pace from the usual big budget blockbusters that throw all manner of effects and lavish musical numbers at you for an hour and a half. The filmmakers clearly and keenly understand the simplicity of A.A. Milne’s books and the adventures therein and sough to recapture what made him a Disney icon. The story is short and simple and sweet, with no complications for its characters. The animation is nostalgic and luscious, perfectly echoing the gorgeous designs of past shorts. And the voice cast is a perfect substitute for their original counterparts. Hopefully hand - drawn animation will return one day, but the middling box office numbers of Winnie the Pooh proved it was time for Disney to move on. Rest in peace, traditional animation.

Is Winnie the Pooh a Disney Classic? There’s nothing particularly groundbreaking about Winnie the Pooh, it’s always a treat to venture back to the Hundred Acre Wood to revisit the gorgeous cast of characters who have been delighting audiences for over five decades. Winnie the Pooh is undoubtably a Disney Classic in his own right. And, by virtue of being the final hand drawn animated film, as well as other reasons, so is this,

The Magic Kingdom Project: Tangled 2010

The Turning Point For Disney Animation

When Michael Eisner announced the end of traditional animation in 2002, he almost caused a rebellion amongst the studio’s animators. Several of the animators who survived Eisner’s extensive layoffs weren’t entirely convinced computers should replace the art of hand-drawn animation, causing a fierce divide amongst the team between those already experienced in computer animation and those resistant to the idea of adapting their skills.

Desperate to resolve the situation, then-president of Walt Disney Feature Animation David Stainton begged veteran (and highly influential) animator Glen Keane to help convince the entire team that computer animation was the way of the future and it was ultimately in the animators’ best interests to evolve with the changing times. Keane agreed but with one important condition; if he successfully resolved the rift, Stainton would greenlight an adaptation of the Brothers Grimm fairy tale Rapunzel the animator had been developing since 1996.

After joining Disney in 1974, Keane was taken under the wing of legendary animator and member of Disney’s Nine Old Men Ollie Johnston. The young animator quickly became one of the most prominent figures of the animation team and a leading figure in Disney’s Renaissance period of the late 1980s and 1990s. Throughout his illustrious career, Keane created numerous iconic and beloved characters including Ariel from The Little Mermaid, Beast from Beauty and the Beast, and the titular characters of Aladdin, Pocahontas, and Tarzan.

During the production of Tarzan, Keane began to feel the studio was wrong to move away from the fairy tale adaptation that had proven so successful in the early 90s and began developing an animated musical adaptation of Rapunzel. Walt Disney himself had considered adapting the Brothers Grimm tale in the early 1940s, but shelved the idea when World War II forced the studio to cease production on new feature-length animated films.

After creating an initial story treatment and preliminary sketches, Keane pitched his idea to Eisner in 2001. Eisner immediately approved the project, but insisted the film had to be fully computer-animated, with the then-CEO clearly already prophesizing the eventual demise of traditional animation two years later. However, Keane was resistant to the idea, feeling like computer animation was still not as fluid or organic as traditional animation. So the project was put on hold while Keane wrapped up his work animating John Silver in Treasure Planet.

When Keane successfully managed to quell the animator revolt, Stainton stuck to his word and greenlit Rapunzel Unbraided in October 2003, with Keane approved to direct the film. Despite Keane’s initial reservations, the pair agreed to produce the film with computer animation and set a release date target of late 2007. At the time, the studio was still pushing further away from fairy tale adaptations and encouraged Keane to develop Rapunzel Unbraided as something wittier and more humourous in the same vein as DreamWorks Animation’s mega-successful Shrek.

At one point, Eisner had suggested setting the film in modern-day San Francisco before Rapunzel is magically transported into a fairy tale setting, but Keane couldn’t make the idea work. After spending over two years on the project, Keane was still struggling with finding the right tone and angle for the film. In late 2005, Eisner pushed Rapunzel Unbraided back to a summer 2009 release in an attempted to give Keane more time to work on the story.

By January 2006, the studio wasn’t convinced the film was feasible, especially the complicated animation of Rapunzel’s gargantuan hair. Much to Keane’s disappointment, the project was subsequently shut down. However, when Pixar’s Ed Catmull and John Lasseter were placed in charge of Disney Feature Animation just one week later, they reviewed the cancelled project and saw the potential in Disney returning to the fairy tale genre. So one of their very first decisions was to restart the Rapunzel Unbraided project and instruct Keane to keep trying.

But Keane was still anxious over the idea of Rapunzel Unbraided being animated by computers, especially given Disney was still in the early stages of crafting its first fully computer-generated animated feature, Chicken Little. In an attempt to quell his fears, Keane held a seminar called “The Best of Both Worlds,” where he gathered 50 of Disney’s animators to discuss the pros and cons of computer animation. During the meeting, it was agreed the Rapunzel project would be made with 3D CG animation, but in a way that felt more like an extension of the fluid traditional “hand-drawn” 2D animation, with inspiration taken from The Illusion of Life: Disney Animation, a book written by legendary Disney animators Frank Thomas and Ollie Johnston.

In late 2008, tragedy struck when Keane suffered a serious heart attack, forcing the director to step back from the project he had been slaving over for five years. Lasseter handed directing responsibilities over to Bolt director Byron Howard and storyboard artist Nathan Greno, while screenwriter Dan Fogelman was enlisted to rework the troubled screenplay, with the title now shortened to Rapunzel. After Keane’s recovery, he would eventually return to the project as an executive producer and animation supervisor.

While Fogelman kept the roots of the Brothers Grimm fairy tale, in that it would still feature a beautiful young woman with long golden hair who is trapped inside a tower in the middle of the woods, the storyline was drastically altered to create something more akin to a typical Disney animated adventure.

THE STORY

Long ago, in medieval Germany, a drop of liquid sunlight sprouted a magical healing flower. For centuries, a witch named Mother Gothel used the flower to retain her youth, until soldiers from a nearby kingdom plucked it to heal their ailing and pregnant queen. Shortly afterward, the Queen gives birth to a princess she names Rapunzel, whose golden hair contains the flower's healing properties. Gothel tries to steal a lock of Rapunzel's hair to use the power once again but discovers that cutting the hair renders it inert. She instead abducts Rapunzel and raises her as her own in a secret tower. In order to keep the confined, isolated Rapunzel content, Gothel teaches her to fear the outside world and its people. Each year, the King and Queen release sky lanterns on Rapunzel's birthday, hoping for their daughter to see them and return.

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During Keane’s initial development of Rapunzel Unbraided in 2004, Broadway star Kristin Chenoweth was cast in the titular role, while Reese Witherspoon was enlisted to voice an unnamed female character who Rapunzel would meet on her journey to Corona. However, Witherspoon departed the project in 2008 due to creative differences in regards to the script changes, with her agent stating the project is “no longer the film Reese had originally signed on to do.” After the numerous production delays, Chenoweth was now 40 and the filmmakers felt she was simply too old to voice the 18-year-old Rapunzel, with the actress departing the project in early 2009.

The filmmakers began the search for a suitable replacement and insisted on avoiding the now-common practice of merely stunt casting an A-list celebrity in the role. After an exhaustive search of dozens of young actresses (including Chenoweth’s Wicked co-star Idina Menzel), singer and actress Mandy Moore won the role after impressing Howard with her down-to-earth, girl-next-door quality that perfectly fit his vision of the heroine. Moore auditioned for the role twice, including performing a cover of Joni Mitchell’s “Help Me” to display her vocal abilities. The actor has been a huge fan of Disney animated films and later described her casting as fulfilling her “ultimate childhood dream.”

For the role of Rapunzel’s love interest Flynn Rider, the production team auditioned dozens of young male actors including Dan Fogler, Santino Fontana (who would later voice Prince Hans in Frozen), and American Idol alum Clay Aiken, for some odd reason. After an enormously impressive audition, television actor Zachary Levi was cast in the role, with the filmmakers feeling he perfectly captured Flynn’s cocky nature while still being entirely endearing. Levi performed James Taylor’s “Sweet Baby James” during his audition to showcase his background in musical theatre. Flynn was initially written as a British character, requiring Levi to adopt a British accent for his audition and during early recording sessions. This was later dropped and Levi was allowed to use his natural American accent.

In the key role of the film’s antagonist Mother Gothel, Greno and Howard turned to Tony Award-winning Broadway veteran Donna Murphy, who blew the production team away with her audition performance of “Children Will Listen” from the musical Into the Woods. Howard felt Murphy brought “something extra” to the role and was particularly impressed by her innate charisma and intelligence, which were key attributes to Mother Gothel’s characterisation.

MY VERDICT

This film ended up marking a turning point in Disney animation, with the studio proving it could craft a stunning, narratively impressive CG animated film. And despite the mind - boggling Oscar snub (shame on you, Academy), the film is a clear indication that Disney were ready to play against, and probably beat, Pixar at their own game.

Is Tangled a Disney Classic?  A combination of the old and the new, Tangled broke new ground for a studio genuinely struggling with the dawn of a new style of animation. Without this film, Disney may have simply abandoned the art of computer animation and surrendered to their Pixar rivals. It paved the way for the next decade of Disney animation, which unquestionably makes Tangled a Disney Classic.

The Magic Kingdom Project: the Princess and the Frog 2009

The Second Renaissance

Since the revival of Disney animation in the late 1980s, the studio had (occasionally) strived towards crafting animated films featuring more diverse characters to juxtapose the decades of exclusively white narratives of Disney’s past. While the animation studio had delivered their first Asian and Native American heroines in Mulan and Pocahontas respectively, the studio had yet to produce an animated feature film headlined by an African American, either male or female.

To put it mildly, Disney’s history with its depiction of people of colour was far from stellar (Song of the South, anyone?), yet the studio still hadn’t made any inroads with correcting the mistakes of the past. When Disney launched its wildly popular Disney Princess merchandise line in 1999 (which originally featured Esmerelda from The Hunchback of Notre Dame until she was unceremoniously dumped in 2004 due to poor sales), it was obvious the range of products lacked one important element; a black princess. It would take another decade before her arrival.

In 2002, then-Disney CEO Michael Eisner announced the end of the studio’s commitment to producing traditionally animated feature films, with 2004’s Home on the Range intended to stand as Disney’s final film created in the classic “hand-drawn” style. Animators were fired or retrained in computer animation. Equipment was dismantled and sold off. And fans mourned the painful loss of an art form Disney had defined 65 years earlier.

But when former Disney chairman Roy E. Disney’s “Save Disney” campaign successfully removed Eisner from power in 2005, many hoped incoming CEO Bob Iger might feel differently towards Disney’s tradition animation legacy. When Roy returned to the studio as a creative consultant, he begged Iger to allow the animation department one more attempt at resurrecting traditional animation. In 2006, newly-minted Chief Creative Officer of Walt Disney Feature Animation John Lasseter agreed with Roy and convinced Iger to reverse Eisner’s decision.

With the traditional animation department reinstated, Lasseter rehired many veteran Disney animators who had left the studio in recent years, including Eric Goldberg, Mark Henn, Andreas Deja, Bruce W. Smith, and Chris Buck. As fate would have it, both Disney and Pixar were currently developing projects adapted from the Brothers Grimm fairy tale The Frog Prince. However, Disney’s adaptation was based on E.D. Baker’s 2002 children’s novel The Frog Princess, in which the titular princess kisses a prince-turned-frog and becomes a frog herself.

Lasseter decided to cancel Pixar’s project and greenlight Disney’s adaptation and began the hunt for someone to direct the studio’s return to hand-drawn animation, with his sights firmly set on a pair of directors who had fled Disney one year earlier. After the cataclysmic failure of their 2002 big-budget animated space adventure Treasure Planet, directors Ron Clements and John Musker had resigned from Disney in September 2005, after then-president of Walt Disney Feature Animation refused to greenlight their next project, Fraidy Cat.

While Treasure Planet was an unfortunate misstep, Clements and Musker had directed two of Disney’s most successful animated films in The Little Mermaid and Aladdin, and Lasseter was keen to bring the pair back to the studio to co-write and co-direct The Frog Princess. When they both agreed, Lasseter offered them the choice of producing the film in either traditional animation or CGI, with the duo unsurprisingly choosing the former.

While the majority of Disney’s princess films were set in Europe, Clements and Musker wanted to craft an American fairy tale, with the directors choosing to set the film in New Orleans as a tribute to the city and its magical qualities. In Baker’s original novel, the titular princess was named Emma, but the directors felt a New Orleans “princess” would work best as an African American female, thus creating Disney’s very first black princess in the form of a chambermaid named Maddy.

At The Walt Disney Company’s annual shareholders’ meeting in March 2007, Clements and Musker presented early story concepts, sketches, and songs for The Frog Princess, which were met with immediate criticism from African-American media outlets. Many felt the name Maddy was too similar to the derogatory term “mammy,” which was the racist stereotypical archetype applied to female black slaves who worked for white families in the early 20th century. This was only further compounded by Clements and Musker’s decision to have Maddy work as a maid. Some journalists also questioned if it was appropriate to set a film in New Orleans in the wake of the devastation caused by Hurricane Katrina in August 2005. And some even felt the title could be misconstrued as a slur on French people.

While Disney rarely bowed to feedback from outside its studio walls, Clements and Musker understood the project needed to be reworked to avoid facing further backlash over the concept. As such, the title was changed to The Princess and the Frog and Maddy’s name was altered to Tiana, who would now be a hard-working waitress and chef, with dreams of one day opening her own restaurant. The pair even hired television legend and equal rights activist Oprah Winfrey as a technical consultant in a bid to avoid further racial problems with the film’s narrative and setting.

To combat the negative reaction to the New Orleans setting of The Princess and the Frog, Clements and Musker became determined for the film to stand as a loving tribute to a city struggling to recover from its darkest moment.

THE STORY

In 1912 New Orleans, a girl named Tiana and her friend Charlotte La Bouff listen to Tiana's mother read the story of The Frog Prince. Charlotte, a believer in true love, finds the story romantic; Tiana declares she will never kiss a frog.

In 1926, Tiana has grown into an aspiring young chef who works as a waitress for two local diners, so she can save enough money to start her own restaurant, a dream she shared with her father, who, apparently, died in World War I.

Prince Naveen of Maldonia arrives in New Orleans to better his financial situation. After being cut off by his parents for being a philanderer and spendthrift, Naveen intends to marry a rich Southern belle, and Charlotte is the perfect candidate. Eli "Big Daddy" La Beouff, a rich sugar baron and Charlotte's father, hosts a masquerade ball in Naveen's honor. Charlotte hires Tiana to make beignets for the ball, giving her enough money to buy an old sugar mill to convert into her restaurant. Meanwhile, Naveen and his valet, Lawrence, meet a voodoo witch doctor, Dr. Facilier. Inviting them into his emporium, Facilier convinces them that he can make their dreams come true, but neither gets what he is expecting.

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Once the film was announced and it became evident Disney was on the hunt for someone to voice its first black princess, the studio was inundated with offers from black female actors and musicians to fill the role. Music superstar Beyoncé contacted Disney and asked to be considered for the role. However, when she refused to audition for the part, Disney politely declined. Everyone from Alicia Keys to Tyra Banks was considered for the part, but it came down to Dreamgirls co-stars Anika Noni Rose and Oscar winner Jennifer Hudson.

While Hudson had the vocal chops for the role, the studio felt Rose (whose vocals were equally impressive) perfectly captured the heart of Tiana in her audition and offered the actor the part. In a later interview, Rose called the opportunity to bring Disney’s first black princess to life “a dream I never thought would come true.” Mark Henn was assigned as the supervising animator for Tiana’s with the animator incorporating Anika’s trademark dimples into Tiana’s design. At Rose’s suggestion, Henn also made Tiana left-handed to match her voiceover artist.

For the role of the film’s voodoo bokor villain Dr. Facilier, Musker and Clements hired veteran Disney actor Keith David to bring the antagonist to life. The character’s design was crafted by Bruce W. Smith, who described the villain as the “lovechild” of Captain Hook and Cruella de Vil. For the role of the scene-stealing Cajun firefly Ray, the filmmakers turned to veteran Disney voiceover artist Jim Cummings, the voice behind iconic characters like Winnie the Pooh and Tigger. Cummings grew up in New Orleans and was able to easily create an authentic Cajun accent.

After initially joining the production as a creative consultant, Oprah was the natural choice to voice Tiana’s doting mother, Eudora. Veteran Broadway performer Jenifer Lewis was cast to voice Mama Odie, a blind, 197-year-old voodoo priestess. Mama Odie was partly inspired by iconic New Orleans storyteller Coleen Salley, who consulted on the film until her death in late 2008. Lewis based her eccentric performance on American stand-up comedian Moms Mabley. Animator Andreas Deja was assigned the task of creating Mama Odie and based her character designs on Mabley and, oddly enough, Yoda.

MY VERDICT

This film is brilliant in more ways than I can count. The animation is incredible, making New Orleans look like the party capital of the USA. The music is amazing, since it was written by Randy Newman, I’m not even surprised; though I am thankful he didn’t sing most of it. The voice cast is perfect. Anika Noni Rose plays Tiana with the determination, grit and yet incredible fragility and grace that befits a lady of that time period. Jennifer Cody as Charlotte aka ‘Lotte, is the comedic highlight of the film, almost everything she does, especially in the beginning, makes me laugh HARD. Keith David as Dr. Facilier… well... anyone who knows about Keith David’s past at Disney will agree he’s perfect for this role as well as why, so I don’t need to say anything more.

Is Princess and the Frog a Disney Classic? It wasn’t enough to revitalise the world of traditional animation, but it proved it was an art form still worthy of admiration. A groundbreaking work that kickstarted Disney animation’s second renaissance, The Princess and the Frog is undoubtedly a Disney Classic.