Jim On Film
Page 1 of 2

Disney Live-Action Films:
If I Ran Disney
Part 2

When Disney stated that a "new and refreshing meaning of the Disney movie was defined with the smash hit Remember the Titans" in a retrospective included on the Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs DVD, they were doing more than playing the studio propaganda game. They were telling the truth. Advertised without a single reference to the studio that birthed it, Remember the Titans must have proved a shock to the many moviegoers of all ages who bought opening-weekend tickets to see the movie. If they were caught off guard when the blue Disney emblem opened the film, then they were surely even more surprised by how it shattered all their stereotypes of what a Disney movie can be.

Smartly written, socially conscious without being preachy, and starring box office champ Denzel Washington, Remember the Titans, which followed Bruce Willis’ smart The Kid, was surely a hopeful sign of a new move in Disney live-action films. The quality withstood the stereotype of the Disney family film; it was too good for anyone to care that the same studio who had made Meet the Deedles and Inspector Gadget had anything to do with it. In the end, Remember the Titans was a true family film, drawing in large audiences of all ages because it was more than a non-R or non-PG-13 rating. It was a film that truly appealed to all people, not just parents, and its final box office take proved that.

As praised highly in previous columns, The Princess Diaries and The Rookie would arrive in theaters throughout the next two years, both bolstering the Disney image, but despite these artistic and financial successes, the great change in Disney’s live-action output has yet to make a permanent port in American movie houses.

While I was not alive during the time Walt Disney ran his studio, it appears from the body of work left behind that he was not making kids’ movies. He understood the big difference between the terms kids’ movie and family film. The term family film implies a film that is not only suitable for the whole family but made for everyone to enjoy. One might assume that a kids’ movie is one directed toward kids. These two are not to be confused. It is quite possible that a twenty-five year old could enjoy Mighty Joe Young (a family film) but not Barney’s movie (a kids’ film). Of course, Disney produced plenty of films with youthful stars, but that, a kid’s movie does not make. In fact, it appears likely that many films he made would be better enjoyed by older viewers. In The Sword and the Rose, Those Calloways, and The Happiest Millionaire, for example, there is little to find offensive, but there is also little that the average ten-year old would find worthwhile. He was interested in making quality films that he enjoyed that would be suitable for the whole family.

It was probably during the 1970s when the studio relied on formula for its comedies and dull scripts for many of its other films that the Disney name came to be equaled to the term kids’ films. Because of this, it sunk the studio’s Disney releases during the 1980s. Even intelligent films such as Tex and The Journey of Natty Gann hardly had a chance to succeed because audiences were not looking for kids’ films. When Michael Eisner and friends came to the studio, the output for the Disney division began to vary greatly, but its silver was still tarnished. Since then, there have been films that have appealed to many different audiences, but there have also been a steady flow of films more strongly targeted toward younger audiences, such as A Kid in King Arthur’s Court and Air Bud. Overall, however, the films that found success were those with parent appeal as well, if not in actuality, at least in appearance.

It is now time for Disney to completely return to its roots and make films suitable for family viewing that are not necessarily intended only for kids’ viewing. After the past three decades, this would be a bold move on the part of Disney, but as Remember the Titans, The Princess Diaries, and The Rookie prove, the benefits are great.