While walking through Time Square in NYC I passed the Disney
store and in the window was an add for the company’s latest hit: Wreck-It Ralph. The poster claimed “We’re Taking it Up a
Level” and I thought to myself yes you
did. This film was by far the most
innovative movie from Disney I have ever seen.
When I
think of Disney movies I clump them into four different categories: old
animated, middle animated, new animated, Pixar, and all those weird real-life
movies. When I think old animated Disney I picture The Aristocats or Snow White. I consider middle animated to be the era of
the Little Mermaid, Aladdin, The Lion King, and even Lilo
and Stitch. Pixar is Pixar and real-life is real-life; they speak for
themselves. What I and many others of our generation are interested in is the
new animation: the new wave of popular animated movies produced by Walt Disney
Animation Studios (rather than Pixar). I consider this new era of Disney to be
marked by Meet the Robinsons and so
far the last made in this era is Wreck-It
Ralph. While younger children will
like almost anything made for them and adults lose interest in childish
entertainment, our current generation is at a time when we still appreciate the
art of movies made for children and we now scrutinize every move Disney makes
to assure that it will not fall into the old habits of creating the God-awful
sequels and second-sequels that undermine the value of original movies such as The Little Mermaid, Cinderella, or Beauty and The
Beast, each of which have two sequels.
We also keep our eyes on this beloved corporation because we hope to see
it creating new and better work so that children today can appreciate it later
as we do now.
This movie
is the fifth attempt at Computer Generated Imagery by Disney itself and while Tangled was arguably the first CGI hit, Wreck-It Ralph blew all the others
away. The use of CGI was vital to the
film because there was an underlying aesthetic theme of technology and
videogames shown subtly through things like the pixilated splatters of cake in
one of the earlier scenes. This form of
animation helped define the film, enforce the aesthetic theme, and connect the
setting and plot to the actual art of the movie.
What I
found particularly interesting about the movie was the fact that it held so
many firsts. It was the first Disney
animated film to incorporate music that was not originally made for the
movie. Rihanna’s “Shut Up and Drive” was
not made for the movie originally the way other songs such as Billy Joel’s “Why
Should I Worry” were made first for a movie then later distributed as part of
the artist’s work. This is the first
movie Disney has ever had a short film made for it, while others have been
given premade short films. It even
transcends Pixar with the innovative choice to place the short film at the end
of the credits rather than right before the movie begins; cleverly giving the
viewer a reason to stay and watch the credits.
Another striking difference from Pixar’s shorts is how “Paperman” (Wreck-It Ralph’s short) was drawn. It is hand-drawn which is completely
different from every Pixar short and the host movie itself, showing contrast
between the short and film to give the short more weight as its own entity
apart from the movie. Finally, this
masterpiece is the first Disney movie I can recall with cheeky potty-mouthed
jokes. Children are more sensitive to
media content than they once were. As a
child I recall seeing old cartoons like Looney
Toons with political commentary and incredible amounts of violence; you
won’t see characters dropping anvils on each others’ heads in the new shows for
children these days. Language, content,
and plot were far more inappropriate at the time because it was more acceptable
then, however today parents call for less dirtiness in the shows their kids
watch. Disney has always done its best
to stay appropriate with what society calls for in children’s entertainment
until now; Wreck-It Ralph spews
endless poop jokes and references to violence throughout the film in addition
to using creatively harsh insults. With
this film the writers walked right up to the line of appropriateness and wrote
on the edge, straying dangerously close to a side no Disney movie will ever go
with lines like Calhoun’s use of the insult “pussywillows”. There is even an allusion to sexual ambiguity
when Satan, a villain from another game, claims he has changed the name to
“Satine”. Needless to say this subject
matter is far more inappropriate for the standards children are used to today,
and it’s genius!
Wreck-It Ralph is a small step from Tangled but a huge step for Disney as a
whole. While the animators at Disney
have slacked off and let Pixar work its magic the differences between each
studio have become more and more noticeable.
It seems, with this film as evidence, that the writers working for Pixar
have rubbed off on those in Disney Animated Studios. Now the tables are turning; Pixar is slowly
running out of ideas and beginning to create sequels and spinoffs like Planes and Monsters University while the magic has returned to headquarters as
Disney creates more original movies like Tangled
and Wreck-It Ralph that both children
and adults can enjoy.
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