Film The fantastic artistry of Walt-era Disney studios!

[matbezlima]

Many animated films explore animation for its own sake in many ways, the beauty of the art of the animation by itself. The philosophy of classic Walt-era Disney films is that the plot itself would be simple and direct (even quaint and twee in some peoples' impressions nowadays), the charismatic characters and animation would do most of the captivating job of creating magic, atmosphere and wonder. Disney Studios were fantastic pioneers in the evolution of animation with films that still look stunning, like Bambi from 1942, for example. The experimentalism was great and always looking to evolve the art of the animation and amazing break-throughs, specially with the Silly Symphonies and the Golden Age spanning 1937-1942, that had Snow White And The Seven Dwarfs, Pinocchio, Fantasia, Dumbo and Bambi. Fantasia took the idea to its biggest extreme with no plot at all, a collection of segments like these:


And the artistry of all those classic Walt-era Disney films is incredible! I recommend these video essays whose links are below! I freaking love Pinocchio, the wonder and magic that it has in the animation and sound-tracks makes me want to cry, it's artistical beauty! Like the clocks in Gepetto's home. The first 20 minutes of Pinocchio are maybe the pinnacle of Disney! I love how the music, not just the songs, is so constant, indissociable, in-sync with the animation and almost omnipresent in those movies. Really sweet, rich, epic and grandiose orchestras and big vocal harmonies in those films' scores. The effect is memorable and magical! And those opening credits that the Classic Disney films have are an artwork by themselves. The attention to detail, absurd level of craft, perfectionism and extremely hard work of those films is remarkable.





The links below are examples of what I talk about the magnificent vocal choruses!



And here is Disney's experimentalism and surrealism.

 

[dumbo]

That series of films is difficult to beat. Disney wore the crown during animations' golden age and the core animators that came through the studio largely defined what we think of as animation. For better, and sometimes worse, most everything we see today is steeped in animation principles that can be traced directly to those early theatrical releases. I think the days of big studios financially committing to technical draftsmanship, in the way Walt Disney was prepared to, are pretty much gone.