Green Phoenix - Soul (2020) Review

 

 THIS ARTICLE SHOULD'VE BEEN RELEASED ON JANUARY 15TH. DUE TO SOME SORT OF ERROR, IT WAS NOT PUBLISHED AS SCHEDULED.

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Welcome everybody to my first proper film review of 2021.

Last week would've been the release of my review for Tom Clancy's 1994 film Clear and Present Danger but 2020 decided that it had a few more surprises left for the world and had to deliver them into 2021's hands. Suffice it to say, that review will be released in a couple weeks time once it has been re-contextualized to fit a post-Insurrection world.

Until then, the new plan is to start our reviews off with one of the few newly released films from the holiday season. Originally intended for a theatrical release, the global societal prolapse that was the coronavirus pandemic forced Disney/Pixar's Soul to be billed as the first Disney+ original film, a representation of what I believe may end up becoming the future of film releases even after theaters finally open back up once this pandemic eventually peters out.

This film was something of a mystery for quite a while. I enjoy learning about upcoming releases for films many years in advance and Soul was one of those films that was announced years ago, but was kept very much under the radar. But now that it is out, I have the wonderful opportunity to explore Pixar's latest emotional piece and see how it stands among Pixar's prodigious lineup.

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Green Phoenix - Beauty and the Beast (1991) Review

I want to apologize to everyone for the two-week delay in releasing this review. Two weeks ago was TrotCon, a convention that I regularly participate in as a guest, and due to the fallout of COVID-19, I needed to dedicate a great deal of my time and focus to the convention and couldn't finish this article with the level of quality that I expect of myself. As to why I had to delay last week, well...

...Accidentally deleting an entire article the night before you have to publish it fucking sucks.

But all that aside, I am happy to finally present a review of one of the most well-regarded Disney films in cinematic history.

In 1991, Disney found themselves at a crossroads in terms of their Renaissance. 1989's The Little Mermaid had been a massive success that seemed to revitalize public interest in Disney animation, while 1990's The Rescuers Down Under was largely ignored in terms of public interest, due to lack of interest from Disney marketing (though the film would maintain a strong public interest and fanbase on VHS). It was in this environment that Disney released Beauty and the Beast.

To say that this film has a prodigious legacy and reputation is the greatest of understatements. The New York Film Festival gave an unfinished rough-cut of the film a standing ovation. And the film would go on to be the first animated film to ever be nominated for Best Picture at the Academy Awards.

But does the film still deserve that indelible reputation? Let's take a look at Walt Disney Pictures' Beauty and the Beast and find out.

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Green Phoenix - Disney's Hunchback of Notre Dame Review

In the latter half of the 1990s, the Walt Disney Company's animation department had just passed the zenith of its power. Fresh off the heels of a string of monumental successes with films like Aladdin, The Lion King, and Beauty and the Beast, Disney executives were absolutely certain that Disney animation could do no wrong, even in spite of the politics going-on behind the scenes, and began pushing heavily on their next big animation projects.

The Disney Renaissance had to continue, right?

First there was an adaptation of the story of Pocahontas, the Native American woman whose association with the Jamestown Colony had reached the annals of American legend which was released in 1995. It had to be good. This was the film that everyone wanted to be apart of, not The Lion King.

Reviews for the film were...lackluster at best. People criticized the appropriation of Native culture and the animation, which looked far too different from the last Disney outing featuring animated humans (Aladdin). The film made money, but for the first time, Disney executives realized that success wasn't a guarantee. Success was riding on their next big project.

So Disney pulled all the stops on their adaptation of Victor Hugo's most famous story after Les Misérables. They got the directing duo behind one of their biggest animated success The Lion King, they got Alan Menken on music, they got some of the best voice actors in the business.

1996's The Hunchback of Notre Dame was definitely going to be a hit...right?

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Green Phoenix - The Lion King (1994) Review

In 1988, during a promotional tour for Oliver and Company in Europe, a meeting was held between Jeffrey Katzenberg, Roy E. Disney, and Peter Schneider to discuss future projects for The Walt Disney Studios.

Among the projects discussed was a desire by the three to create an animated film set in Africa. The project was handed over to the vice-president of creative affiars, Charlie Fink, who developed the project further. Katzenberg would later add his elements, creating a coming of age story and some elements that he would later credit to his own life.

In 1991, the film, tentatively called King of the Jungle, was put into production, though many animators and directors wanted to work on Pocahontas (which was considered the more prestigious and likely to be successful of the two) instead, with The Lion King representing the lesser of the two projects.

In spite of that; by 1994, King of the Jungle, now renamed The Lion King was released to critical and financial acclaim and has since gone down in history as among Disney's greatest animated films. With a "live-action" adaptation of the film expected for later this year, I felt it only fair to take a look at this legendary picture to see if it still holds up.

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Green Phoenix - Disney's Dark Age

Imperial March playing in the background

Between their ownership of Pixar Animation, the Marvel Cinematic Universe, and the entirety of Star Wars, the Walt Disney Company has become a nigh unstoppable juggernaut of the entertainment industry. Disney has become successful off of decades of successful branding and marketing their most popular entertainment properties until they have become staples of our childhoods.

And when one takes a look at the greater portion of these properties, a pattern emerges. The majority of them belong to a specific period of incredibly high-performing and critically lauded animated films released between 1989 and 1999, more popularly known as in cinematic history circles as the "Disney Renaissance".

But what about the period before the Renaissance? What was the state of Disney animation in the decades following the death of their founder, when the Nine Old Men began to pass and new talents rose and fell to eventually define my generation's childhood?

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