Where did all the great Disney animated films go?

[EricJ]

Originally Posted by Wolverine1980

Yeah I think the timing of the release and the lack of large scale marketing did Princess and the Frog in, hoping Lasseter learned his lesson on that one.

The lesson, in this case, is, WHATEVER YOU DO, DON'T LET FOX GRAB THAT KIDDY-FILM CHRISTMAS DAY OPENING, like they have for the last six years!!
Disney blinked and wimped out in their game of chicken against the Chipmunks, and they paid the wages of cowardice...Now it's time for payback.

Originally Posted by P@t_Mtl

Tarzan = base on a fictional character raise by apes in Africa
Hercules = the demi-god legends of Greece
Mulan = legendary Chinese characters
Lion King = base on Shake--

--DON'T...even...try it.
(Unless you're deficient in your classic "Silver Age That Only Really, Really Old Studio Execs Remember Growing Up With in The 60's" anime lore, in which case, here: http://www.netflix.com/Movie/Kimba_T...ition/70042454 )
We've got Katzenberg's fingerprints on it, we've got witnesses who fingered him in Japan at the time of the '87 series revival, and enough smoking guns to fill an arsenal.)

Aladdin = middle-eastern tales
Beauty & The Beast = French tale
Little Mermaid = Han Christian Andersen story from Norway

I remember, back around the time David Stainton was allowing animators to indulge whatever half-baked pet projects they liked--and we all thought Lilo & Stitch was so neato because it was so much more "different" than Treasure Planet--the Orlando animation building at the Disney parks used to have tours to Q&A with an animator on break, and I remember rushing to Treasure's defense and saying "Forget Stitch, could we have a classic story back, please??? "

Although--(more Secret Disney History alert)--much of the '93-'03 output was a product of...yep, greedy ol' Jeff again:
They hadn't yet made a Broadway musical of "Beauty & the Beast", but stage musicals of B&B and Pocahontas were doing well in the parks...And with talk of adapting stage shows to NY, the boardroom put out a directive to the animators to concentrate on stories and classic-books that had earthbound humanoid lead characters, like Greek gods or gypsies or Chinese warriors, in them. Easier to adapt for live actors down the road, you see.

(That way, they could do musicals of Hunchback and Tarzan, 'cause, like, there was no way they'd ever be able to do Little Mermaid or Lion King with live actors on stage, c'mon! )