Last year I made the decision to rewatch all of the films produced by Walt Disney's Animation Studio, chronologically from beginning to end. So that means starting from Snow White & The Seven Dwarfs, and then going all the way to
However I am approaching the end. So you're probably thinking "Oh so now he's going to rank them all." Lord no. That's sixty films, my guy. Some of the studio's earlier films I haven't watched in over year. Not a challenge I have the time and mental capacity for right now.
No instead I've decided to write a couple think pieces, each focusing on a specific film or films. While I've seen many of these films numerous times, others I was watching for the first time in years, or believe it or not, for the first time ever.
Last week this House of Mouse Marathon brought me back to two films from The Experimental Era of Disney Animation (1999-2008), Atlantis - The Lost Empire and Treasure Planet. These two films are quite similar. They're both sci-fi adventure films, that blend hand-drawn and computer animation, and believe it or not, each feature a cast member from Frasier. Both films are products of their time, and in many cases are victims of it.
At the time of their respective releases, each received average-to-poor reviews from critics (Critics were nicer to Treasure than Atlantis), and turned out to be box office failures. Atlantis made very little profit, and Treasure didn't even break even. Fast forward to present day and many see both films as cult classics.
So...what happened?
I think a lot factored into the unjust failures of Atlantis and Treasure Planet. Atlantis was released in June of 2001 and Treasure in late November of 2002, over the Thanksgiving holiday. They were some of the first films released by Disney Animation in the new millennium, and after the hot streak that would become known as The Disney Renaissance (1989-1999, so The Little Mermaid through Tarzan).
On paper, there are a lot of consistent threads throughout the films of The Disney Renaissance. They're all based on either fairy tales or classic literature, musicals, and family friendly (for the most part). Atlantis...is none of those things. It is Indiana Jones meets 20,000 Leagues Under The Sea, and a lot (A LOT) of people die in the action sequences. To be a background character in Atlantis is the Disney equivalent of being a red-shirt in Star Trek or a Stormtrooper in Star Wars. Treasure Planet is based on Robert Louis Stevensons's Treasure Island (Which Disney previously adapted in live-action in 1950), but like Atlantis is much more mature and heavy in its action.
Suffice it to say, these films were a stark contrast from the ones Disney released in the prior decade. Gone were the singing teapots, magic genies, and talking lions of the nineties. Atlantis and Treasure were weren't exactly what audiences had come to expect from Disney Animation, and could be seen as unconventional choices for the studio. But then again, so were Dinosaur, The Emperor's New Groove, and Lilo & Stitch which also came out in the same three-year period. This was a time when the studio was moving away from the animated musical formula, and trying new things (Hence the name The Experimental Era).
Atlantis and Treasure were definitely the most adult-oriented films that came out during this period, and I say that well aware of the fact there is an alien in Treasure Planet that speaks in fart ("Flatua" if you wanna get technical). Animation is not specifically for kids though (Say it again with me...ANIMATION IS NOT JUST FOR KIDS. Stupid Oscars.) Disney was already experimenting with more mature themes and ideas in their animated films prior to the 2000's, see The Hunchback of Notre Dame, Tarzan, and I guess Pocahontas. This was also a time when traditional hand-drawn animation was starting to decline in popularity, and computer-animation was on the rise. Disney for the longest time had become synonymous with traditional animation. As audiences became less interested in the medium, they became overshadowed by the likes of Pixar and bold new offerings like Shrek from Dreamworks, and Ice Age from Blue Sky. It is worth noting that Atlantis and Treasure both have great traditional animation that combines CGI elements beautifully. Atlantis does the blend flawlessly, while Treasure definitely has some shots where the tech hasn't aged well.
Atlantis came out the first year the Academy Awards decided to instate the Best Animated Feature category. Shrek would go on to win the Oscar, while Atlantis wasn't even get nominated. Treasure would secure a nomination alongside Lilo & Stitch, Ice Age, and Spirit - Stallion of The Cimarron, but the Oscar went to Hayao Miyazaki's Spirited Away, which is traditionally animated in the Japanese style.
By that class of nominees alone you can see that there was still an audience for hand-drawn animation, although I wouldn't use the Oscars as the best example of it. In future years the Academy would nominate the likes of Shark Tale and...The Boss Baby.
At the box office, these two films were failures. Atlantis was released on June 3rd 2001, which sounds like a perfect release date for a film like it. Schools were getting ready to close for summer vacation, and it being a sci-fi adventure, it should have fit perfectly into the traditional blockbuster season. It came out the same weekend as Lara Croft: Tomb Raider starring Angelina Jolie, and came in second place to it. It wouldn't be fair to say they were competing for the same audience, although they are both adventure films. Atlantis also had to deal with the fact that Shrek had come out less than a month ago.Why would parents take their kids to see "another Disney cartoon" when all they've heard lately is how good Shrek is? Atlantis wouldn't have a chance to make up for lost profit over the summer, when films like Dr. Dolitte 2, The Fast & The Furious, Jurassic Park III, and Planet of the Apes came out in the following weeks. Ultimately it ended up in fifteenth place at the overall 2001 summer box office.
Now Treasure Planet...this film was set-up to fail. It released over the same Thanksgiving weekend as Die Another Day, the fourth and final film to star Pierce Brosnan. Not exactly a film it would be in direct competition with. It also had to go against another Disney film, The Santa Clause 2, which had already been out for a few weeks, delivered holiday cheer for the season, and already had an established audience because like Die Another Day it was a sequel. Speaking of sequels, what also came out earlier that month...was Harry Potter & The Chamber of Secrets...Treasure Planet had no chance.
What kills me is Disney didn't learn from this mistake and made a far worse decision nine years later when they released a new Winnie the Pooh film on the same day Deathly Hallows Part 2. But "oh no hand-drawn animation is dead! It's not our poor business decisions..."
Treasure Planet, also a sci-fi adventure like Atlantis, could've benefited from a release during summer blockbuster season. Of course these days blockbuster films get released all year round. Unfortunately, Disney also released Lilo & Stitch that year and gave it a June release. You could argue that because Lilo & Stitch came out a few months before, families might have had their fill of Disney Animation for the year. Why did they decide to release both in the same year? Who knows. Apparently Disney didn't do a lot of marketing for Treasure Planet either, which is sad when you remember the superb marketing for Lilo & Stitch. Those trailers where Stitch invaded iconic moments in other Disney films? Genius.
Did Disney even care about Treasure Planet? The story goes that legendary animation directing team Ron Musker and Jon Clements pitched the idea to Jeffrey Katzenberg after The Great Mouse Detective got the studio back on solid ground. Katzenberg pretty much went "Nah I don't care for it". Katenzberg is a sourpuss and a jerk, though to be fair Disney Animation was struggling back then, especially after the colossal failure of The Black Cauldron. Treasure Planet was probably seen of too much of a risk at the time (ironically, the film probably would have thrived in the eighties).
Over the next few years a pattern unfolded that pretty much went like this:
"Can we make Treasure Planet now?"
"No make The Little Mermaid."
*The Little Mermaid is a hit*
"Can we make Treasure Planet now??"
"No make Aladdin"
*Aladdin is also a hit*
"Can we make Treasure Planet now???"
"No BUT, if you make one more successful film (Hercules), then you can."
*Hercules does alright"
"Can we make Treasure Planet now????"
*Jeffrey Katzenberg has left the chat*
Although Katzenberg was long gone as chairman by the time Treasure Planet was made (He left in 1994, the film was released in 2002!!!), he and the studio honored his word, and Musker and Clements were finally allowed to make their passion project. We already know how it turned out.
The fact that the man who allowed Treasure Planet to be made had already flown the coop well before its release gives you some sort of idea of how much the studio was invested in it...or does it? I mean Musker and Clements were clearly well-known and well-liked at Disney or they wouldn't have gotten this far. They even went on to make Princess & The Frog and Moana after this. Not to mention a sequel was in pre-production, and there were talks of a franchise. Willem DaFoe set to play the villain. These plans were scrapped when the film had a poor box office performance.
The crazy thing is, Disney also had similar plans for Atlantis that were canceled as well (No I didn't forget about Atlantis). A television series titled Team Atlantis was in the works, but was scrapped due to the film's poor performance. The few episodes that were produced were repurposed into a direct-to-video sequel Atlantis: Milo's Return. Here's a fun fact...both films were considered for the rebranding of the Submarine Voyage ride at Disneyland. Eventually they did find a film to rebrand it with, Finding Nemo, which seems more appropriate anyway. So Disney definitely saw franchise potential in both Atlantis and Treasure, and frankly why wouldn't they?
I've already mentioned who directed Treasure Planet and their body of work at length. They also wrote it alongside Ted Elliot and Terry Rossio, who together wrote Aladdin, Shrek, and rather fittingly, the Pirates of the Caribbean films. Atlantis was directed by Gary Trousdale and Kirk Wise, another iconic Disney duo. Together, Trousdale and Wise helmed Beauty & The Beast and The Hunchback of Notre Dame, and they also wrote the script with Joss Whedon (*Before* we knew he was garbage). Combine all this with the stellar animation and voice casts, each of these films had all the makings to be Disney classics, but sadly it wasn't meant to be.
Now I don't have a lot of memories of watching these films. I didn't see either of them in theaters. I was gifted Atlantis on VHS, and watched it a fair amount. Treasure Planet I didn't see until years later when kids I was babysitting had it on DVD and requested a viewing. Neither film really stuck with me through the years. Have my opinions on them changed with recent rewatches? Yes and no.
Atlantis has great animation, stellar action sequences, and a wonderful ensemble of characters. The protagonist, Milo Thatch (Micheal J. Fox), can be a little annoying at times, and Mole (Corey Burton)...he's just there for the kids I guess. Man though is Vinny (Don Novello) a riot. The voice cast is great, featuring Fox, Novello, James Garner, Cree Summer, and many more. The amount of detail that went into crafting the Atlantean culture is really impressive. I will say though that the plot and the villains, are a little cliche and predictable. That doesn't necessarily make it a bad film, but it does make it a bit less substantial. That, and like Trousdale and Wise's previous film Hunchback of Notre Dame, there's a bit of an uneven tone. It's not as bad as like the slapstick of the Gargoyles, but there is an imbalance. It's almost like how people complain when MCU films undercut a lot of serious moments with one line-OH MY GOD I FORGOT THIS FILM WAS WRITTEN BY JOSS WHEDON...Anyway, despite its flaws I think Atlantis is a solid viewing.
I never really went for Treasure Planet's "steam-punk gimmick". It's old, it's futuristic, just make up your mind. Now, I think it's pretty creative. You have to admire the detail that went into the world-building. The animation is also spectacular here, but like I said a bit dated in some shots. Some of the designs of the aliens are a little too off for me. Some are cute, some are ugly (I remind you of the one that speaks in fart), they cover all their bases. Thankfully the designs of all the main cast are appealing, and again this a wonderful ensemble of characters with a great voice cast. Young Joseph Gordon Levitt is great in the lead role of Jim Hawkins. Brian Murray is iconic as Silver. David Hyde Pierce, Emma Thompson, Laurie Metcalf are superb in their supporting roles. I hate to say it, but Martin Short as the robot B.E.N. is awful, and it's not his fault! The character just does nothing but yell and panic. It's a waste of Short's talents to cast him as Disney's version of Jar Jar Banks (Is that too harsh?). Other than that, my only real problem with Treasure Planet is the use of modern pop songs in the montage where Jim and Silver grow close, and the final scene. They just don't mesh with the rest of the film, and using "I'm Still Here" by John Rzeznik in the montage just helps gloss over important character development. It's not a non-traditional musical like Tarzan where there are songs throughout not sung by the characters. It's this one, isolated musical moment in a film that's not musical. That said, the music composed by James Newton Howard is amazing and I love the main theme.
So yeah, it took me a few years but I do enjoy and appreciate Atlantis and Treasure Planet. It took a lot of people a few years to appreciate them. Thankfully both are now part of the massive Disney Plus library, where they can find new audiences, and their part in the Disney Legacy can carry on. Do they have their flaws? Yes. Are they bad films? No, and Disney has made much worse. Forgive me for saying this but, these two are some of the very few Disney animated films that could *benefit* from a live-action remake.
Atlantis - The Lost Empire and Treasure Planet had a lot working against them. Changes of taste in both audiences and filmmakers, poor release strategies, but it can all be summed up in one phrase: Bad Timing. They shouldn't be looked at as terrible failures of Disney, because they came out during a period when nothing that was coming out of their animation studio was really succeeding (except for Lilo & Stitch). Timing can be a B-word, but time can also have a way of working things out. Atlantis, Treasure Planet, and other Disney films from this era have thrived since their initial releases, been given second chances by audiences and achieving cult-classic status.
I wouldn't call either of these film failures...maybe just late bloomers, and as The Emperor in Mulan said "the flower that blooms in adversity, is the rarest and most beautiful of all"
...That's probably overselling it but you get it.
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