Film Studies 2159A/B Lecture Notes - Lecture 13: Stanley Kubrick, Cockroach, Shaky Camera
29 Jun 2018
School
Department
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Professor
Screening 13; Lecture 13
Wednesday, April 11, 2018 11:21 AM
Wall-E
•Golden Era (1937-1942) – big budget features; some big box-office
successes [
Snow White, Dumbo; Pinocchio; Fantasia; Bambi
]; films have
‘dark’ moments; dramatic shifts from dark to sweet; some scholars even
describe it as “Disney Expressionism”
•War-Time Era (1943-1949) “Package Era”[6 package films/repackaging older
work/propaganda shorts] [sometimes seen as an insignificant period and
not a film era]; war-time propaganda shorts and educational films; the low-
budget package production and educational films still continue after the war
ends in 1945…
•Silver Era (1950-1967) – soft colors, pastels, watercolors; a return to big-
budget feature-length films;
Cinderella
was the most successful critically and
commercially of the silver era films, this is why
Cinderella
[production
started in 1944] is sometimes seen as the last flourish of the Disney Golden
Age (the 1950s nature documentaries and educational films could also be
seen as an extension of the war-time era production that continued during
the Silver Era]. The first Disney True-Life-Adventure was released in 1949,
the last film “Jungle Cat” in 1960. Also called the “Disney Romantic” Age.
“Xerox” production started in the 1960s, leading some critics to speak of a
longer “Xerox era” (1961–1977 or 1989? - this can be debated)
•Bronze Age (1970-1988) – move away from fairy tales – cheaper production
and lots of repetition/recycling. Studio continues producing cheaper
“scratchy films” , Xerox technique [first used in 1961 in
101 Dalmatians
criticized for being very ‘scratchy ] was used frequently to directly print
drawings onto cells;
Rescuers
,
Winnie the Pooh
were somewhat successful,
but this is considered a less successful era commercially and critically.
Sometimes called the “Modern Era”
•Renaissance Era (1989-1999) – Disney revives the art of the musical fairy
tale; more successful commercially and critically [
Lion King
;
Little Mermaid
];
often have Broadway feel
•Post-Renaissance (2000– 2008)* Transitional era as Disney moved from
traditional animation to CGI effects [Disney buys Pixar in 2006Pixar in 2006)
•The Revival Era (2009*-Present) CGI effects; some financial successes
(
Frozen
)
•We could debate the end and start dates of the Post-Renaissance and
Revival Era.
The Princess and the Frog
(2009) was a more successful film at
the box office and arguably after
Wall-E’s
(2008) success helped set a new
creative course for the studio. Most critics consider
Wall-E
the final
“transitional film” of the Post-Renaissance era.
•
Wall-E
either jump starts the Disney Revival Era (2008 -present) or is the last
“transitional” film of the Post-Renaissance Era (2000– 2008).
•The film initially evoked criticism from conservative commentators in the
United States for its “negative portrayal of consumers and its
environmentalist messages.” (Herhuth, 55). However, many religious
commentators started to embrace the film and its “religious themes”. The
film ultimately garnered high praise from various factions:
environmentalists, political conservatives, as well as born-again Christians.
•In an interview in
Christianity Today
with the film’s director Andrew Stanton,
one journalist explores religious themes he sees in the film like “Noah’s Ark”.
Stanton argued “So much of the Old Testament is sort of built into our
DNA.”[Mark Morning, “Little Robot that Could,” available at
http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2008/juneweb-
only/andrewstanton.html?start=2]
•Joseph Laycock in his review of the film points to the importance of a
Marxist readingMarxist reading, while still arguing that the film’s journey is fuelled by
Christian allegory:
•“The film’s depiction of robot laborers naturally lends itself to a Marxist
theodicy: The story makes it clear that a life of affluence and indolence is
dehumanizing and cannot lead to a fulfilling existence. When the autopilot
tells the ship’s captain that he cannot live on Earth, he answers, “I don’t
want to live, I want to survive!” The technology of the cruise-ship has
alienated humanity from their labor and from each other. WALL-E, a tireless
worker covered in dirt, naturally represents the proletariat. Stumbling
around the ship, he inadvertently causes humans to see and touch each
other for the first time––perhaps in hundreds of years. By breaking the
isolation created by private affluence, humans are able to play together,
love each other, and ultimately mount a resistance against the
autopilot….The new society depicted at the film’s conclusion has an
eschatological dimension indebted to the Christian tradition.” [
Journal of
Religion and Film
, Vol. 13, No. 1 2009]
•Disney purchased Pixar for a staggering 7.4 billion dollars in 2006.
•
Wall Street Journal
announced that with the merger a new “creative course”
had been set for the Disney Company.
http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB113813740822755125
•Pixar Studios started in the 1970s, but the 1960s cyberculture that emerged
out of counter-cultural movements and the Cold War was also important for
its founders. (See footnote 24 in Herhuth’s essay “Life, Love and
Programming”)
•In 1974 Computer Graphics Lab was founded.
•The Graphics Group was launched in 1979, a computer division of Lucas
Film. Worked on special effects for
Star Trek II.
•In the 1980s Pixar produced the
Pixar Image Computer
and sold these
computers to governmental agencies, medical facilities and scientists.
•The Disney studio also used Pixar Image Computers as part of their
Computer Animation Production System (CAPS), an attempt to automate or
computerize their ink & painting process.
•Remember that after rotoscoping or tracing images, xeroxgraphy was also
used to eliminate the hand-inking stage in the animation process by printing
the animator's drawings directly to the cels.
•CAPS digital ink and painting process replaced the xeroxgraphy technique.
•CAPS was used for the Rainbow Sequence at the end of
The Little Mermaid.
•In the CAPS system, completed digital cels were composited over scanned
background paintings and camera or pan movements were programmed
into a computer exposure sheet simulating the actions of old style
animation cameras.
•Complex multiplane shots Complex multiplane shots giving a sense of depth were again possible.
•In the 1990s, Disney also experimented with a technique called “Deep
Canvas,” a computer-assisted background painting technique that allowed a
2D character to move through a 3D environment or space. Again, this allows
for a complex multiplane process.
•Pixar continued to successfully collaborate with Disney Studios in the
1990s.
•Pixar made a historic 23 million dollar deal to produce three animated films
with Disney, including
Toy Story.
•In 2006 the companies merged.
•During the 1990s and 2000s, Pixar gradually developed the "Pixar
Braintrust," the studio's primary creative development process, in which all
directors, writers, and lead storyboard artists at the studio view each other's
projects and give each other very candid "notes" (the industry term for
constructive criticism).
•The Braintrust operates under a philosophy of a "filmmaker-driven studio,"
in which creatives help each other move their films forward through a
process somewhat like academic peer review, radically unlike the traditional
Hollywood approach of an "executive-driven studio" in which directors are
micromanaged through "mandatory notes" from development executives
ranking above the producers.
•“The Pixar Philosophy” values collaboration and a “director’s vision” as
more meaningful and important than “studio ideology.” (Murray and
Heumann, 1)
•As Murray and Heumann and others argue, there are two contrasting
ideologies in the film that can be tied to the rhetoric of [and management-
style of] Disney Studios and Pixar Studios.
•
Wall-E
on the one hand “reflects the postmodern viewpoint of Pixar
Animation Studios” and channels a critique of consumerism critique of consumerism - a
“significant meta-commentary on American consumer values and social
identity”. This is also described as a “dystopic and mechanisticdystopic and mechanistic” criticalcritical
perspective. perspective.
Document Summary
Wall-e: golden era (1937-1942) big budget features; some big box-office successes [snow white, dumbo; pinocchio; fantasia; bambi]; films have. Age (the 1950s nature documentaries and educational films could also be seen as an extension of the war-time era production that continued during the silver era]. The first disney true-life-adventure was released in 1949, the last film jungle cat in 1960. This can be debated: bronze age (1970-1988) move away from fairy tales cheaper production and lots of repetition/recycling. Pixar in 2006: the revival era (2009*-present) cgi effects; some financial successes (frozen, we could debate the end and start dates of the post-renaissance and. The princess and the frog (2009) was a more successful film at the box office and arguably after wall-e"s (2008) success helped set a new creative course for the studio. Transitional film of the post-renaissance era: wall-e either jump starts the disney revival era (2008 -present) or is the last.
