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  • Blog Post: Can the "Fantasia" Blu-ray help raise the Walt Disney Family Museum 's profile?

    Well, it looks like Christmas is coming a little early not only for fans of Walt Disney the man, but also for the Walt Disney Family Museum at The Presidio in San Francisco . Today, Walt Disney Studios Home Entertainment is releasing a combo Blu-ray / DVD collection featuring both " Fantasia"...
  • Blog Post: Looking back on the early, early days of the “Toy Story” franchise

    With “Toy Story 3” earning over $365 million worldwide since this Lee Unkrich film was released on June 18 th (More importantly, with the “Toy Story” franchise having produced over $8 billion in global retail sales to date), it is sometime hard to remember that – just 15 years ago – there weren’t a whole...
  • Blog Post: Why For did Walt Disney pull the plug on “Pinocchio”?

    DonkeyBoy writes with a question related to Wednesday’s “ The Art of Shrek Forever After ” review . He wants to know about … … that image of teenage Shrek you included with your article. You mentioned that this was a storyline that Mike Mitchell and his team developed for this Dreamworks film and then...
  • Blog Post: When you work in animation, there’s just no avoiding those Pink Slip Blues

    It was late summer 1958 and things had been going well. The mad rush to wrap the animated feature film, “ Sleeping Beauty ” was finally succeeding, and the film was well on its way to completion. Taking a break from the drawing board, I headed up to the second floor of the Animation Building...
  • Blog Post: Did you spot all of the in-jokes & Disney references in “Prep and Landing”?

    Okay. I know. JHM has already done a number of stories on “ Disney Prep and Landing ,” that new holiday special that Walt Disney Animation Studios produced exclusively for ABC (which – FYI – wound up being the highest rated Christmas special of the 2009 – 2010 season ). Copyright 2009 Disney Enterprises...
  • Blog Post: Disney’s timeless battle between the young punks and the old guard

    You probably already know the story. A group of young guys move into the establishment and begin to shake things up. The old guard naturally has issues with the young punks, and they begin to push back. It’s a story we’ve all heard before, and I find it amazing that it remains a story that never really...
  • Blog Post: CalArts celebrates the 100th birthday of animation pioneer Jules Engel

    This past Saturday, film directors and animators gathered to pay tribute to Hungarian-born artist Jules Engel , a man whose work combined a modernist orientation of serious art with the commercial leanings of animated films. This year marks the 100-year anniversary of his birth. A small man, usually...
  • Blog Post: "Walt & El Grupo" looks back at Disney's Latin American adventure

    The loss of Oswald the Lucky Rabbit and the birth of Mickey Mouse in 1928. The creation and release of “ Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs ” in 1937. The development of Disneyland and its opening in 1955. All of these were important and challenging periods for Walt Disney and his company. But there was...
  • Blog Post: Tons of Toontown's secrets revealed in "Animation Magazine: 20 Year Collection"

    You have to admit that it's a pretty amazing time to be an animation fan. By that I mean: The best reviewed film of 2007 was " Ratatouille ." With " Enchanted " and "How to Hook Up Your Home Theater," we're getting our very first glimpses of the revival of hand-drawn animation at Walt Disney Animation...
  • Blog Post: Toon Tuesday : The Failure Factor

    A couple weeks ago, we had a visit from John Lasseter and two hundred of his wizards from Pixar Animation Studios . The Pixar team was getting a special tour of both the Burbank and Glendale facilities of the Walt Disney Company. It was good to see so many old friends & colleagues again. And I couldn...