WHAT WAS I THINKING? “Whatever Happened to Charm?” - Tangled up in Disney, Then and Now

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Hello, NiteLife Exchange Readers! This week’s column is (hopefully) appearing before everyone can disappear for that yearly festival of food and dysfunctional family fun we call Thanksgiving. And what better topic for this pundit to ponder at the beginning of the holiday season, than family entertainment, and Disney movies, in particular? Tangled, Disney’s computer animated, new fangled version of the Grimm fairy tale Rapunzel, is the 50^th official Disney animated feature, a milestone in movie history and the latest legacy of a tradition dating back to the world premiere of Snow White and t he Seven Dwarfs on December 21, 1937.

Now, mind you, I haven’t seen Tangled yet, but if its TV promos spoofing perfume commercials are any indication, its tone will probably be similar to much popular family entertainment today. It will probably be hip, irreverent, fast-paced and won’t take itself too seriously. It will probably refer to contemporary in-jokes (like perfume commercials) that don’t fit in with a fairy tale world. It will probably be full of action stuff and funny stuff and won’t be too sappy or sentimental for too long, so that no one, especially the adults who buy the tickets, has a chance to get bored. Most movies are like that, most TV shows are like that, in fact, almost everything a child (or adult) watches today, even the immensely successful, critically praised Pixar films, are like that. Almost everything, in fact, except the classic Disney animated features I’ve been thinking about.

So, how did we get from Snow White to Tangled? Let’s take a short walk down animation lane, shall we? Let’s see how animated films started and how they have changed.

Most film historians universally acknowledge each of the first five Disney animated features, released from 1937 through 1942, as masterpieces. They are Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, Pinocchio, Fantasia, Dumbo and Bambi. Critics and audiences alike embraced these films both for their novelty (until Snow White, a cartoon was barely ten minutes long and the use of color in any kind of movie was extremely rare) and for their artistry.

Actually, Walt Disney himself was not a very good artist. It irked him no end that he couldn’t draw a decent Mickey Mouse! What he was, was a master storyteller and entrepreneur who knew how to enchant an audience. With the exception of Fantasia, a plotless, episodic merger of gorgeous animation with classical music, each of the “first five” has a strong story with a hero or heroine a child can identify with, a host of memorable supporting characters, tuneful songs and thousands of subliminal details that draw the audience into its world. (In Snow White, there’s this turtle, slowly climbing a flight of stairs only to tumble down again when the faster animals make an about face, that has more personality than most leading characters in movies today - animated or human!)

But there’s something else that distinguishes these films and sets them apart from most family entertainment today. What is it? Well, let’s ask another question first: what are the most memorable moments in these movies? For adults, it’s probably the moments of terror: the Wicked Queen turning into a crone, Pinocchio turning into a donkey, “Night at Bald Mountain” in Fantasia, Dumbo’s mother locked up as a mad elephant and, yes, the death of Bambi’s mother. These are the moments adults remember from their childhood and talk about, almost incessantly.

But, if you talk to the children who see these movies, what they are most drawn to are the long sequences of joy and delight, sequences that are unparalleled in today’s animated features: Bambi exploring the forest and discovering his first friends, Thumper, the rabbit, and Flower, the skunk; the many marvels of Gepetto’s toy workshop; the long opening scene of Dumbo in which storks drop off baby animals and the circus train makes its journey to the next town; the seven dwarfs “heigh ho-ing” home while Snow White and her animal friends “whistle while they work.” Fantasia has these sequences, too, like Mickey Mouse as “The Sorcerer’s Apprentice,” or the hippo and ostrich ballerinas in “The Dance of the Hours.”

One word, my friends, best describes the essence of classic Disney and that’s charm. These films enchant their audiences. It’s a major achievement, because being charming isn’t easy. It requires sincerity and a child-like belief in what you’re doing. If your film or book or song or show is going to be charming, it better be sincere, too, because one false note, and the spell you cast is broken.

Walt Disney knew how to cast a spell, and in doing so, not only created a new art form, but a hitherto untapped target film audience: children and their chaperones, an entertainment gold mine.

 Only one hitch: the product was ruinously expensive to make. By 1941, World War II had closed off the lucrative world market for Disney films. For eight years, the animated “features” released were actually collections of cartoon shorts, sort of bargain-basement Fantasia‘s, relatively cheap and easy to make, too safe to be truly charming.

The end of the war and the Baby Boom that followed, saved Walt Disney. Yes, folks, peace and sex produced millions of new consumers for his product. So, in 1950, a new, feature length animated fairy tale was finally released: Cinderella.

 Talk about charm! This one has it in spades, with a fumbling, lovable Fairy Godmother and her “Bibbidi-Bobbidi-Boo,“ dozens of singing Cinderellas in floating soap bubbles and a whole bunch of mice who can not only sing, but are handy with a needle! The “Cinderelly” sequence, in which Cinderella’s only friends, the mice and birds, make the dress she has no time to finish so that she can go to the ball, is a sure-fire antidote for depression, giving Lexapro a run for its money.

In the 1950s and 60s, other classics followed: Alice in Wonderland, Peter Pan, Lady and the Tramp, Sleeping Beauty, 101 Dalmations, The Jungle Book. Plus the creation and huge success of Disneyland, the Disney TV series and The Mickey Mouse Club, the live action films like The Absent Minded Professor and, of course, Mary Poppins, which finally got Disney something he had always wanted: an Oscar nomination for Best Picture of the Year. In the midst of all this new work, the “first five” were being released again, every seven years, so that those booming babies could see Snow White, Bambi and the rest.

It was truly a Magic Kingdom, but it couldn’t last forever. Disney died in 1966. Without his sensibility, Disney artists and writers floundered, producing confused, depressing product like The Black Cauldron. Then, in the late 1980s, Jeffrey Katzenberg and his associates created what is now called the “Disney Renaissance,” beginning with the very charming Oliver and Co. and culminating in the sublime The Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast, Aladdin and The Lion King. Once again, strong stories, sympathetic protagonists, tuneful songs and charming sequences (“Under the Sea,” “Be Our Guest,“ “Hakuna Matata”) were at the forefront. The kudos (and money!) started rolling in again, and a second Disney movie (Beauty and the Beast) was nominated for Best Picture.

But, by the late 1990s, charm once again had gone out the window. Smarm (defined as "false earnestness”) and sarcasm replaced it. Today, whimsy is for sissies and cynicism rules. We are all so smart, so clever, kids and adults alike, that we don’t dare admit to the world, or ourselves, that we truly believe in anything. When you wish a upon a star, your dreams come true. Yeah, right. Sure. That’s a pretty thought. But, today, every story we tell has to break its spell at regular intervals, with a wink or a nod or a shove or a reference to something contemporary to remind children and adults alike that we really don’t believe, and that, once you’re old enough to go to school, it’s best to wise up and know what kind of a world we really live in.

Well, yes, too bad, you may say, but that’s the way it is. Time and tastes change. You have to appeal to the adults who buy the tickets. Charm and sincerity just doesn’t sell to adults. Oh, the smallest children may enjoy Snow White and Cinderella, but anyone over five, forget it.

1973. New York City. Alice Tully Hall. In honor of the Walt Disney Company’s Fiftieth Anniversary, a summer festival of almost every animated and live action film is scheduled. With home video not yet in existence, this is an unimagined opportunity to see the films together and in context. Since Disney films are, of course, for children, most of the showings are scheduled for the morning and afternoon, with multiple dates for the “first five.” There is one 8pm showing for each film. Those are the ones that sell out first. The demand for more evening showings is so great, 10:30pm screenings are added. They sell out, too. Tickets are being scalped at outrageous prices. In the theatre each night, the jaded, hedonistic, entirely adult (and mostly male!) audience is completely entranced. No campy laughter. No winking or shoving. We are charmed. We believe, and we are young again.

This Thanksgiving, I am very grateful for these memories. I’m grateful that Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, Dumbo, Cinderella, Lady and the Tramp, The Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast, and all the rest exist. I hope someday soon we'll get tired of sarcasm and cynicism and that sincerity, charm and a little “Bibbidi-Bobbidi-Boo” will come back into our lives again. Now, that would be magic!

Thanks for reading my column! And thanks to Hector Coris for the cartoon masthead. If you have a comment, question, correction or suggestion, please email me at