Gustaue’s: A Disney Metaphor?

[Rac_Rules]

@uruseiranma

course, there’s the idea of ‘doing something unexpected,’ or ‘follow the recipe.’ If you consider it, after Walt passed away, there were many who just ‘followed the recipe’ for many years, with the ideas of innovation and new story directions just getting sidelined (watching ‘Robin Hood,’ that film just seems to be a ‘follow the recipe’ film).

Good point. Maybe Colette’s lines where winking at Disney. Walt often did unexpected things, like Fantasia, which you mentioned. After he died, it seemed a lot of people thought “It was his job to do something unexpected. It is our job to follow the recipe.”

[A113]

EVIDENCE:

See? AAAAAAAAA! This is gonna be as popular as…The Adventures of Milo and Otis! ROFLOL XDDD

Also, think about this quote from Monsters, Inc.:

I’ll kidnap a thousand children before I see this company die, and I’ll silence anyone who gets in my way!

This reminded me of Eisner, Eisner, Eisnerrrrrrrrrrrrrr.

[bright_dot-dasher]

@Rac_Rules

@uruseiranma

course, there’s the idea of ‘doing something unexpected,’ or ‘follow the recipe.’ If you consider it, after Walt passed away, there were many who just ‘followed the recipe’ for many years, with the ideas of innovation and new story directions just getting sidelined (watching ‘Robin Hood,’ that film just seems to be a ‘follow the recipe’ film).

Good point. Maybe Colette’s lines where winking at Disney. Walt often did unexpected things, like Fantasia, which you mentioned. After he died, it seemed a lot of people thought “It was his job to do something unexpected. It is our job to follow the recipe.”

Makes sense…that’s a good point. But Linguini (it was actually Remy) still did something unexpected, in a way. Like a whole new turn on the way things work. When Gusteau’s was out of business, they started a whole new one. So could that also mean something…

[zada]

Oh my god A113, that looks soooooooo bad!!! ahaha, I’d probably go see it just because it looks that bad though.

[Rac_Rules]

@zada

Oh my god A113, that looks soooooooo bad!!! ahaha, I’d probably go see it just because it looks that bad though.

but then you’ll be putting money in their pocket for a bad movie.

[Mitch]

Not to get off-topic, but…

@A113

This is gonna be as popular as…The Adventures of Milo and Otis!

You watch your language. That was a great movie.

– Mitch

[ErikRuud]

@Disney_Guy

Yeah, Princess and the Frog will be 2D.
I wonder what others there might be after that one that will be 2D.
It also makes me wonder why we’re still getting things like Bolt and Rapunzel… Not entirely sure, but my guess is they could have already been in development before Lasseter’s decision that Disney should produce 2D animated films again… Or maybe a change of mind? I guess it is too early to speculate, because even if Disney is still moving back to old grounds, it might take a few years before we actually see the significant changes.

Most likely because they were already in production, and it didn’t make sense to kill them after spending so much money. Keep in mind that these movies take years to produceand would have started well before the merger.

The previews for Bolt actually look OK. If it was truly bad, Ed Catmull and John Lasseter would have stepped in and had them rework the story much like they did with several of the Pixar films.

[Ragdollcorpse]

@Mitch

Not to get off-topic, but…

@A113

This is gonna be as popular as…The Adventures of Milo and Otis!

You watch your language. That was a great movie.

– Mitch

I agree…I actually liked that movie…even though it has been a while since I last saw it.

But that Chihuahua movie looks horrible…Disney is going downhill, but hopefully it’ll pick up with “Up” and “The Frog Princess”.

A113, you are right. That quote really is very Eisner…a friend of mine called it “Hurricane Eisner” when he was in charge, though I know it’s a pretty popular trm now.

Who’s the head of Disney now? Is it Lassater, or am I completly dumb?

-Kim

[martini833]

Well, Disney has been going downhill because of Eisner (and other factors) for the last decade. Anyways, Disney’s new CEO is Bob Iger (since 2006) which is really helping Disney. Ed Catmull is president of Walt Disney Animation Studios and Pixar Animation Studios. John Lasseter is the Chief Creative Officer for the afformentioned studios and he has big input in Imagineering. Steve Jobs is also Disney’s biggest shareholder (at 11% I think) and is on the Disney board.
Hopefully this kind of leadership will bring Disney back to it’s former glory, and I really think it can.

[Ragdollcorpse]

@martini833

Well, Disney has been going downhill because of Eisner (and other factors) for the last decade. Anyways, Disney’s new CEO is Bob Iger (since 2006) which is really helping Disney. Ed Catmull is president of Walt Disney Animation Studios and Pixar Animation Studios. John Lasseter is the Chief Creative Officer for the afformentioned studios and he has big input in Imagineering. Steve Jobs is also Disney’s biggest shareholder (at 11% I think) and is on the Disney board.
Hopefully this kind of leadership will bring Disney back to it’s former glory, and I really think it can.

Oh wow…where have I been? Well, things seem to be going well since 2006 and with this team, you may be right about them being able to retsore Disney glory. Thanks for the info Martini!

-Kim

[Mark-E]

I am so glad that this thread exists, as i was just about to make one myself.

I was watching ratatouille last year when the exact same thought struck me, that the movie was partly a metaphor for disney animation, as well as pixar.

I even made a blog about it when i was bored one night! Rather than just babble on about the same thing, i’ll just quote my own blog. It’s a bit long and does stray away from ratatouille slightly…for which i can only apologize.

There’s a scene in the movie that was the sole purpose for making me want to write this blog, and this review if you will. Though my analysis of the film is probably completely and utterly false, I can’t help but think part of it can be seen if you look close enough.

The scene takes place in the office of chef Gusteau’s restaurant, where the current head chef “Skinner” who had taken his place after the death of the inspiring chef Gusteau, is selling off another uninspired idea for a family meal. And it was this scene that gave me the idea of writing up this blog, right now. Gusteau’s restaurant is Disney animation. And Chef Gusteau is Walt Disney.

To fully appreciate where I’m coming from, allow me to explain a few things to you. I would start from the beginning, but I don’t want to patronise you. We all know how great Walt Disney was, and how influential in the world of animation he was. But that’s not the point I want to bring up. Somewhere after his death, and after Disney became a full franchise with theme parks, merchandise and all that follows. A spark started to be lost in the department that started it all, animation. You know the history of movies within Disney animation, so I’m not going to bore you with that either. But you also know that the studio did eventually decline in quality, and become irrelevant. And that’s where I would relate Gusteau’s restaurant to the studio.

A business man took over the establishment, otherwise known as Michael Eisner. So with all of this in mind, Michael Eisner would continue to steer the ship and keep it above water and nothing more. Until Disney became just another middle of the road studio, just like how Gusteau’s restaurant became just another middle of the road restaurant. No matter what history it had, the quality had slipped. And it didn’t deserve anything more than what it has been branded…For the purposes of this piece of writing, the new head chef “Skinner” Is very much Michael Eisner.

So back to the movie, Gusteau’s restaurant is irrelevant; the boss appears to be more focused on keeping the business in business, rather than taking a risk and making good food. This is where our main character’s fit into the plot.

Remy is a rat, and an aspiring chef (the character of which I draw parables to Pixar). He finds himself in Paris, and decides that he can finally out his dreams of becoming a chef, and heads to the one place that inspired him for so long, Gusteau’s (Disney). This is where he stumbles upon Linguini, a bumbling chef. They form their partnership and the movie starts to flow as you would imagine. For the record, I obviously love the film, or I wouldn’t be writing about it. But all of this is devoid of the point.

Though I’ll still be using references and examples of Ratatouille as reference points for my ramblings, I shall now start to drift away from the movie itself and begin speaking about the future of Disney animation. Though I’ll sum it up, using a quote from Ratatouille (See what I’m doing here?)

“Django: This is the way things are; you can’t change nature.
Remy: Change is nature, Dad. The part that we can influence “

I believe that single scene there, taken in context with the way I look at the movie, can provide me with enough to go on a little tangent about the future of the studio that has been influential to movies as a whole for a very long time.

I’m going to go out on a limb, and say that nowadays the modern audience are a fairly cynical bunch of spectators. The days of sentimentality are long gone when it comes to cinema. Furthermore, Disney as a studio can’t really fool anyone nowadays. It’s recognised as something which is corporate, and something that is a franchise. Basically, their own values don’t represent the same values that they claim to represent. Which is always a problem; you can’t try and sell lies. It’d be like hoping for a dead seed to create life. It’s not going to happen; unfortunately things need to change in order for anything to get better.

Change doesn’t mean not representing the same values that you always have. I would argue that you need to portray them in a different light. It’s that intangible “Disney spirit” that people often speak of. With the cynicism that comes with a modern audience, it would obviously seem to be next to impossible to encapsulate the “Disney spirit” with a modern Disney animation movie. But personally, I don’t believe it to be impossible at all.

Take snow white for example, and compare it to the little mermaid. Two movies which are completely different in tone, humour, the list goes on. They both manage to maintain the same spirit, even when being completely different in tone. This is why I feel that John Lasseter’s approach to making Disney movies is one that is going to work out for the best in time.

I believe that he appreciates and knows that most audiences have grown up with these animated movies throughout their childhood, and now wish to keep their own children entertained for an afternoon. And in doing so, we now have movies which have a sense of maturity to them, something more in tune with the adult audience; you could argue that some of its tone is tongue in cheek.

Though this shouldn’t be labelled as a bad thing by any means, from what I’ve heard the approach worked for Enchanted (not that I’ve seen it just yet, but stay with me!). Though the movie looks at Disney films in general in a post modern, tongue in cheek, ironic way. By the end of the movie it has fully transformed into your archetypal Disney film, keeping in tune with the aforementioned “Disney spirit”. If it worked for one movie it could work again, though obviously there would be a bit more imagination involved than simply copying the same formula.

Ultimately, my point boils down to one thing. Everything has a golden age which will always make it hard to recapture the magic, or spark that was once there. To try and emulate a golden age would be foolish. This brings me back to the idea of embracing change, what with it being in our nature to do so. We’ll all mature in time, and we’ll look back fondly on the films of our childhood and want to share them with our children, or loved ones to show them how it once was. And that’s because it’s part of time and history.

Movies as a whole, are supposed to represent the culture of the time. And they’re supposed to deal with themes of the time. And I think you’ll find that if animated movies in the future continue the trend of remaining relevant with their audiences, then we could have a strong animation studio once more from Disney. Though music is an important part to most of Disney’s movies, the songs are nothing without a decent quality film to accompany them.

Thank you very much for taking the time to read

Eesh…I sure can ramble about a whole lot of nothing.

But this is a great thread and i’m glad that other people have though of the metaphor!

[lizardgirl]

That’s very interesting, Mark-E! You’ve clearly thought this through. And I like the comparison you made between The Little Mermaid and Snow White to show that although two films can be very different, they can have the same feel, and that’s what Lasseter does.

[Mark-E]

Well, thank you very much!

Of course, me thinking about it so much says a lot about how much free time i have.

[M.O]

Well it definitely has a good meaning behind it, if it is a disney metaphor then it was an unconcious on, there is no way Disney would have Pixar ‘Diss’ them in one of their own films.

[Rac_Rules]

Does anyone think Epic Mickey is Disney trying to do something “unexpected?” It is pretty unusual for the character to be in something this dark these days, and it looks friggin awesome. Dang, Disney is on a role this year!

I do sense the beginning of the second Disney Renaissance, and maybe even better then the last!

[bright_dot-dasher]

Rac_Rules: Hmm, you’re onto something…maybe this really is one of the unexpected things we were waiting for!

This Gusteau’s : Disney metaphor comparison gets more and more into my head. Now I dont’ think I can go through watching Ratatouille without the need to tell that comparison to someone, even if they’ve heard it from me before. It’s just so good of a comparison!

[sanfranfan]

I am glad that I am not the only one who noticed this. It dawned on me as I left the theater after seeing Ratatouille for the first time. The reason I am sure that Gusteau’s is a metaphor for Disney is that it was during the same week as Ratatouille’s initial release that Disney announced that they were going to stop producing direct-to-DVD sequels of their animated movies–that was to much of a parallel for me. From there it is easy enough to draw parallels throughout the movie to the history of Pixar and Disney.

[MIKE_WAZOWSK-E]

@Rac_Rules

I was thinking about Ratatouille tonight, and I realized something. Could Gustaue’s be a metaphor for Disney after Walt’s death? Gustaue put his heart and soul into all of his dishes and tried to make them the best they could be, not standing for cheapness, as Walt did with his movies. After Gustaue died, Skinner ruined his good name by making cheap but money making microwave meals, which kinda remind me of a lot of the movies Disney comes out with these days. A coincidence? Or a hidden message?

Eh, clever.

[SullyMike]

Nice metaphor, although I admit I like Meet the Robinsons–but that’s it…and some other one. Other than that, curse Michael/Skinner and his microwave-meals.

[snowflake]

hope he would have been in real in that movie!