Drive Drunk, Go to Jail and Become Someone Else's "Play Thing"

Disney often uses fairy tales as magical and whimsical stories lacking any real lesson other than "be pretty and find true love." This reimagined Buzz cartoon is used as traditional fairy tales were; as cautionary tales. This warns people not to drive drunk (or "Buzzed") or you'll go to jail. It's purpose is mostly humor as it shows how absurd modern Disney would look as a cautionary tale.

Would You Like More "Tea" Mrs. Nessbit?

A Pam A. Day Keeps the Disney Away

“Some day you will be old enough to start reading fairy tales again.”

-       C. S. Lewis

Pam A. Day believes that day is today and that today, like every day, Disney is in a daze about which ways we should show kids fairytales this day in age.  Her major argument with these case studies is that Walt Disney and company are watering down Grimm’s fairytales, making them palatable and easy for the sensitized Protestant white American family to consume. Her issue with this is that it strips away the message and moral of the fairy tale.

For example, in Grimm’s original “Snow White and The Seven Dwarves,” we are able to connect with Snow White through the love her mother gives to her and we are able to live with her harsh life because of the bond created by her mother, with the Prince and his love being nothing more than a subplot. In Disney’s version, as Day sees it, the Walt himself is represented by the Prince and in some narcissistic way, Disney has made himself the main character/hero of the story.

            From what I’ve read of her essay, I agree with Day and her belief that the fairytales should retain most of Grimm’s grim story, that Disney has more than just adapted the story for modern American audience, but stripped it of it’s message and delivered it in a way that would be profitable and popular.

So Was Leo DiCaprio Asleep at the End of Inception or Was He Just Watching Waking Life

Waking Life, a drama that follows a man who seems to be muddling the line separating the dream world and the real world attempts to philosophically address the question: Is there really a difference between those worlds? This trippy experience is unique to say the least, offering many points of view that suggest a lot of abstracts about the meaning of dreams and their presence on our “waking life.” While it is inherently different from most other animations and is an uninhabited frontier for both the director Richard Linklater and the production company Fox Searchlight (Searchlight had previously never made an animated film), it’s definition leans more to the influence of developmental animation than experimental. The generally recognizable story arch is evidence to an orthodox style while it’s unique animation style would have been at the time slightly experimental (later, Linklater would make A Scanner Darkly, done in the same animation style). The combination of these experimental and orthodox styles contributes to its innate developmental style.

Cloudy With a Chance of Genius

“Have you ever felt like you were a little bit different? Like you had something unique to offer the world, if you could just get people to see it. Then you know exactly how it felt to be me.”

                                                                                                -Flint Lockwood (2009)

Flint Lockwood, the main character in Sony Pictures’ Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs, written and directed by Phi Lord and Chris Miller in 2009 and loosely based on the book, Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs, written by Judi Barrett in 1978, is a characterized personification of the movie itself.  Like most animations today, it is a comedy, but its heart is what most effectively delivers its message. In this opening line of the movie, Flint is able to sum up both his life as an unsuccessful inventor on the tiny dreary island of Swallow Falls and the revolution that inspired so much of Sony Pictures’ success in the future. Refusing to follow the stereotypical rules of popular animation while simultaneously overtly acknowledging its tropes, Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs is “a little bit different,” like it has “something unique to offer the world.”

With posters on his wall of Nikola Tesla and Albert Einstein painted to be a rock stars and his most prized possession being a white lab coat from his understanding yet recently deceased mother, it’s no wonder Flint Lockwood aspires to be a successful inventor. Unfortunately, with his most successful inventions being a communicator with a monkey who can only say his own name and a pair of spray on shoes that are impossible to take off (yes, he wears them the entire film), Flint finds himself well into adulthood and the fact that he still lives at home indicates that he has no major accomplishments. His lack of money, the surplus of fish the island has failed to export, and his overall desire to earn his father’s love has landed him a job working at the sardine store. There, he works for his dad to kill time until he can go home and work in his home made laboratory.

What creates the plot/conflict of Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs is in the ensuing scene, when Flint accidentally overpowers the FLDSMDFR and it goes haywire, runs rampant through the city, and ultimately flies into the sky, taking residence among the clouds. From there, he is able to remotely control the device causing it to rain (and snow and hail) in the form of all types of food, gaining him and his town international popularity. For a while, he revels in it, even getting the attention of those who previously neglected his existence and a pretty young reporter following his story. Chaos is the result however, when the machine gets a mind of its own and the town and its corrupt mayor are forced to deal with its dangers while Flint tries to solve this unique problem.

The film in itself is refreshingly different from the cookie cutter princess story that Disney has kindly provided for us all these years. The animation style, a form of 3d not unlike Pixar and Dreamworks, has its own identity, exaggerating certain characteristics and quirks in different ways. For example, it takes the freedom of adhering to its own laws of physics and runs with it without pushing the story outside the walls of our imagination into a realm that would leave us disinterested. There is a scene in the movie, for instance, when Flint and his love interest Sam are at a palace made entirely of gelatin. The animators take certain creative liberties having the Flint and Sam jump around the mansion and bounce around as if the place were made of rubber until they jump into a pool made of the exact same consistency of gelatin and they sink. Obviously, in real life this would be impossible and in any world outside of this one, it would make no sense, but because the animators follow their own laws and use their freedom intelligently, it makes for a fun and playful scene.

What sets this movie apart from others is its witty and self-aware, yet sincere, story line. It rattles off punches with a quick pace that keeps the viewer constantly entertained and develops characters that are extreme versions of the archetypes they embody. The dad is so stern, his eyebrows literally droop over his eyes and they can’t be seen until he is very surprised. The hard-nosed cop, played by Mr. T, yells at the top of his lungs no matter what his emotion is and his muscles are overwhelmingly visible through his extraordinarily tight cop uniform. The overarching story of acceptance and the idea that anyone can be a hero fits perfectly within the world the animators created. The comedy is used not as a crutch but simply as a side effect of the plot driving itself forward with the characters responding humorously to the plights they’ve found themselves in.

What impressed me most about this movie was the legacy it has created. Released only five years ago, it has propelled the career of the writer/directors Lord and Miller. Post Meatballs, they have – hand in hand with Sony – gone on to write and direct a Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs sequel, LEGO Movie, 21 Jump Street, and 22 Jump Street, all of which were enormously successful. It is this new style of humor that is able to poke fun at animation and traditional story telling that has transcended the art of animation and into live action movies (21 and 22 Jump Street are both live action movies that follow the same form of story telling). Simply, Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs is just the movie the world needs right now; a little bit different with something unique to offer the world.

Uncle Grandpa Could Get Milhouse's Parents Back Together

Animation on television has revolved around the use of humor since the beginning, with The Simpsons being historically the most effective. What’s worth noting is the difference in humor styles between The Simpsons and Uncle Grandpa. On one hand, there is essentially an animated sitcom, in which human characters live in a semi-normal world and hijinks ensue based on the interactions the characters have with each other and on the other hand is Uncle Grandpa, which relies on the silliness and exaggeration that is allowed with a completely fictional and unbelievable world. Both are successful and are representative of the era they come from.

Neither show provides a story arch that extends past the each episode. However, within each episode is a narrative that differs from the other. The Simpsons uses a coherent world with recognizable archetypes (at least within the cartoon world). For instance, in this episode A Milhouse Divided, the “lovably stupid father figure” of Homer is seen in many family-based animation television shows (Family Guy, Fairly Oddparents, Jimmy Neutron, etc.) who is seen early on sitting around in his underwear waiting for the party to start while everyone else is dressed and ready. This is representative not of normal fathers but of the Homer archetype we often see used to drive the narrative. The plot in this episode follows two of The Simpsons friends, Milhouse’s parents, who have decided to get a divorce. The comedy and ultimate storyline is based on the reactions to this and attempts to resolve it by the other characters. In Uncle Grandpa’s Escalator, Uncle Grandpa and Pizza Steve get stuck on an escalator, believing their life to be in danger. Extreme response to this is seen in the form of hyperbolic actions by very fictional characters. It is evident that these two shows follow a very different approach to comedy: one show uses realistic situations with believable characters and the other is an intentional fantasy designed to shock the audience into laughter. Both are effective.

As a spectator, I enjoyed both shows. Both provide a quick paced entertainment without any sort of depth. The Simpsons however is more relatable and is more successful I believe. Based on these episodes alone, it could be seen that each show is a satire in some form, a commentary on some aspect of society. Escalator points heavily at the obesity and laziness of Americans and consumers (scenes of fat and bored people eating and looking foolish during this episode point to that). The Simpsons episode is quick to point out early on the desire to have a more refined life, and how that is ultimately impossible for the type of people that the Simpsons represent.