now if only Disney can do something about their "retellings" of Pocahontas, The Hunchback of Notre Dame, and all the other stories they've "lightened" up and reworked for the benefit of ruthless saturation marketing to children.

My 12 year old daughter, 10 year old son, and I whooped it up at this movie. It was a hilarious self conscious send up of all things Disney. I adored Amy Adams in the lead role. She was portrayed the ingenue ironically and sympathetically at the same time. It would have been easy to play Giselle as a caricature, but Adams went for the truth of the character and I'm sure this will be a role that will launch her career.

Oh, and Susan Sarandon as a wicked queen? Brilliant.

Wow, zra. I wanna party with you.

I wasn't too hot on seeing this but went anyway over the weekend with some friends--and I was quite charmed by it. Amy Adams was really a joy to watch.

What's wrong with "Little Mermaid?"

Now if only Lawrence Lessig could do something about Disney's re-branding of cultural heritage as copyrighted commodities under a hog-pile of lawyers. 70 years plus the life of the author, my eye.

Yeah, I was shocked how Disney made the Indians in Pocahontas look noble and fearless and one with nature.

I too can't stand the way that Disney fluffs over the sour truths in our society! Everyone knows that toasters aren't brave!

I guess the traditional Grimm's Fairy Tale versions are more to the Disney-Hating-Curmudgeons's taste: like where the wicked stepsisters cut off chunks of their own feet to fit into the slipper; or where the stepmother of the Goose Girl gets driven through town, naked, in a horse drawn keg with nails driven through it, or when many and sundry people get mutilated, have their eyes plucked out, etcetera...

I guess I'll take the homogenized versions, after all. (But the Little Mermaid's huge eyes still scare me.)

My mother dragged me to see Little Mermaid when it came out in theatres years ago.
We both walked out of the movie pissed that she hadn't ended up as sea foam or ocean breeze as she should have...

ooh...Disney Hating Curmudgeon. I like that. I'll have to use it.

When I invited my boyfriend (the original Disney Hating Curmudgeon) to go to a family reunion at Disneyworld, he said (direct quote): "I'd like to go, but I hate their iconography."

okay...i don't hate disney. the kiddeaux and i are fond of watching disney flicks quite a bit. Fantasia is one of our top five but...I'm just trying my best to avoid having to buy heaps of this stuff for my kids because everyone else in their class has it.

Aladdin 5: Jasmine's Revenge? Beauty and the Beast 3? I know those don't exist, but the current formula for Disney cartoon movie success seems to be to create a great storyline in their usual style, market the hell out it in every way conceivable then to keep that stuff selling, they crank out three or four more sequels which (to me) kinda cheapens the original...

Sure it works but...

you don't wanna party with me DDD, really. I'm old, I'm cranky, and I go to bed early.

A little info that might make you a bit happier with Disney, zsa: I read recently that the new head of Disney Animation is putting a nix on the crappy direct-to-DVD cash-in sequels. So there you go.

Wait a minute. What the hell kind of name is zsa?

A little info that might make you a bit happier with Disney, zsa: I read recently that the new head of Disney Animation is putting a nix on the crappy direct-to-DVD cash-in sequels. So there you go.

Wait a minute. What the hell kind of name is zra?

it's irish.

I love Steamboat Willie.

I love the Robert Smiegel (? Not sure if that's spelled right; anyhow he's the SNL cartoon guy and the Triumph the Insult Comic Dog puppeteer) cartoon that made fun of the endless Disney sequels like "Aladdin 5" as Zra sez.

At the end of the 'commercial' which includes the part about "Hurry, before they're back in the Disney vault!", the kids accidentally stumble into the Disney vault, which has stacks of racist "Song of the South" movies and also the defenestrated, frozen head of Walt Disney.

Good fun!

Girl From the North Country,

"defenestrated" meaning the head was thrown from a window? Please explain.

"Decapitated" or "Removed by surgeon after death to be cryogenically frozen" would have been more precise, but I think defenstrated is funnier.

Good catch!

Though I hadn't heard the version of the story where Cinderella's sisters chop off parts of their feet to fit into the slipper, I prefer it already.

At the end, at the Royal Wedding Banquet, crows fly in and peck out the eyes of the wicked stepmother and sisters, too!

and did you ever notice none of the Disney princesses have living mothers? Belle, Ariel, Jasmine, Pocahantas, Cinderella, Snow White...what's up with all the dead mama's?

I don't understand the mindset of 'it has become popular so we must hate'. Me personally I loved the disney movies when I was younger and I'm not going to say they haven't been sensored for children but be fair people, they were marketed to children. I cried when Mufasa died in the Lion King, imagine the buckets there would have been if the heroine turned to sea-foam. You want that ended go watch anime (not that I'm knocking anime, I love it).

I liked enchanted both on it's own and as a joke but if happy endings aren't your thing what are you doing watching disney? It does exactly what it was designed to do. Although the sequals are rubbish. The only sequal I liked was Cinderella 3 and that's only because I'm a big fan of time-travel, time-paradox things (hence the love of Doctor Who).

I love Enchanted because of the prince and princess

um, people you gotta remember these movies were made for kids, do you honestly want them watching the truths behind stories and then having no imagination because they will be so full of reality that they won't have any room for fantasy?

I don't know why you watch Disney if all your going to do is complain. I grew up on Disney and I love it. If all your going to do is dog on it. Then just don't watch. Very very annoying. There called "fantasy" for a reason.
But very true about the no mother thing. Whats up with that??

Disney is a way for young children to escape reality and tap into the creativity they need to enjoy their young lives. There's nothing wrong with some fantasy, unrealistic ideals of love, or yes a "brave toaster".

Disney isn't primarily about fostering children's creativity though--they're primarily about making a lot of money, and willing to co-opt children's fantasy lives in pursuit of that goal. "Buy x from the Princess line or..." Or what?

Walt sold the rights to put Mickey Mouse on school writing pads in 1929; the Mickey Mouse Club followed a year later. In management speak, it was vertically integrated synergy: use the cartoons to push merchandise and theme parks, use merchandise and theme parks to flog the movies. As Walt’s brother Roy put it: “The sale of a doll to any member of a household is a daily advertisement in that household for our cartoons and keeps them all ‘Mickey Mouse Minded’.”