I had always wanted to watch Steel and America, the 1965 educational film produced by Disney for the American Iron and Steel Institute. I finally found a link to the whole documentary.
 

This just in from Michael Goldberg:

[I noticed this in an article on the TCM Website about DeMille’s ‘The Ten Commandments’! I had not seen this referenced before! Thought it might be of interest!

According to a May 1954 version of the screenplay, the look of the pillar of divine fire was suggested by the dcor paintings done by Pavel Tchelitchev for the Ballets Russes de Monte Carlo version of the ballet "Firebird." Studio records add that several of the animators who worked on the pillar of fire, the finger of God, the burning bush and other effects were borrowed from the Walt Disney Studios. The studio special effects report noted that the writing of the commandments on the tablets "was accomplished by animating three different drawings for each frame," and that nine shades of color were used for the pillar of fire.]

Any idea of who the Disney artists were?

[UPDATE:

Steven Hartley says: I recently found a article here on effects animator, George Rowley, and it appears he was an unc. animation supervisor on the special effects on the Cecil DeMille picture.

Todd Pierce says: The Ten Commandments work was done by Ed Parks and maybe others too.

So in essence, the Disney-done special effects in Forbidden Planet lost to other Disney-done special effects in Ten Commendments for the 1956 Oscars.]

And so, apparently, there is not just one, but two movies in the making about the early days of Walt! Here is a link to the website of the second one.

Paul Perrello, who sent me the heads up, wrote the following article about the project:

["I only hope that we don't lose sight of one thing - that it was all started by a mouse."—Walt Disney

One thing that we are certainly not going to lose sight of in the weeks, months and year ahead is Walt Disney.  First up is Tom Hanks’ portrayal of the iconic showman in “Saving Mr. Banks” arriving in theaters this month.  Uncle Walt will continue to get the star treatment in 2014 with word that a major feature film is in the works.

Filming is scheduled to begin on “Walt Before Mickey,” a big screen flick about the life and times of a simple man with a big dream: Walt Disney.  Set in the 1900’s, the film is based on the 2011 book “Walt Before Mickey, Disney’s Early Years 1919-1928” by author and lawyer Tim Susanin.  The book by the suburban Philadelphia writer chronicled Walt’s early years and his rise to success. The foreword to Susanin’s book was written by the late Diane Disney Miller.

The movie version of Walt’s life before the Mouse is being produced by actor and Florida native Armando Gutierrez with filming commencing this month in the Sunshine State. Gutierrez says the movie will offer a “fresh take on a classic American ideal, exploring a part of Walt Disney’s life that little is known about.”

An avid baseball and movie fan Gutierrez, a Harvard graduate, just finished serving as executive producer of “Henry & Me,” a feature film with a star-studded cast of actors, singers and athletes including Richard Gere, Chazz Palminteri, Lucie Arnaz, Danny Aiello, Cyndi Lauper, Paul Simon, Reggie Jackson, Alex Rodriguez and Yogi Berra.

If the Disney movie holds true to Susanin’s book, audiences will get a chance to see a different side to the man who came into our living rooms each week on television to introduce “The Wonderful World of Disney.”  When promoting the release of his book in 2011 Susanin said “if you are looking to understand the creative mind, who was firing on so many cylinders in so many different ways through the 30’s and the 60’s, it is all right there in the first decade.”

For Susanin, a former federal prosecutor, Navy JAG and television legal commentator, his interest in Disney was the result of a family vacation to “the Happiest Place on Earth.”  The author says a 2003 trip to the Walt Disney World Resort with his wife and their three children was an eye-opening experience for him, one that he confesses he never saw coming.  He said at the conclusion of the trip he “couldn’t figure out what hit him,” but left Florida wanting to know more about Disney and as Susanin says “who was this guy who put this together?”

He picked up a biography of Walt and read it on the plane trip home, admitting that he just could not put the book down. He quickly realized that there was very little, detailed information about Walt’s return from World War One and what came next in Disney’s world. “There was no record so I wanted to learn more about that” he recounts.

“I guess it was a good break from the law. It turned out to be a great hobby,” Susanin concedes. “I really liked the guy a lot that I got to know in doing this.” Hopefully that experience will spill over to the movie version of the project.  Other producers signing onto the project include Jeff Rice, who was executive producer of “End Before Watch” and “Lone Survivor” and Christian Vogeler of “Silver Linings Playbook.” The movie will be directed by Ari Taub and could be released by the end of 2014.]

I would love to be able to go to Italy in February to catch this upcoming documentary about Walt Disney and Italy. You can see a trailer at this link. I guess I will have to wait until the DVD release. Oh well...

As Dreamers Do is an independent film about the life of young Walt Disney to be released in Spring 2014. The project scares me. I hope that the people behind it have at least read Tim Susanin's book... I hope that my fears are unfounded.

3 Is a Family



A good friend of the blog sent me the opening sequence of the movie, created by the Disney Studio. Enjoy!

The movie itself does not seem to be worth watching, by the way.

As we know, in 1933 a version of Alice in Wonderland which would combine live action and animation was discussed between Walt Disney and Mary Pickford and a test was shot in Technicolor. Would any of you happen to have access to that footage? I would love to see it.

Lost Laugh-O-Grams found!
One of the greatest Disney-history discovery of the last 10 years (made by David Gerstein and Cole Johnson) is finally official. You can read about it here and here.

I was working this weekend on an interview of special effect animator Dan MacManus by John Culhane from 1972 that was recently transcribed for Walt's People by Robert Kolakowski.

The interview contains quite a few jewels, including the fact that MacManus was actually Mexican, but the two pieces of information that particularly caught my attention were the fact that MacManus mentions that he directed a movie called The Imperfect Crime (a 45-minute mystery) and that he stared in a Western parody, called Grizzly Gulch, directed by Carl Fallberg and Lars Calonius. That movie featured many Disney artists and was partly filmed at Ward Kimball's Grizzly Flats. Since we know that the Grizzly Flats railroad started operations in 1938 and that the movie was filmed before WWII (see CartoonBrew), we can deduct that it was shot around 1939. It lasted 1 hour and fifteen minutes.

Apparently only one copy of the movie survived and for reasons linked to rights we are unlikely to see it anytime soon.

This just in from Jim Korkis:

[The "Lost" Compilation Disney Animated Feature: MUSIC LAND

The little known final compilation film, Music Land, was released October 5, 1955. Disney had created its own company to release its films to theaters but still owed its current distributor, RKO, one more film under the existing contract. In order to fulfill that final film commitment, Disney took a combination of four sequences from Make Mine Music and five from Melody Time to create a new compilation film entitled Music Land. The poster boldly declared it was “The Big Parade of Mirth and Melody!” The film was never shown again except once at a retrospective “Tribute to Walt Disney” at the National Film Theater in 1970. The film contatined the following sequences: Trees, All The Cats Join In, After You’ve Gone, Once Upon a Wintertime, Pecos Bill, Johnny Fedora and Alice Bluebonnet, Bumble Boogie, Casey At the Bat, Blame It On the Samba.]

This just in. You can also discover some great trailers of the movie by checking this link.

[“WAKING SLEEPING BEAUTY” DEBUTS IN THEATERS ON MARCH 26, 2010
NEW YORK, LOS ANGELES, SAN FRANCISCO AND CHICAGO

After a successful festival debut, Waking Sleeping Beauty will begin its theatrical run
with limited releases in New York, Los Angeles, Chicago and San Francisco on March 26, 2010.
Directed by Don Hahn and produced by Peter Schneider and Don Hahn, Waking Sleeping Beauty
was an Official Selection at the 2009 Telluride Film Festival, Toronto International Film Festival
and winner of the Audience Award at the Hamptons International Film Festival.
Waking Sleeping Beauty is no fairy tale, as it chronicles the time from 1984 to 1994,
when a perfect storm of people and circumstances changed the face of animation forever. It is a
story of clashing egos, out-of-control budgets, escalating tensions... and one of the most
extraordinary creative periods in animation history.

In New York, the film will open at the Landmark Sunshine. In Los Angeles, the film will
open on two screens, at the AMC Century City and AMC Burbank. In Chicago, the film will
open at the AMC River East, and in San Francisco at the Landmark Embarcadero—all on March
26, 2010.

Director Don Hahn (producer of Beauty and the Beast and The Lion King) and producer
Peter Schneider (former chairman of the studio), key players at Walt Disney Studios feature
animation department during the mid1980s, offer a behind-the-magic glimpse of the turbulent
times the animation studio was going through and the staggering output of hits that followed
over the next 10 years. Artists polarized between the hungry young innovators and the old guard who refused to relinquish control, mounting tensions due to a string of box-office flops, and
warring studio leadership create the backdrop for this fascinating story told with a unique and
candid perspective from those that were there. Through interviews, internal memos, home
movies and a cast of characters featuring Michael Eisner, Jeffrey Katzenberg and Roy Disney,
alongside an amazing array of talented artists that includes Steven Spielberg, Richard Williams,
John Lasseter and Tim Burton, Waking Sleeping Beauty shines a light on Disney animation’s
darkest hours, greatest joys and its improbable renaissance. Waking Sleeping Beauty is a Stone
Circle Pictures/Red Shoes Production.

WAKING SLEEPING BEAUTY
Running time: 86 minutes
Rating: PG
www.wakingsleepingbeautymovie.com]

This just in from Don Hahn:

[I am thrilled to share with you the news that my documentary, Waking Sleeping Beauty, will be screened at the Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) next month.

Below is a synopsis of the movie along with screening information for TIFF.

I am so excited about this movie and hope that over the coming months you have the opportunity to see the film as it plays at film festivals around the country and ultimately, in theatrical release in the spring of 2010.]

WAKING SLEEPING BEAUTY

From 1984 to 1994 a perfect storm of people and circumstances changed the face of animation forever

Directed by Don Hahn
Produced by Peter Schneider and Don Hahn

By the mid-1980s, the fabled animation studios of Walt Disney had fallen on hard times. The artists were polarized between newcomers hungry to innovate and old timers not yet ready to relinquish control. The conditions produced a series of box office flops and pessimistic forecasts: maybe the best days of animation were over. Maybe the public didn’t care. Only a miracle or a magic spell could produce a happy ending.

Waking Sleeping Beauty is no fairy tale. It’s the true story of how Disney regained its magic with a staggering output of hits - “The Little Mermaid,” “Beauty and the Beast,” “Aladdin,” “The Lion King,” and more – over a ten-year period.

Director Don Hahn and producer Peter Schneider bring their insider knowledge to “WSB”. Hahn was one of the Young Turks at Disney who produced some of its biggest sensations. Schneider led the animation group during this amazing renaissance and later became studio chairman. Their film offers a fascinating and candid perspective of what happened in the creative ranks set against the dynamic tensions among the top leadership, Michael Eisner, Jeffrey Katzenberg and Roy Disney (the nephew of Walt).

The process wasn’t always pretty. The filmmakers bring a refreshing candor in describing ego battles, cost overruns, and failed experiments that others might prefer to forget. During times of tension, the animators’ favorite form of release was to draw scathing caricatures of themselves and their bosses. Director Hahn puts several memorable ones on display and marshals a vast array of interviews, home movies, internal memos and unseen footage.

Announcing the world premiere of “Waking Sleeping Beauty” at the 2009 Toronto International Film Festival (http://www.tiff.net), the festival’s documentary programmer Thom Powers said, “’Waking Sleeping Beauty’ celebrates the rich history of Disney animation and honors the many writers, artists, and composers who created the Disney magic. The treatment is so thorough that it includes key figures who famously left Disney such as Don Bluth, John Lasseter, and Tim Burton. At one time, children imagined that Walt Disney’s signature meant a film was the creation of one man. This is a more grown-up portrayal that reveals the collaborative, often contentious, experience in all its complexity.”

WAKING SLEEPING BEAUTY

September 12th at 9:30am Press/Industry 1, AMC 9
September 16th at 6:00pm Press/Industry 2, AMC 9

September 15th at 6:00pm Public Screening 1, AMC 7
September 17th at 3:00pm Public Screening 2, AMC 9
September 19th at 10:45am Public Screening 3, AMC 5

This just in from Sebastien Durand:

[Romy Schneider was a big star in in Europe (and remained so until her untimely death). While she toured the US to promote her film about Queen Victoria’s Young Years (or The Story of Vicky as it was known there), she visited Disneyland (I have not been ablo to locate pictures of it). Apparently, there were talks at some point of her appearing in Third Man on the Mountain. But she wanted to get away from the saccharine image she had at the time (her three Sissi movies about the life of Austrian Empress Elisabeth had been a huge hit), requested many changes to her character and a star treatment that the studio was not willing to grant a European actress. Talks broke and the role went to Janet Munro instead.]

This just in from Amid Amidi:

[Today on Cartoon Brew TV we're presenting a lost piece of Disney-related history: the Van Beuren short "Dinner Time" (1928).

Why is it lost Disney history?

This is the film that inspired Walt to pursue making "Steamboat Willie". It was a sound film that Walt saw in New York in 1928 and which made him realize that he could do a better job of combining sound and animation.

"Dinner Time" is specifically mentioned in a letter from Walt Disney to his brother Roy and collaborator Ub Iwerks. Excerpts from the letter are reprinted in the Disney bios by Neal Gabler, Bob Thomas and Michael Barrier, but the actual film hasn't been seen in 80 years.

We're presenting the short exclusively on Cartoon Brew TV. You can see the original short as well as hear a newly recorded audio commentary by animation historians Jerry Beck and Mark Kausler. It's free to watch, and feel free to embed the video directly if you're so inspired!]

Check out this page to see the short.

This just in from Are Myklebust:

[Referrering to the posting at Mark Sonntag's blog "Walt's early gig" (April 25, 2008)

Walt Disney quoted in Bob Thomas biography:

"The Newman was playing a Cecil B. DeMille picture, Male and Female, and all I had to work with was a standing photo of the stars Gloria Swanson and Thomas Meighan. Well I thought it would make a better ad if they were lying down, and that's how I drew them."

Could it be this photo (above)?]


[Here is another still from ”Male and Female” (1919)]

Are you as excited as I am about Ted Thomas' next movie / documentary "Walt & El Grupo" which focuses on Walt's visit to Latin merica in 1941? Then you should check the newly launched site that will give you more information about the progress made on this soon to be released project.

Ted Thomas, by the way, is the director of Frank & Ollie and Frank Thomas' son.

Now if someone knew when J.B. Kaufman's long-awaited and equally exciting book on the same subject will be published...