THAR BE GOLD IN THEM STARS: Treasure Planet (Lovefest Entry #2)

Lovefest is an annual tradition done by the Dissolve community wherein people do extensive reviews and defenses of movies they love that have garnered a more negative public reception. This year, Douglas Laman decided to take a look at the 2002 Ron Clement and John Musker movie Treasure Planet.

At this point, the canon of films made by Walt Disney Animation Studios is so dense (it contain 56 films as of this writing) that you’ve got all kinds of different types of movies in regards to how much success they had. You’ve got your out-and-out hits (Frozen, The Lion King, The Jungle Book), you’ve got your bombs that got reappraised as classics (Fantasia and Sleeping Beauty) and then you’ve got your features that bombed but developed a cult following over the years. Hercules and The Emperor’s New Groove most certainly belong in this category as does (to a far lesser degree) the subject of this Lovefest review, Treasure Planet.

The Iron Giant More Than Earns It Status As A Masterpiece Through Incredible Storytelling

I am far from the first person whose ever wrote about how awesome The Iron Giant is as a piece of cinema. Coming at the tail end of the 1990's, a decade that had theatrical American animation reinvent itself as the a huge moneymaker after decades of dormancy after the death of Walt Disney, The Iron Giant was unlike anything else seen in that decades crop of animated fare. Most of the studios chasing the tail of Disney in this era, including the studio behind The Iron Giant (Warner Bros.) were looking to do the kind of musical fairy tales that Disney had turned into box office powerhouses, leading to a lot (and boy do I mean a lot) of animated fare that just boiled down to "Disney knock-off".

Treasure Planet Failed At The Box Office, But It Managed to Find Success With A Song

Welcome to a new bi-weekly column called When Good Songs Happen To Bad Movies, in which I look at pretty well done songs that just so happened to debut in more subpar features.

My past four entries in this series have focused on films that I personally found lackluster, but today, the definition of "bad movies" stretches to include features that underwhelmed at the box office. For you see, I'm quite a big fan of Treasure Planet, a movie from Walt Disney Animation Studios that absolutely bombed in 2002, and I felt contrasting that sort of financial performance with a high quality song contained within the film would make for quite an interesting column.

Big Hero 6 Review

A Heroic Achievement

As one of the biggest Disney animation nerds on the planet (my first word on this planet was Disney actually...I was doomed to this life from the start!), a new feature from the newly revitalized animation studio always gets me excited. Trailers for Big Hero 6 looked terrific, but I was worried, simply due to there being so few movies from the studio that were like this one. Heavy on action (the last time the studio tried that, *hooray!* Treasure Planet, though before that we got *shudder* Atlantis), based on an obscure Marvel character and a potential trainwreck of a lead character...these are the elements that filled me with worry as the movie approached. 

New Disney Animation Film, Moana, Revealed!!

 As a Disney Animation fanatic, nothing makes me happier than the announcement of new projects from the studio. A level of secrecy hangs over the studios future films; the only film beyond Big Hero 6 that's been officially revealed is Zootopia. But today, Walt Disney Animation Studios finally unveiled their other 2016 project, Moana, the newest movie from Ron Clements and John Musker!