The Black Hole (1979)

George Lucas once said that movies are binary, ones or zeros, they either work or they don’t… Obviously this quote was early in his career before his own films became a displaycase for a line of toys and merchandising tie-ins, but he makes a good point: you walk away from a film either liking it or hating it.

However, there are things in this world that defy simple explanation, that hover in a twilight between heaven and hell, Möbius loops and unresolvable equations that warp the very fabric of spacetime itself…. There is Disney Studios’ The Black Hole!
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Fantasia (1940)

The Nutcracker Suite

Stokowski’s interpretation of the classic Christmas ballet has a slinky unmechanical timing, lending a sensuality to the tiny naked fairies that bring garden flowers to life and effect the seasons’ changes.

Pastoral Symphony

An overload of Maxfield Parish sunsets and classical pavillions are the backdrop for some of the cutest characters ever to come from Disney. Cherubs, satyrs, unicorns, pegusi, and centars play and frolic in this drunken bachenale that sometimes look like burlesque pin-up doodles.

Dance of the Hours

The only sequence that seems to admire it’s formal ballet source, Dance of the Hours is the most successful, the most modern, and the funniest sequence in Fantasia. It’s an actual ballet as performed by African wildlife that would normally be seen at a shrinking watering hole, but here fantastically characterized as ostrich ballerinas and a corps of elephant dancers blown away on the wind. Attitude spills from Hyacinth, the hippo who is by turns dainty, annoyed, and rapturously pursued by an amorous alligator.

Night on Bald Mountain

The final and probably best known sequence is Night on Bald Mountain where Chernabog summons the dead to haunt a European village until dawn’s light returns him to stone. Watchout for nipples nipples nipples.

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TRON (1982)

There is only about 20 minutes worth of actual CGI in TRON, but Disney Studios still deserves credit for pioneering 3D animation. Even though it was all outsourced, no other animation studio could convincingly create a computerized look with traditional cel painting to fill in the rest of the movie. TRON is a stripped to the bone, minimalist experience of thin lines and smooth gradiants.

So the plot is lame: a cyberworld exists inside a corporate mainframe where nerds are worshiped as gods by their programs. A tyrant called Master Control Programclamps down on freedom in its quest to replace the religion with fear, forcing the programs to die in an arena of video games. David Warner is fun as the snarling sadist Sark. Jeff Bridges seems able to entertain himself. Bruce Boxlightner is as stiff as Dudley Dooright, and poor Cindy Morgan has little to do but be the girlfriend.

But the artwork is as visionary as anything put on film. Syd Mead’s light cycles are legendary, as is the violent jai-alai deathsport seen in the movie but absent from the original arcade game (later to become Discs of Tron). Wendy Carlos contributes a memorable dissonant soundtrack in a mathmatical tuning, and Moebius provides costumes that would pass as athletic bicycle racing gear today trimmed with designs made from reflective tape. And the Frisbee…, ugh, nothing says Eighties like tossing a Frisbee to save the world!

Return to Oz (1985)

Fans of the original books beware: Disney Studios and Jim Henson’s Muppet factory go to great detail to lovingly recreate the art nouveau illustrations, but disreguard L Frank Baum’s books! Gone is clever rascal Tip, Princess Ozma’s pre-fem identity and wayward servantboy of Witch Mombi. Some of his children are here, including Jack Pumpkinhead and the amazing Gump made from a hunting-trophy head, a sofa, and and other drawing room furniture. The wooden sawhorse makes a cameo as a playroom rocking horse, and other beloved characters appear without speaking. Ozma herself is practically expunged, appearing only at the end of this overlong film. Don’t even get me started with the Mombi-Langwidere hibrid. Why have they mangled the Oz legacy into this boring snoz.
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