If you didn't grow up with Bluth's work and only know his studio's output from the later years (the unyielding torrent of direct to video Land Before Time sequels)...you really owe it to yourself to watch his studio's earlier stuff. It came at the moment where he had just struck off from Disney, disenfranchised by the output of the other major animation houses, and has his clearest vision.
The Secret of NIMH is, IMHO, one of the finest animated movies ever made, but An American Tail, the original Land Before Time and All Dogs Go to Heaven are all masterpieces in the own and couldn't really be matched in terms of narrative and animation excellence until the early Pixar movies. They definitely have a distinct aesthetic and a certain style of animation and storytelling unique to the production house.
They lost their way somewhere, I think it was Rock-a-Doodle, and the studio just started hemorrhaging money and losing connection with their audience. Their last two major gasps were Anastasia, a beautifully animated film with a poorly targeted audience demographic and Titan A.E., an ambition mixed-media project, which apparently ran out of money (among other problems) during production and resulted in some hilariously bad computer generated graphics at the end but I think stands up better than Disney's Treasure Planet response.
In the end, the studio floated themselves on cheaply produced, but child friendly, direct to video sequels of The Land Before Time, which is notable as being an unbroked series of sequels dating from 1988 to 2016 which at least has had the advantage of being a series of characters I can share with nieces and nephews who also grew up with the same characters...almost like Star Wars.
Treasure Planet was a labored planning process starting soon after (and some sources claim before) The Little Mermaid, so it's not entirely fair to call it a response to Titan AE. Convergent evolution at work.
Also, if you are going to point fingers at possible reasons that Bluth's studio failed, its hard not to point more directly to the interesting but failed experiments that were its LaserDisc games division (Dragon's Lair, Space Ace, ...).
It was a good read. I have been saying how I can't stand how kids are served at Disney and Nick. Every show has someone kissing someone or some other story-line that is good for teenagers but for kids 6-12 year-olds they just see it as "Not Kiddy."
Parents are side notes and they are either dead or your on an awesome Cruise Ship School without your parent. Also everyone is always happy happy or they are sad because they are disappointed. If it is sad and disappointed the plot line is 100% they get what they wanted and now are happy no matter if it was due to bad choices by the main character.
I don't let my kids watch much TV and I just watch YouTube Science videos with them at night (Why is Science and Social Studies the enemy of Math and English and must be only studied every other year or not at all for K-7 grades?) Books usually have better story lines, but I don't have the time to read to them more than about 10-15 minutes :(
Disney produced animated TV shows aimed for kids are the worst. The pattern is really set:
1. There is a problem.
2. The problem is fixed with either "pixie dust" or a "Mouse ka Tool". Both fix problems magically and immediately. They require no work, sacrifice, or even waiting from the characters
Pixar's rule of "Coincidences to get characters into trouble are great; coincidences to get them out of it are cheating" applies here
Hopefully with Lasseter at the helm things will change drastically not just for Disney movies, but for Disney TV shows as well.
It is to a degree. It's also for a different audience and purpose. I should have been more specific. I was referring to Disney shows targeted towards really young children as educational like Mickey Mouse Clubhouse or Jake and the Neverland Pirates
There's one for Big Hero 6 too. Don't care much for the animation style; if they're gonna go 2D I'd rather they used something that looked smooth and dynamic, like Kim Possible. But plot-wise it keeps up much of the vibe of the film.
Great little article. I was just talking to my mom the other day and I mentioned that I never forgot the day we were in the McDonald's drive-thru and I somehow convinced her to spend the 5 extra bucks to get the Land Before Time on VHS. I haven't thought of those movies in the article in years, and never knew the same team was behind them. I just remember being a kid and knowing that something was different about those films that separated them from other kids movies, even throughout the entire '90s. It's definitely an aesthetic that sticks with you, I can attest!
The Land Before Time really stuck with me. My parents went to a banquet dinner at some hotel, and all the kids were kept in an adjacent room with some baby sitters. I remember them turning the lights down, wheeling in the TV and VCR. I remember us all sobbing. I don't remember the exact storyline, but I remember the mood. One of my most vivid childhood memories.
1) My first thought on reading this: 'LaTeX never seemed all that melancholic to me..." took a second to get reoriented
2) A lot of his films were favorites of mine in childhood, and I didn't know until much later that they shared a creator. Having said that, two of the disney movies mentioned here as not being so great, "The Fox and the Hound" and "The Great Mouse Detective," were also childhood favorites.
3) For anyone thinking "they don't make them like that anymore," I'd highly recommend you watch and then make it all the way through "Adventure Time." The Ice King's arc is as sad and haunting as anything in Bluth's works. Season 9 begins with the effects of PTSD, complete with auditory hallucinations.
When I was young, Don Bluth movies, along with few others, were placed by my mother on that high shelf I couldn't reach of movies that made me sob uncontrollably and spend the rest of the day depressed.
If you publish an article that uses embedded media, please don't do it like this. Not one of the media embeds in this article is accompanied by anything resembling a useful byline or caption.
I am reminded how much these films contributed to my learning to embrace change and loss. I think I would be much more inclined to run from these things if it were not for these films.
The Secret of NIMH is, IMHO, one of the finest animated movies ever made, but An American Tail, the original Land Before Time and All Dogs Go to Heaven are all masterpieces in the own and couldn't really be matched in terms of narrative and animation excellence until the early Pixar movies. They definitely have a distinct aesthetic and a certain style of animation and storytelling unique to the production house.
They lost their way somewhere, I think it was Rock-a-Doodle, and the studio just started hemorrhaging money and losing connection with their audience. Their last two major gasps were Anastasia, a beautifully animated film with a poorly targeted audience demographic and Titan A.E., an ambition mixed-media project, which apparently ran out of money (among other problems) during production and resulted in some hilariously bad computer generated graphics at the end but I think stands up better than Disney's Treasure Planet response.
In the end, the studio floated themselves on cheaply produced, but child friendly, direct to video sequels of The Land Before Time, which is notable as being an unbroked series of sequels dating from 1988 to 2016 which at least has had the advantage of being a series of characters I can share with nieces and nephews who also grew up with the same characters...almost like Star Wars.