In a special treat for the girls, we'd agreed to check out The Little Mermaid DVD. The was very much as I recalled: pretty so-so Disney fare, though clearly on the upswing from the 70s/80s low point of the studio. However, what the two of us adults really enjoyed was this Disney/Pixar short film of Hans Christian Anderson's "The Little Match Girl".
Certainly designed to leave you all misty-eyed, especially wile sitting in the warm indoors with all your children gathered around close.
It's also impressive to see how good a piece of animation the Disney animation department is still capable of putting out, even if they're working through master works like recent Disney movies (excluding Pixar) have been decidedly lackluster in regards to both story and animation.
O Rex Gentium
14 hours ago
5 comments:
That was beautiful. I guess there's still some blood left in Disney after all.
+JMJ+
It is beautiful.
It also makes an interesting contrast to Disney's Little Mermaid, because this one stays true to the original ending.
I sent this video around to my interested friends. So far everyone has cried. It's just beautiful.I really love the music. But I don't think that Disney could do a feature length with that sort of ending. Sleeping Beauty is my favorite Disney feature mostly for the music, then the scenery.
I blame Disney's Mermaid for torpedoing our first-choice (for a while) name for Offspring #1: Ursula. Where we were living, it wasn't a rare name--lots of Filipinas named Ursula--and *we* thought (still think) it's pretty. But Disney, every time they make a movie, seize on some name for the villain which they apparently feel is unusable by cultural consensus. I wonder if the rapid turnover of fashion in names these days makes them think twice, or if they just go on ruining perfectly lovely saints' names.
+JMJ+
Opinionated Homeschooler:
I remember the dissonant jolt I felt when I read in (a translated, heavily abridged) Les Miserables that Marius thought Cosette's name might be Ursula. Thanks (or no thanks) to Disney, I had come to think of it as a name fit only for a sea witch. It took a bit of time, but I've since learned to discern its beauty.
Yet Disney's reach is wider than yours or mine ever will be, alas! I think that if I ever have a daughter I want to name after St. Ursula, I will probably "compromise" by calling her Ursuline!
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