Disney Marathon: ‘Peter Pan’

05/07/2021 by gfunk101

The significance of this entry didn’t occur to me until about three days after I watched it. I’m an established adult and I’m watching through every Disney movie, and now there’s a movie about endless childhood. Huh.

For those just joining us, this is a movie marathon with a twist. Myself (cranky 40 year old blogger), my son Josh (10 year old Nintendo obsessive) and my daughter Amelia (drama llama 8 year old princess) are watching Disney movies in a random order and ranking them. We hope to see interesting differences in how we organise our lists.

Film: Peter Pan

Released: 1953

Director: Clyde Geronimi, Wilfred Jackson, Hamilton Luske

Cast: Bobby Driscoll, Kathryn Beaumont, Paul Collins, Tommy Luske, Heather Angel, Nana, Hans Conried, Bill Thompson, Candy Candido

Plot: In the early 1900s Wendy Darling is facing to face the prospect of growing up and moving out of the nursery where she takes on a second mother role to her younger brothers. The three children are instead whisked away to the magical Neverland by the impish Peter Pan.

Review: Like so many Disney animated features this movie went through many years of problematic development. Walt Disney was keen to make this the follow up to Snow White and the Seven Dwarves, but the project was delayed through copyright negotiations with Paramount Studios, a bidding war with Fleischer and then the period of WWII where Disney Studios was roped into producing propaganda. What separates out this project from many other troubled productions is how well the final product came together. It’s no wonder that Walt was set on getting this project underway, the core themes of the story line up neatly with the animator’s attitude towards creating media and theme parks.

Peter Pan is also a film that you’ll feel familia with even if you’ve never sat down and watched it through for yourself. Peter Pan (voiced by the tragic Bobby Driscoll) and Captain Hook (Conried) feature such effective designs and characterisation that their images are as well known and reused in new content 70 years later. From the Kingdom Hearts games, to preschool-aimed show Jack and the Neverland Pirates, to playing a role in Disney Villain spin-off The Descendants, to being playable in board game Villianous, to being one of the most famous theme park dark rides…this character’s are as closely tied to Disney as the rodent. And that’s not even touching on the expansive range of Tinker Bell focused media and merchandising empire. The jerkwad fairy is one of the most used faces on Disney clothing and accessories.

With the over-saturation of the brand you’d half expect it to be an overblown but passable older piece of animation. If you haven’t seen Peter Pan, or haven’t revisited it since childhood, you’ll likely be surprised had how good it is. This movie functions as a showcase of some of the best animation produced in the early days of the studio. The shot of Peter’s face being lit up and revealed for the first time is stunning by the standards of any day, and that’s being they get the nonsensical but delightful Neverland with it’s population of pirates, mermaids, Lost Boys and…um…

Just to keep the focus on the animation for the now, the movie feels most like an alternate version of Fantasia with an actual story to keep us interested. We get sweeping landscapes of gas-lit London as the children fly about it, singing pirates, lagoons filled with sassy mermaids, animal-clothed children singing in a forest…there’s a delightful sense of magic here. They’ve achieved a careful balance of child-like imagination and fantasy adventure.

As you no doubt know, there’s a few parts of the movie that have aged very, very poorly. The stereotyping of Indians is pretty cringeworthy and have absolutely contributed the generations of children accepting these misrepresentations at face value. The role of Tiger Lily in the story makes it difficult to simply cut the sequence out, with ‘What Make’s the Red Man Red’ reaching peak discomfort. That said, I think Disney made the right decision to leave the film intact as a document of animation history, as acknowledging out changing attitudes is more important than covering up uncomfortable artefacts of the past.

Although I’m glad we never visited Cannibal Cove. What’s at Cannibal Cove, Disney?

Now that we’re past the uncomfortable part, this is a movie worth checking out still. It’s fun, it moves at a good pace, its got a strong heart at the core and the animation is a work of art.

Best Song: ‘A Pirates Life For Me’ is easily the catchiest. It’s just a shame it’s so short.

Coolest Easter Egg: Hans Conried is best known for playing Captain Hook, but in tradition with the theatre history of the story he also plays the children’s father, George Darling.

Weirdest Trivia: Although there have been many productions of the classic story on both stage and screen, this was the first time Peter had been played by a male performer, and the first time Tinker Bell was given a humanoid appearance rather than appearing as a bright light.

Rating: EIGHT out of TEN

THE RANKING

Click those titles if you want to see what we said about the other movies.

AMELIA

Amelia couldn’t quite articulate what she liked about this movie, but I have a feeling it was very fairy and mermaid based.

Raya and the Last Dragon
Frozen
Moana
Tangled
The Little Mermaid
The Rescuers
Peter Pan
Emperor’s New Groove
Zootopia
Lilo & Stitch
Atlantis: The Lost Empire
The Great Mouse Detective
Home on the Range
The Nightmare Before Christmas
Mulan
Hercules
Alice in Wonderland
Cinderella
Wreck-It Ralph
Bolt
Pocahontas
Enchanted
Dinosaur
The Aristocats
The Princess and the Frog
Robin Hood
The Jungle Book
Fantasia 2000
The Lion King
Beauty and the Beast
The Three Caballeros
The Fox and the Hound
The Sword in the Stone
Saludos Amigos
The Hunchback of Notre Dame
Tarzan
Oliver & Company
Aladdin
Treasure Planet
Big Hero 6
Fun and Fancy Free
Sleeping Beauty
A Goofy Movie
Snow White and the Seven Dwarves
Meet the Robinsons
Chicken Little
Fantasia

JOSHUA

I found it good. But it was older than I thought. And Tinker Bell was a lot more mean and selfish than I expected (and I kept calling her ‘Stinker Smell’ 🤢).