Watching "Tangled"

So this post isn't technically about planning my vacation, but all the podcasters recommend watching Disney movies as part of the spiritual and emotional preparation for visiting "The World," so I took John to an opening day afternoon screening of "Tangled," the 50th full length animated movie in Disney's canon.

Now one would think that the Wednesday before Thanksgiving would be a big day for movies, and since Tangled had just come out, I thought it would be best to get to the theater a good hour before show time in order to secure our tickets. John smiled and nodded when I told him we would be leaving this early, and the slight hint of bemused judgement in his eyes did little to dissuade me from my excessive punctuality. When we made it up to the 3rd floor of the 34th St. multiplex, we were greeted not by masses of little girls in princess outfits and their tired mothers, but by a nearly empty theater inhabited only by two old queens and the cleaning lady. "Well, at least we got good seats," I said, cheerfully.

I came of age in a weird time in the Disney chronology. The animated movies that came out when I was a child the mid '80s were the forgettable "The Great Mouse Detective" and the terrible "Black Cauldron," neither of which my parents took me to see. I was seven when "The Little Mermaid" came out, a film no seven year old boy will admit to liking, let alone memorizing the words to "Part of Your World" in his swimming pool. By the time the "boy friendly" Aladdin and The Lion King came out, I was a pre-teen and preferred artsier fare. I do remember going to theatrical re-releases of some of Disney's classic films.  As a little kid my parents took me to Cinderella, Pinocchio and 101 Dalmatians. I lasted for about five minutes of Sleeping Beauty before my mother ushered me out of the theater screaming and crying. What? Maleficent is SCARY.

Tangled is a clear attempt to hearken back to the classic Disney films, before Pixar's nuanced characters and Dreamworks' noxious parodies render the brand completely obsolete. And the movie works for the most part. Despite its obvious cribbing of past success, the story is fun, the tone sincere without too much senimentality, the voice actors proficient, and the look beautiful. The 3D actually enhances the animation, and the mix of computers and hand drawing is seamless.

Is this the dawning of Disney's 3rd (or is it 4th) golden age? Who knows? Now that Disney has acquired Pixar and is not just distributing their movies, they don't really need another golden age.

And no new Disney song will ever be able to top this one.