When I first saw Chris Sander’s designs for "American Dog", his second animated feature for Disney, I immediately fell in love. Sander’s way of playing with light and watercolor backgrounds impressed me in "Lilo & Stitch" and it looked like he was taking it to a new level with American Dog. But good design does… Read More »Disney goes for Bolt!
Apparently there have been a couple reports of kids who bought or received a Disney Channel Hits CD for the holidays but got something else entirely. While it looked like a Disney CD that Jay Scott’s daughter got as a Christmas gift, the music on it was actually from the Diplomats, a hip-hop group out… Read More »Be on the lookout for fake Disney CDs
We just got the Pirates Of The Caribbean: At World’s End DVD. I had seen it in the theater, but it was my wife’s first time watching it. The film certainly loses something in the translation to the small screen. My wife also felt that… Read More »Pirates of the Caribbean films timeline
Those who saw Disney’s National Treasure: Book Of Secrets this weekend and help bring in the estimated $65 million total for the holiday weekend were also treated to the start of a new trend at Disney — the return of the animated short film. The Goofy short "’How To Hook Up Your Home Theatre" also… Read More »John Lasseter tells it like it is
Much like its American cousins, Disneyland Paris has it’s own riverboat, although it runs on the "Rivers Of the Far-West" instead of the "Rivers Of America", named the "Molly Brown". The boat is named after Margaret Tobin Brown (wikipedia), one the survivors of the Titanic, who later became known as the Unsinkable Molly Brown. Well,… Read More »Will an Iceberg sink the Molly Brown?
VaultDisney (no idea if it’s official) has posted this wonderful piece with Disney’s most famous jazz band The Firehouse Five Plus Two playing "Jingle Bells". It’s a great clip that features an introduction from Walt and some of Walt’s animators as part of the band: Danny Alguire on cornet, Harper Goff on banjo, Ward Kimball… Read More »Christmas Cheer from The Firehouse Five Plus Two
Disney World News has started posting some video on YouTube. There was a nice behind the scenes making of a gingerbread house and now there’s a great summary of the Walt Disney World parks holiday offerings. I am happy to see Disney starting to do more of this. They had a wonderful video podcast going… Read More »A Disney World Holiday Update
I chose not to spend big bucks to attend Mickey’s Very Merry Christmas Party this year, so the first chance my son and I had to see the Holiday offerings at the Magic Kingdom was yesterday. We enjoyed "Mickey’s Twas The Night Before Christmas" stage show. Nothing new, but it’s nice that they put this on with a live band.
I also have to give the cast credit for their energy and professionalism with some of the stale material. Finally, all the characters had the articulated heads and I’m happy to report that the closeness of the audience to the stage was not a problem. You quickly forget that they’re puppets and they become the Disney characters you’ve always loved.
We also saw the holiday parade which has some new floats and a new name – Mickey’s Once Upon a
Christmastime Parade. I miss some of the old floats (particularly the big stern wheeler float) but appreciate the length and the energetic performances put on by the performers. I took some pics and they’re up on Flickr right now (start here and work backward thorugh the photo stream).
I’d love to be able to offer more photos to the readers of The Disney Blog. So, if you’re in the holiday spirit and feel like contributing to a ‘Pro’ level account for The Disney Blog on Flickr, I’ve put a paypal donate button below the fold. Thank you and Happy Holidays.