Interesting conversation. I watched most of these to death as a child, but it's been SO long since I've seen them...

Even if it was "new-agey" this made sense to me. Animals have no souls so if they are intelligent what have they got to look forward to?

And the whole "Son of the King" struck a Biblical cord I couldn't pass up.

By the way, if you've got thoughts on animal "afterlives" let me know, I'm wondering how to play with that.

Never liked Snow White - *shudders*. The best part in Cinderella is Gus.

MULAN was amazing! Love the music in it. In fact the biggest thing I love in the Disney movies is the music... speaking of which, anyone have any favorite "bad guy songs" from the Disney animated films? "Les Poissons" and "Poor Unfortunate Souls" from TLM are amazing... so is "Mine, Mine, Mine" and "Savages" from Pocahontas...

When re-watching Anastasia I was surprised at the gross scenes in it... if I have kids I would not show it to them until they were older. But I also love the music in that movie. I could listen to "At the Beginning" (played during the credits) over and over again.

I liked Tarzan too. I've never read the books so I can't compare it to them... I did see the old, B&W tv show however which was extremely corny. Umgawa!

And yes, I love the Lion King (add "Be Prepared" to favorite bad guy songs). My pastor loves showing film clips to illustrate his point, and he played the clip from the Lion King where Simba looks into the water, sees Mufasa's reflection, then "talks" to his father. I was blown away by how much the words apply to us as Christians.

Yep. So perhaps it's weird for me to love the bad guy songs (the good ones, anyway). Do y'all like any or am I the only one?

I think I saw most of Anastasia.

I liked Gus in Cinderella too.

Robynwaltz, sometimes the badguy songs are better than the goodguy songs

I love Be Prepared!

There are others, but I can't think of them off hand...

So no, you are not alone

Wow, I only just found this thread.

I really like Beauty and the Beast, mostly beacause of Lumière and Cogsworth.

We watched Fox and the Hound about a zillion times when we were little so I don't like it so much anymore. We went through a phase where we would groan if it was ever put on.

I love The Lion King's, especially 1.5. That was hilarious! I personally loved the art work in the first LK. It was gorgeous. And as for the circle of life thing, I'll admit to liking the song.

I also love Aladdin. The genie is a crackup.
"In case of emergencies, the exits are here, here, here, here, here, here, everywhere!"

101 Dalmatians are hilarious! The very first part when Pongo wraps his leash around Roger I'm sure we've rewound and watched over again a hundred times!

I think Snow White was the worst; it was very creepy for younger kids. And Pinocchio creeped me out as a kid too. I don't like that one very much. Same for Dumbo.

I watched The Lion King again... and was stunned to see anteaters. Anteaters don't live in Africa.

It's still a good movie.

You sure you weren't looking at an aardvark, which does live in Africa, and is very similar?

Nope. I checked. Anteaters.

Which is good, because I would hate to think that I, of all people, would confuse anteaters and aardvarks, which are not that similar at all other than in their eating habits.

I've had a chance to watch a few more movies since this thread was active. Here's an update.

The Lion King still makes me cry.

Alice in Wonderland annoyed me and felt like a waste of time because I could find no perceivable theme to the story except that a young girl ought not always think nonsense.

Robin Hood could have been better in my eyes if the villains had seemed remotely dangerous. The bluesy music was neat though, and I recognized some of the voices from other films.

101 Dalmatians is charming and adorable. I must read the book.

The Little Mermaid has much grown on me, having been working on fairy tale rewrites (and actually seen the movie at a double digit age). The themes are much stronger than I thought, and I'm not mad at Ariel for surviving to the end of a movie where she disobeys her father.

The art in Sleeping Beauty. My word...

Aladdin was pretty good, but I think the characters could have been more communicative. Jafar doesn't get a villain song, so we have to speculate on his motivations more, and it is a bit difficult to tell what he's trying to get out of life. That makes me want to explore his character in a rewrite, but I also wish the movie had done more to that end. The climax also rose too high, too suddenly. More substance behind the power trip would have been helpful.

I think those are all of the ones I've seen more recently...

That's still my favorite of Disney's traditionally animated fairy tales.

Because "traditionally" includes spending a week painting each individual scene so that it looks like an authentic medieval tapestry.

There is a good reason it was the second most successful film in its release year, and a good reason cartoons are not that successful anymore.

In addition to the art, I thought the story had some really neat points. The plot is a rather traditional clash between good and evil, but there were little things that made it more unique than that. The fact that the immortal henchmen never thought of a girl growing up and spent the next sixteen years looking for an infant. Maleficent's throwaway comment about finally getting a good night's sleep really struck me because we so often assume that evil is just throwing a curse and leaving the rest to the magic. In truth, the devil has no time to relax or recuperate. Peace does not exist in the realm of evil.

Still, after sixteen years, one would think the fairies would have learned something about housekeeping and making clothes. What did they do the rest of the time?

Good thoughts on the story.


Not necessarily, but it can mean that.


It is unfortunately realistic that people might go sixteen years without learning something important, since people do it all the time.

Then who sews Rose' clothes? It can't be Slow Joe Crow. He's a villain..

Sleeping Beauty was my childhood, and I still adore it, but I'm finding myself drawn more to the original (morbid ) fairytales now.

I figure that Aurora got so tired of the fairies not being able to cook or sew that she learned to do those things herself.

But how did she learn? What did she wear and eat as a child?

The fairies had a cookbook, so perhaps they had a book about sewing, too. Once they'd taught her to read, she could learn from the books. And I imagine she had an interesting childhood due to the awkward clothes and odd food they gave her.

Little Brier Rose. Another excellent rewrite.

It could make an amusing story.