Which Disney Renaissance Film is the BEST? part 8: The Special Effects

It should come as a surprise to no one that the greatest era in Walt Disney's Feature Animation department is arguably the most beloved era of a single company's film making in motion picture history.  After all, not only was Disney at the height of their creative development, but the studio continued to release hit after hit, without any glaring failures in anyone's eyes.  To many who are reaching adulthood today,. these films are what we grew up on.  My first film watching experiences were at least five of the top movies pictured above.  These films have had a profound impact on how we act, how we think, and how we tell our life stories.  

But which of these high ranking movies is the most superior?  How can one masterpiece be better than another?  That is what I will be focusing on for the next several posts.  Which film was the most structurally sound, which was the most superior in one area, and ultimately, which was the best.  Feel free to argue for one of your movies on this list or if you think my list is incorrect, but please understand that this is all opinion based, so it doesn't make someone stupid if they agree or not.  

Here is how the list will be determined.  All 10 films of the Disney Renaissance will be judged on the following categories:

Hero

Heroine

Villain

Supporting Cast

Songs (The Rescuers Down Under gets a pass here)

Musical Score

Animation

Story

Special Effects

Theme/ Message

Each film will be scored on a 1-10 scale.  The higher points you score for a category, the greater the chance is that film is ranked the best.  But please note that just because a film could get two or three 10's in a row, doesn't mean that it is guaranteed a victory.  Keep a close eye on the consistent films.

At the end of the competition, the films will have their scores divided by 10 (nine for Rescuers Down Under), and a winner will be determined when the math is completed.  The winner will receive the next King's Analysis and a special surprise for it on my YouTube channel, NintendoMan64.

This Round: Best Special Effects 

In animation, one particular element that is often ignored is the Special Effects.  After all, when you could create the scope and majesty of a film like The Lion King, why do you need more extra budgeted animators to create over the top scenes.  Well, the special effects in animation are significantly different from special effects in movies.  In animation, special effects are needed for weather, camera pans, fire, stampeding wildebeests, crowds of people, and various other things that in the older days of animation, were done entirely by hand.  In other words, the more handmade effects, the better score you get, or the more unique and original the special effect, the better the score will be.  I think you all know what's number one, but let's go anyway...

10. Hercules 

Look, I'm sorry, Hades.  I don't blame you for the ineptness of your movie's special effects.  I blame the likes of Disney becoming way too reliant on computers to convey animation techniques that just a few years prior were completely hand drawn.  There are several moments where the special effects for Hercules are odd and poorly constructed, but by far the most gruesome (at least for my standards) is the big Hydra battle in the middle of the movie.  When Disney used CGI to construct characters (The Magic Carpet of the Cave of Wonders from Aladdin), they either blended in with the rest of the colors and lighting so well that we ignored the fact that it was animated using a computer, or the character didn't dominate the entire scene.  In fact, a number of times when the Cave talks, we cut down to a character's reactions.  But the Hydra fight was one of the centerpieces in the movie, and the Hydra's CGI design really contrasts with the 2D Hercules.  Maybe it isn't too bad, but it's enough to shut the door on this film's shots at being number one...or is it?

+1 point

9. Mulan

Mulan is not being demonized for weak special effects.  Quite the contrary, Mulan has some of the finer SFX in all of the Renaissance movies.  But the movie's biggest fault is it's lack of original special effects.  None of the big camera movements were that groundbreaking and the whole "turning one into a thousand" thing had been done twice already (see numbers 5 and 3).  Does the Hun army look more realistic than the lifeless puppet crowds that adorned Paris in The Hunchback of Notre Dame?  Yes, but the rest of the movie's effects are unfortunately subpar when compared to the rest.  I guess sometimes, Disney just can't be too unique with their ideas for big action scenes.

+2 points

8. Pocahontas

While listening to the Audio Commentary for The Hunchback of Notre Dame, I heard Gary Trousdale say that many of the effects for Huncback were done at last minute or by hand because the CGI was being used for Pocahontas.  Um...where?  The special effects in Pocahontas are almost downplayed.  Unlike it's predecessors, the film lacks a major scene for the special effects to shine on the limelight.  There aren't many special effects scenes, and when their are, there aren't any original scenes (a storm sequence sounds pretty darn familiar, eh?).  But I'm gonna give this film the benefit of the doubt over Mulan, because the animation is just SO DAMN GOOD!  Let's just say that the effects blend in with the animation...Is that being too nice?

+3 points 

7. The Rescuers Down Under

There are quite a few reasons as to why so few people remember this gem of a film.  Much like Pocahontas, the special effects are very downplayed throughout the movie.  The scenes show off more of the quality of the animation than the efforts of the special effects department, who were hard at work on the major Fairy Tales coming out around the same time.  But from what we got, I am pretty impressed.  The big blustery blizzard in New York stood out to me for a few reasons.  Firstly, because I'm from New York and I've seen the hellish winters we've had to endure here.  Second, Disney rarely covered stuff like snow at that time, especially falling snow.  When Disney takes the time to understand just how to make the most simple things (snow storms, rain drops, sunny days) so good, how can you fault them?

+4 points

6. Beauty and the Beast

Unfortunately for one of the greatest motion pictures ever made, the remaining five films simply had better effects.  But in the film's defense, Beauty and the Beast also came out in a time when both the primary animation art form was being transitioned into the computer age, but also when special effects dominated movies.  1991 was the year for special effects, with Judgement Day obviously taking home the biggest slice of pie.  This motion picture represents a perfect crossroads for animation, utilizing both computers and hand drawn styles to tell a simple love story and embellish it for a new age.  It may not be a crime to have poor special effects, when compared to other films of the time...

+5 points 

5. The Hunchback of Notre Dame

In terms of the era where Disney Animation was transitioning towards overusing CGI, The Hunchback of Notre Dame represents a last effort for a film to challenge the very way we look at special effects in animated films.  Outside of reusing the special effects already used in The Lion King, almost every single weather and other anomaly effect seen in this film is a cut above everything that had been attempted in many of the previous films.  The snowflakes in this film's stunning intro are all given such intricate detail that it flat out astounds me that the designs weren't created in the computer.  The massive fires in several scenes and the incredible "sanctuary!" scene more than set this film's bar almost unreachable.  Disney wanted something big to come of this film, and by god did we get just that...

+6 points 

4. Tarzan

In order to allow Tarzan to fly through the dense jungle and surf down the enormous trees that call Africa home, the Disney Animators needed to rely on a computer program called, Deep Canvas, which allowed the animators to create realistic looking jungles and create an intense amount of depth in every scene the ape man was needed.  And unlike other films of the time, Tarzan's special effects and animation move with almost effortless ease, conveying a truly action packed universe.  I am still honestly impressed that Disney didn't just rehash the animation used in another film to generate the same kind of feelings for this film.  Impressive...most impressive...

+7 points 

3. The Lion King

In an effort to make The Lion King stand out more in comparison to the three Fairy Tales that had preceded it, Disney Animators and Storytellers knew that they would need to pull out all the stops in order to give us the epic sights and sounds of a continent that back in 1994, we knew little about.  Disney turned to the CGI department to turn a simple little storyboard idea (which actually took 2 1/2 years to completely storyboard) into a massive scene of intensity that almost certainly forces one to have to see this film in theaters.  The wildebeest stampede is one of the most ingenious moments in Disney History and continually stands out as a cut above the rest of the department's work at the time.  Along with the great work here, special effects were also used for many other epic scenes, such as the finale to "Be Prepared", the final battle, and Mufasa's Ghost scene, all of which make The Lion King one of the most famous motion pictures of all time.  Period.

2. Aladdin

As I've stated on several occasions in several different articles, in the early 1990's, the animators all pushed themselves to create a film that could be much better and far more artistic than the previous one.  In the case of Aladdin, the animators succeeded in creating a gripping, action packed environment that kept audiences on the edges of their seats in 1992.  Almost every single CGI element in the film blends with the 2D animated characters so well that one could easily assume that the Magic Carpet was hand drawn.  Whereas Beauty and the Beast focused more on telling a story with the help of special effects, in Aladdin, the effects and the story go hand in hand on many occasions, such as the intense escape from the Cave of Wonders and the epic showdown between Aladdin and Jafar, each coexisting almost too well to be true.  Aladdin truly is the king of CGI/2D blending...

+9 points 

1. The Little Mermaid

But once again, the fully hand drawn outwits the CGI aided 90's films.  There is just some kind of element about The Little Mermaid which instantly makes me think of Disney's most technically perfect motion picture, Pinocchio.  In fact, many of the epic ocean scenes were drawn both from influential designs from Kay Nielsen and from the masterful oceanic escape from Monstro in the film's climax.  Disney went all in on their first Fairy Tale in almost 30 years, giving
The Little Mermaid a sense of belonging in the Disney Canon.  The sheer fact that all of the effects in this movie (minus King Triton's rainbow at the finale), in an age where animation was almost being removed from theaters and television altogether for Disney, is mindboggling.  This is what happens when animators, executives, musicians, and many others placed their trust and faith in one another to create a visually stunning film, and The Little Mermaid gives us precisely what we asked for...

+10 points 

Current Standings

1. Aladdin                                                   68 pts 
2. The Little Mermaid                                61 pts 
3. The Lion King                                        61 pts 
4. Beauty and the Beast                             60 pts 
5. The Hunchback of Notre Dame            49 pts
6. Pocahontas                                             32 pts
7. Tarzan                                                     31 pts
*8. The Rescuers Down Under                  27 pts
9. Mulan                                                     26 pts
10. Hercules                                               25 pts

Next Round, we tackle the greasy underbelly of the Disney Renaissance: the Stories.  All I'm gonna say, is I hope that Pocahontas enjoyed it's nice little run here...