"I didn't find a genius, I found an artist." That's probably why so much of his work resonated with me. I missed a lot of his stuff because much of it came out when I was going through that awkward phase of trying to be more adult than adult, I was far too sophisticated for baby stuff, and cartoons were mostly baby stuff. I've come full circle in my middle age and embraced my love or childishness and silliness and especially animation.
For "Once Upon a December" I'd say it works so well because of the character arc you see Anya go through the entire song. Staring out as somber and sorrowful as she recounts the memories of her past, knowing that everyone close to her is dead. She yearns to see or hear the voices of her dearly departed family once more, even for a brief moment. Getting her wish with the dream sequence with all the ghosts of her friends and family enjoying a dance in their palace one more time and being able to dance with her father one last time even if he's a ghost before they depart again for the afterlife. Leaving her still saddened by the loss of everything she had, but on some level is able to accept it and move on with some closure to that chapter in her life. That's something as you say, Disney has never been able to reach in any of their musicals and I love that Don Bluth and his team was able to accomplish such a feat.
Oddly enough, Bluth is the reason why Ireland has an animation industry. I believe Teenage Mutant Hero turtles (British censorship, woo!) was animated in Ireland (I believe in the later seasons actually) and it continues to this day with The Cuphead Show and the Bobs Burgers movie all having Irish teams working on them. Hoo boy. 2 hours and 16 minutes. Strapping in for a ride.
I actually know a lot of the people out there working on those shows! A pal of mine explained this to me when I mentioned I was making this video, was fascinating to realise how his entire career was helped by Don's move to the country.
@@Snips.Snails.Fairytales Unfortunately no, Bluths history with Irish animation began in 1985 with the creation of Sullivan Bluth Studios Ireland Limited. Their first film was The Land Before Time which was produced DURING the relocation to the Republic and lasted from 1985 until (technically) 1995 when the studio went bankrupt (after two name changes). But most of Bluths animation from between 1985 (they JUST missed An American Tail and no more) and the Pebble & the Penguin was animated in Ireland. Cartoon Saloon began in 1999 and by that time, Bluth was back in Arizona heading the 20th Century Fox animation studio. HOWEVER, Tom Moore, Nora Twomey and Paul Young all graduated from the course that was set up with conjunction with the studio in an Irish CALarts sort of way at Ballyfermot College of Further Education. And Don Bluths studio helped them set up that course so in a sort of way, it paved the way for the Book of Kells to happen
Edit: Originally I was unable to monetise the video due to copyright claims which have, after 30 days, finally been lifted. A huge thank you to everyone who supported the channel and video in the meantime, it's been amazing seeing the response, and even better that I'm still able to show everyone the final result without having to compromise on any edits after uploading. Hope you guys continue to enjoy the vid!
Glad to see this got to be seen, but might I suggest DailyMotion or The Internet Archive as backup venues? Can't hurt to have a Plan B or C to make sure all this hard work doesn't go to waste... Keep Up The Great Work, B-Mask!
So happy to see the video come out! Unfortunately I’m a bit low on funds but I just got a new job that pays me way more so I can add you on to my Patreon finally at the end of the month.
@@jaredhebert942 Thank you! I did think about this funnily enough- there's a smaller gig version of this on a google drive and maybe dailymotion is worth looking into as well. I was a bit upset as I really thought I had a handle on what I could get away with, but ah well, at least you can all see it now!
Don Bluth himself is ashamed of it. He wanted to make it darker and give the troll more issues, but the studio and execs forced them to make it "cuter."
This is a such a beautiful, funny, mindful, witty, and in-depth retrospective on animation and musical history. I haven't seen all of Don Bluth's films (some of them, like Banjo the Woodpile Cat and the Bartok sequel I had never even heard of), but I'm so touched that we both share the exact same extreme hatred for A Troll in Central Park, which honestly deserved to win a Razzie more than Thumbelina.
@@altarush . In the 80's he was able to compete with Disney at their lowest point. In the 90's Disney became so successful that it became harder to compete. As a result I'm not sure if Don Bluth was fully in control when he was making films in the 90's. It's been said that Thumbelina, Troll in Central Park, and Penguin with Pebble was made all at once ua-cam.com/video/y42j1Y6StKA/v-deo.html.
I loved the rest of this video- But I really, REALLY want to commend you on the subtitles for the musical sections. I know they must have taken a lot of effort, and they paid off SO well. They are SO funny and while I appreciate the great retrospective of this video in my artistic brain, the jokes in how the subtitles are presented ended up my favourite part because I actually just have an animal brain.
It made me wish more movies and musicals had subtitles that MATCHED the comedic timing of the spoken word. I've always been hard of hearing and let's be honest, most people can't enunciate to save their lives. It can be so hard to understand what someone is saying that the joke can get lost. Reading it helps me immensely but subtitles like you provided. Fantastic.
Ken Page is not only known for King Gator or Oogie Boogie. He was Old Deuteronomy in the original Broadway production of Andrew Lloyd Webber's Cats & the on stage production of Cats that was filmed in 1998. He has reprised Old Deuteronomy more than once.
God, i would be SO down for you to cover "Cat's Don't Dance" and "Fivel Goes West." Always felt there was a whole world of context I was missing out on.
@@BMask Thank you. I'm sometimes concerned when someone else covers a topic before you, like what you want to say has already been said pretty well. But I always like your take on things. Maybe I just like your voice! Seriously, I'd like to hear you VA someday
I'd also be keen to see a video on the songs of American Tail III and possibly IV. While I haven't seen the latter film, I have very fond memories of the songs from American Tail III, and I will admit that I probably wouldn't enjoy them as much without the nostalgia, they certainly felt enjoyable and entertaining to me as a young child.
@@BMask The people want to hear your thoughts! The Gene Kelly choreography! The iconic villain song! The references to how black entertainers were sidelined by the Hollywood system! Max!
Around 2013, а few friends and I decided to watch all of those direct-to-video sequels. In every case, at least one of us had already seen the movie growing up, although it had been years since the last viewing at that point. When we got to Bartok, none of us had seen it. By the end, we were all shocked by how genuinely great it was. Almost every beat, musical or otherwise, understood what it needed to be. I just finished this video and I'm so happy you had that experience, too. It's so obvious Bartok didn't have the budget, or maybe even the aspirations, of Anastasia, but boy did that combo of lack of pressure from the studio and pure broadway talent make a difference. I can only hope more people check it out because of this. It deserves that attention.
Honestly I love the love for Bartok. I feel it's always misunderstood as some "meh"-tier Disney-style fantasy by many, and it had always hurt me to see that style of criticism. Seeing the rest of your thoughts on Bluth's work, only to see you examine (correctly) Bartok as a musical made me have a shit-eating grin and a genuine giggle. Props! P.S. I finally got a stable income and am absolutely returning to your Patreon after a brief college-poverty-induced break.
I recently showed it to my roommate who'd never seen it. I remembered liking it as a kid and hadn't seen it in years. I was telling him "yeah, it's a good, fun romp that I honestly like more than Anastasia." Upon watching it again, I realised I undersold the film, it's so dang good.
@@hanakosan4404 Bartok was originally going to be voiced by Woody Allen, but then it was confirmed that Mr. Allen might be controversial. So Hank Azaria was a safer choice.
@@hanakosan4404 same! bartok the magnificent was my favorite movie for a couple years as a kid mostly bc of him (and the villain, she was awesome) also your PFP and username made me smile, i need to catch up on that series
Musical theater and animation is a match made in heaven, but very few can see it. The failure of King and I means no more animated projects based on classic musicals, the flop of Cats Don't Dance means no more original musicals, and the Disney Reinassance being this double edged sword that did great to the medium, while at the same time creating a new image and standard that would both reject any deviation or half-measured attempt at competing (Quest for Camelot, Ferngully, We're Back) and some times rejected by Disney themselves (Brother Bear, Home on the Range, de-Kingdom of the Sun-ified Emperor's New Groove). It's gonna be a while until an actual attempt is made again.
I've been watching this retrospective over and over again for a long time, especially when I'm falling asleep, and it's a quality product, man. After seeing a few Don Bluth retrospectives along with yours, it really hit me how many of his films ended up getting somewhat lukewarm reception, and it only makes me admire him and his persistence to keep animating. And I have to admit, Thumbelina became a guilty pleasure of mine to watch while drunk (watching scenes with that damn beetle is like being trapped in a nightmare).
Thanks so much! Always appreciate people picking up on some of the stuff I'm attempting to do- makes it tough to write when you're making points chronologically like that but it helps encourage better structure, getting viewers to experience something almost the way I did as I went through the films.
I loved that you said that Anastasia was well received in Russia because I have a Russian friend who just LOVES this movie. Which kinda surprised me considering the history of romanticizing the Romanovs who where terrible.
To be fair, I've found among Russian friends that the Romanovs are looked on with a bit of hazy nostalgia, particularly because the answer to the question "How could the leaders of Russia get any worse?" was swiftly answered by the very people who threw the Romanovs out.
@@jacksyoutubechannel4045 that probably explains why the characters in the film were so nostalgic for the romanovs themselves. As bad as Nicholas was and how much of antisemitiest he was....at least he wasn't Stalin.
Fun fact: In The Dark Of The Night sounds the way it does (gloriously; one of the best villain songs of the era, easily) because it was produced by no less a songwriting talent than Jim goddamn Steinman of Bat Out Of Hell fame. Doug Walker's comment about it sounding like a Meatloaf number was ironically correct - it was made by the guy who made Meatloaf a household name. It also works because - well - Bat Out of Hell. They dance around saying Rasputin being in Hell ("Limbo", uh huh, sure) but Hell is the vibe, and nobody made Hell sound cooler than Jim Steinman. I don't know HOW they got him, I don't know WHY they got him, but I'm glad they did. (Removing the magical elements from the Broadway musical was a grave error and I stand by that!) Also the *NO PITCHES?* gag made me laugh out loud in real time. Absolute banger video. I've been craving video essays that analyzed musical films through the lens of musicals, and this scratched that itch. You're really quite good at it.
@@broodwars64 I remember liking his stuff, though even back in those days where I still liked Channel Awesome (ahh, the halcyon days of innocence before realizing how fucked up things really were) I HARD disagreed with him on Harry Nilsson's music for Robert Altman's Popeye. It's flawed, but when it works it REALLY works. Glad he found success running a podcast network, after Change The Channel made everybody abandon ship.
This is a wonderful essay that I honestly feel taught me SO MUCH about Don's way of thinking. I've struggled to understand some of Don's storytelling decisions for a long time... seeing his career through this musical theater lens truly makes things click for me.
Thumbelina holds a special place in my heart! It was the first Don Bluth movie I was introduced to as a kid and, yes while not the best and quite cheesy, I still love it! I watched that VSH over and over. Also Let Me Be Your Wings is such a cute song and I will not tolerate the hate for it lol 😆
I cemented a life-long friendship with my college roommate when she responded to my boy drama by giving me the following advice: 🎶"DEAR-ie... marry the mole!!"🎶
As an avid youtube watcher of 10+ years, this is genuinely one of my favourite videos on youtube I have EVER seen, I sincerely mean it. So well put, informative, intriguing, a diamond of an analysis video! Such a blast to sit down with, as the giant animation and musical nerd that I am. Thanks for making this, man :)
Fun fact: all dogs go to heaven 2 wasn't actually a direct-to-video sequel. That's why the animation is so try-hard (if not a bit rushed and unpolished at times), it did have a decent theatrical release.
To a degree, it's due to the budget($8 million) and multiple animation studios working on it, due to problems with the og animation studio involved. There is an interview with the original director(Larry leker pt 2) on animation guild mentioning this stuff.
Now that you mention Doug Walker, I remember him talking about Rasputin's song from Anastasia and how underwhelming the visuals were. Now it makes sense to me why it feels that way. A lot of Bluth's musicals lack that sense of spectacle and staging. A lot of flat camera angles with few cuts, nothing to differenciate the music numbers from other scenes...
@@Dragzilla66 Sorry what I meant to say is Maybe drawing monsters was too difficult to animate without delaying the film??? Bugs are easier to animate fast because their so small. Also the female pink bugs, reminds me of the Pink cats from Banjo the Woodpile Cat.
I am immediately reminded of the fact that Warner Bros had so much extreme doubts over Thumbelina ever being a hit that they tasked the team in charge of Animaniacs to do a short before the film.
@@hanakosan4404 Same. You can actually still find the short in the show itself. It was the song "I'm Mad" for those who are wondering, and it was going to be among a number of shorts that were planned for theaters..... if Thumbelina didn't bomb amazingly.
@@daniexists6 Warner Bros would try to copy Disney again with Quest for Camelot, and that didn't work ether. Except for the ( Prayer) that was pretty good.
Funny that Warner literally did test screenings on Thumbelina and it was negative... Warner then tried another experiment, replacing their logo with a Disney logo in front of the otherwise unaltered film for another test screening..... it was positive 🤯
@@SparkzEnt Fun Fact: the original Thumbelina fairly tale was also poorly received. It was so bad that Hans Christian had to take break to release his next story, which would be the (Little Mermaid).
Linda Ronstadt is quite tragic. She was *huge* and one of the most versatile singers from rock to mexican folk to opera but tragically she lost her voice due to a degenerative disease. There's a documentary on her on UA-cam somewhere, I reccomend it. I'd recomend you listen to the Phillip Glass Album Songs from Liquid Days, in particular the song Freezing. Her vocals are haunting. The whole album is really good honestly.
"An American Tail" really tickles my nostalgia bone in the best ways possible, I had TOTALLY forgot about this movie, i am glad you made this video and unlocked the most hidden memories from my childhood!
The underwater and “Les Poissons” subtitles cracked me up, and here I am, a grown man tearing up over the backstory song for a character in the All Dogs Go to Heaven direct-to-video Christmas Carol retelling.
As an artist who has a barely disguised kink, I completely forgot about Bartok the Magnificent, and now here I am cleaning up pepsi from my screen. You made me shoot my drink out my nose XD
@@Painocus Bartok was originally going to be voiced by Woody Allen, but then it was confirmed that Mr. Allen might be controversial. So Hank Azaria was a safer choice.
I actually saw his production of Midsummer Night's Dream here in AZ. He did a Q&A at the end and said that NIMH was the one movie he had complete control over without outside interference when asked about it. He was very kind and open about his career and you could definitely feel the love he had for music.
The fact you say BARTOK is the best musical hit me hard. Like. I watched it the other day with some friends and I had forgotten the little gem, hearing someone break it down made me so happy. Thank you for making this
It made me so happy seeing someone speak highly of Bartok instead of just dismissing it as a shitty spin off sequel. I watched this movie SO much as a kid we had to get it on DVD as well as VHS cos we wore it out XD
I guess now we can only hope and pray that Dragon's Lair the Movie is still in production, and will be seen by the whole world before his time on this earth ends... soon.
Sadly, people are saying that the Dragon's Lair movie will be on Netflix as a live action movie and will star the man who played Deadpool. Let's hope it dose not happen and they'll change their mind and have it be 2D animated instead.
I remember Marry the Mole more clearly than anything in that movie except Thumbelina getting stripped to her underthings in front of a booing audience and. honestly. I think as a small girl child it changed the direction of my entire life. Thanks. Ms. Field-mouse. I have treasured your marital advice.
Finally, someone else who understands the masterpiece that is An American Tail. As a descendent of the victims of the pogrom who escaped to New York, it just incapsulates the stakes and the trauma of escaping one disaster into another and then finding joy in that trauma.
youtube really is a fantastical place where i can find a 2 hour video and then listen to a person talking about a man's career and a movie you've never seen. then you spend half an hour storyboarding rock a doodle doo and running it in a completely different direction and then being sad that version never got made.
I gotta say, I've never been a big musical person but I've always been a big animation fan ever since I was little. Our copies of The Land Before Time and All Dogs Go to Heaven got a lot of repeat watches from five year-old me, and I think the impact those two movies in particular play a big part in why I'm a big fan of Bluth's work. But it's weird, I've just never liked musicals, and most of the reason I tolerated musical numbers in animated films was because of the animation itself. I feel like this video has given me a completely different perspective on musical theater, a genre I'm admittedly not a big fan of, and just how effective it can be in storytelling, especially in animation. I'm not sure I'll ever really be a person into musicals, but this definitely makes me appreciate the musical numbers in Disney and Don Bluth films (at least, the good musical numbers, lol) more than I had before. Thank you for that. ... A part of me wants to see you just rip A Troll in Central Park to shreds, though, because I remember not even liking it as a kid and as a fan of his work by then. Good lord, that movie was dreck. One more thing, I was a very big fan of Bartok the Magnificent when it came out, just because bats are my favorite animal and there's not nearly enough cartoon bat characters. And Jennifer Tilly and Tim Curry were in it too and I adore both of them. I just liked Bartok as a character when he was in Anastasia when I was a kid, and when he finally got his own movie, I felt at though his character was done justice aside from just being funny sidekick character voiced by comedic actor. Really underrated movie, it's nice to see it get some love.
Something I'm noticing is that a lot of the Bluth films that flopped seemed to have extremely bland lyrics, waxing on about love and I swear there was like 4 "if you follow your dreams they'll come true* (*eventually)" lines in as many movies. Heck, Thumbelina _STARTS_ with that. They don't push anything, like you said. They don't further the story. They sort of just reinforce the emotion in the moment. That was one big nitpick I had about his movies, and now I know why. This is probably one of the best retrospectives I've seen, like a lot of people have said. I want to thank you SO much for adding subtitles - I have difficulty parsing out lyrics the first time I hear a song, and obviously this is a video where you _need_ to hear lyrics. Thanks for all the research and great insight you've given. Hope to see more great content. ^^
This video is a year old now... when this video came out, my family decided to marathon all of Don's movies and afterwords I watched this and thought: "Pefect Timing."
I might not 100% agree with every thing said in this review, but I am shocked it took almost decades for someone to FINALLY give a proper breakdown of a majority of Bluth's filmography (if only the musicals, which are the majority to be fair), and to contextualize them beyond the boilerplate commentary you usually see out there. This was a solid breakdown, and I'm glad it randomly appeared in my suggested feed. Also regarding ADGTH 2, you should do frame by frame on that movie sometimes. It has tons of animation errors because there was like 12+ animation teams working across the globe to make that thing on a tight schedule, and the guy who created Cow and Chicken was the character designer on it (yes). It's an absurd movie when looked at frame by frame, but just boilerplate as is. Strangely, based only on a random poster floating around online, it might have been aiming to look like the first movie more earlier on in production.
Compared to Disney, his musicals have always felt kind of artificial to me, like the numbers are mainly there for splash. Compare 'Belle' in Beauty & the Beast with 'Rumor in St. Petersburg' from Anastasia - in the first the characters are doing an exaggerated version of everyday movement that makes it feel like a typical day in that village. In Bluth's movie, the characters are literally dancing, as if they have an audience watching, which gives a stagey, not-quite-natural feel to the whole number.
That's and interesting thought -- I actually liked this about _Anastasia._ It was like a stage musical, but with a depth and scope of set that you just can't fit on a stage.
I love Don Bluth films but I always thought Rock a Doodle was just weird. I think the only reason we had a copy of it at home was because Glen Campbell was our cousin and my mom was always buying stuff with his name on it.
In the Dark of the Night is like the sister to Be Prepared and that is a very big compliment (yes yes Jim Cummings jokes aside). The only thing missing were better visuals, namely, the cartoony bugs. If they had all been imps or little demons like there was concept art for, the sequence visually would’ve been right up there with Be Prepared.
I definitely don’t mind the bugs, but a bunch of demons and undead monsters singing along with Rasputin and all rejoicing in their villainy, would have been so much fun.
One of my favorite things about this channel and these videos, is that on top of telling an interesting commentary on the topic, it also goes all in on the funny bits too. They work with the criticisms or defenses made, but they are also just kind of off the wall and I have no clue where half of them come from, but even if I don't get the joke, I can always hear B- Mask having a giggle about making them, and thats great entertainment. Fish people
I think one of the things about Rock-a-Doodle that makes the "non-musical-theatre" Chanticleer songs work for me (at least theoretically) is that they seem a lot more strictly diagetic. Sun-do-shine bridges the gap between diagetic and representational the best, and so much of me wishes that they had leaned into a divide between it and the commercialized songs more... You said it in the video, but Rock-a-Doodle has SUCH good bones that it makes me so sad at how it seems to miss the mark fleshing them out at every opportunity. I think it's a testament to that about how mesmerizing it is even with it being so absolutely awful.
This video gave me a newfound appreciation for Bluth. I never really gave him or his spotty film lineup much thought but I loved the deep dive into it all here. I now want to watch Bartok the Magnificent, which is something I’d never thought I’d say.
I've actually met two people who used to work with Bluth. They did clean up and some key animation. They were really cool guys, always loved having them when they showed up at my work.
It’s actually fitting they got Glen Campbell to play Chanticleer. Before he got big, Campbell was a demo singer for songs that were given to Elvis for his movies.
Me seeing Bartok the magnificent in the thumbnail, hell yeah. I watched that film over and over as a young kid and rewatched it recently. I was surprised I could still remember it shot for shot and all the lyrics 🤣
I kind of wrote it off with Rock-a-doodle as just another of those movies I loved as a kid that probably doesn't hold up now, but this vid has made me think it's worth revisiting.
Dude keep making videos about literally whatever you want and I'll keep watching them. Your attention to detail and the passion you have for each subject is astounding, seriously keep it up man!
It's good to see you return to the longer form Documentaries on Animated Films, Back in the old Epic Mickey Days is how I found you, but it's great that you finally did a video over Don Bluth, and the focus on musicals no less. Amazing work as always B.
Great seeing such an in-depth, well-rounded video on Bluth! Typically superlative work, B-Mask. (Also hilarious what incredibly short shrift Troll in Central Park rightfully receives compared to multiple direct-to-video films. As it should be.)
Videos like this make me think "How do you have ONLY 70k subscribers?" Totally got me in the mood to look out my Nimh and American Tail VHSes and maybe dive a but further into the musicals rabbit hole. Astonishing video mister Mask, thank you for creating and sharing 🖤🖤🖤
In Ireland Don Bluth movies would air on RTE 2 on a regular basis (except for a Troll in Central Park for obvious reasons). An American tale and The Land before Time were the most common along with Thumblina. At one point it would play almost every year at Easter break. I guess someone at RTE really liked that one.
@@TheHetzer-xy9lb They mostly aired in the 90s and early 2000s. After that only An American Tail and Land Before Time would air the odd time. I wonder if they play them nowadays.
Holy shit, basically all of my favorites from childhood are from this one man... Except for The Last Unicorn, Rower Rockstar, and Swan Princess, but, man - he created almost all of my happy memories from back then...
For whatever reason I’ve been compelled to rewatch this video several times, and pretty much all of the featured songs have been stuck in my head since.
Hearing these all back to back, it's easy to forget that these movies all came out in the 80s and 90s when they sound so old-fashioned. Glad you pointed that out. By this point Disney was seriously diversifying the music in their movies and using more modern sounds.
I'm kind of just starting to dip my toes into the musical fandom, and I'm learning lots of the terminology and going to the theater and stuff. But I am a life-long Bluth stan and omg, this video essay RIPS my dude, best documentary of 2022. We don't talk about A Troll in Central Park lol. I must have slept on the Bartok sequel because I never expected the original team to be behind it! WOW!
The second I came across this video I sent it to my siblings and childhood best friend. This is probably the number 1 topic I can go on about forever and I’m so grateful to listen to someone else talk about it 🤣🤣
This immediately went into my Favorite Video Essays playlist, such a brilliant analysis of the one thing that always made Don Bluth's films what they are. .... Also it's so funny to me that pretty much the universal consensus on Rock-a-Doodle is "this movie is an absolute trash fire, and I wouldn't have it any other way." It's glorious
This is the kind of content I'm very much into and I'm _so mad_ that UA-cam is pushing the algorithm to hide it from me and make sure you don't get paid for your hard work.
UA-cam scares me sometimes. Literally just started revisiting Bluth movies for the first time in ages a few days ago and thinking about them critically since the choices made in a lot of them are just so weird to me. Musically and plot wise. Was dying for a well made longer analysis video about them and this pops up which is exactly what I was wanting to watch.
They probably should have cut down on the amount of songs in All Dogs but I still love it. Burt Reynolds and Dom DeLuise were good friends in real life and have great chemistry on screen together but Burt Reynolds really wasn't a singer. People complain about the Gator song but I would have cut the sharing song first.
You know, after rewatching this several times, I realize that Don Bluth was more comfortable with animals as protagonists than humans. Since the very beginning, he’s done animals (from his start thru Small One or his work on Robin Hood). The only time he’s done humans as protags (if you don’t count Dragon’s Lair and Space Ace) was Thumbelina, which was trying to copy Disney. Same with Anastasia. A Troll in Central Park comes close, but again, the Troll is in the title. So it don’t count. (You could also say that Rock-a-Doodle did it first, but he gets turned into a cat for most of the runtime, so it’s disqualified) Bartok really feels like a mix of both styles. You get the scope of American Tail with the grandiose nature of Anastasia, but with a musical identity that actually fits. I do hope Don gets another shot at making an animated film, but this time he should be given a clear direction. The later films of his career are riddled with barren ideas and little quality control over the scripts. Or he could remake Rock-a-Doodle. His choice really.
Sorry to be that person, but All Dogs Go To Heaven 2 was actually in theaters, it wasn't a direct-to-video release. Fun fact though! Charlie's singing voice was performed by Jesse Corti, who played Lefou in Beauty and the Beast. :3
I love this video so much, I’ve watched it an embarrassing amount of times. B mask never disappoints, he must do so much research. I LOVE WHEN HE TALKS ABOUT MUSICALS!!!
Don bluth just did not have the chops to run an animation studio. Was he a great animator? Oh yes. But he lacked the leadership to discern bad ideas or create synergy with the music and writing department.
So what I have gotten from this essay is that Don Bluth movies are guaranteed to be amazing if the main characters are rodents of some sorts (Secret of nimh, American Tail and Bartok to an extent, with the exception of Land before time, dragons lair and maybe all dogs go to heaven)
Growing up I took in all of Bluth's output backwards, I started off with the cheap Disney era knock-offs before working backwards to the earlier great ones. An in-depth and actually chronological examination of his musical body of work certainly does a lot to help me reappraise my own sadly biased experiences with his output; particularly your take on American Tail where I was always too desperate to get to the brighter, funnier sequel to take the original on its own merits. Lot of food for thought. I've liked your vidoes for some time but with quality like this I've got no choice but to financially support you. Any new upload from you is guaranteed to surprise with its subject matter and assured to entertain in equal measure. All praise aside though, 135 minutes of musical analysis and you can't even devote one to A Troll in Central Park? Was my misspent, sibling-enduced childhood suffering all for naught?
Love the video! Don Bluth was, in my experience, never that big a deal in The Netherlands. Yet his works always comes up and this gives some nice background as to why. Also really appreciate the lyrics. You can see those took time, but it was totally worth it!
This video is everything I love about this channel; your sense of humor, the way you get your points across, the amount of research... This was an incredible watch.
Honestly I think Somewhere Out There hits a lil more cause it doesnt sound like a crazy production. Its just two kids singing about missing each other etc etc Like, it feels more sincere that way even if its not as pleasant on the ears.
This was a lengthy and very well-presented video that went into a lot of depth about these productions, their historical origins, and the various actors at play. The amount of research it seems you went to had to have been laborious, and I very much enjoyed the whole thing. I was so glad you came down with good reviews for Bartok the Magnificent, because I remember really enjoying it as a kid, and I think you're right when you say that the few songs it does have are underrated for what they convey. Always enjoyed that movie, a real gem. Not to mention, the absolute batshit insanity of Rock-a-Doodle will forever be in my brain. Thank you!
Katzenberg: "Get rid of "Part of Your World"
The entire team on The Little Mermaid: "So you have chosen death."
finally some rock-a-doodle content
The Rock a Doodle Fandom is dying! Like if you are a true rocker
There was already a video on it I few days before
I’d rather watch rockadoodle over crap like captain marvel and that good awful has no balls lion king remake which I refuse to watch.
Rock a Doodle was a jam!
Everyday I wake up, and I ask myself.. “where’s the rock-a-doodle content”???
This is one the best retrospectives I've seen, so knowledgable, so entertaining, so encompassing. Thank you for this.
Absolutely.
Great to see you here! I would love you to talk about Bluth!
"I didn't find a genius, I found an artist."
That's probably why so much of his work resonated with me. I missed a lot of his stuff because much of it came out when I was going through that awkward phase of trying to be more adult than adult, I was far too sophisticated for baby stuff, and cartoons were mostly baby stuff. I've come full circle in my middle age and embraced my love or childishness and silliness and especially animation.
For "Once Upon a December" I'd say it works so well because of the character arc you see Anya go through the entire song. Staring out as somber and sorrowful as she recounts the memories of her past, knowing that everyone close to her is dead. She yearns to see or hear the voices of her dearly departed family once more, even for a brief moment. Getting her wish with the dream sequence with all the ghosts of her friends and family enjoying a dance in their palace one more time and being able to dance with her father one last time even if he's a ghost before they depart again for the afterlife. Leaving her still saddened by the loss of everything she had, but on some level is able to accept it and move on with some closure to that chapter in her life.
That's something as you say, Disney has never been able to reach in any of their musicals and I love that Don Bluth and his team was able to accomplish such a feat.
Indeed!
Oddly enough, Bluth is the reason why Ireland has an animation industry. I believe Teenage Mutant Hero turtles (British censorship, woo!) was animated in Ireland (I believe in the later seasons actually) and it continues to this day with The Cuphead Show and the Bobs Burgers movie all having Irish teams working on them.
Hoo boy. 2 hours and 16 minutes. Strapping in for a ride.
I actually know a lot of the people out there working on those shows! A pal of mine explained this to me when I mentioned I was making this video, was fascinating to realise how his entire career was helped by Don's move to the country.
I believe Allspark Productions (behind Transformers Cyberverse and Rescue Bots Academy) are based in Ireland as well.
Did he have a hand in Cartoon Saloon? I love their films, Secret of Kells being my reigning favorite.
@@Snips.Snails.Fairytales Unfortunately no, Bluths history with Irish animation began in 1985 with the creation of Sullivan Bluth Studios Ireland Limited. Their first film was The Land Before Time which was produced DURING the relocation to the Republic and lasted from 1985 until (technically) 1995 when the studio went bankrupt (after two name changes). But most of Bluths animation from between 1985 (they JUST missed An American Tail and no more) and the Pebble & the Penguin was animated in Ireland. Cartoon Saloon began in 1999 and by that time, Bluth was back in Arizona heading the 20th Century Fox animation studio.
HOWEVER, Tom Moore, Nora Twomey and Paul Young all graduated from the course that was set up with conjunction with the studio in an Irish CALarts sort of way at Ballyfermot College of Further Education. And Don Bluths studio helped them set up that course so in a sort of way, it paved the way for the Book of Kells to happen
@@stevena488 thank you so much that is a lot of fantastic info I never knew!
Edit: Originally I was unable to monetise the video due to copyright claims which have, after 30 days, finally been lifted. A huge thank you to everyone who supported the channel and video in the meantime, it's been amazing seeing the response, and even better that I'm still able to show everyone the final result without having to compromise on any edits after uploading. Hope you guys continue to enjoy the vid!
Glad to see this got to be seen, but might I suggest DailyMotion or The Internet Archive as backup venues? Can't hurt to have a Plan B or C to make sure all this hard work doesn't go to waste...
Keep Up The Great Work, B-Mask!
So happy to see the video come out! Unfortunately I’m a bit low on funds but I just got a new job that pays me way more so I can add you on to my Patreon finally at the end of the month.
This singlehandedly made me decide to watch anastasia and and an American tail
So thanks for that man.
@@jaredhebert942 Thank you! I did think about this funnily enough- there's a smaller gig version of this on a google drive and maybe dailymotion is worth looking into as well. I was a bit upset as I really thought I had a handle on what I could get away with, but ah well, at least you can all see it now!
The big nosed polygamous elephant seal moment just crack me up every time. My god, that is brillant.
Its probably better than whatever the filmmaker's had in mind too.
I died 😮😊
"Over my dead body, ill strangle you." is my new favorite Howard Ashman quote
I’m so glad someone else thinks this
gotta love how Troll in Central Park is so bad B-Mask didn’t give it half a minute
Don Bluth himself is ashamed of it.
He wanted to make it darker and give the troll more issues, but the studio and execs forced them to make it "cuter."
This is a such a beautiful, funny, mindful, witty, and in-depth retrospective on animation and musical history. I haven't seen all of Don Bluth's films (some of them, like Banjo the Woodpile Cat and the Bartok sequel I had never even heard of), but I'm so touched that we both share the exact same extreme hatred for A Troll in Central Park, which honestly deserved to win a Razzie more than Thumbelina.
Don Bluth, in my opinion, shouldn’t have tried to copy Disney or anyone else. He should have been myself.
@@altarush . In the 80's he was able to compete with Disney at their lowest point. In the 90's Disney became so successful that it became harder to compete. As a result I'm not sure if Don Bluth was fully in control when he was making films in the 90's.
It's been said that Thumbelina, Troll in Central Park, and Penguin with Pebble was made all at once ua-cam.com/video/y42j1Y6StKA/v-deo.html.
I loved the rest of this video- But I really, REALLY want to commend you on the subtitles for the musical sections. I know they must have taken a lot of effort, and they paid off SO well. They are SO funny and while I appreciate the great retrospective of this video in my artistic brain, the jokes in how the subtitles are presented ended up my favourite part because I actually just have an animal brain.
It made me wish more movies and musicals had subtitles that MATCHED the comedic timing of the spoken word. I've always been hard of hearing and let's be honest, most people can't enunciate to save their lives. It can be so hard to understand what someone is saying that the joke can get lost. Reading it helps me immensely but subtitles like you provided. Fantastic.
Ken Page is not only known for King Gator or Oogie Boogie. He was Old Deuteronomy in the original Broadway production of Andrew Lloyd Webber's Cats & the on stage production of Cats that was filmed in 1998. He has reprised Old Deuteronomy more than once.
God, i would be SO down for you to cover "Cat's Don't Dance" and "Fivel Goes West." Always felt there was a whole world of context I was missing out on.
I'd love to talk about CDD. If I find the right reason, I'll do it!
@@BMask Thank you. I'm sometimes concerned when someone else covers a topic before you, like what you want to say has already been said pretty well. But I always like your take on things. Maybe I just like your voice! Seriously, I'd like to hear you VA someday
@@BMask Please. PLEASE, I beg you.
I'd also be keen to see a video on the songs of American Tail III and possibly IV. While I haven't seen the latter film, I have very fond memories of the songs from American Tail III, and I will admit that I probably wouldn't enjoy them as much without the nostalgia, they certainly felt enjoyable and entertaining to me as a young child.
@@BMask The people want to hear your thoughts! The Gene Kelly choreography! The iconic villain song! The references to how black entertainers were sidelined by the Hollywood system! Max!
Around 2013, а few friends and I decided to watch all of those direct-to-video sequels. In every case, at least one of us had already seen the movie growing up, although it had been years since the last viewing at that point.
When we got to Bartok, none of us had seen it. By the end, we were all shocked by how genuinely great it was. Almost every beat, musical or otherwise, understood what it needed to be. I just finished this video and I'm so happy you had that experience, too. It's so obvious Bartok didn't have the budget, or maybe even the aspirations, of Anastasia, but boy did that combo of lack of pressure from the studio and pure broadway talent make a difference. I can only hope more people check it out because of this. It deserves that attention.
Honestly I love the love for Bartok. I feel it's always misunderstood as some "meh"-tier Disney-style fantasy by many, and it had always hurt me to see that style of criticism. Seeing the rest of your thoughts on Bluth's work, only to see you examine (correctly) Bartok as a musical made me have a shit-eating grin and a genuine giggle. Props!
P.S. I finally got a stable income and am absolutely returning to your Patreon after a brief college-poverty-induced break.
I recently showed it to my roommate who'd never seen it. I remembered liking it as a kid and hadn't seen it in years. I was telling him "yeah, it's a good, fun romp that I honestly like more than Anastasia." Upon watching it again, I realised I undersold the film, it's so dang good.
Bartok was such a comfort character for me as a child and he still is. He's just so funny and adorable
@@hanakosan4404 Bartok was originally going to be voiced by Woody Allen, but then it was confirmed that Mr. Allen might be controversial. So Hank Azaria was a safer choice.
@@orangeslash1667 I didn't knew that; I'm glad they picked Azaria!
@@hanakosan4404 same! bartok the magnificent was my favorite movie for a couple years as a kid mostly bc of him (and the villain, she was awesome)
also your PFP and username made me smile, i need to catch up on that series
Musical theater and animation is a match made in heaven, but very few can see it. The failure of King and I means no more animated projects based on classic musicals, the flop of Cats Don't Dance means no more original musicals, and the Disney Reinassance being this double edged sword that did great to the medium, while at the same time creating a new image and standard that would both reject any deviation or half-measured attempt at competing (Quest for Camelot, Ferngully, We're Back) and some times rejected by Disney themselves (Brother Bear, Home on the Range, de-Kingdom of the Sun-ified Emperor's New Groove).
It's gonna be a while until an actual attempt is made again.
I've been watching this retrospective over and over again for a long time, especially when I'm falling asleep, and it's a quality product, man.
After seeing a few Don Bluth retrospectives along with yours, it really hit me how many of his films ended up getting somewhat lukewarm reception, and it only makes me admire him and his persistence to keep animating. And I have to admit, Thumbelina became a guilty pleasure of mine to watch while drunk (watching scenes with that damn beetle is like being trapped in a nightmare).
Thanks so much! Always appreciate people picking up on some of the stuff I'm attempting to do- makes it tough to write when you're making points chronologically like that but it helps encourage better structure, getting viewers to experience something almost the way I did as I went through the films.
I loved that you said that Anastasia was well received in Russia because I have a Russian friend who just LOVES this movie. Which kinda surprised me considering the history of romanticizing the Romanovs who where terrible.
To be fair, I've found among Russian friends that the Romanovs are looked on with a bit of hazy nostalgia, particularly because the answer to the question "How could the leaders of Russia get any worse?" was swiftly answered by the very people who threw the Romanovs out.
@@jacksyoutubechannel4045 that probably explains why the characters in the film were so nostalgic for the romanovs themselves. As bad as Nicholas was and how much of antisemitiest he was....at least he wasn't Stalin.
@@jacksyoutubechannel4045 The tragic irony
@@jacksyoutubechannel4045 "And then it got worse"
@@rhubarbjinThe poor fellas seriously cannot catch a break. 💀
Dropping everything to watch a two hour video on Don Bleuth because the nice voice mask man made it
I remember seeing American Tail & hearing adults chuckle when Fievel's voice cracked in "Somewhere Out There". It's still so endearing.
Fun fact: In The Dark Of The Night sounds the way it does (gloriously; one of the best villain songs of the era, easily) because it was produced by no less a songwriting talent than Jim goddamn Steinman of Bat Out Of Hell fame. Doug Walker's comment about it sounding like a Meatloaf number was ironically correct - it was made by the guy who made Meatloaf a household name. It also works because - well - Bat Out of Hell. They dance around saying Rasputin being in Hell ("Limbo", uh huh, sure) but Hell is the vibe, and nobody made Hell sound cooler than Jim Steinman. I don't know HOW they got him, I don't know WHY they got him, but I'm glad they did. (Removing the magical elements from the Broadway musical was a grave error and I stand by that!)
Also the *NO PITCHES?* gag made me laugh out loud in real time. Absolute banger video. I've been craving video essays that analyzed musical films through the lens of musicals, and this scratched that itch. You're really quite good at it.
His eye for detail is pretty amazing, it's succint, sharp and to the point and I'm tired of pretending it's not.
If you like musical reviews, his work is quite old at this point in UA-cam years but Paw Dugan's Music Movies series was great.
I like NC 'jokes' have some truth about a work which goes over his head because of his own ignorance and lack of research
God bless Jim. Such a legend!
@@broodwars64 I remember liking his stuff, though even back in those days where I still liked Channel Awesome (ahh, the halcyon days of innocence before realizing how fucked up things really were) I HARD disagreed with him on Harry Nilsson's music for Robert Altman's Popeye. It's flawed, but when it works it REALLY works.
Glad he found success running a podcast network, after Change The Channel made everybody abandon ship.
This is a wonderful essay that I honestly feel taught me SO MUCH about Don's way of thinking. I've struggled to understand some of Don's storytelling decisions for a long time... seeing his career through this musical theater lens truly makes things click for me.
Thumbelina holds a special place in my heart! It was the first Don Bluth movie I was introduced to as a kid and, yes while not the best and quite cheesy, I still love it! I watched that VSH over and over.
Also Let Me Be Your Wings is such a cute song and I will not tolerate the hate for it lol 😆
I cemented a life-long friendship with my college roommate when she responded to my boy drama by giving me the following advice:
🎶"DEAR-ie... marry the mole!!"🎶
As an avid youtube watcher of 10+ years, this is genuinely one of my favourite videos on youtube I have EVER seen, I sincerely mean it. So well put, informative, intriguing, a diamond of an analysis video! Such a blast to sit down with, as the giant animation and musical nerd that I am. Thanks for making this, man :)
Fun fact: all dogs go to heaven 2 wasn't actually a direct-to-video sequel. That's why the animation is so try-hard (if not a bit rushed and unpolished at times), it did have a decent theatrical release.
To a degree, it's due to the budget($8 million) and multiple animation studios working on it, due to problems with the og animation studio involved. There is an interview with the original director(Larry leker pt 2) on animation guild mentioning this stuff.
@@eugeneketaminekrebs3403
I like All Dogs Go To Heaven 2 and The Land Before Time movie Sequels.
Now that you mention Doug Walker, I remember him talking about Rasputin's song from Anastasia and how underwhelming the visuals were. Now it makes sense to me why it feels that way. A lot of Bluth's musicals lack that sense of spectacle and staging. A lot of flat camera angles with few cuts, nothing to differenciate the music numbers from other scenes...
@@Dragzilla66 Maybe bugs were easier to animate than Skeletions???
@@Dragzilla66 Sorry what I meant to say is Maybe drawing monsters was too difficult to animate without delaying the film??? Bugs are easier to animate fast because their so small. Also the female pink bugs, reminds me of the Pink cats from Banjo the Woodpile Cat.
I am immediately reminded of the fact that Warner Bros had so much extreme doubts over Thumbelina ever being a hit that they tasked the team in charge of Animaniacs to do a short before the film.
I would have bought a ticket to see the Animaniacs on the big screen if I were born at the time! I don't care about Thumbelina tho
@@hanakosan4404 Same. You can actually still find the short in the show itself. It was the song "I'm Mad" for those who are wondering, and it was going to be among a number of shorts that were planned for theaters..... if Thumbelina didn't bomb amazingly.
@@daniexists6 Warner Bros would try to copy Disney again with Quest for Camelot, and that didn't work ether. Except for the ( Prayer) that was pretty good.
Funny that Warner literally did test screenings on Thumbelina and it was negative...
Warner then tried another experiment, replacing their logo with a Disney logo in front of the otherwise unaltered film for another test screening.....
it was positive
🤯
@@SparkzEnt Fun Fact: the original Thumbelina fairly tale was also poorly received. It was so bad that Hans Christian had to take break to release his next story, which would be the (Little Mermaid).
Linda Ronstadt is quite tragic. She was *huge* and one of the most versatile singers from rock to mexican folk to opera but tragically she lost her voice due to a degenerative disease. There's a documentary on her on UA-cam somewhere, I reccomend it.
I'd recomend you listen to the Phillip Glass Album Songs from Liquid Days, in particular the song Freezing. Her vocals are haunting. The whole album is really good honestly.
"An American Tail" really tickles my nostalgia bone in the best ways possible, I had TOTALLY forgot about this movie, i am glad you made this video and unlocked the most hidden memories from my childhood!
The underwater and “Les Poissons” subtitles cracked me up, and here I am, a grown man tearing up over the backstory song for a character in the All Dogs Go to Heaven direct-to-video Christmas Carol retelling.
As an artist who has a barely disguised kink, I completely forgot about Bartok the Magnificent, and now here I am cleaning up pepsi from my screen. You made me shoot my drink out my nose XD
Respect.
Based and Blimp-pilled
@@Painocus Bartok was originally going to be voiced by Woody Allen, but then it was confirmed that Mr. Allen might be controversial. So Hank Azaria was a safer choice.
Guess it's been to long since I've last watched Mulan. That little clip of her singing made me tear up.
I actually saw his production of Midsummer Night's Dream here in AZ. He did a Q&A at the end and said that NIMH was the one movie he had complete control over without outside interference when asked about it. He was very kind and open about his career and you could definitely feel the love he had for music.
The fact you say BARTOK is the best musical hit me hard. Like. I watched it the other day with some friends and I had forgotten the little gem, hearing someone break it down made me so happy. Thank you for making this
It made me so happy seeing someone speak highly of Bartok instead of just dismissing it as a shitty spin off sequel. I watched this movie SO much as a kid we had to get it on DVD as well as VHS cos we wore it out XD
"Don't you DARE make a turkey!"
well, to be fair to Don, he didn't make a turkey...but he DID make a chicken
I guess now we can only hope and pray that Dragon's Lair the Movie is still in production, and will be seen by the whole world before his time on this earth ends... soon.
Yeah, he absolutely deserves to direct at least one more animated film & see it through to the theaters before he kicks the bucket!
Sadly, people are saying that the Dragon's Lair movie will be on Netflix as a live action movie and will star the man who played Deadpool. Let's hope it dose not happen and they'll change their mind and have it be 2D animated instead.
@@jaredhebert942
I hope he gets a successor in his place to continue his legacy.
I remember Marry the Mole more clearly than anything in that movie except Thumbelina getting stripped to her underthings in front of a booing audience and. honestly. I think as a small girl child it changed the direction of my entire life. Thanks. Ms. Field-mouse. I have treasured your marital advice.
Finally, someone else who understands the masterpiece that is An American Tail. As a descendent of the victims of the pogrom who escaped to New York, it just incapsulates the stakes and the trauma of escaping one disaster into another and then finding joy in that trauma.
youtube really is a fantastical place where i can find a 2 hour video and then listen to a person talking about a man's career and a movie you've never seen. then you spend half an hour storyboarding rock a doodle doo and running it in a completely different direction and then being sad that version never got made.
You did a storyboard re-write for Rock-A-Doodle? That sounds like great fun, would love to see that! Do you have it on UA-cam or somewhere else?
as a hobbyist animation historian who has not looked into the history of don bluth im so glad to see this
I gotta say, I've never been a big musical person but I've always been a big animation fan ever since I was little. Our copies of The Land Before Time and All Dogs Go to Heaven got a lot of repeat watches from five year-old me, and I think the impact those two movies in particular play a big part in why I'm a big fan of Bluth's work. But it's weird, I've just never liked musicals, and most of the reason I tolerated musical numbers in animated films was because of the animation itself. I feel like this video has given me a completely different perspective on musical theater, a genre I'm admittedly not a big fan of, and just how effective it can be in storytelling, especially in animation. I'm not sure I'll ever really be a person into musicals, but this definitely makes me appreciate the musical numbers in Disney and Don Bluth films (at least, the good musical numbers, lol) more than I had before. Thank you for that.
... A part of me wants to see you just rip A Troll in Central Park to shreds, though, because I remember not even liking it as a kid and as a fan of his work by then. Good lord, that movie was dreck.
One more thing, I was a very big fan of Bartok the Magnificent when it came out, just because bats are my favorite animal and there's not nearly enough cartoon bat characters. And Jennifer Tilly and Tim Curry were in it too and I adore both of them. I just liked Bartok as a character when he was in Anastasia when I was a kid, and when he finally got his own movie, I felt at though his character was done justice aside from just being funny sidekick character voiced by comedic actor. Really underrated movie, it's nice to see it get some love.
Something I'm noticing is that a lot of the Bluth films that flopped seemed to have extremely bland lyrics, waxing on about love and I swear there was like 4 "if you follow your dreams they'll come true* (*eventually)" lines in as many movies. Heck, Thumbelina _STARTS_ with that.
They don't push anything, like you said. They don't further the story. They sort of just reinforce the emotion in the moment. That was one big nitpick I had about his movies, and now I know why.
This is probably one of the best retrospectives I've seen, like a lot of people have said. I want to thank you SO much for adding subtitles - I have difficulty parsing out lyrics the first time I hear a song, and obviously this is a video where you _need_ to hear lyrics. Thanks for all the research and great insight you've given. Hope to see more great content. ^^
This video is a year old now...
when this video came out, my family decided to marathon all of Don's movies and afterwords I watched this and thought:
"Pefect Timing."
I might not 100% agree with every thing said in this review, but I am shocked it took almost decades for someone to FINALLY give a proper breakdown of a majority of Bluth's filmography (if only the musicals, which are the majority to be fair), and to contextualize them beyond the boilerplate commentary you usually see out there. This was a solid breakdown, and I'm glad it randomly appeared in my suggested feed.
Also regarding ADGTH 2, you should do frame by frame on that movie sometimes. It has tons of animation errors because there was like 12+ animation teams working across the globe to make that thing on a tight schedule, and the guy who created Cow and Chicken was the character designer on it (yes). It's an absurd movie when looked at frame by frame, but just boilerplate as is. Strangely, based only on a random poster floating around online, it might have been aiming to look like the first movie more earlier on in production.
Compared to Disney, his musicals have always felt kind of artificial to me, like the numbers are mainly there for splash. Compare 'Belle' in Beauty & the Beast with 'Rumor in St. Petersburg' from Anastasia - in the first the characters are doing an exaggerated version of everyday movement that makes it feel like a typical day in that village. In Bluth's movie, the characters are literally dancing, as if they have an audience watching, which gives a stagey, not-quite-natural feel to the whole number.
spot on
That's and interesting thought -- I actually liked this about _Anastasia._ It was like a stage musical, but with a depth and scope of set that you just can't fit on a stage.
I love Don Bluth films but I always thought Rock a Doodle was just weird. I think the only reason we had a copy of it at home was because Glen Campbell was our cousin and my mom was always buying stuff with his name on it.
In the Dark of the Night is like the sister to Be Prepared and that is a very big compliment (yes yes Jim Cummings jokes aside). The only thing missing were better visuals, namely, the cartoony bugs. If they had all been imps or little demons like there was concept art for, the sequence visually would’ve been right up there with Be Prepared.
I definitely don’t mind the bugs, but a bunch of demons and undead monsters singing along with Rasputin and all rejoicing in their villainy, would have been so much fun.
38:54 man the little crab wiggle gave me a right good giggle sir, excellent video
One of my favorite things about this channel and these videos, is that on top of telling an interesting commentary on the topic, it also goes all in on the funny bits too. They work with the criticisms or defenses made, but they are also just kind of off the wall and I have no clue where half of them come from, but even if I don't get the joke, I can always hear B- Mask having a giggle about making them, and thats great entertainment. Fish people
I think one of the things about Rock-a-Doodle that makes the "non-musical-theatre" Chanticleer songs work for me (at least theoretically) is that they seem a lot more strictly diagetic. Sun-do-shine bridges the gap between diagetic and representational the best, and so much of me wishes that they had leaned into a divide between it and the commercialized songs more...
You said it in the video, but Rock-a-Doodle has SUCH good bones that it makes me so sad at how it seems to miss the mark fleshing them out at every opportunity. I think it's a testament to that about how mesmerizing it is even with it being so absolutely awful.
This video gave me a newfound appreciation for Bluth. I never really gave him or his spotty film lineup much thought but I loved the deep dive into it all here. I now want to watch Bartok the Magnificent, which is something I’d never thought I’d say.
I've actually met two people who used to work with Bluth. They did clean up and some key animation. They were really cool guys, always loved having them when they showed up at my work.
It’s actually fitting they got Glen Campbell to play Chanticleer. Before he got big, Campbell was a demo singer for songs that were given to Elvis for his movies.
I love all of these movies even if none of them are really that deep or good. When I was 4 I didn't need depth, I apparently needed singing penguins
American Tale, at least, is pretty deep. The rest of them, maybe not so much.
Me seeing Bartok the magnificent in the thumbnail, hell yeah. I watched that film over and over as a young kid and rewatched it recently. I was surprised I could still remember it shot for shot and all the lyrics 🤣
I kind of wrote it off with Rock-a-doodle as just another of those movies I loved as a kid that probably doesn't hold up now, but this vid has made me think it's worth revisiting.
Same here I love the movie
I love Bartok the Magnificent, Kelsey Grammar saying “cabbage” lives rent-free in my brain
Dude keep making videos about literally whatever you want and I'll keep watching them. Your attention to detail and the passion you have for each subject is astounding, seriously keep it up man!
Loved the video, Don Bluth’s career is very inspiring. The musical elements of animation are truly underrated.
It's good to see you return to the longer form Documentaries on Animated Films, Back in the old Epic Mickey Days is how I found you, but it's great that you finally did a video over Don Bluth, and the focus on musicals no less. Amazing work as always B.
Crazy how often I revisit this video
Same, I rarely rewatch most video essays but I come back to this one a lot.
So I'm not the only one, huh?
Great seeing such an in-depth, well-rounded video on Bluth! Typically superlative work, B-Mask.
(Also hilarious what incredibly short shrift Troll in Central Park rightfully receives compared to multiple direct-to-video films. As it should be.)
Boy, it's a rather small world, suddenly seeing this post here after having followed you elsewhere in recent times.
Videos like this make me think "How do you have ONLY 70k subscribers?" Totally got me in the mood to look out my Nimh and American Tail VHSes and maybe dive a but further into the musicals rabbit hole. Astonishing video mister Mask, thank you for creating and sharing 🖤🖤🖤
In Ireland Don Bluth movies would air on RTE 2 on a regular basis (except for a Troll in Central Park for obvious reasons). An American tale and The Land before Time were the most common along with Thumblina. At one point it would play almost every year at Easter break. I guess someone at RTE really liked that one.
I only remember seeing the Land Before Time. I might have been too young though to remember.
@@TheHetzer-xy9lb They mostly aired in the 90s and early 2000s. After that only An American Tail and Land Before Time would air the odd time. I wonder if they play them nowadays.
@@lastflunky Figured I was a little too young.
@@lastflunky Impressive!
The subtitles keep cracking me up, great video always love these bigger looks at the whole career of an artist
This 2 hour video review felt like listening to the audiobook of Don Bluth's Somewhere Out There: My Animated Life!
Holy shit, basically all of my favorites from childhood are from this one man... Except for The Last Unicorn, Rower Rockstar, and Swan Princess, but, man - he created almost all of my happy memories from back then...
I watch the All Dogs Christmas Carol every year for Christmas. It's such a fun little musical, glad to hear it getting the respect it deserves.
I've seen all three of the movies but I haven't seen the TV series yet
For whatever reason I’ve been compelled to rewatch this video several times, and pretty much all of the featured songs have been stuck in my head since.
This is why Don Bluth is one of my muses. As someone who wants to work in the arts, this is kind of legacy I strive to build for myself.
Hearing these all back to back, it's easy to forget that these movies all came out in the 80s and 90s when they sound so old-fashioned. Glad you pointed that out. By this point Disney was seriously diversifying the music in their movies and using more modern sounds.
I'm kind of just starting to dip my toes into the musical fandom, and I'm learning lots of the terminology and going to the theater and stuff. But I am a life-long Bluth stan and omg, this video essay RIPS my dude, best documentary of 2022.
We don't talk about A Troll in Central Park lol. I must have slept on the Bartok sequel because I never expected the original team to be behind it! WOW!
The second I came across this video I sent it to my siblings and childhood best friend. This is probably the number 1 topic I can go on about forever and I’m so grateful to listen to someone else talk about it 🤣🤣
A thorough look at each and every film, you're spoiling us, B-Mask. Keep up the great work, loved this one.
All Dogs Go to Heaven was one of my favorite movies as a lil kid so that whole section was really fascinating to see it from a critical standpoint
Yet another B-Mask masterpiece. No one else does it like you. You can bet I'll be rewatching this often.
This immediately went into my Favorite Video Essays playlist, such a brilliant analysis of the one thing that always made Don Bluth's films what they are.
.... Also it's so funny to me that pretty much the universal consensus on Rock-a-Doodle is "this movie is an absolute trash fire, and I wouldn't have it any other way." It's glorious
This is the kind of content I'm very much into and I'm _so mad_ that UA-cam is pushing the algorithm to hide it from me and make sure you don't get paid for your hard work.
So pleased at the existence of the Loathsome Characters Wiki, thank you for bringing it to my attention.
You have unlocked old childhood memories. Great job as always.
Indeed.
UA-cam scares me sometimes. Literally just started revisiting Bluth movies for the first time in ages a few days ago and thinking about them critically since the choices made in a lot of them are just so weird to me. Musically and plot wise. Was dying for a well made longer analysis video about them and this pops up which is exactly what I was wanting to watch.
They probably should have cut down on the amount of songs in All Dogs but I still love it. Burt Reynolds and Dom DeLuise were good friends in real life and have great chemistry on screen together but Burt Reynolds really wasn't a singer. People complain about the Gator song but I would have cut the sharing song first.
You know, after rewatching this several times, I realize that Don Bluth was more comfortable with animals as protagonists than humans.
Since the very beginning, he’s done animals (from his start thru Small One or his work on Robin Hood). The only time he’s done humans as protags (if you don’t count Dragon’s Lair and Space Ace) was Thumbelina, which was trying to copy Disney. Same with Anastasia. A Troll in Central Park comes close, but again, the Troll is in the title. So it don’t count.
(You could also say that Rock-a-Doodle did it first, but he gets turned into a cat for most of the runtime, so it’s disqualified)
Bartok really feels like a mix of both styles. You get the scope of American Tail with the grandiose nature of Anastasia, but with a musical identity that actually fits.
I do hope Don gets another shot at making an animated film, but this time he should be given a clear direction. The later films of his career are riddled with barren ideas and little quality control over the scripts.
Or he could remake Rock-a-Doodle. His choice really.
Sorry to be that person, but All Dogs Go To Heaven 2 was actually in theaters, it wasn't a direct-to-video release. Fun fact though! Charlie's singing voice was performed by Jesse Corti, who played Lefou in Beauty and the Beast. :3
The song about batteries is literally the only thing I remember about rock a doodle
I love this video so much, I’ve watched it an embarrassing amount of times. B mask never disappoints, he must do so much research. I LOVE WHEN HE TALKS ABOUT MUSICALS!!!
Yet another banger from B-Mask; loved seeing your take on this guy, and your editing was tight the whole way through as expected.
Don bluth just did not have the chops to run an animation studio.
Was he a great animator? Oh yes. But he lacked the leadership to discern bad ideas or create synergy with the music and writing department.
So what I have gotten from this essay is that Don Bluth movies are guaranteed to be amazing if the main characters are rodents of some sorts (Secret of nimh, American Tail and Bartok to an extent, with the exception of Land before time, dragons lair and maybe all dogs go to heaven)
Growing up I took in all of Bluth's output backwards, I started off with the cheap Disney era knock-offs before working backwards to the earlier great ones. An in-depth and actually chronological examination of his musical body of work certainly does a lot to help me reappraise my own sadly biased experiences with his output; particularly your take on American Tail where I was always too desperate to get to the brighter, funnier sequel to take the original on its own merits. Lot of food for thought. I've liked your vidoes for some time but with quality like this I've got no choice but to financially support you. Any new upload from you is guaranteed to surprise with its subject matter and assured to entertain in equal measure.
All praise aside though, 135 minutes of musical analysis and you can't even devote one to A Troll in Central Park? Was my misspent, sibling-enduced childhood suffering all for naught?
Perhaps he might cover Troll in Central Park on its own? Certainly seems like it has enough that one could unpack on its own
@@jaredhebert942 Musical Hell already reviewed it!!
So many early beautiful animations, much nostalgia for Don Bluth.
Love the video! Don Bluth was, in my experience, never that big a deal in The Netherlands. Yet his works always comes up and this gives some nice background as to why.
Also really appreciate the lyrics. You can see those took time, but it was totally worth it!
This video is everything I love about this channel; your sense of humor, the way you get your points across, the amount of research... This was an incredible watch.
Great video! Speaks to the quality of it that I, someone that isn’t very into musicals, was interested and entertained through the whole thing
I just wanna thank you for including subtitles in the actual video of the sung portions.
Honestly I think Somewhere Out There hits a lil more cause it doesnt sound like a crazy production. Its just two kids singing about missing each other etc etc Like, it feels more sincere that way even if its not as pleasant on the ears.
I completely forgot that Anastasia and Bartok were Bluth productions! Another amazing essay!
This was a lengthy and very well-presented video that went into a lot of depth about these productions, their historical origins, and the various actors at play. The amount of research it seems you went to had to have been laborious, and I very much enjoyed the whole thing. I was so glad you came down with good reviews for Bartok the Magnificent, because I remember really enjoying it as a kid, and I think you're right when you say that the few songs it does have are underrated for what they convey. Always enjoyed that movie, a real gem. Not to mention, the absolute batshit insanity of Rock-a-Doodle will forever be in my brain. Thank you!
I knew the waltzing ghosts were coming and STILL got goosebumps