My Reactions to Disney’s “Wish” Teaser Trailer

Tags

100 years, 2D animation, alan tudyk, animated, animated feature, animated movie, animated movie review, animated musical, animation, animation artwork, animation tribute, Ariana DeBose, artwork, Asha, baby goat, blending mediums, blog, blog post, centennial, cgi animation, Chris Pine, classic Disney animation, computer animation, Disney, Disney 100 years, disney animated, disney animated feature, disney animated movie, disney animation, disney character, disney characters, disney song, disney villain, Fantasy, Magnifico, musical, November release, review, star, teaser trailer, trailer, trailer reaction, trailer review, Up On The Shelf, Valentino, villain, Walt Disney Animation, Wish, wishing star

If you’ve read this blog long enough, you know how much I love Disney. The projects they’ve announced for their centennial this year have been hit or miss (Little Mermaid and Peter Pan remakes? Not interested. Big history exhibit with Tupac Walt Disney hologram? Very cool. Suing the pants off Ron DeSantis? Awesome!) but the one thing I’ve been looking forward to the most is their next animated film Wish. What little of the premise revealed at D23 revolves around the time-honored Disney tradition of wishing on stars. What really drew me in, though? THE ARTWORK:

Ever since Paperman I’ve hoped that Disney would create a full animated feature blending traditional and CGI mediums in a beautiful, unique way, and now it seems we’re finally getting it. Look at that last picture, it’s like a watercolor illustration! I’ve been keeping tabs on Wish since the D23 debut because the potential here is staggering. Yesterday morning Disney released the first teaser trailer, and if you’ve read this far then you’re probably wondering what I think about it. After all, viscerally reacting to trailers and making bold assumptions before knowing the full context is nothing new on the internet, right?

Faerie Tale Theatre Reviews: The Pied Piper of Hamelin

Tags

80's fantasy, 80s, blog, blog post, boy, charm, child, children, children's story, corrupt, crutches, disabled, enchanted, enchantment, eric idle, Faerie Tale Theatre, faerie tale theatre reviews, flute, Hamlin, Jan Brueghel, keram malicki-sanchez, lame, lame boy, magic, magic spell, mayor, nicholas meyer, pied piper, pipe, poem, rat, rats, review, review series, rhyme, rhyming, robert browning, scary 80s, series review, shelley duvall, spell, the pied piper, the pied piper of hamelin, tony van bridge, tv review

“‘Please your honors,’ said he, ‘I’m able, by means of a secret charm, to draw all creatures living beneath the sun that creep, or swim, or fly, or run, after me so as you never saw! And I chiefly use my charm on creatures that do people harm: the mole, and toad, and newt, and viper; And people call me the Pied Piper.’”
-An introduction to a character that needs no introduction

For 300 years, a stained glass window depicting a colorfully dressed piper stood in the church of the German town of Hamelin. Although the window was destroyed in 1660, records detail the message enshrined upon it:

In the year of 1284, on the day of Saints John and Paul on June 26, by a piper, clothed in many kinds of colors, 130 born in Hamlin were seduced and lost at the place of execution near the koppen.

Another entry in Hamelin’s town records dating from 1384 follows up with a grim assessment:

It has been 100 years since our children left.

It’s said that every folk story and fairy tale has a grain of truth to them…which can make the tale in question even more disturbing when there are written accounts to back it up. Such is the case with The Pied Piper of Hamelin. We know something terrible right out of a fantasy story did indeed happen, but the details and reasoning behind it are lost to time. From there the human imagination takes over and fills in the spaces with dark suppositions. What of this enigmatic Piper who lured so many victims to an unknown fate? Is he Death personified? One of the fae? A remnant of the mysterious dancing plague that struck 14th century Europe? Was he a colorful recruiter of German colonizers looking to settle further east? A metaphor for the Children’s Crusade, where thousands of children were rounded up to take the Holy Land only to never return? Or, perhaps, a dark manifestation of the fear of child predators?

Curiously, neither the window nor documents make any mention of a rat plague that so often accompanies retellings of the Pied Piper story. That aspect didn’t appear until the 16th century. The wonder and terror surrounding the Piper’s doings have inspired one interpretation after another. Can Faerie Tale Theatre recapture the magic, or is it full of sour notes?

Vote for Your Christmas Shelf Review! (Plus Life Updates)

Tags

A Christmas Carol, blog, blog post, blog update, brian henson, cartoon review, Christmas, christmas carol, Christmas cartoon, christmas episode, Christmas review, christmas special, christmas story, disney muppets, disney review, ghost of christmas future, ghost of christmas past, ghost of christmas present, ghost of christmas yet to come, library, movie vote, muppet, Muppet Christmas Carol, Muppet Movie, Muppets, review, television review, The Muppets, tv review, Up On The Shelf, update, Updates, vote, vote now

Greetings, all! Hope you’re enjoying this spooky season! It’s often around this time I open the blog to vote for multiple Christmas-related specials and films for me to review, but things will be going a little differently this year.

In September I began a new job as an Assistant After-School Tutor at the largest library in my district. It started simple enough, just helping out kids with homework and doing activities with them twice a week. The staff and clientele are great and the pay is decent, no complaints. In fact, I did well enough flying solo in my first weeks there that I got promoted! As of October 24th I will officially be the Lead Tutor, with all the raises, responsibilities, and extra workdays the position entails.

How does this bode for the blog? Well, the holidays are a busy time for me, as some of you already know. Writing three lengthy posts on top of the Faerie Tale Theatre reviews is pretty stressful even before taking the new job into account. That’s why I’m limiting myself to just two Christmas reviews – and I already have one of them picked out.

What can I say, it’s a stone-cold classic that’s hitting a milestone this year and I don’t want to pass up the chance to talk about it.

“So what do I get to vote for?” you may ask. The answer is simple, dear friends: anything on the Christmas Shelf that’s under the category “Very Special Specials”. Let me know the special you want me to look at in the comments or by emailing me at upontheshelfshow@wordpress.com. Don’t worry, you’ve got plenty to choose from.

Thanks, happy voting, and I’ll see you on October 20th with the next Faerie Tale Theatre review!

Seventh Anniversary: Twelve Movie Reviews in One Post!

Tags

a very potter musical, a very Potter sequel, animated movie review, anniversary, Bill Murray, blog, blog post, blog update, cartoon review, Chico Marx, Christmas review, classic comedy, coco, Comedy, comedy review, computer animation, Disney, disney animation, disney film, disney review, disney star wars, Duck Soup, feature film, film, film review, films, Groucho Marx, Groundhog Day, Harpo Marx, James Gunn, Legally Blonde, Luca, Marx, Marx Brothers, movie, movie review, Movie Reviews, musical review, Night of the Living Dead, Pixar, pixar animation, Pixar review, review, review series, Rifftrax, Rifftrax Live, romantic comedy, Solo, star wars, team starkid, The Mitchells vs The Machines, The Suicide Squad, Up On The Shelf, We're No Angels, youtube video, Zeppo Marx

It’s Up On The Shelf’s seventh anniversary, yaaaaay!

I never imagined the blog would come this far or have the loyal band of readers like you. Thanks for sticking around for so long! I understand some of you are disappointed by the lack of updates or movie reviews (believe me I miss them too, but don’t have the time to get back to them just yet), so to mark the occasion I’m doing something a little bit different.

About ten years ago I got into the habit of documenting what movies I watch each month. It’s a fun way of tracking my taste in film, how many times I revisit favorites and mark new discoveries. To that effect, I put every movie I watched each month over the past year (2021) in a Randomizer, and came out with twelve mini spoiler-free reviews for you to take in. Some of these flicks are On The Shelf so consider them previews for when I eventually review them proper. Let’s get to it!

Seventh Anniversary Plans

Tags

anniversary, announcement, blog, blog post, blog update, film, film review, films, movie review, Movie Reviews, patreon, random, Up On The Shelf, update, Updates

Hey everyone! Hope you’re beating the summer heat and having fun in the sun. As some of you already know, the blog is turning seven this month, and I’m doing something a bit different to mark the occasion. Rather than write one big movie review, I’m doing twelve randomized mini-reviews! These will be based on features I’ve watched in the past year. Don’t worry, these will not count towards the requested reviews that are currently on hold, or full reviews of features that are On The Shelf; rather, some of them will be previews of what’s to come should they get the proper review treatment.

Patrons of the blog will get to see the full list of which flicks I’ll be covering among other great perks, so consider joining the Patreon party today! I’ll see you July 30th when we celebrate in cinematic style. Shelf out!

Faerie Tale Theatre Reviews: Jack and the Beanstalk

Tags

1980's, 80's fantasy, 80s, beanstalk, billy bryan, blog, castle, castle in the clouds, cow, cow costume, dennis christopher, elliot gould, english fairy tale, english fairy tales, Faerie Tale Theatre, faerie tale theatre reviews, fairy tale, fairy tale history, fairytale, fee fi fo fum, giant, giant wife, giant's wife, giants, giants in the sky, golden eggs, jack, Jack and the beanstalk, jean stapleton, jerry hall, katherine helmond, magic beans, magic harp, magic hen, mark blankfield, pantomime, perspective, puppet, puppeteers, retelling, review, review series, series review, shelley duvall, singing harp, television review, television series, tv, tv review, tv series

“When you mounted that beanstalk, you started to climb that ladder to fortune!”
– The Mysterious Old Man, reminding us that opportunities are worth the arduous climb

What’s in a name? Would that which we would call a Jack by any other name be as wily, cunning, adventurous or tricky? Perhaps, but then he wouldn’t be nearly as memorable as those who share the namesake. Funny how you find a lot of Jacks in fairy tales and nursery rhymes, isn’t it? There’s Jack Sprat, Jack Horner, Jack Be Nimble, Jack O’Lantern, and of course, Jack The Giant Killer, a distant cousin of today’s story. Thanks to the multitude of English and Appalachian tales featuring a hero with that sobriquet, naming a character Jack has become shorthand for a clever, agile, and often charming personality, a tradition in fiction which continues to this day (Jack Sparrow, Reacher, and Skellington, anyone?) Of course, it’s only natural that someone with a larger-than-life persona would have an enemy in someone who is, quite literally, larger than life.

Myths of giants and giant killers have rocked the folkloric landscape since the days of Greek and Norse mythology. The story of Jack and the Beanstalk, however, grew almost entirely out of England. Scholars have found its roots go as far back as 4500 BC, with some signs that it may have originated in early Iran. Inspired by the aforementioned Jack The Giant Killer and passed down through years of oral tradition, the story as we first know it appeared in English publications in 1734 as “The Story of Jack Spriggins and the Enchanted Bean” (I can see why the title got whittled down). It was later popularized in 1845 by Henry Cole, the man who invented greeting cards, and again by Australian folklorist Joseph Jacobs in 1890. Jacobs’ version is the one that stuck around the longest, and is the take on Jack’s adventures that we’re all familiar with, for better or worse.

See, while all those qualities I mentioned earlier can be noble in some Jacks, they can be villainous in others, like Spring-Heeled Jack and Jack The Ripper – and even in the case of this particular Jack. Back in the salad days of Jack and the Beanstalk’s popularity, no one really questioned the morality of Jack’s actions. I suppose just being a giant (and an implied man-eating one at that) were wicked enough traits to make him the designated antagonist. When the Victorian period dictated that all children’s stories should teach morals in as hamfisted a manner as possible, Andrew Lang and Benjamin Tabart rewrote Jack and the Beanstalk so that Jack has a tragic backstory that gives him the moral high ground and makes the Giant more monstrous from the reader’s perspective. While the idea does have merit, I’m left wondering if two wrongs really do make a right. Does stealing from someone and eventually murdering them negate your culpability if the victim committed those same crimes against you first? What if your retribution left behind a widow with no one to support her? Does that still make you a hero, or leave you in the need of some good PR? I suppose that’s why I lean towards versions where Jack realizes his greed is making him as much a monster as the giant, or where the consequences of his actions catch up to him and he must take responsibility in order to set things right (hi, Into The Woods). I definitely don’t expect Faerie Tale Theatre’s to delve into such a moral gray area, but how do they handle making this Jack a hero worth rooting for?

Vote for Your December Reviews!

Tags

animated movie review, blog, Christmas, christmas carol, Christmas cartoon, christmas episode, Christmas movie, Christmas review, christmas special, christmas story, december, film review, holiday episode, holiday special, holiday tradition, movie, movie review, movie vote, pick a movie, vote, vote now

November’s just getting started but you know what that means – the floor is once again open to voting for Christmas-themed reviews! Visit the Christmas Shelf to see what shorts, specials and movies you can vote for. Pick one of each and let me know in the comments or by emailing me at upontheshelfshow@gmail.com before November 25th. The winners with the most votes will be reviewed all throughout December (never fear, the next Faerie Tale Theatre review will still be up on December 6th).

Can’t wait to see what you pick! Happy voting!

It’s Raining Sunshine (Awards)

Tags

answers, award, blog, blogger, bloggers, q&a, questions, sunshine blogger, sunshine blogger award, tag, tags

Rebecca Deniston of Taking Up Room has nominated me for the Sunshine Blogger Award! Yay! Let’s get ready to Q&A!

First things first, the rules:

• Thank the person who nominated you and provide a link to their blog.
• Answer the eleven questions from the blogger who nominated you.
• Nominate eleven bloggers.
• Create eleven new questions for your nominees to answer.

NOTE: I’ve looked at some other bloggers’ Sunshine posts and they each have different amounts of questions/bloggers tagged, so feel free to alter the number if you can’t get to eleven.

Thanks Rebecca! I really appreciate your shout-out. People, go check out her blog once you’re done reading this. Now on to the questions:

1. Have you picked up any new skills since being in lockdown?

I learned Google Classroom to teach an online class, does that count?

2. What kinds of unique experiences have you had in lockdown, if any?

My sister organized a drive-by with my friends and neighbors for my birthday, and it was a wonderful surprise.

3. You can do a podcast with anyone, living or dead. Who would it be, and what would it be about?

I want to say I’d love to talk animation with Walt Disney focusing mostly on what he would think about what his studio’s put out since his passing, but that feels too easy an answer for me. I’m going with Mary Blair and Tomie dePaola, two of my favorite artists/illustrators who I wish I could have met. I’d love to discuss how they developed their styles, their influences, careers and legacy, and any tips they’d like to pass down to the next generation of creators.

4. Is there a movie or a TV show you feel should never be remade ever?

Frankly, every time I find out a movie’s being remade I think “Really, they’re remaking that?” I’m all for retelling stories, but some are classics for a reason, and stuffing in current A-listers, modern effects and moving the setting up a notch doesn’t necessarily mean it’s an improvement. You’ll see what I mean when I get to the review I’ve planned for the blog’s fifth anniversary…

5. Which historic site would you most like to visit?

I’d love to tour Italy and most of Europe seeing the places that shaped the culture and inspired artists everywhere. Oh, and Notre Dame de Paris once it’s rebuilt, God willing.

6. Which song describes you best at this moment in time? Don’t overthink it–just whatever pops into your head.

Don’t hate me for picking a Pogo song (the guy’s said some cringey things I can’t really condone though his music is amazing) but his most recent remix of Fiddler on the Roof just feels so relatable right now, and not just because it utilizes one of my favorite movies/musicals. It’s upbeat despite being in an uncertain place, takes the drama unfolding and turns it into something beautiful, but near the end reveals a vulnerability in the wake of injustice (if you can’t already tell, it’s been helping me through everything going on in the world as of late). It also utilizes lyrics from the songs wonderfully in regards to the latter: ” You stand around/I stand with him” “My father and my mother said we’d learn to love each other” “I don’t understand what’s happening today…” It’s just beautiful.

Oops, I may have overthought that one after all. Sorry, Rebecca!

7. What film genre do you think we need to see more of?

Honest to goodness musicals. No cheap gimmicks, snide self-awareness or snark to try to appeal to those “too cool to enjoy this”, just ones that fully, passionately, and honestly embraces what they are. Remember what a sensation La La Land was when that came out? That’s because it was something we hadn’t seen in years, especially in musical films. Also, I’d love to see more upbeat fun horror-comedy-adventures the whole family can get into like Ghostbusters or Coraline.

8. Do you have a YouTube channel? Do you think you’d ever start one?

Yes, some of you who knew me from before I started this blog came from my YouTube channel, TheITinFIT. If you ever watched a Disney Random Craziness video, yep, that was me. I still make silly mashups and edits there sometimes.

9. Finish this sentence: “Never have I ever…”

…ridden a roller coaster that goes upside-down. Maybe one day I’ll work up the courage to go on one!

10. Do you have any favorite film critics?

I’m fond of Siskel and Ebert’s reviews, even if I don’t always see eye to eye with them. Most of the other critics I enjoy are on YouTube and far too many to name.

11. You can have your own version of Mary Poppins’ carpetbag. What are you going to stuff in it?

The question is what WOULDN’T I put in there? I’d be prepared for every situation with a bag like that.

And now, the lucky nominees:

• The Animation Commendation
• The Review Nebula
• RJ Writing Ink
• Bookidote
• The Library Key
• Perpetually Past Due
• Beyond the Dreamline
• Feeling Animated
• Madame Writer
• Alby Seeing You
• Unshaved Mouse

Congrats, everyone! Here are my questions for you:

1. What performance in film, tv, theatre, etc. has moved you the most?
2. What is your all-time favorite movie-going experience?
3. What property that hasn’t been touched yet would you love to see adapted into another medium?
4. Are there any acclaimed movies (Oscar winners, anything on AFI’s Greatest Movies or 1000 Movies You Need to See lists, etc.) that you’ve seen but wished you hadn’t?
5. If you could switch out one actor with a totally different one in any movie, who would it be and why?
6. Is there any particular work that inspired you to follow the path you are on now?
7. Pick a movie you’d love to see a reverse live-action remake of, ie. a live-action movie remade as an animated movie.
8. If a loved one was to serenade you, what song would you want them to sing?
9. What genre mashups do you enjoy (horror/comedy, fantasy/sci-fi, etc.)
10. What story do you believe deserves a proper continuation?
11. Where do you consider your home to be?

And there you have it. I hope you have fun with these questions. Thanks again, Rebecca, and I hope you all have a great day!