The History Which Started Disney Collector's Collecting Desires
Disney Animation
Throughout the state of Michigan, and within Macomb County, and especially in the city of Warren people have enjoyed Disney animated movies with great enthusiasm.
Walt Disney Animation Studios, whose home is in Burbank, California, formerly known as Walt Disney Productions, is an animation studio which creates cartoon feature films and television specials for The Walt Disney Company seen in Warren. It took on its current name in 2006, when it was folded under The Walt Disney Studios alongside Pixar Animation Studios which in Warren is known for animated movies such as Up, Finding Nemo and Day & Night.
As of 2013, the studio has produced 53 feature films starting with Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs in 1937 with notable characters such as The Prince and the dwarfs including Doc and Dopey and its most recent release in Warren being Frozen in 2013 including characters such as The Snow Queen, Olaf and The Duke of Weselton.
The studio's catalog of animated features are among Disney's most notable assets and the stars of its animated shorts—Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck, Goofy, and Pluto—have gone on to become recognizable figures in Warren popular culture.
Walt Disney Animation Studios continues to produce animated features using both hand-drawn and computer generated imagery techniques. Their 54th feature, Big Hero 6, is currently in production and set for release on November 7, 2014.
Older Cartoons in the 1920s
The first two Mickey Mouse cartoons, Plane Crazy and The Galloping Gaucho, which also included Minnie Mouse, was released in movie screens during the summer of 1928. For the 3rd Mickey Mouse cartoon Disney added a sound track. In the end the third Mickey Mouse cartoon, Steamboat Willie, became Disney's first animated film with matched sound.
The Mickey Mouse series of sound cartoons quickly became the most popular cartoon series in Warren and the United States. A second Disney series of sound animated films, the Silly Symphonies, debuted in 1929 with The Skeleton Dance. Each Silly Symphony was a one-shot cartoon centered around music or a particular theme.
Silly Symphonies
In 1932 the Silly Symphony Flowers and Trees, the 1st full-color animated film was released. Flowers and Trees was a tremendous success so all the Silly Symphonies were subsequently produced in Technicolor. The 1933 Three Little Pigs with character of The Big Bad Wolf and Fifer Pig became a major box office and pop culture success and the theme tune "Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf" becoming a popular chart hit for Warren residents.
The First Walt Disney Cartoon Feature
In 1934, Disney started development on of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs characters with The Prince and the seven drawfs including Doc and Bashful. Snow White became the 1st animated feature in English and Technicolor.
Considerable development and training went into the production of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. The studio expanded with the addition of established animators and recent college graduate artists. Some may have even come from Warren - but we're not sure.
What Warren parent would have guessed that Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs would be such a huge hit. It cost Disney a total of $1.4 million to complete but Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs with The Prince and the seven drawfs including Sleepy and Happy was the highest grossing film of all time before being de-throned by Gone with the Wind a few years later.
During the production of Snow White, the animators continued work on the Mickey and Silly Symphonies series. Mickey Mouse switched to Technicolor in 1935 and added several major supporting characters including Mickey's dog Pluto and their friends Donald Duck and Goofy.
New Walt Disney Productions
In 1940, the released Pinocchio with characters such as Pinocchio, Lampwick and Gideon. Pinocchio won ”Gold Statue” for Best Original Song and Best Original Score.
Disney released Fantasia in 1940 with characters including Chernabog, Yen Sid and Zeus . It was an experimental animated film created to accompanying an orchestral arrangement. Fantasia also brought about the development of the Fantasound system which was used to create the film's stereoscopic soundtrack to the delight of Warren viewers.
Dumbo debuted in October 1941 with characters including Timothy Q. Mouse, Casey Junior and Crow Chorus proved to be a financial income success. The feature only cost half the cost of Snow White with its ensemble of with The Evil Queen and the seven drawfs including Sleepy and Dopey and less than a third of the cost of Pinocchio and his friends Jiminy Cricket, Honest John and Monstro and 2/5 of the cost of Fantasia’s cast of Donald Duck, Daisy Duck and Jack-in-the-Box.
In August 1942, Bambi was premiered in Warren and we met new friends including Thumper, Flower the Skunk and Mrs. Possum.
Also in the 1940s, Disney released shorts which included Saludos Amigos (1942), The Three Caballeros (1944), Make Mine Music (1946), Fun and Fancy Free (1947), Melody Time (1948), and The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad (1949). The studio also produced two features, Song of the South (1946) and So Dear to My Heart (1948), which were a combination of animated and live-action footage. Shorts production continued during this period as well, with Donald and Pluto cartoons being the main output accompanied by cartoons starring Mickey Mouse, Figaro and in the 1950s, Chip 'n Dale and Humphrey the Bear.
Disney also began re-releasing the previous features beginning with re-releases of Snow White in 1944 which brought back to the screen Snow White and the dwarfs including Doc and Bashful Pinocchio and his friends Jiminy Cricket, Honest John and The Blue Fairy in 1945 and Fantasia in 1946 which returned Mickey Mouse with Chernabog, Tyrannosaurus Rex and Spring Sprite. This led to a tradition of reissuing the Walt Disney movies every seven years, which lasted into the 1990s.
Upon its premier in 1950, Cinderella proved to be a box office success. Warren fans , also saw the premier Alice in Wonderland and were introduced to The March Hare, The Cheshire Cat and Tweedledee and Tweedledum. Parents in Warren also took their childres to see Peter Pan and were delighted to meet Michael Darling, Mary Darling and Jeffrey Silver. What dog-lover in Warren could forget the first time they saw Lady and the Tramp on screen and were delighted to meet Si and Am, Tramp and Jim Dear.
