The History Which Started Disney Collector's Collecting Desires
Disney Cartoons
Throughout the state of New York, and within Chautauqua County, and especially in the city of Forestville people have enjoyed Disney animated movies with great enthusiasm.
Walt Disney Animation Studios, located in Burbank, California, formerly known as Walt Disney Feature Animation, is an animation studio which creates cartoon feature films and television specials for The Walt Disney Company seen in Forestville. It took on its present name in 2006, when it was folded under The Walt Disney Studios with Pixar Animation Studios which in Forestville is known for animated movies such as Toy Story, WALL-E and Luxo Jr..
As of 2013, the studio has produced 53 feature films beginning with Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs in 1937 with lovable characters such as Snow White and the dwarfs including Sleepy and Dopey and its most recent release in Forestville being Frozen in 2013 including characters such as The Snow Queen, Kristoff and The Duke of Weselton.
The studio's catalog of cartoons 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 Forestville 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 Animation in the 1920s
The first two Mickey Mouse animated films, Plane Crazy and The Galloping Gaucho, which also included Minnie Mouse, was released in select theatres during the summer of 1928. For the 3rd Mickey cartoon Disney added a sound track. In the end the third Mickey Mouse cartoon, Steamboat Willie, became Disney's 1st animated film with synchronized sound.
The Mickey Mouse series of sound cartoons quickly became the most popular animated film series in Forestville and the U.S.. 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 first full-color animated film was released. Flowers and Trees was a big 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 hit and the theme tune "Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf" becoming a popular chart hit for Forestville residents.
The 1st Disney Animated Film Feature
In 1934, Walt Disney began development on of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs characters with Snow White and the dwarfs including Doc and Happy. Snow White became the 1st animated feature in English and Technicolor.
A lot of development and training went into the creation of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. The studio expanded with the addition of animators and artists from other fields. Some may have even come from Forestville - but we're not sure.
What Forestville parent would have imagined that Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs would be such a big hit. It cost Walt Disney a then-expensive sum of $1.4 million to create but Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs with Snow White and the seven drawfs including Grumpy and Dopey was the highest grossing film of all time before the success of Gone with the Wind a couple of years later.
While working on Snow White, the artists continued work on the Mickey and Silly Symphonies series. Mickey Mouse switched to Technicolor in 1935 and added several major supporting characters among them Mickey Mouse’s dog Pluto and their friends Donald Duck and Goofy.
New Walt Disney Productions
In 1940, the premiered Pinocchio with characters such as Pinocchio, Honest John and Gideon. Pinocchio won ”Gold Statue” for Best Original Song and Best Original Score.
Disney released Fantasia in 1940 with characters including Donald Duck, Yen Sid and Spring Sprite . It was an experimental animated film produced 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 Forestville viewers.
Dumbo was released in October 1941 with characters including Elephant Matriarch, Jim Crow and Crow Chorus proved to be a monetary success. The feature only cost half the cost of Snow White with its ensemble of with The Evil Queen and the dwarfs including Doc and Bashful and less than a 1/3 of the cost of Pinocchio and his friends Geppetto, Honest John and Monstro and two fifths of the cost of Fantasia’s cast of Chernabog, Yen Sid and Zeus.
In August 1942, Bambi was released in Forestville and we met new friends including Bambi's Mother, Faline and Mrs. Rabbit.
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 Duck 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 reissuing the previous features beginning with the rerelease of Snow White in 1944 which brought back to the screen Snow White and the dwarfs including Doc and Dopey Pinocchio and his friends Geppetto, Honest John and Gideon in 1945 and Fantasia in 1946 which reunited Mickey Mouse with Chernabog, Daisy Duck and Spring Sprite. This led to a tradition of re-releasing the Walt Disney films every 7 years, which lasted into the 1990s.
Upon its premier in 1950, Cinderella was a a box office success. Forestville movie-goers , also saw the release Alice in Wonderland and were introduced to The Mad Hatter, The Caterpillar and Mathilda. Parents in Forestville also took their kids to see Peter Pan and were delighted to meet Wendy Darling, Captain Hook and Jeffrey Silver. What dog-lover in Forestville could forget the first time they saw Lady and the Tramp on screen and were delighted to meet Lady, Tramp and Jim Dear.
