Emily Oosterom
Designing
the Tooniverse
The tension between realism and the fantasy vision
in Walt Disney Pictures’ animation aesthetics
MA Film Studies
University of Amsterdam
University of Amsterdam
Supervisor: dr. Charles Forceville
Second reader: dr. Floris Paalman
Designing the Tooniverse
The tension between realism and the fantasy vision
in Walt Disney Pictures’ animation aesthetics
Emily Oosterom
Emily Oosterom – 10002051 emilyoosterom@gmail.com 06 21 80 46 98 Supervisor: Dr. Charles Forceville Second reader: Dr. Floris Paalman MA Film Studies University of Amsterdam Professional track, fiction / Beroepsgeoriënteerde specialisatie, fictie Master coordinators: Dr. Erik Laeven and drs. Judith Tromp 9 May 2017 22.873 words
for opa & oma pap & mam Thank you for always stimulating my creativity and curiosity. You inspire me.
Abstract
Animation is regarded as a highly artificial and therefore “free” medium in which everything is possible. Therefore, animation might seem to opt out of the reality debate. Paradoxically, however, the Walt Disney Animation Studios perfected a “language” for their animation that took its model from live-action cinema. This illusion of life aesthetic became synonymous with Disney’s animation and put realism at the centre of discussing the medium. Does animation’s move towards a realistic aesthetic mean that it looses the freedom of the fantasy vision? This thesis investigates how animators produce a believable rendering of the characters, their performances and their worlds in animation, despite the viewer’s knowledge that they are projections of either drawings or computer generated images. By combining the vision of both Film Studies scholars, historians and filmmakers, this research focuses on the techniques of animation and the negotiation between the codes of realism (the representation of the real world equivalent as photorealistic as possible for the medium) and the fantasy vision (the freedom that is inherent to the animated cartoon) to create a hyperrealistic aesthetic.
Keywords: animation, realism, cartoon, film studies, Disney, hyperrealism, believability, aesthetics, design
Contents
Abstract………5 Acknowledgements………7 1 Introduction………...8 1.1 Abandoning the lunatic Tooniverse: critiquing Disney’s realistic aesthetic……….10 1.2 Thesis’ structure………12 2 Animation and the Problem of Realism: A Critical Approach to Animation, Realism and the Fantasy Vision……….………...14 2.1 Realism in an artificial medium………14 2.2 Exaggerating reality: hyperrealism and over-illusionism………....18 2.3 Structure for analyses……….21 3 From Flatland to Multiplane: Innovating the Animated Medium..……….………...23 3.1 Innovating animation: the cartoons………..24 3.1.1 Animating space: from flatlands to spatial dynamics………26 3.1.2 The sound cartoons: realistic and fantastic sound effects………... 29 3.1.3 Colour and mood: the narrative power of expressive colouring………31 3.1.4 Believing the characters: character animation and embodied acting……..32 3.1.5 Concluding remarks: the cartoons……….35 3.2 Realism as basis: the illusion of life animation………36 3.3 Conclusion……….43 4 The Cowboy and the Spaceman: Technology, Realism and a new Fantasy Vision in CGI Animation……….………...45 4.1 CG technology: redesigning a realistic fantasy………..………..46 4.2 Not a flying toy: “the valley of the uncanny” in Toy Story……….49 4.3 Simulation terminated: Monsters, Inc. and other Disney/Pixar films………53 4.4 Creating a hybrid: the merging of hand-drawn and CGI animation………...56 4.5 Conclusion……….59 5 Conclusion………...…….61 5.1 Disney’s hyperrealistic aesthetic……….62 5.2 Final conclusion……….63 Bibliography………...……….65Acknowledgements
It did not come as a complete surprise to the people who know me that I wanted to write my thesis about animation. I have been interested in animation films and their techniques and aesthetics ever since I was a little girl, when I watched The Aristocats (1970) with my nose pushed against the television screen and could remember the camera set-ups, design, lighting and colour palette of every single shot of Pocahontas (1995). Writing this thesis meant that I could dive into the world of Walt Disney’s animation. Both the University Library (UB) and the American Book Centre (ABC) in Amsterdam have helped me to get artworks and theoretical studies that no other bookshop could order and my collection has expanded extensively. It seems only fitting that I finish my Master Film Studies with the films that started my passion for cinema: Walt Disney’s animation.
A great many people (and animals) have contributed to the creation of this thesis and deserve special mention. Foremost among them are my two cats and my family members, especially my mom and dad, who have always supported me and made sure that I never lost my motivation (or run out of tea). I also want to thank my highly supportive and creative grandparents Joke and Peter, who have set a great example for me, my uncle Floris for indulging me with tasty late lunches after a long day of studying, and my grandmother Wiljo’s generous contribution, which allowed me to move the contents of ABC’s bookshelves to my home. Furthermore deserving of special thanks are my amazing friends - especially Yvette, Dominique, Samantha, Anouk and my partner Fabian - for their enthusiasm, support and their patience to listen to a tremendous amount of Disney-related stories. Anouk and my partner in film Dominique were willing sounding boards for my thoughts and Charles Forceville has been an inspiring supervisor. Lastly, I want to thank the amazing people that have shared their knowledge about animation with me: Amy Backwell and Sarah Joseph for teaching me the fundamentals of animation at Bournemouth Arts University and motivating me to chase my childhood dream of working in animation, Aardman animator Richard Haynes for sharing his highly inspiring experiences with me, and visual effects animator Eric Daniels, who has been so kind to answer my questions and to allow me an inside look into the creative processes at the Walt Disney Animation Studios.
1
Introduction
Welcome to the Tooniverse. It’s a portal in the movie experience through which we may venture into realms similar to but different from the imagined ones in mainstream movies. These animated worlds and their inhabitants exist if viewers and animators believe they do – Donald Crafton (2013: 2).
In animation, life begins with a single drawing. Animators construct an entire universe out of nothing and imbue it with life. In order to get emotionally involved in the animated film, the viewer must be able to forget that he or she is looking at series of drawings. The characters must be perceived as individuals that fit into a fully developed world. As Donald Crafton explains in the quote above, the animated worlds and characters only exist if both the animators and the viewers believe they do. How do the animators produce a believable rendering of both characters and worlds? Why do the performances of the characters seem alive, despite the viewer’s knowledge that they are mere drawings?
In terms of telling an engaging story, animated feature-length films are not that different from their live-action counterparts. Animation is created out of nothing, frame-by-frame, which gives it a unique quality. At the same time, however, it is exactly this quality that makes the medium highly artificial. André Bazin discusses cinema as a response to human’s obsession with realism (1967: 19-20). Live-action films are able to construct a reality that can be controlled by the filmmaker: a perfect illusion of the world. However, live-action films draw on an already existing, pro-filmic quality: there has to be a real event for the camera to record (Barthes 2000: 4). This creates a natural believability (Crafton 2013: 146). By contrast, everything in animation is created and can be manipulated by the artists. Therefore, animation can be seen as the ultimate form of control but also as highly artificial (Wells 1998: 25). In addition, animation is regarded as being “free” because it is not constraint by the physical laws of the real world. This allows for the freedom of the fantasy vision: to make real what exists in the imagination, in which everything is possible. Creighton Peet explains:
Unhampered by any such classical limitations as dramatic unities, or even such customary necessities as the laws of gravity, common sense, and possibility, the animated drawing is the only artistic medium ever discovered which is really “free” (quoted in Maltin 1987: 26).1
Consequently, discussing realism in animation seems contradictory. However, when looking at the development of animation from the early cartoons in the 1910s and 1920s to the CGI animation of today, a move towards a more realistic approach is undisputable. For instance, Snow White from Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937) has more similarities with a human girl than Mickey Mouse has with a real mouse. Furthermore, new computer technologies call into question the former distinctions between photographic realism and fantasy because these technologies have the ability to create “fake” images that look real. How do new technologies in animation work towards a realistic aesthetic in the medium? Are the values of the free cartoon still maintained? A popular critique on the medium’s move towards realism is the loss of the freedom of cartoons, favoring the realistic approach that takes its model from live-action cinema. This critique fuels the fear of technological determinism and the process of creating a film for which animation is not necessary: a film that could just as easily have been photographed in live-action. This suggests a double-sided problem with realism in animation: (1) how can we, as scholars, talk about realism in a highly artificial medium and (2) does animation’s move towards a realistic aesthetic mean that it looses the freedom of the fantasy vision, which is seen as the value of the early cartoons? I want to address these questions and focus on the tension in animation’s conventions of realism on the one hand and its freedom of the fantasy vision on the other, in order to discover how new technologies are used to create believable characters and worlds in an artificial medium. The term realism is used in this thesis as the representation of the real world equivalent as photorealistic as possible for the medium. I use the term fantasy vision to describe the quality of animation as a “free” medium, in particular the freedom of the artist to create everything he or she can image.
In order to answer these questions, I will concentrate on the technical and creative processes of animation from the Walt Disney Animation Studios from both a Film Studies’ and a filmmakers’ perspective. I will use the work of film theorists, scholars and historians alongside the opinions of filmmakers to offer an analysis that combines the academic field with the professional field of the animation film industry. While most scholarly work tends to favour the academic field and ignore the filmmakers’ perspective, I find it useful to combine the two and use the practical knowledge of animators to either critique or complement both analytic and theoretical arguments. I agree with theorists like Paul Wells, Jay P. Telotte and Jayne Pilling that there is a need for more critical attention to the technical and creative processes of animation in scholarly work and critical analyses (Wells lecture “Animation & Sports”, 19 March 2015; Telotte 2010: 1; Pilling 1997: x-xi).
1.1 Abandoning the lunatic Tooniverse: critiquing Disney’s realistic aesthetic
Since I will be focusing on the animation created by the Walt Disney Animation Studios and not on the rest of the Walt Disney Company, which ranges from amusement parks to cruises and from live-action films to merchandise, a short explanation on my use of terms is necessary. Henceforth, when referring to the Walt Disney Animation Studios, I shall use the term Disney and when referring to Walt Disney himself, I will use his first name. Should I need to discuss other parts of the Walt Disney Company, I will use the appropriate description to indicate it.
Why is it necessary to write another thesis about Disney? When perusing the university library and bookshops, you will find that writings and documentaries about the company are aplenty. However, most of these documents focus on either the narratives of the films, the company’s history or they are ideological/sociological critiques. Pilling claims:
Following Disney’s audacious gamble on the animated feature film, animation became defined by the Disney model – that of the cartoon as child/family entertainment, and as such, a no-go area for most film critics and theorists other than as material for ideological/sociological analysis (1997: xi).
I believe that the company has much more to offer analytically. Throughout the successful run of the Walt Disney Company in the entertainment industry, the company’s technological developments have proven almost as fundamental to the company’s identity and success as the development of the character Mickey Mouse. Wells elaborates, writing:
In many senses, Disney had aligned animation with aspects of photographic realism, and misrepresented the form’s more distinctive characteristics. The animated film had reached maturity, but in doing so had established Disney as synonymous with “animation” (1998: 24).
Wells discusses two important points. First, Disney has perfected a certain “language” for animation that became the default for the medium. This language is what the animators at Disney call ‘the illusion of life animation’, an aesthetic that uses aspects of photographic realism and that is modelled after the conventions of live-action cinema (Wells 1998: 24). This aesthetic dominates the work of not only Disney but also of other animation studios, among which the American studios Dreamworks and Universal and the Japanese Studio Ghibli. Wells therefore notes that ‘consequently, and ironically, Disney’s dominance of the medium places the issue of “realism” at the centre of any discussion of animation’ (1998: 24).
Second, Wells argues that by using this realistic approach, the medium dismisses the distinctive characteristics of the animated form. This has been a field of discussion for film critics, historians, scholars and filmmakers alike. Animation does not have to conform to the rules of the real world. It can even attack the laws of nature and mock photographable reality, creating a contradictory, lunatic Tooniverse (Leslie 2002: 202). Journalist and film theorist Siegfried Kracauer reckons that the characters and worlds of Disney’s illusion of life animation could just as easily have been photographed.2 He writes:
On the one hand, the cartoon (…) strives not after the fixing but the dissolution of conventional reality. On the other hand, it certainly does not have the function of visualizing a reality for whose representation cartoon is not at all necessary (quoted in Leslie 2002: 203).
Kracauer emphasizes two ways in which the illusion of life animation dismisses the cartoon’s values: (1) the films conform to conventional reality instead of dismissing it (2) the films create a reality that neglects the medium’s potential and could just as easily have been photographed. He describes these two points as being the true interests of the cartoon and argues that Disney threatens these qualities by creating an aesthetic in which the animators ‘bowed down before nature’, abandoning the lunatic and contradictory Tooniverse of the cartoon (Leslie 2002: 202-203). Consequently, the freedom of the cartoon seems to be replaced by the cause-and-effect logic of the real world. Animation director Glen Keane counters by saying: I disagree with the argument that if it’s animation, it has to be a subject matter that you can only do in animation. If that’s the case, why not just have everybody stop doing landscape paintings because of Ansel Adams? (quoted in Wells 1998: 26).
By describing Ansel Adams’ photorealistic images of landscapes as a definitive view, Keane suggests that the animators believe that they move beyond a realist representation. Art director Ralph Eggleston says about his work on Toy Story (1995) that ‘it was taking elements from reality and making them into a heightened reality, because I didn’t want to make it photo-realistic. I think it looks better than real’ (quoted in Telotte 2008: 159). By claiming that Toy
Story looks ‘better than real’, Eggleston moves beyond the photorealistic representation.
In short, while Kracauer’s statement suggests a dualism between the explicit freedom of the medium and the creation of a more realistic aesthetic, Keane and Eggleston discuss the combination of these two elements. I want to argue that it is a negotiation between realism and the freedom of the animated cartoon that marks the technological innovation of the animated film. By creating an aesthetic in which realism is blended with the values of the animated cartoon, the films go beyond the representation of the real: they achieve a hyperrealism. Consequently, Disney progressed in, on the one hand, making their films more realistic and believable and on the other hand more imaginative, magical and artistic. My research will show how both advances were necessary to create the magic that Disney is known for. By distracting the viewer with the seemingly real characters and their Tooniverse, the animation techniques remain invisible and add to the magical atmosphere of the Walt Disney Company (Telotte 2008: 2-3). At the same time, Disney knows that revealing how this “magic” works can be rewarding. I want to follow the company’s lead in this regard by offering a wide-range examination of Disney’s animated works, from the early cartoons of the 1920s to the company’s cooperation with Pixar in the 2000s. Disney’s dominance of the medium makes the studio a solid point of departure for my research. The studio’s technological innovations place the issue of realism at the center of discussing animation. At the same time, the critiques and discussion about the misrepresentation of the medium’s distinctive qualities allow for a critical evaluation of the development of the art of animation towards hyperrealism. In this thesis, I strive to lay the groundwork for similar research on other animation studios.
1.2 Thesis’ structure
I will discuss and analyse the progress of technological development and the company’s negotiation between realism and the fantasy vision in Disney’s animated cartoons and feature-length films, by signalling and analysing key technological developments and how they are used. For my case studies, I choose films that carry the burden of using a key technological innovation in the animation aesthetic.
Chapter two provides a theoretical framework. Departing from the movement towards realism, I discuss the different points of view of both theorist, scholars, historians and filmmakers in relation to the problem of realism in animation. How can I write about realism in a highly artificial medium that is created and constructed frame-by-frame? This chapter works towards a model for analysis for hyperrealistic animated films, which I will use to lay bare the studio’s negotiation between reality and the fantasy vision to accomplish believability.
In chapter three, I discuss the development of the early cartoons towards the illusion of life aesthetic that is characteristic of Disney’s feature-length animated films. As the stories told in animation became more complex, both characters and backgrounds had to become more
complex as well in order for the viewer to be moved by the picture and forget that he or she is watching a series of drawings. I will start with Disney’s earliest cartoons, the Laugh-O-Grams (1922-1923) and Oswald the Lucky Rabbit (1927-1928). Then I will move towards the Mickey
Mouse-cartoons (1928-present) and the Silly Symphonies (1929-1939). I will finish with a close
reading of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937) in which I will also show some examples of other illusion of life animation films.
In chapter four, I focus on the cooperation between Disney and Pixar and the advances in the technology of computer-generated images (CGI), which created both new possibilities and problems in the creation of a hyperrealistic animated film. CGI-technologies have the ability to create “fake” images that look photorealistic. It therefore problematizes the former distinctions between realism and fantasy. However, the Disney and Pixar studios wanted a more stylized aesthetic for their animation. Telotte notes that the studios ‘had to figure out, essentially from the start, what could be done in and with this new approach to the art form’ (2010: 221). First, I will analyze this process by doing a close reading and analysis of Disney/Pixar’s first CGI-animated feature film Toy Story (1995) and Monsters, Inc. (2001), in which I will also show some examples of other Disney/Pixar films. Second, I will discuss the Non-Photorealistic Rendering movement in Disney’s animation by analyzing the background aesthetic of Tarzan (1999) and the short films Paperman (2012) and Feast (2014) that merge the aesthetics of hand-drawn and CGI techniques to create a new animation aesthetic that moves away from a realistic depiction.
Finally, chapter five will provide the conclusion of my analyses and research. In this chapter, I will provide a short summary of my research, answer the questions I addressed in my introduction and give the concluding remarks of my analyses.
In short, the questions I address are the following: How do the animators produce a believable rendering of both characters and worlds? And why do the performances of the characters seem alive, despite the viewer’s knowledge that they are mere drawings? When looking at the legacy of the animated works of the Walt Disney Animation Studios, the answer seems to be the addition of realism. To create believability, the animators created images that look “real”. However, it seems contradictory to talk about realism in a medium that is highly artificial. It suggests a dualism between the explicit freedom of the medium and the creation of a more realistic aesthetic. In line with this, I continue by asking the following questions: How do new technologies in animation work towards a realistic aesthetic in the medium? And are the values of the free cartoon still maintained?
2
Animation and the Problem of Realism
A Critical Approach to Animation, Realism and the Fantasy Vision
I definitely feel that we cannot do the fantastic things based on the real, unless we first know the real - Walt Disney (quoted in Thomas and Johnston 1981: 71). In order to survive in the competitive environment of the entertainment industry, Disney, like most companies, has had to constantly innovate its product. By adopting or innovating new technologies the company has helped animation to mature. In this process, which I will discuss in chapter three, Disney has been engaged in constant negotiations between the technologies of the animated cartoon and those of live-action cinema. As Walt emphasizes in the quote above, even though the medium is based on the fantastic, the point of departure for animation lies in realism. Telotte writes: ‘These almost real figures and the fantasy realm they inhabit distract us from the technology that makes the fantasy that Disney sells possible’ (2008: 3). By revealing animation’s technology and exploring the realistic approach to the fantasy vision that forms the context of Disney’s animated films, it is possible to better understand how this “magic” is created. This chapter will function as a theoretical outline in which I discuss this negotiation and create a model for analysis that I will use to lay bare the development in Disney’s animated features.
2.1 Realism in an artificial medium
The historical pattern of popular animation was, just like conventional cinema, characterized by technological innovations. This way, animation closely followed the path that we usually associate with the history of film. Bazin saw, in his notion of the ‘myth of total cinema’, the development of cinema as a response to a human obsession with realism. He discusses theorists like Plateau who describe cinema as ‘a total and complete representation of reality; […] the reconstruction of a perfect illusion of the outside world in sound, colour, and relief’, a way to reconstruct ‘the world in its own image’ (1967: 17-22). He argues that this obsession with realism fashions new techniques of mechanical reproduction in the 19th century, from
photography to the phonograph. Roland Barthes claims that the camera’s essence is the repeating of an event that actually happened; without the event the camera could not have recorded it (2000: 4). He writes: ‘The photograph is literally an emanation of the referent’ (2000: 80). This suggests a high level of realism; the viewer can count on it that the event has taken place for it to be photographed or, in this case, filmed. However, realism in film is a complicated notion. As it operates within the image-making practice, there is no fixed meaning
of the film: it is open to interpretation by both the artist and the viewer (Wells 1998: 24). The interpretation of images always has an element of subjectivity. While non-fiction seems to be more “real” than fiction, there is still the matter of the manipulation of the filmed material. A film is by definition constructed; images are edited to evoke certain emotions or responses in the viewer. Still, it can be argued that in live-action films there at least has to be an event for the camera to record before the manipulation can take place.
Herein lies a fundamental difference between live-action and animation, according to Charles Solomon. He claims that animation can be defined by two factors: ‘(1) the imagery is recorded frame-by-frame and (2) the illusion of motion is created, rather than recorded’ (1987: 10). Animation is a highly artificial and therefore free medium in the sense that the animator is able to create and construct the reality he or she imagines. Wells notes: ‘Animation can defy the laws of gravity, challenge our perceived view of space and time, and endow lifeless things with dynamic and vibrant properties’ (1998: 11). The artificiality of the medium therefore ensures that animation is not restricted by the physical constraints of the real world. Animation does not record reality but ‘artificially creates and records its own’ (Wells 1998: 25). Therefore, Wells paraphrases Umberto Eco in claiming that animation can be seen as a “completely fake” medium (1986: 7).
Consequently, the combination of animation with the notion of realism poses a problem. Animation, being highly artificial, might seem to exclude itself from the reality debate. However, the problem of realism has become the centre of discussing animation. Philip Kelly Denslow underscores this in asking the rhetorical question: ‘What is animation if not the desire to make real that which exists in the imagination?’ (1997: 4). When looking at the development of Disney’s cartoons towards the illusion of life aesthetic, it is tempting to approach the studio’s animation from Bazin’s perspective and recognize a technical process that works towards a state of perfect realism. The development of the medium from the first Oswald the Lucky Rabbit-cartoon in 1927 to the illusion of life animation in Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs in 1937, as I will illustrate in chapter three, was extraordinarily rapid. Colour, sound, movement and personality animation as well as narrative, spatial and graphic complexity were all taken to unprecedented levels in just ten years time. Wells argues: ‘With each technical development (…) Disney moved further away from the plasmatic flexibility of many of the early Silly Symphonies, and coerced the animated form into a neo-realist practice’ (1998: 23). With the creation of the studio’s first feature-length animation Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, animation moved away from the flatland cartoons and created the illusion of life animation. The world, characters and their actions were based on real life, translated into cartoon terms (Kaufman 2012: 49). So, while live-action film environments are selected, constructed and manipulated, there still has to be an event played out for the camera in order to record the film. The mise-en-scène
is a photographic given and the techniques for the manipulation are disguised. Consequently, the viewer is used to conflating the film’s location with the real equivalent (Crafton 2013: 145-146). This creates a natural believability, or what Crafton calls ‘a cinematic trompe l’oeil that passes for reality’ (2013: 146). By contrast, in animation these physical attributes are not fixed: time and space are limitless and obey arbitrary laws. The viewer does not have the certainty of the photographic material to create this believability: he or she watches the actions of drawings or computer generated images in an artificial environment. The characters in Disney’s feature-length animated films are not living people, yet they exhibit agency and life. Why do the Tooniverse and the toon actors seem alive and present, despite the viewer’s knowledge that they are projected film frames of drawings? Crafton writes that they exist if viewers and animators believe they do (2013: 2). According to Andy Darley, this believability can be accomplished by creating a heightened realism. He explains:
This heightened realism was largely produced by a combination of introducing unprecedented levels of spatial and temporal verisimilitude into the fictional world via the continuity system, use of psychologically rounded characters to ground and motivate the trajectory of the narrative, and an enhanced literality in the drawn imagery itself (inspired by the “impression of reality” of live action photography) (1997: 17).
Several elements in animation are highlighted in Darley’s statement: (1) the appearance of a real world that extends beyond the frame and (2) psychologically rounded characters. These elements are then achieved by (3) using an enhanced literality in the drawn images and (4) the “impression of reality” and continuity system of live-action films. These are the elements that I want to focus on in my analyses in the subsequent chapters.
First, what is interesting in Darley’s statement is his emphasis of the fictional world. Maureen Furniss elaborates on this by claiming that in terms of image design, the images in the majority of animated works can be discussed in two categories: characters and backgrounds (1998: 66). While characters are usually perceived as important to attract the viewer’s attention, their worlds are often seen as a static arena for the character’s action. Furniss writes: ‘Audiences generally remember characters the most, but background art greatly impacts the viewer’s perception’ (1998: 66). I want to follow Furniss and Darley in this regard and make a distinction in my analyses between the world and the characters, because both are necessary in an analysis of Disney’s animation aesthetics. In order to create a believable world, the development from the flat, two-dimensional Tooniverse towards a spatial dynamic is important. Leslie describes the worlds of the early cartoons as flatlands (2002: 23). Their two-dimensionality highlights the
constructed and artificial nature, subverting a realist sensibility. By creating a three-dimensional space that extends beyond the frame, the film suggests that the world created is bigger than the viewer can see: it is a world that can be explored. Bazin believes that a realistic representation should approximate the dynamics of natural vision and the exploration of visual reality (1967: 37). The illusion of depth and spatial dynamic allow the viewer to explore the animated world. These innovations can therefore be seen as a move towards realism. To create this kind of world, different technologies are used, such as multiple camera set-ups, enhanced drawing (and later digital) techniques to create the illusion of depth and the addition of colour and sound. Telotte elaborates the use of ‘sounds to real-ize space – that is, to bring it into being, to suggest its substance, and to suture spatial elements together’ (2010: 75).
Darley’s second statement is the use of psychologically rounded characters. When discussing the scene in Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs in which the huntsman attempts to kill Snow White, animator Hamilton Luske explains that in order to fear for Snow White’s life, the viewer first has to believe that she is real. He notes: ‘Walt and his writers and artists were pushing the envelope of believability to its furthest point when cartoons of human beings attempted to take the life of other characters’ (quoted in “Audio commentary DVD” 2014 00:07:23).3 Instead of just moving from one action to another, a character needs a personality,
emotions and motivations for action. This is called personality animation. Crafton makes a distinction between figurative acting and embodied acting. He explains: ‘Figurative performance is extroverted. Characters behave as recognizable “types”, marshalling a small range of instantly identifiable facial and body expressions’ (2013: 23). These performances work against the viewer’s emotional involvement with the character by showing its constructed and artificial nature. The acting, as Crafton describes, is skin deep: he character conveys emotion and thought through the distortion of its body. Embodied acting, on the other hand, is introverted. It is an approach that was influenced by the teaching of “the Method” of Stanislavsky that became popular in films and on stage in the 1950s. Crafton describes it as ‘the philosophy and practice of creating imaginatively realized beings with individuality, depth, and internal complexity’ (Crafton 2013: 36). Again, different innovations in the medium were crucial for this development, like the use of sound to give the characters a voice and music and colour to guide the viewer’s emotions.
Third, Darley points out the importance of enhanced drawing techniques that take its model from live-action films to create these believable worlds and characters. Visual effects animator Eric Daniels explains: ‘If Snow White, for example, looked like Olive Oyl, you wouldn't care as much about her plight, because you wouldn't really believe her as a person’ (personal
3 Hamilton Luske wrote this in 1937 and is quoted by John Canemaker in the audio commentary on the DVD of Snow
communication, 16 May 2016).4 Again, this suggests a move towards realism. In chapters three
and four, I will analyse key technical processes and developments that were used to help create these worlds and characters.
Finally, Darley’s fourth point is about the use of the “impression of reality” and continuity system of live-action films. The staging and cutting of the scene became more and more important. Instead of using a long shot to show the action, intercutting and montage helped to guide the viewer’s emotions and create suspense. Bazin writes: ‘In analysing reality, montage presupposes of its very nature the unity of meaning of the dramatic event’ (1967: 36). Wells elaborates on this, claiming that animation aspires to create a realistic image system that echoes the live-action film’s realism (1998: 25). By doing so, animation creates the illusion of reality.
2.2 Exaggerating reality: hyperrealism and over-illusionism
As I mentioned in the introduction to chapter one, this move towards realism created a discussion among theorists, scholars and critics. The main critique of Disney’s realistic aesthetic is that it neglects the values of animation and creates films for which the animated medium is not necessary: the film could just as easily have been photographed in live-action. Not just the aesthetics, but also the types of narratives of the illusion of life animation came to resemble those of the live-action films and began to touch on the concerns of the real world (Telotte 2008: 57). Pocahontas (1995), for instance, not just tells the story of people that have actually existed but addresses America’s problematic colonial history. Disney/Pixar’s Monsters Inc. (2001) finds a solution for the energy crisis and Wall-E (2008) presents the dystopian future of an uninhabitable planet, caused by enormous amounts of garbage. Telotte describes the illusion of life animation as ‘an illusion of a version of life that audiences would readily recognize, accept, and even find comforting’ (2008: 57). The narratives are set in an imaginary world that resembles the real world but is not an exact copy. Eco calls this hyperrealism. He writes about Disneyland, saying that ‘once the “total fake” is admitted, in order to be enjoyed it must seem totally real’ (1986: 43). This statement can be expanded to the problem of believability in animation: in order to enjoy the animated film and be moved by its story, the viewer first has to believe that it is real. Wells proposes a list with key conventions of such a hyperrealist film:
- The design, context and action within the hyper-realist animated film approximates …, and corresponds to the design, context and action within the live-action film’s representation of reality.
4 Olive Oyl is a character from Popeye the Sailor (1933-1957). She is characterized by the use of rubber hose animation and unrealistic bodily proportions. I will discuss rubber hose animation in chapter three.
- The characters, objects and environment within the hyper-realist animated film are subject to the conventional physical laws of the “real” world.
- The “sound” deployed in the hyper-realist animated film will demonstrate diegetic appropriateness and correspond directly to the context from which it emerges .... - The construction, movement and behavioural tendencies of “the body” in the hyper-realist animated film will correspond to the orthodox physical aspects of human beings and creatures in the “real” world (1998: 25-26).
Wells sees this list as a yardstick by which animated films can be measured for their relative degree of realism (1998: 27). He argues that the more the animation’s style corresponds to these codes, the more realistic it appears. By contrast, when the animation deviates from these conventions, it will appear more unrealistic. Animations’ advancements in techniques to create more realistic movements and environments seem to suggest that the more realistic the film looks, the better it will be. Darley already stated that the enhanced literality in the images is important for creating a heightened realism. With the development of computer generated imagery, or CGI, the possibility opened up to create photorealistic images that were indistinguishable from the live-action images. This way, the focus of technological developments seems to stay on realism. Daniels explains that ‘in the early days of CG, everyone was eager to make their images as photographic as possible. The goal was to create an image you couldn't tell from a photograph’ (personal communication, 16 May 2016). This also poses a problem: while the difference between live-action images and hand-drawn animation stays recognizable, CG technology can create artificial images that look photorealistic. This way, CGI problematizes the distinction between realism and fantasy. As Eco describes: ‘The “completely real” becomes identified with the “completely fake.” Absolute unreality is offered as real presence’ (1986: 7).
Are the critics right: has animation lost the freedom of the cartoons to become a simulation of live-action cinema? On the contrary, Crafton argues that ‘Walt Disney always insisted that his artists preserve at least a small gap of implausibility to keep animatography distinct from cinematography’ (2013: 2). Animators Frank Thomas and Ollie Johnston describe how Walt often said to the animators: ‘We oughta be looking for entertaining ways of doing things. We don’t want to get it straight, y’know – we’re not copying nature!’ (1981: 37). Elements of the action and design had to be exaggerated. Animators of the Zagreb School suggest that ‘to animate’ is ‘to give life and soul to a design, not through the copying but through the transformation of reality’ (quoted in Wells 1998: 10). Animation is the realization of something that exists only in the imagination and, while its roots are in realism, it does not copy our real
world but transforms it into something else. Walt called this transformation ‘a caricature of realism’ (Thomas and Johnston 1981: 65-66). Thomas and Johnston explain: There was some confusion among the animators when Walt first asked for more realism and then criticized the result because it was not exaggerated enough (…). When Walt asked for realism, he wanted a caricature of realism (1981: 65-66).
Walt’s approach meant that animation has its roots in realism but exaggerates it for entertainment purposes, creating a caricature instead of a representation of reality. Michele Pierson describes a similar approach when theorizing the spectatorial pleasure of CGI. She argues that the development in this technology has been informed by two fascinations: the creation of photorealistic imagery and the desire for a cinema of astonishment (2002: 48-49). First, I want to discuss her view of CGI as a device for simulation, designed to represent the photographic or cinematographic reality and to simulate objects of the real world (2002: 65). Daniels calls this Photorealistic Rendering (personal communication 6 January 2016). The use of CGI as simulation is in line with Bazin’s notion of cinema as a perfect reproduction of the real world. Second, Pierson describes CGI as illusionistic (2002: 64). These images do not try to simulate the real but create something of its own, something new. Daniels describes this as a movement towards Non-Photorealistic Rendering, or NPR, ‘which referred to a desire in some of us [animators, E.O.] to make computer animation which looked more like art than photography’ (personal communication, 6 January 2016). Pierson claims that the viewer is not meant to recognize these images as real but to be amazed by the magic happening on screen. She believes that if the imitation of the real is too perfect, it tends to make the astonishment disappear (2002: 48-49). Disney’s animated films are not supposed to be a perfect simulation; they must feel and look inherently different from their live-action counterparts. The viewer wants to be amazed and entertained. Eco, while discussing Disneyland, notes:
When there is a fake (…) it is not so much because it wouldn’t be possible to have the real equivalent but because the public is meant to admire the perfection of the fake and its obedience to the program. In this sense Disneyland not only produces illusion, but – in confessing it – stimulates the desire for it (1986: 44).
The same can be said for animation. Disney animators move beyond traditional modes of realist representation, maintaining a hyperrealism ‘which is neither a completely accurate version of the real world nor a radical vindication of the animated form’ (Wells 1998: 27). Jeffry Katzenberg, former chief at Disney, describes the aesthetics of Pocahontas (1995) as
exaggerated reality (quoted in Wells 1998: 26). Every object and environment created in the animated film is recognizably real but at the same time becomes over-determined: a realism that is simultaneously realistic and “fake”. Wells calls this over-illusionism: ‘The principles of movement themselves are necessarily over-enunciated in the animated vocabulary’ (1998: 27). This is recognizable in many technological developments in animation. On the one hand, a new technical process creates the possibility for more realistic images. On the other hand, the animators pushed the new technology beyond the limits of realism, exaggerating the action for entertainment. I will illustrate this in chapter three.
In short, Disney’s animated feature films are not only constructed through the established codes of realism of live-action films but also correspond with the conventions of animated cartoons. This way, Disney succeeded in achieving a heightened sense of realism in an artificial medium, creating a hyperrealistic aesthetic. Disney did not strive to create a copy of live-action cinema or a photorealistic representation of our real world. However, the studio did develop technologies to bring the animated image closer to reality in order for the viewer to engage with the narrative and emphasize with the main characters. The roots of Disney’s animation are in realism but the studio exaggerates or caricatures it, creating an over-illusionism that distinguishes the medium from its live-action counterpart. 2.3 Structure for analyses In my research and analyses, I will focus on the animation techniques at the level of production and how this is related or affects changes at the level of reception. I depart from Darley’s believe that:
One must attempt to understand the ways in which the new means of image origination figure in the production of the text. Then one might ask how the differences at the level of production might be related to, or affects changes at, the level of reception or reading (1997: 18).
I strive to accomplish this by close reading and analysing key cartoons and feature films from Disney’s hand-drawn animation aesthetics in chapter three and Disney/Pixar’s CGI animation aesthetics in chapter four. Two elements of the case studies will be analysed in relation to the technical process: the animated world and the characters. Central to my research is the creation of believable worlds and characters in an artificial medium and the studio’s negotiation between realism and the fantasy vision to accomplish this believability. How is the art of animation used to create the reality illusion and where are these rules for realism deviated to create a fantasy vision? In order to answer this question, I will use Wells’ list of the key elements of hyperrealism
that I have outlined as a practical guide. I will make a combination of the analytical and theoretical perspectives of the scholars that I have discussed in this chapter, and the perspective of the filmmakers that is often overlooked in scholarly writings. I will hereby focus on these two points: - The design of the imaginary world. This means both the aesthetics of the world and cinematographic elements. - The design of the characters. Again, I will analyse their aesthetics but also how they physically relate to their counterparts in the real world.
By analysing the aesthetics of Disney’s hand-drawn animation and Disney/Pixar’s CGI animation, I want to investigate how Disney uses the conventions of live-action cinema to create a believable world that touches on the concerns of our real world, while at the same time the freedom of the animated medium is used to insert fantasy elements into the realistic world. I argue that Disney establishes its believability by creating a trade-off between realism on the one hand and the freedom of the fantasy vision on the other.
3
From Flatland to Multiplane
Innovating the Animated Medium
Disney’s gift, from the beginning, was not as is commonly supposed a “genius” for artistic expression. It was for the exploitation of technological innovation – Richard Schickel (quoted in Telotte 2008: 1).
1928 to 1937, the decade that brought a spectacular advance in the cartoon: from novelty to art form – Frank Thomas and Ollie Johnston (1981: 25).
In the early 1920s, Disney was still a small studio and innovated in a similar way as the other animation studios of the era. This changed when Disney started experimenting in 1928 with new animation techniques that innovated the medium. The cartoons that dominated animation production from the late 1920s played an important part in shaping animation’s development towards the creation of feature films and the illusion of life aesthetic that was introduced in
Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937) and made the Disney-style synonymous with
animation. Historian Gregory Waller stated: ‘for almost all critics and journalists and reviewers of the 1930s and early 1940s, the animated cartoon was quite literally Disney’s land’ (in Telotte 2010: 61).
This chapter will provide a short outline of the history of the Walt Disney Animation Studios, in which I will focus on the important steps in animation techniques towards realism. I want to lay bare the development from Disney’s early cartoons, which are characterized as being “totally free”, to the hyperrealism of Disney’s feature-length hand-drawn animated films. How did Disney begin to conform to hyperrealism? And did the studio, in the process, maintain the freedom of the animated cartoon or conform to a realistic aesthetic, which could just as easily have been photographed in live-action? In short, I will focus on the tension of the codes of realism and the fantasy vision. I will do this by analysing key films that represent the shift from the early cartoons to Disney’s illusion of life aesthetic and focus on the new techniques in animation used to help the animated medium develop and mature from novelty to art form. First, I will sketch the context in which these technological innovations took place by analysing the Laugh-O-Grams (1922-1923), the Alice-series (1924 and 1925-1927) and Oswald the Lucky
Rabbit (1927-1928). Second, I want to analyse the technological innovations in the animation of
space, the use of sound and colour and eventually the development of character animation in the
how these technological innovations came together to create the illusion of life animation by analysing Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937).
3.1 Innovating animation: the cartoons
According to Donald Crafton, the animated medium acquired its characteristic methods, forms and content in America during the 1930s and 1940s (2013: 2). In order to better understand these innovations that worked towards the illusion of life animation, I first want to focus on the earliest cartoons.
The first theatrical cartoons that the studio created were called the Laugh-O-Grams (1922-1923). The animation was simple, starting with black lines on a white background in
Little Red Riding Hood (1922) and evolving towards more detailed backgrounds that were
coloured by a range of wash tones in Puss in Boots (1922) (image 3.01-02) (Maltin 1987: 30). The subsequent cartoons that Disney released were the Alice’s Comedies-series (1924) and the
Alice in Cartoonland-series (1925-1927). Both Alice-series reversed the idea of the Out of the Inkwell-cartoons (1918-1926) of the Fleischer Brothers, by letting a live-action girl enter the
Tooniverse. While the Laugh-O-Grams focused on telling a fairy tale filled with gags, the blurring of the boundaries between animation and realism was the main focus of the Alice-cartoons and the Out of the Inkwell-series, in which a live-action performer interacts with the toon characters and helps to construct the Tooniverse. This latter kind of animation reminisces of the early vaudeville-acts like Winsor McCay’s Gertie the Dinosaur (1914), in which McCay interacts with his animated dinosaur and eventually enters the frame.5 3.01-02: Disney’s early Laugh-O-Grams: Little Red Riding Hood (1922) (00:02:12) (l) and its simple animation, compared to Puss In Boots (1922) (00:00:56) (r) and its attention to detail and use of wash tones.
5 McCay accomplished this trick by creating an animated version of himself. The live-action performers in the Alice-cartoons and Out of the Inkwell-series were not animated but recorded.
Important to note is that in the Laugh-O-Grams and Alice-series, the cartoon characters stayed fairly realistic in their movements. A couple of gags were used where the limps of characters became longer or shorter, but overall realistic physical movement was maintained. Disney animators Thomas and Johnston write:
There was no movement in the figures in early animation besides a simple progression across the paper. No one knew how to get any change of shape or flow of action from one drawing to another. There was no relationship of forms, just the same little cartoon figure in a new position on the next piece of paper (1981: 45).
Furthermore, the early cartoons were flatlands, as Leslie calls them, because of the flat two-dimensional horizontal depiction of the scenes, which usually consisted of long shots (2002: 23). However, the subsequent series Oswald the Lucky Rabbit (1927-1928) showed a considerable increase in the quality of the studio’s animation.6 Construction of the animation
became more and more modelled on live-action conventions like cutting patterns and multiple camera set-ups (Leslie 2002: 24). Instead of horizontally depicting the scene in long shots, the
Oswald-cartoons had an accelerated pace and was more dynamic in its cinematography and
effects, such as the iris masks and an object or mouth that blacks out the frame (image 3.03-04).
3.03-04: Camera set-ups in Oh, What a Knight (1928), modelled after live-action conventions. Oswald is first seen in a long shot (00:00:22) (l) and then shown in close-up in an iris mask (00:00:33) (r).
Furthermore, Disney and other studios introduced techniques of transformation and rubber hose animation. The first technique, transformation, allowed Oswald to wring himself out like a towel or smash his body into pieces that all become miniature replicas of the rabbit. The second
6 Disney made the Oswald-series from 1927-1928. After that, the rights of Oswald were bought by other studios, which kept on making the cartoons until 1943.
technique, rubber hose animation, approaches the appendages of the character as flexible garden hoses (image 3.05). When useful for a gag, the Tooniverse and everything in it gains this flexible and transformable quality. Leslie argues that in these cartoons the characters operate within a universe of impermanence, constant transformation and shifting expectation (2002: iv). While these techniques are hardly realistic, they were actually seen as a virtue. Thomas and Johnston explain that ‘there was no suggestion of realism because the concept of the character was not one of realism’ (1981: 45). The freedom of the animated form that Peet celebrated in 1929 was the point of focus: if you can image it, you can draw it, as long as it is funny. 3.05: Clean-up animation drawings of Oswald and his camel. The flexible neck and legs of the camel are a typical example of rubber hose animation. There is no suggestion of realism (in Thomas and Johnston, 1981: 45).
As I will demonstrate in this paragraph, the technological changes in the medium on the one hand propelled the cartoons towards a lunatic and contradictory world in which nature and its laws are under attack. By the power of an artist’s pencil, a car could for instance turn into an aeroplane in the Mickey Mouse-cartoon Plane Crazy (1928). On the other hand, however, the innovation of animation techniques guided the medium towards a more hyperrealistic aesthetic as well. I want to focus here on four important technological innovations of the medium that propelled it towards hyperrealism, but also show how the same techniques gave the artists more freedom in the Tooniverse. These innovations can be summarized in these four terms: space, sound, colour, and character animation. I will discuss these four points by analysing cartoons from the Mickey Mouse-series (1928-present) and the Silly Symphonies (1929-1939) and their use of the innovation in question.
3.1.1 Animating space: from flatlands to spatial dynamics
Plane Crazy (1928), the first Mickey Mouse-cartoon, positions Mickey in the spirit of the age of
plane using classic cartoon transformations: when Mickey pulls at the different parts of an old car, they become longer so the car can transform into a plane. The Mickey Mouse-cartoons add a more three-dimensional, stereoscopic quality to the Tooniverse, while still being clearly two-dimensional. Mickey is placed in a more complex world than that of Oswald, Messmer-Sullivan’s
Felix the Cat (1919-present), or the cartoons of the Fleischer Brothers. Telotte writes: ‘the early
Mickeys seem far more intent on making space function within the narrative so that it might thereby reveal itself’ (2010: 66).
The animation of Plane Crazy shows this development in spatial dynamic. Mickey’s actions are neither in a flatland, nor a realistic world, but depicted to distort or warp space. The world and actions are both unpredictable. For instance, the plane hits a cow, takes her up in the air and her udders black out the frame. While this trick was also used in earlier cartoons, Plane Crazy uses it to spatially convey the fear of the collisions: the camera does not turn away from the collision but rather goes through it and prepares the viewer for a rapid spatial displacement. In addition, the camera shifts from the typical horizontal depiction of the action to a point-of-view shot, so the viewer experiences the collision head-on. These point-of-view shots also invite the artists to play around with the horizon, stepping away from the straight line to show how the plane twists and turns (image 3.06). A different kind of spatial dynamic is seen in Plane Crazy’s use of aerial shots. The camera looks down on the farm that gets smaller or larger, depending on the height of the plane. In short, while the other cartoons of the era use solely horizontal movement, Plane Crazy explores every element of the frame. This cartoon therefore experiments with a three-dimensional Tooniverse and its spatial dynamics. 3.06-07: Spatial dynamic while the plane twists and turns in Plane Crazy (1928) (00:03:11) (l) and the illusion of depth in a detailed background décor with foreground and background action in The Gallopin’
Gaucho (1928), (00:03:52) (r).
Mickey’s second cartoon, The Gallopin’ Gaucho (1928) is also worth mentioning in relation to spatial development. On first sight, The Gallopin’ Gaucho looks more like the flatland cartoons than Plane Crazy but the cartoon is drawn ‘both toward and away from a realist register’ (Telotte 2010: 70). In The Gallopin’ Gaucho, Mickey uses his tail as a transformable prop; he turns it into a hook to steal a mug of beer or he pulls it loose from his body to use as a lasso. This trick has been the source of gags in the Felix the Cat-cartoons, demonstrating the clever nature of the character and his ability to triumph over obstacles and reality.7 However, The Gallopin’ Gauco is also
innovating. Like Plane Crazy, the cartoon uses a detailed background décor with an emphasis on dimension but in a different way. Buildings in The Gallopin’ Gaucho are presented at an angle to the frame-line to create the illusion of depth. Gags build around foreground and background, using space in a three-dimensional way. In a scene in The Gallopin’ Gaucho, laundry hangs out to dry in the background with a bucket of starch underneath. Mickey goes from foreground to the background to get the starch and use it to stiffen the legs of his drunken ostrich (image 3.07). Not only foreground and background, but also off-screen space is used to build gags in The
Gallopin’ Gaucho. During a battle with Pete the Cat, Mickey tumbles off-screen to a previously
unseen space to grab a pot. He then throws the pot outside the frame into the next shot, where it hits Pete’s head. This use of previously unseen space creates the illusion of an extensive, wide world that extends beyond the film frame. In the late 1930s, a couple of different animation studios were working on techniques to create a depth illusion in their cartoons. Disney created the multiplane camera, a vertical device that allowed for more complex camera zooms. Four glass planes, each with its own light source, were horizontally attached to a frame. The planes could move up and down independently, closer or further away from the camera that was mounted on top of the structure and photographed downwards through the planes. Telotte explains: ‘The two uppermost planes received the basic animation cells, the next two were used for various elements of a scene’s background or setting, and the final, unmoving plane typically supplied sky or neutral backgrounds’ (2008: 63). As the opening sequence of the Silly Symphony-cartoon The Old Mill (1937) demonstrates, the camera gives the illusion of moving past the bushes on the foreground and closer towards the mill (image 3.08-09). Because the background can stay on the last plane, not moving closer towards the camera as it zooms in, the sky and sun can stay the same size while the mill itself becomes larger. Inside the mill, the camera passes the wooden beams in the mill to show all the animals that live there. Walt talks in the episode “Tricks of our Trade” of the television series Disneyland (1954-1958) about the multiplane camera as ‘a piece of equipment, designed to make cartoons more realistic and enjoyable’ (quoted in “Tricks of our Trade”
7 In, for example, Outdoor Indore (1928), Felix tears a tiger’s stripes off and uses them as a ladder. In the same cartoon, Felix pulls off his own tail and turns it into a flute.
February 13, 1957: 00:22:37). He explains that they wanted to take a painting and ‘make it behave like a real piece of scenery under the camera’ (quoted in “Tricks of our Trade” February 13, 1957: 00:25:31).8
3.08-09: The opening sequence of The Old Mill (1937) shows how the multiplane camera zooms-in in a new realistic way; the clouds in the sky stay the same size. An illusion of depth is created. (00:00:26) (l), (00:00:35) (r). Notice the way the colours and lighting slightly change to indicate a sunset.
To sum up, the earliest cartoons are defined by their horizontal and uniform staging. Their characters are placed against spare, flat backgrounds and their actions are shown through a range of long shots and close-ups, all depicted by a horizontal camera placement. Plane Crazy and The Gallopin’ Gaucho show a more complex, stereoscopic world: one with which Mickey interacts. The multiplane camera in The Old Mill allows for more depth and gives the viewer the feeling of a world that can be explored. This creates new opportunities for unexpected gags, compelling stories but also a more realistic depth perspective.
3.1.2 The sound cartoons: realistic and fantastic sound effects
The success of the live-action sound film The Jazz Singer (1927) created an outbreak in Hollywood of both excitement and anger about the creation of talking pictures. Some studios opposed it while others embraced it. The viewer, however, loved the talkies so sound in film meant big business. Disney grabbed the opportunity to innovate the animated cartoon. Mickey’s third short, Steamboat Willie (1928), became the first synchronized sound cartoon. Steamboat
Willie uses sound in four different ways.
First, a musical score accompanies the images, similar to the live piano performance of the silent film viewings of that time. Second, fantastic sound effects are added to accompany the gags. Examples are the whirling sound when Pete the Cat pulls Mickey’s stomach out of
proportions (notice again the rubber quality of Mickey’s body) and the now common use of “plings” and “plongs” when a character is kicked or falls (image 3.10). Third, sound is used for transformations. For example, Mickey turns a goat into a phonograph and plays the animals on the boat like they are musical instruments: he pulls at a duck’s neck and drums on the teeth of a bull like it’s a xylophone (image 3.11). The power of transformation is here bound to the aural dimension. As critic Gilbert Seldes noted: ‘The sound was as unreal as the action’ (quoted in Maltin 1987: 35).
3.10-11: The rubber quality of Mickey’s body, accompanied by a whirling sound (00:00:57) (l) and the transformation of a bull’s teeth into a xylophone, using music (00:06:20) (r) in Steamboat Willie (1928).
The fourth sound dimension in Steamboat Willie is the creation of an aural context for the action, emphasizing the reality of the images by giving them a voice: the ducks quack and Mickey whistles. Furthermore, the arrival of the steamboat is announced by mechanical sounds and horns before the viewer sees it. This way, off-screen space and on-screen space are cued by sound, enhancing the sense of spatial reality. Another example is that when Mickey moves from the deck where music plays to another part of the ship, the tune can still be heard while the source of the music is no longer visible. Consequently, this innovation inspired new gags as well: when Mickey flings a potato at a mocking parrot, the sound of a splash off-screen indicates that the parrot has fallen into the water and motivates Mickey’s smile of satisfaction. By indicating an action, announcing a presence, suggesting contiguous space and motivating a character’s response, these sounds function to help construct the reality illusion (Telotte 2008: 28). At the same time, they also underscore their function as part of the construction of animation. The sounds are carefully selected so that the viewer only hears a duck quack when it is supposed to, instead of a more realistic cacophony of animal sounds. It is therefore, as Telotte argues, an example of Hollywood’s habit of constructing reality (2008: 28).
