A new film opening today, “Planes,” comes from Disney but not from Pixar, and it was originally scheduled to go straight to home video rather than theaters.
Now you can look at those distinctions as either worrisome or hopeful, depending on your point of view. After all, Disney is trying (some might say “desperately”) to prop up its own animation division as separate and apart from Pixar, and that’s not a bad thing. And if “Planes” was scheduled for DVD release but later determined to be deserving of a theatrical release, that could be a good thing, right?
This new animated feature is built around anthropomorphic airplanes, which sparked my interest, so I for one choose to be hopeful. Well, at least until the reviews that come out today discourage me, as happens all too often.
The real question for Disney, of course, is whether all of those ads for “Planes” will give it some box-office traction this opening weekend. Not that Disney really needs to care.
True, “The Lone Ranger” was a huge disappointment, a big-budget film that is not likely to go into the black. But Disney has three other movies that rank in the top six for 2013 (so far): “Iron Man 3” (at No. 1), “Monsters University” (No. 4) and “Oz the Great and Powerful” (No. 6). No weeping for Disney, please.
There is already some Internet blather deriding “Planes” as merely a knockoff of “Cars,” just taking the same basic story airborne. And there may be some truth to that, since even the posters tout that “Planes” is “From above the world of cars.”
But “Cars” wasn’t all that original, either. There were lots of animated shows about anthropomorphic cars before Pixar came up with its 2006 blockbuster. In fact, Disney did a theatrical cartoon in 1952 about “Susie the Little Blue Coupe.” Anyone remember that? And Tex Avery animated an MGM short the same year titled “One Cab’s Family,” the title being a spoof of the long-running radio soap opera “One Man’s Family.”
And so it is with planes.
You youngins out there may think immediately of the children’s TV cartoon series “Jay Jay the Jet Plane,” an educational show that ran on PBS from 1998-2005.
If you’re a baby boomer like me, however, you may recall that in 1953 Tex Avery did another MGM theatrical cartoon that recycled the “One Cab’s Family” plot about married taxis becoming parents to a bouncing baby auto that aspires to become a hot rod, much to his father’s consternation. Only this one was about planes.
“Little Johnny Jet” takes on a post-World War II motif, as a B-29 bomber unable to find work. No one wants planes with propellers anymore; it’s all jets now, he moans. And his consternation begins when he sees that his newborn has no prop, and once he’s airborne the little tyke is revealed to be a jet. (No, the bomber never confronts his wife about that; it’s a family cartoon.)
Eventually there is a jet race and Dad is determined to win and prove his worth. Of course, he’s no match for the young jets flying circles around him — until Sonny Boy gives him a boost.
“Little Johnny Jet” is available as a bonus extra on the DVD of the James Stewart Western “The Naked Spur.”
But Walt Disney came up with an anthropomorphic airplane a decade earlier for a segment of “Saludos Amigos,” a 1942 Latin-themed anthology feature (or perhaps “featurette” would be more accurate since it is a scant 42 minutes).
“Saludos Amigos” has some brief live-action elements but is primarily composed of four animated segments: One stars Donald Duck, another stars Goofy and a third pairs Donald and Brazilian parrot Jose Carioca, a character introduced in this film.
The fourth segment, titled “Pedro,” is about a family of three airplanes in Chile, where Dad carries mail over the Andes and into Argentina.
The plot kicks in when Papa Plane is laid up with a cold in his cylinder head and Mama can’t replace him due to the altitude’s effect on her high oil pressure. As a result, young Pedro is designated to make his first trip through the treacherous mountain terrain, made all the more dangerous by his becoming distracted.
Like the other “Saludos Amigos” segments, “Pedro” was initially intended as a stand-alone short, and later, in 1955, it was finally released in theaters that way. Today it’s on DVD as part of “Saludos Amigos” and also as a bonus feature on the Disney cartoon collection “It’s a Small World, Volume 2.”
Of course, most of these shorts can also be found on YouTube.
As for “Planes,” I remain hopeful. Although whether it will soar or barely lift off remains to be seen.
Chris Hicks is the author of "Has Hollywood Lost Its Mind? A Parents Guide to Movie Ratings." His website is www.hicksflicks.com, Email: hicks@deseretnews.com