Why the Disney live action remakes are (mostly) terrible
And what the House of Mouse should do moving forward
Wherever you go, you will experience a form of Disney; whether it is the hundreds of licensed IP they have, or the merchandise they sell, or even the television channels they own, it is hard to miss their influence on many aspects of popular media. As arguably one of if not the largest corporation in the world and potentially in history, all eyes tend to be on what the next move will be from the company. However, there are so many parts to Disney, it is hard to keep track of what is going on at any one time. However, arguably its oldest and most loved aspect is the original stories they have told throughout their esteemed existence.
Everybody knows the classic princess tales of Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty and Snow White, or the acclaimed animation blueprints like the Jungle Book, Lady and the Tramp and Dumbo, and people will always consume these stalwarts of childhood entertainment, no matter the age, on Disney+. The issue is Disney are struggling to come up with new ideas, and have therefore become less popular, especially with the rise of other animation studios and other more successful children fare. So, when you are intellectually bankrupt in an ever moving business, what do you do? You double down, of course.
It all started with Maleficient in 2014. Starring Angelina Jolie as the titular villain (or hero in this case), the film attempted to tell a different story, taking liberties with the original fairytale, to create a new potential classic. This is admirable, as at least this represents an original idea, although based on pre-existing materials. It even did well enough with audiences to warrant a sequel, which was released in 2019 and received a luke-warm reception. But, at the end of the day, Disney were showing they were willing to touch their finest works, no matter the risk of ruining the original’s charm. This is where the rot began to begin.
Since the original Maleficient arrived, and not including the sequel, there have been 12 live action Disney remakes, and a few new spins on the original source material, such as Christopher Robin and Cruella, which felt like a less magical version of the Angelina Jolie Disney movie. Some of the films (The Jungle Book as one example) have actually been received rather well, as they found the perfect balance between sticking to the original story beats and expanding on things which work. Most of the other films released, however, received middling to dejected reviews, with many feeling like these releases were heartless or boring, lacking the original beauty experienced by many.
The issue with adapting these classics is that, really, you can’t capture lightning in a bottle twice. The reason why the original animations were so beloved was the stories, but also the animation medium allowing more personality and soul into a piece of work. It is hard to try and, for example, capture the same magic on display in the Lion King in live action. Sure, the animals may look hyper-realistic and the CGI might be groundbreaking, but to bring something into live action and attempt to make it grounded, you cannot do with an animated fairytale or tale in general, as either it loses the realism and is no longer justified, or it becomes so realistic that it becomes a slog.
My solution? If you are struggling to find original concepts and are relying on stories already told, why not look to the sequels? Disney have a knack of making sequels to their animation classics, however usually they are both poor in quality (visually, talent wise) and story wise. However, because most of these films were direct to DVD/Video, not many people will have saw them. It not only means the stories will be fresh, because they are less known, but also means they can take more liberties with the narrative, improving on elements that audiences were not fond of, perhaps even rewriting large sections to make the whole thing more appealing.
WIth all that being said, Disney have even more live action remakes lined up in the next few years, so it appears despite deminishing returns and a lot going straight to Disney+, they would rather persist with something that doesn’t work rather than try to fix the problem. I guess that is the problem when you have more money than sense.
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