Disney's Live-Action Thread

The more I see about the movie, the more it looks like Free Willy.

Lol...thought the same thing. The humans made me cringe...and make me wonder if there will even be a pink elephant scene.

The bubbles kind of reminded me of the pink elephants, but idk. For all we know it could end up just being a little nod to the pink elephants.

Have to agree that the human actors sound kinda...stilted, I guess. Especially the kids.

I.... didn't hate that. I mean, I only saw the first Dumbo movie only twice as a kid so I'm not as attached to it as I am other Disney classics so maybe that's why.

Yeah, from what I remember from the original, the humans were very cruel and unsympathetic, and most of the emotions came from Dumbo's relationship with his mother and his mouse friend. And while I don't think the humans will be completely bland in this remake, it probably won't leave a bigger impact than the original when Dumbo is reunited with his mother.

Watched the film a lot when I was younger had impact on me I think,I respect them for doing their own thing,I do see them bringing in the talking animals for the inevitable sequel

At least this version will probably have less racism. That's always a plus.

You certainly hope so,sometimes racism camouflages itself and takes a good eye to spot it "Yeah no that is a bad idea"

Although there are probably people lamenting the loss of the crows

I suppose it's possible this movie will have something worse than the song of the Roustabouts.

But I wouldn't hold my breath.

I've been wondering if that song was going to be in the movie in some form, but removed from its original context. In a vacuum, separated from the blackface gags that it was originally attached to (and with the lines updated so the language is less stereotypical), the song itself has some merit - to the point that House Of Mouse referenced it as late as the 2000's.

Edited by KnownUnknown on Nov 15th 2018 at 3:05:41 AM

I dont recall Song of the roustbouts being linked with e blackface gags

You can watch it on Youtube.

As has been said, if you tweak its context heavily, change it around and look at with your head tilted and one eye closed, its not too bad.

I'm asking you to explain without me having to watch a youtube video

I was referring to "When I See An Elephant Fly" about the blackface gags (the crows are pretty textbook as far as blackface gags in film and animation go, though there is more of an effort from Disney to make them into characters on top of those gags), sorry for the confusion.

Song of the Roustabouts, in a vacuum / on paper, could argued to not be specifically racist, but in execution the fact that all of the characters singing it are explicitly black link its lyrics to a great deal of stereotypes about African Americans at the time in a way that's very hard to argue wasn't intentionally playing to the association, particularly the parts about never learning to read or write, being lackadaisical with money, and the use of the vernacular "boss man."

Edited by KnownUnknown on Nov 15th 2018 at 5:09:38 AM

Sadly, the other two things I liked about the movie that made it memorable to me (the crows, and the pink elephants) will like either be edited out of this one entirely or altered, because you can no longer include a MC of a children's/family film drunk and hallucinating visions in this day and age, and can't use black face in ... ANYTHING.

The crows could probably be fixed, but they also probably won't actually do it. The typical studio response is to pretend things like that never happened.

I hope the pink elephants are in. They're the best part of the movie imo.

Edited by KnownUnknown on Nov 15th 2018 at 5:36:33 AM

We see the pink elephant bubbles in the trailer. They’re there.

Yes but I fear they will

1. only be seen for a few seconds or only a minute

2. arise from something other than alcohol, like ... I dunno a dream.

I don't see how the crows could be fixed. Their entire existence is just a big "Jim Crow" and "Black People Are Stupid And Funny" joke. They could have met any other characters to serve the same purpose. I don't think its "pretend something didn't happen" and more "somethings need to be left in the past".

Honestly, the only things I remember from the original are the Jim Crows and Pink Elephants. And both haven't aged well. One is pure racism and the other is technically a minor getting drunk.

Honestly, the more I see of this movie, the more I'm bored by it. I don't know what the plot is. Is it this family at the Circus? Is it Dumbo? What's my focus? I feel like everything they've added just clutters the movie rather than enhances it. I mean, sure, the original was flimsy and I have no love for it, but everything around the original just feels superfluous or just replacing the talking animals (main characters) with human actors.

Also, oh boy, that child acting was rough.

> Also, oh boy, that child acting was rough.

Someone on reddit commented that the girl looked unsuprised at the flying elephant (you doofuses,he'a supposed flies at the end!),acting against something that's not there is really hard,probably had to do multiple takes and at the end got really bored of it

And this is why I have issue with Dumbo in particular being chosen to be redone in live-action... it's Disney's last-resort move. Walt's studio wanted a smaller-scale project after Pinocchio burned them out, and they were watching their finances very closely, so they made a very short film based on a story that wasn't epic at all, sprinkled in with whatever they wanted. It was the bare effort they could muster, so seeing it as a multi-million-dollar feature film is disturbing!

> so seeing it as a multi-million-dollar feature film is disturbing

In a way they're it giving the treatment it deserves,though I would have preferred it if had stayed as an animated film

The pink elephants better be in—their presence will make or break the movie for me. Burton is directing and he's gonna get trippy with them if they're in.

Edited by Karxrida on Nov 16th 2018 at 12:32:19 PM

So, for one, the people who are singing the Roustabout song are not "explicitly Black". The whole song plays during a storm, they are not "black" they are in the dark. You would really need to make a huge leap to say "oh, yeah, they are black".

The Crows, well, I have this to say about them: They are crows. Whatever the animators used as inspiration while creating them, the only way to even recognize any of the references made is if you are already aware of the stereotypes. And it is not like they are eating chicken or watermelons or anything like this, they are just moving in a very over-the-top manner and sing jazz. Their design is a mix of the choir who sung the song and the animators who worked on them themselves. Even if you see them as representing Black people, it is a hell of a better representation than you could hope for back in the 1930s and it is still a better representation than what you get to see in some movies TODAY.

They are cool. They are allowed to be unintentionally mean, but also allowed to become the rescuers of the day when they realize what Dumbo deals with. And it frankly bums me out that in the remake they will most likely be erased completely. Along with the pink elephant scene. That is the one thing I thought might be kind of interesting to see from Burton, and it doesn't look like we will get it.

> The whole song plays during a storm, they are not "black" they are in the dark. You would really need to make a huge leap to say "oh, yeah, they are black".

No they are black,it's not like you can't make out the skin tones so it's not a huuuge leap