Animation matures beyond child’s play

Like most folks of my generation, I love well-conceived and expertly executed animation. No genre has as much flexibility, and its maturation in the late 1900s demonstrated that it is no longer merely a juvenile disport. Dozens of features would be worthy of discussion, but the following three are highlights that bookend the century nicely.

Fantasia (1940)

Like him or not, any historical discussion of American animation must begin with Walt Disney. He produced animated features that predate this one, but none were as influential or more lasting. The film is a compilation of independent dynamic sketches, each to a different piece of classical music, and all of them are extraordinarily creative. My personal favorite is a telling of planet Earth’s natural history, from primordial soup to nuts, as it were, set to Stravinsky’s “Rite of Spring.” However, Mickey Mouse as Paul Dukas’ “Sorcerer’s Apprentice” is definitely the trademark of the film, and possibly even the entire Disney franchise as well. Not every segment is equal in brilliance, but all are ambitious endeavors that helped to show the dazzling possibilities the emerging genre offered. “Fantasia” is the foundation upon which all subsequent animation was built, and to which it shall always be compared.

The Hobbit (1977)

Before Peter Jackson conceived his impeccable trilogy, this film was how most young people of our time knew the works of J.R.R. Tolkien. One day this film too will pass, but everyone in my generation saw it at least a dozen times as a child. The late 1970s were a time of rebirth for animated features after decades of obscurity that followed Disney classics like “Bambi,” “Pinocchio” and “Cinderella.”

Almost no notable animated films were produced in the 1960s or early 1970s, but “The Hobbit” sparked a renaissance of the genre in the United States in much the same way that “Watership Down” did the following year in Britain. The early works of Hayao Miyazaki did the same shortly thereafter in Japan. Modern audiences will likely find it somewhat sketchy, but it’s easy to see why imaginations were so captivated and moved to re-invest in animation as a serious forum for cinematic creativity.

South Park — Bigger, Longer & Uncut (1999)

Considering the genius of Trey Parker and Matt Stone’s weekly ribald comedy series, this film exceeds even unreasonably demanding expectations. That it is hysterically funny is perhaps not that surprising. That it is funny on so many levels might also seem almost customary. What is overwhelming, however, is the quality of original composition, which makes “Bigger, Longer” one of the finest animated musicals of the 1990s — easily in the league of the Disney masterpieces of the early decade.

When the song “Blame Canada” was nominated for the Best Original Song Oscar, the Academy considered insisting that the word “bitch” be revised for the on-stage performance. They relented, however, when Anne Murray agreed to sing it as written, despite the fact that Murray herself was the “bitch” to which the lyric referred. Oh, and if you ever need ammunition for a cut-down fight, this is your arsenal; who can ever top “donkey-raping ass-spelunker” for raw punch?