Treasure Planet
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Treasure Planet is the forty-second film in the Disney animated feature canon. It was produced by Walt Disney Feature Animation, and released on November 27, 2002 by Walt Disney Pictures and Buena Vista Distribution. The film is a science-fiction retelling of Robert Louis Stevenson's adventure novel Treasure Island. It was produced and directed by Ron Clements and John Musker from a screenplay by Musker, Clements, and Rob Edwards. The film features music by James Newton Howard, and two songs by Johnny Rzeznik of Goo Goo Dolls.
The film employs a novel technique of hand-drawn 2D traditional animation set atop 3D computer animation. This effect is occasionally used in video games (Xenogears used 2D sprites on top of 3D backgrounds), but is quite rare in film. A similar dichotomy was used for the character of the cyborg John Silver: his natural body is hand-animated, but his mechanical arm and eye are computer animated.
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Voice Cast
- Joseph Gordon-Levitt - Jim Hawkins
- Brian Murray - John Silver
- Emma Thompson - Captain Amelia
- David Hyde-Pierce - Dr. Doppler
- Michael Wincott - Scroop
- Laurie Metcalf - Sarah Hawkins
- Martin Short - B.E.N
- Roscoe Lee Browne - Mr. Arrow
- Patrick McGoohan - Billy Bones
- Dane A. Davis - Morph
Plot Synopsis
As a boy, Jim Hawkins was enchanted by stories of the legendary pirate Captain Flint and his ability to appear from nowhere, raid passing ships, and disappear, hiding the loot on a "treasure planet". As a young man, abandoned by his father, Jim has become alienated, begrudgingly helping his mother run an inn, then getting his only thrills from "solar surfing", a variant of windsurfing atop a rocket and a pastime that frequently gets him arrested.
One day, a ship crashes near the inn. The dying pilot gives Jim a sphere and tells him to "beware the cyborg". The sphere turns out to be a projector, showing a map that Jim realizes leads to Treasure Planet. Shortly thereafter, a gang of pirates raids and torches the inn, with Jim, his mother, and their friend Dr. Doppler barely escaping.
Doppler commissions a ship on a secret mission to find Treasure Planet. The crew is a motley bunch, led by cook John Silver, who Jim suspects is the cyborg he was warned about. Jim is sent down to work in the galley and despite his mistrust of Silver, they bond, forming a tenuous sort of father-son relationship. Later though, Jim comes to realize the crew are pirates and Silver their captain, and that they plan a mutiny.
As the ship reaches Treasure Planet, the mutiny begins. Jim, Doppler, and Captain Amelia escape to the surface, but what Jim thought was the map is actually Silver's shape-shifting pet, Morph. They meet an abandoned robot, B.E.N., who invites them to his house to care for the wounded Amelia. The pirates corner the group here, but using a back-door, Jim and B.E.N. return to the ship and recover the real map. Upon their return, they and the map are captured by Silver, who has already captured Doppler and Amelia.
With Jim forced to use the map, the group finds their way to a portal that leads anywhere in the universe, thus explaining how Flint could conduct his raids. The treasure is at the center of the planet, accessible only via the portal. In the stash of treasure, Jim finds a missing part of B.E.N's brain, which causes him to remember that the stash is booby-trapped and the planet is set to self-destruct. In the ensuing catastrophe, Silver finds himself torn between holding onto a literal boat-load of gold and saving Jim, who hangs from a precipice after a fall. Silver saves Jim, and the group escapes to the ship. It cannot clear the planet in time, so Jim fashions a surfer out of sheet metal and a broken rocket, flies down and operates the portal so that he and the ship can fly through the portal to safety halfway across the galaxy.
Escaping the destruction of Treasure Planet, the pirate crew is tied up and prison-bound, but Silver has snuck below deck, where Jim finds him preparing his escape. Jim lets him go, and Silver tosses him a handful of jewels and gold to pay for rebuilding the inn. The film ends with a party at the rebuilt inn, showing Doppler and Amelia now married with children, and Jim a military cadet. He looks to the skies and sees an image of Silver in the clouds.
Critical Reaction
Critical opinion of Treasure Planet was mixed but tended towards the positive. Supporters praised the film's wonderful visuals and use of technology. Some suggested it might also prod children into reading the original book. Others saw the "in space" angle as completely unnecessary, if not utterly patronizing, objected to the typical "cute Disney sidekicks" (Morph and B.E.N.), and suggested the entire enterprise lacked imagination.
Box Office
Treasure Planet was a box office bomb. Its box-office gross was an estimated $110 million worldwide, well short of its estimated $140 million production cost even before the box-office cut was deducted. Additionally, the film had an estimated $40 million marketing expenses. The film's failure forced Disney, a multi-billion dollar company, to restate its earnings estimates for the following quarter.
It can be argued that Treasure Planet destroyed Disney's animation studio, in the same way that Heaven's Gate destroyed United Artists or Cutthroat Island ruined Carolco. Within 18 months of the film's release, Disney had laid off thousands of animators, closed its Florida animation studio, cancelled production on one movie (A Few Good Ghosts) and burned off two others with little promotion (Brother Bear and Home on the Range), leaving it with no traditional cel-animated (aka "2D") films in production. The remaining artists were all retrained in computer animation techniques for upcoming films (so far known to include Chicken Little and Rapunzel Unbraided), in accordance with a management belief that audiences no longer wanted to see 2D animation.
Despite their string of pre-Treasure Planet hits, Musker and Clements were released from their contracts with Disney a year after the film's release.
Reasons for Flop
The degree of the film's failure is shocking, considering the supposed "can't miss" elements:
- Based on a classic novel
- Produced and directed by Disney's "go to" team, whose previous films ( The Little Mermaid, Aladdin, and Hercules) had all been huge hits
- Promoted with all the might of the Disney marketing machine
Possible reasons for the film's failure include:
- Treasure Planet had to compete with more major films, because opened just two weeks after Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, which would go on to make $200 million. It was also beaten by The Santa Clause 2, another family film in its fifth week of release.
- 2002 may have been the wrong time to launch a sci-fi movie, with the previous summer's Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones having been somewhat of a disappointment, and the public's taste tending towards fantasy with the second installments of the Harry Potter and Lord of the Rings movies.
- Fewer children read the Treasure Island series now, so audiences may have seen it as irrelevant to the current generation.
- Other animated sci-fi movies, such as Titan A.E., Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within, and Atlantis: The Lost Empire, also failed.
- While pursuing the teen boy audience, Disney may have unwittingly put off the audience that sought entertainment suitable for young children. While Treasure Planet has a "PG" rating, that same rating didn't stop Lilo & Stitch from becoming the only Disney hit of the early 2000s.
- Audiences have lost interest in hand-drawn animated movies, instead moving toward three-dimensional animated films. Not only have all five Pixar movies been huge hits, but other studios have seen their 3D computer animated films consistently break $100 million (Shrek, Ice Age), while recent hand-drawn animated films have flopped (Sinbad: Legend of the Seven Seas).
External Links
- Template:Imdb title
- The Big Cartoon DataBase entry for Treasure Planet (http://www.bcdb.com/bcdb/cartoon.cgi?film=7266&cartoon=Treasure%20Planet)
- BoxOfficeMojo results for Treasure Planet (http://www.boxofficemojo.com/movies/?id=treasureplanet.htm)
- Rotten Tomatoes review round-up for Treasure Planet (http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/TreasurePlanet-1118322/) WARNING: Might be filtered and restricted by a web filter.zh:星银岛