The state and future of animation

[GeffreyDrogon]

Why are most independent animated films bad?

[Ben]

The Secret Of NIMH, Watership Down, The Plague Dogs, Mary & Max, Triplets Of Belleville, The Illusionist, Wallace & Gromit, Akira, Secret Of Kells, Persepolis…I could go on and on. Not a bad independently made film among them.

[EricJ]

IOW, foreign ones.
Except for the '78-'82 titles you mentioned, which were coming near the end of the old mid-70's Richard Williams "Disney or Weirdo" days when Disney had the monopoly on animation, and only "art" animators would compete. (Unless we're counting Hanna-Barbera with "Charlotte's Web".)

After that, the 90's Disney Renaissance and the early 00's Pixar-mania made it look WAYYY too easy to the naive, ambitious and untalented.
You can just look at an indie CGI like the Nut Job movies and say "This is what can happen to you if you thought the Shrek movies were good."
(Unless it's a foreign CGI-critter import on Netflix, in which case "This is what can happen to you if you live in a country where they thought Madagascar was good.")

[Ben]

Yes, The Secret Of NIMH was made by an obscure Polish outfit, you’re right.

Yes, I know you didn’t include that in your generalization. But that’s the point: you can’t say "independent film" is all bad as a sweeping statement, because there are good and bad examples. And there are plenty of surprisingly good independent CG films, just as there are lots of mediocre big budget studio CG films, like the second Madagascar, to follow your line of thought.

But Madagascar 3 was genius.

[GeffreyDrogon]

Ask anyone if they remember NIMH or Wallace and Gromit, they're more likely to remember Alpha and Omega or Happily N'Ever After or The Nut Job, because they're more known to the general public. Also, Don Bluth isn't popular with families, who often criticize his films as being too dark.

Often, people who are more successful can make things that families can enjoy. Compare Richard Rich to Genndy Tartakovsky. Investors are more likely to invest in companies churning out cheap sequels to an animated movie that cast Hayden Panettiere (who didn't come back for the sequels despite her crumbling career) than for a fifth and final season for a great animated television series that is off-limits for children and doesn't have a name star.

[GeffreyDrogon]

It's also a matter of fact that people will pay top dollar to see something with a mediocre actor in it like Justin Long rather than watch an animated series with a nobody like Phil LaMarr voicing the protagonist.

[GeffreyDrogon]

Alpha and Omega was also something that made money, especially with younger audiences, and it had Justin Long, Hayden Panettiere, and Dennis Hopper. Most of the voices in Don Bluth films aren't people audiences can name anymore. Who can name Dom DeLuise or Christopher Plummer?

More people know who Hayden Panettiere is, she just stopped acting because of becoming a mother and not taking up roles in the MCU or Star Wars, like many other celebrities are.

[EricJ]

...We're building a PRETTY big resentful fantasy world for ourself, aren't we?

As long as we're multiversing reality, there, Wanda, how about one where 90's direct-video never drove the non-Disney/Pixar/DW animation industry into the ground?

[GeffreyDrogon]

What I'm saying is that quality never equals success.

[Ben]

Ask anyone if they remember NIMH or Wallace and Gromit, they're more likely to remember Alpha and Omega or Happily N'Ever After or The Nut Job…

Thanks for the laughs.

[droosan]

As with all things film- & pop-culure-related, the answers to such questions have much to do with the age group being asked ..
.

Twelve.png (195.25 KiB) Viewed 5150 times

.
FWIW, I saw The Secret of NIMH and Rock & Rule at the age of 12. Both rank very high on my personal list of 'favorite animated movies'. Though, I realize that this has more to do with personal nostalgia than with their status as independent productions .. or even the objective 'quality' of either film.

[Randall]

Yeah, and that nobody Christopher Plummer. What did HE ever do?

[GeffreyDrogon]

I came up with that assumption because if you can find a film and its numerous sequels on DVD in most big stores and on Redbox as well as finding them on numerous streaming services, like smaller ones like PlutoTV and Tubi, as well as big ones like Hulu and HBO Max, I assume that Alpha and Omega is a popular film. Compare that to Wallace and Gromit. You can't find DVDs of that in stores easily, and content related to that is difficult to find on streaming services.

[GeffreyDrogon]

I don't think that Alpha and Omega is a good movie, at least not anymore, but the fact that many people will view low-quality animated films like that and Happily N'Ever After highly based on watching them as a child worries me. Especially since some of these people will still hold the same views as they get older.

[GeffreyDrogon]

I regret taking a liking for Alpha and Omega, but I never got to grow up on a number of animated films, especially since some of my sisters think that movies like The Lion King are depressing, and they also think that Happily N'Ever After is a good movie.