Originally Posted By Witches of Morva ORWEN: I think SMALL WORLD looked a lot better with the pink and blue pastels, myslf.
Originally Posted By DlandDug iasw was white mostly because Mary Blair felt that white was the most festive of all colors. I liked it in both incarnations. Fortunately for us Disney fans, there's a "colorful" version in France, and a "festive" version in California.
Originally Posted By RoadTrip It's a Princess Castle in a theme park. If I want to see Neuschwanstein I'll go to Germany. I like the way the new colors make the Castle more visible. Cindy does it with size in Orlando. I think Sleeping Beauty does it very nicely with color in Anaheim.
Originally Posted By Witches of Morva ORWEN: Exactly. I mean, it really seems odd that some ducklings prefer a more 'realistic' version of a fairytale castle. Don't they realize what fantasy is supposed to be about? When in Neverland, do as the lost boys do! And when in Wonderland, do as the Cheshire cats do! Don't try bringing any of that reality with you to the Happiest Place on Earth or you won't be quite so happy!
Originally Posted By jonvn "If I want to see Neuschwanstein I'll go to Germany." OK attitude, if you want the whole place to look like toontown. If I want to see a western town, I'll go to gold rush country. If I want to see a victorian street, i'll go to marceline. If I wanted to see a jungle, I'd go on an african safari. The whole idea of the place is to bring these real life looking things to one location as in movie sets. That's why the realistic angle was so appealing, why movie studio tours are fun, and what sets Disney apart from other vendors. I know what fantasy is supposed to be about, and I know what the park is supposed to be about, and the whole thing isn't supposed to look like it just came out of a cartoon. The 1983 change in Fantasyland made all the buildings look like they were from the country of origin that the story inside came from. They didn't make them look like cartoons from the movie themselves. This follows along with the castle. It is obviously not a fantsy castle, but looks like a castle that is found in Europe. That is how you do good fantasy, by grounding it in something realistic to give people a place to hold onto and build from. Otherwise, everything looks like Toontown, it's all superficial and one dimensional. The castle didn't need to be painted, didn't need squirrels stuck on it, and the entire park does not need to be turned into cartoonland. There is a difference between fantasyland and toontown. They really need to stop destroying theming in their parks.
Originally Posted By Witches of Morva ORDDU: Oh, really, jonvn, duckling! You're the one with the bad attitude around the Laughing Place pond. You remind us of the typical bully who enjoys knocking over the well built sand castle of some little child on a beach--just because there was something about it YOU didn't happen to like. You're always so grumpy about things. Will you never change? ORWEN: Actually, the various Disney castles ARE supposed to look as if they came out of a 'cartoon'--or, more appropriately--out of an animated film! Just goes to show how little YOU know, Mr. Smarty pants!
Originally Posted By karlg Of course Neuschwanstein itself was a fantasy Castle built the late 1800's and was not finish in 1886 when construction stopped. So this castle was less than 70 years old when Disneyland was built, or about the same time period as Disneyland's Main Street represents! The "castle" was built with modern building technology and even had electricity installed. As far as castles go the Disneyland Castle is not even a very complete castle, but is a mix of a castle wall and a castle keep (normally the keep with the tower would be well inside the castle wall and gatehouse). If you have a picture of the famous “lost weekend†Arial View Herb Ryman drew in 1953, you will see that he originally drew up more of a “proper castle†that would have been enormously expensive to implement. It was Herb Ryman that drew on Neuschwanstein for inspiration. As far as the squirrels go; it is a fantasy castle from a cartoon. In gothic times, they would often make gargoyle downspouts and the squirrels as a nice comic turn on this concept. In fact Herb Ryman himself drew a comic castle gargoyle with a character of Marty Skalar that he called a “Sklargoal†that would be on “Dozing Beauty Castle†(see the book “A Brush with Disney†pages 8 and 9). I wouldn’t be surprised if this sketch wasn’t part of the inspiration to put the squirrel-goyles on the castle. KarlG
Originally Posted By RoadTrip <<If I want to see a western town, I'll go to gold rush country. If I want to see a victorian street, i'll go to marceline. If I wanted to see a jungle, I'd go on an african safari. But jonvn... even those areas all have their 'cartoony' aspects. NONE of Disneyland is a literal recreation of the areas they represent. All of the lands include a little whimsy and fantasy that the real thing does not. Brazilian jungle: <a href="http://slavmobile.com/nature/4_320x240.jpg" target="_blank">http://slavmobile.com/nature/4 _320x240.jpg</a> Disney's Jungle Cruise: <a href="http://www.ferieidyll.no/images/disney/jungle_cruise.jpg" target="_blank">http://www.ferieidyll.no/image s/disney/jungle_cruise.jpg</a>
Originally Posted By RoadTrip ^^^ Sorry, but that first photo apparently links to an image that does not want links. Try this one instead for a 'real' jungle: <a href="http://www.braziliansafaris.com/presid2.jpg" target="_blank">http://www.braziliansafaris.co m/presid2.jpg</a>
Originally Posted By jonvn "You remind us of the typical bully " And you remind me of someone who thinks they are clever, but are not. Drop the act already. I don't find it amusing, nor do I find your comments about me worth listening to. Stick to the subject matter. Calling me names doesn't do anything but make you look ill equipped to engage in a discussion. "Will you never change?" Not as long as people think it is appropriate to lecture me on my attitude, which it is not. Somehow, my expressing of an opinion is bullying? Baloney. Your behavior in making personal comments about me, actually is what is bullying. Drop the pretense, I'm not interested in your opinions about me, and never have been. In short, keep those comments to yourself, and things will be much more pleasant. You've interrupted a discussion about the castle with a bunch of useless derogatory comments. I made none towards anyone here. I didn't call them stupid, uninformed, or any other such thing. But you seem to think it's ok to open with that sort of gambit. It's not. You waste space on the topic and add nothing. My whole response here is yet more wasted space. People have different opinions. It's a shame for you that you can't deal with that. "Actually, the various Disney castles ARE supposed to look as if they came out of a 'cartoon'" If this is even true, then this is a relatively recent concept that is actually bad, for reasons I've pointed out. "Neuschwanstein itself was a fantasy Castle" Yes, I believe it's the castle that finally got Ludwig kicked out of power. As I said, if you look at all the other structures in Fantasyland, they pattern themselves, from 1983, on a take off of what is found in the countries of the story's origins. The idea, since I'm having to break this down into tiny tiny components, is that you are a living human person, and you live and exist in the real world. As a portal to this, you interact with a realistic portrayal of a location, that location whisks you from the actual real life you are in to the fantasy cartoon world that is within the ride. This is what they've done always. Then in the 1990s, someone figured that everything has to relate to a cartoon or a film character somehow, and that everything has to be cartoonized if at all possible. That included the castle exterior. So they painted it a gaudy color, and added out of scale gargoyles. It was not a good change. It's not a big deal, but it's not a good change.
Originally Posted By jonvn "even those areas all have their 'cartoony' aspects. NONE of Disneyland is a literal recreation of the areas they represent" I would say they are actually not really cartoony. They are fantasy depictions of real locales. They are not duplicative of these areas, but use these areas as a stepping off point for a fantasy. They are like movie sets. Exactly like movie sets, in that they are trying to evoke a time, place, feeling, and look. That is what they are trying to do with their theming. Or used to do. What they did was try to make you feel like you stepped into another world, as best could be set up to look like that, exactly in the same way they did this in making a film. They did this because the people who built the park first were actually filmakers. They took the idea of locale that was used in film and translated it to an amusement park setting. Now this story has gotten muddled. There are cartoons everywhere, english stuffed toys in the frontier, and squirrels on the castle, that was meticulously built to look a certain way. I don't mind the cartoons, but they do have their place. Everything should have its time and its place. I think the best analogy for Disneyland is a movie theater. If you went into a theater, and they showed you nothing but cartoon after cartoon every time you went, you'd get really sick of it after a while. People like to see different types of movies. People go see adventure films, science fiction films, historical films, and so on. They also go and see cartoons. There are a lot of archetypical film platforms represented in the park. But if they make it so that you see only one kind, then it becomes one dimensional and dull.
Originally Posted By Witches of Morva ORDDU: My sisters and I don't have to drop any sort of act. We are who we are. We're just glad that Walt Disney didn't have the same sort of out-look on Life that YOU have, jonvn, or there never would have been a Mickey Mouse, a Snow White or a Disneyland for anyone to love. All that negativity of yours wouldn't have allowed for such things.
Originally Posted By jonvn "We're just glad that Walt Disney didn't have the same sort of out-look on Life that YOU have, jonvn" If all you can do is make personal commetns about other people, please go away. People here are trying to talk about the castle.
Originally Posted By DlandDug >>People here are trying to talk about the castle.<< And so are a trio of witches. Sorry you find their point of view so disagreeable. Guess it's all a part of the odd notion that there's no room for fantasy anywhere, let alone in Disneyland.
Originally Posted By jonvn "And so are a trio of witches." No, they are calling names and making personal comments. If they want to discuss the castle, then this PERSON (and not a trio of anything) can do just that. "you find their point of view so disagreeable" Considering they are calling me names and flat out insulting me because they don't like what I'm saying, then yes, I find it disagreeable. This should not be difficult to follow.
Originally Posted By Witches of Morva ORDDU: You really need to take your own advice, jonvn, duckling. Ever since we've known you around the Laughing Place pond, all you do is insult others and talk down to them when they don't agree with you. Yet wen someone puts you in your own place, you can't take it. You're the epitome of a hypocrite.
Originally Posted By jonvn "You really need to take your own advice, jonvn, duckling. " No. I didn't start making comments about other people on here, and have not done so to other people, either. I have responded to your trite little comments. That is your little contribution to this thread, thanks. You've made it all so much more worthwhile with your presence. I've insulted no one here. You've not put me in my place, you've acted like a person who can't discuss something, so you have to resort to petty insults. It's actually laughable to hear that you think you've said or done such a thing. All you've managed to do is make yourself look like yet one more tiresome hack who can't defend their own beliefs. So far, in just this thread, I'm a bully, a hypocrite, don't know anything about fantasy, a couple of others. If you actually had an argument worth making, you'd make it. Instead, all you can do is fling insults, and act in this ridiculous multi-voiced manner. As I said, if you can't discuss the topic, go away. You're comments are nothing but useless clutter of personal attack. Thanks for derailing the thread. You've done a great job of wrecking what we were talking about with your insulting comments about other people.
Originally Posted By DlandDug In all fairness, the thread was derailed in Post #31 with this observation: >>Actually, that movie [Sleeping Beauty]is deadly dull to me. I fast forward through most of it. Nice backgrounds, though.<< And as far as who started making comments about other people here, that would be at Post #44: >>OK attitude, if you want the whole place to look like toontown...<< I'm only sayin'...
Originally Posted By jonvn That comment was in no way insulting. It was saying that's an ok attitude if you want these sorts of things. It's not my attitude. I think it's a bad attitude given the reasons I suggested. And it was an attitude about Disney parks, not about the person himself. I certainly never called anyone any names. And while the topic may have drifted in post 31, it was not much of a drift, as the topic is about Sleeping Beauty's Castle in the first place. It certainly did not devolve into this childish stupidty this particular individual seems to enjoy engaging in with me until they decided to take on the responsibility of telling me how they felt about me. Which since they are a total stranger means very little in any case. And in looking back at the topic, I was not the first person who mentioned that film. So, that was not where the topic drift started. Basically, we were all discussing the thing quite civilly until someone decided to start a flame war because he didn't like my opinion, so he started calling me names. What a pathetic act.
