Dateline Movies Presents: Disney's Animated to Live-Action Makeover

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Remember all those old cartoons you watched when you were still kids? Yeah, especially those Disney films, with princes and princesses, with castles and witches, with villains and magic. Well guess what? They're all about to be remade or rebooted. Welcome once again to Dateline Movies, and today, we'll be talking about our beloved animated flicks straight from the realm of Walt Disney himself and their upcoming updates to the big screen. Okay, this would probably be System Reboot 2.0 since we already tackled this subject with the most memorable entries in a certain post a while back. However, we are limiting ourselves to Disney's idea of relaunching some of their animated features and giving them a live-action makeover, and not reboots in general, although it may still apply here. So come, let's get ready to reboot ourselves, Disney style, and see why Disney should or should not reboot their projects.

Reasons To Remake:

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1. They may be nostalgic (in other words, a money-maker).

Now don't lie to me that you have never been manipulated by nostalgia before. You may probably not have noticed that nostalgia has continuously controlled the face of the film industry. Whether if you're watching your favorite DC or Marvel flick or reliving your cherished Disney memories, nostalgia hits you hard, usually in a good way. As such, the film Pan, which is directed by Joe Wright and stars Hugh Jackman, Levi Miller, Amanda Seyfried, Garrett Hedlund, Rooney Mara and other talents and set to be released on October 9, 2015, is overloaded with nostalgia. Sure, Warner Bros. did this production instead of Disney Studios, but it still goes to show that the makeovers have huge potential.

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2. They may provide a better interpretation than the original features.

Yeah, this one would probably hurt you very much, but in my own thoughts, the animated films did not deliver quite enough. Hey, I like the original Disney films as much as you do, but it gets a little predictable as you further analyze the stories of the movies. With more ideas popping out of nowhere, Disney could give us more thought-provoking tales, but of course still appealing to the whole family. I heard Tim Burton is ready to make his own version of Pinocchio, with Robert Downey Jr. as Geppetto (kind of like Iron Man in the Avengers: Age of Ultron).  

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3. They may add more details to the audience's favorite characters.

Have you ever had that feeling when you felt like there are some parts of a certain characters's life that is clouded in mystery? Yeah, I've been there more than once. With the large number of remakes Disney have in their schedules, its a safe bet that Disney should be focusing more on character development rather than the same happy endings that we already knew would happen. Maybe the upcoming Beauty and the Beast update, which stars Emma Watson as Belle, would let us delve deeper inside the characters' hearts and minds.

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4. They may give the audience a new catchy tune or more.

Disney's productions have always been noted for their melodic songs and musical numbers. Sometimes, you can sing to it, or maybe dance to it. The animated smash-hit Frozen gave us a lot of memorable songs like "Do You Wanna Build A Snowman?", "Love Is An Open Door" and the undeniably astounding, "Let It Go". These just shows that Disney is not yet done with giving us harmonic beats in their films. Maybe Steven Speilberg's upcoming fantasy-adventure movie based on Roald Dahl's novel, The BFG, might give us a smile in our faces.

Reasons NOT To Remake:

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1. They may make unnecessary changes to the basic concept.

Remember when I said about better interpretations about the story? Well, I may be wrong. I realized somehow that some stories are better the way they originally are. Sure, they may be experimenting on something unique, or simply forcing it to change even though that it is nearly impossible not to love the original better. The recent Alice In Wonderland tried the old Chosen One approach, but it ended up becoming nothing more than a cash grab. Maleficent attempted the classic "villain has a good side from Star Wars" cliche, but ironically turned into a walking cliche itself, and Oz: The Great and Powerful, although had a great cast and director, had a little too much fun with the CGI. Just pray that they would stick to the source material more.

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2. They may just be a scene-by-scene replica of the original.

The one thing I hate more than an average rip-off is a below-average, frame-by-frame rip-off. The following are the things the audience might probably say when hearing about or watching an upcoming Disney remake.

"Oh look, the good guy wins, where did I see that one before?"
"Oh my, I hope that "true love's kiss" thing can save the princess."
"Hooray, more songs that I already heard a thousand times in Blu-Ray."
"I thought they were going to do something new here?"
"Wait, they're doing a Mulan remake? But why?"
"Can't we just have something original for once?"

Do I have to explain further?

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3. They may not be what the audience thought (and not in a good way).

Normally, you would expect from Disney the light-hearted sweetness, sugar-coated lyrics and melodies and chocolate-coated joyful atmosphere. But imagine all of that replaced with disturbing and almost unrealistic CGI, weird and somewhat uncomfortable jokes and a whole lot of non-sense. In today's films, some directors or producers would go overboard with these things. So please Disney, choose your directors and producers wisely, especially for a Winnie The Pooh film.

Okay, I may not be a huge fan of these types of films, but this is Disney we are talking about. Sure, they may have let us down with the their three previous outings, but I think they might have reignited our interest after Cinderella. So, I believe this is where we conclude our latest post, but before we go our separate ways, I'll leave you a partial schedule of their upcoming remakes in case you're interested, similar to our video game post. Ciao!!!

Schedule of Upcoming Disney Remakes

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1. The Jungle Book (To Be Released in April 15, 2016)
2. Alice: Through the Looking Glass (To Be Released in May 27, 2016)
3. The BFG (To Be Released in July 1, 2016)
4. Pete's Dragon (To Be Released in August 12, 2016)
5. The Beast (To Be Released in March 17, 2017)
6. Cruella de Vil (Unknown Release Date)
7. Mulan (Unknown Release Date)
8. Pinocchio (Unknown Release Date)
9. The Little Mermaid (Unknown Release Date)
10. Descendants (Unknown Release Date)
11. Chip N' Dale Rescue Rangers (Unknown Release Date)
12. Winnie the Pooh (Unknown Release Date)
13. Dumbo (Unknown Release Date)