A common thing I find many animated features that I see anymore is that they are just so sentimental and they push for all of their characters to be "cute" that it just puts me, as a viewer, off. There is a sort of insincerity to it all that I dislike. As a both a viewer and a filmmaker, you need to be able to appeal to the mind and heart in a genuine and subtle way.
I think that sometimes story-telling can be so rigid and so
“Point A to Point B” that you lose the heart of it all. This heart should be
allowed to grow when the audience is giving some time with the characters.
Proper character development is essential to giving the characters that edge
that will make the audience care for them.
But on the other hand, too much heart might start to lead
things into the saccharine, which can feel like very cheap and forced emotion
being heaped onto the viewer. Things can get too cute and cuddly and this can
feel very manipulative.
There is a scene in “The Rescuers” (an oft overlooked little
Disney Classic”) that is mentioned in the book that seems to teeter on this point of being subtly moving and being a little too sentimental
This scene introduces a little orphan girl, Penny, and a cat Rufus. This scene has all of the potential to be sickeningly sweet, but doesn’t completely overstep it. The relationship between the cat and the girl feels real. The animation serves their relationship so well, that even when they don’t speak to one another, you feel their connection, like when the cat rubs up against her, like all cats do. And as children usually are, she is very affectionate to the cat (perhaps a little too much so, as she drags him around like she does her beloved teddy bear.)
In the scene little Penny explains that she is sitting along because it was "adoption day" at her orphanage and that there was a couple that ignored her and instead adopted a "prettier" child. Over the course of the scene Rufus the cat builds up her confidence again. However, things get perhaps a little too sweet while he is explaining faith, but the scene is still powerful and the animation between the two would explain exactly what the two meant to each other even if you mute the dialogue. They work perfectly as a pair and I think that is what you hope to achieve with animation, that the movements, gestures and facial expressions seek to communicate most of the scene, while the dialogue gets into specifics.
This scene introduces a little orphan girl, Penny, and a cat Rufus. This scene has all of the potential to be sickeningly sweet, but doesn’t completely overstep it. The relationship between the cat and the girl feels real. The animation serves their relationship so well, that even when they don’t speak to one another, you feel their connection, like when the cat rubs up against her, like all cats do. And as children usually are, she is very affectionate to the cat (perhaps a little too much so, as she drags him around like she does her beloved teddy bear.)
In the scene little Penny explains that she is sitting along because it was "adoption day" at her orphanage and that there was a couple that ignored her and instead adopted a "prettier" child. Over the course of the scene Rufus the cat builds up her confidence again. However, things get perhaps a little too sweet while he is explaining faith, but the scene is still powerful and the animation between the two would explain exactly what the two meant to each other even if you mute the dialogue. They work perfectly as a pair and I think that is what you hope to achieve with animation, that the movements, gestures and facial expressions seek to communicate most of the scene, while the dialogue gets into specifics.
Another wonderful (and I mean WONDERFUL) triumph in
storytelling is in Pixar’s “Up.” The first ten minutes of the film features a
sequence in the life of a married couple that is sweet, but there is just
enough reality to it that it feels relatable, which is I think the key to
getting ahold of any audience. I just love how this scene really is aimed towards the ADULT fans of Pixar. This scene has a weight and maturity to it that allows it to be touching in a realistic way, like in the small ways that we show affection (the way the couple hold hands by reading) or the way that real life gets in the way of our dreams and expectations.
There must be a subtlety in the scene so that it may be
sweet and relatable, but not overly sentimental, thus losing the audience all
together. I think that as long as Disney films can keep the heart while still
making everything in a scene feel genuine and real, then I think it’s alright
to push the sweetness factor a little bit.
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