Treasure Planet (2002)
Directed by Ron Clements
When space galleon cabin boy Jim Hawkins discovers a map to an intergalactic "loot of a thousand worlds," a cyborg cook named John Silver teaches him to battle supernovas and space storms on their journey to find treasure.
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14 films that influenced Treasure Planet
What critics say influenced Treasure Planet
Another character that's a lot of fun is B.E.N., a beaten down robot voiced by Martin Short (Innerspace) who is reminiscent of old Bob from The Black Hole minus the Western drawl.
The vessel is overseen by a tough-talking cat-like alien named Captain Amelia (Emma Thompson, Primary Colors) and her trusted first officer, Mr. Arrow (Roscoe Lee Browne, "The Cosby Show").
His whole career was founded on two stones: his characters like the bear in The Fox and the Hound or the Beast, large and imposing physical presences that dominate and threaten; and his characters like Ariel and Aladdin, characters with a tremendous collection of facial expressions, delicate and subtle, and greatly evocative.
Musker, Clement and their team take the 3-D animation dubbed "Deep Canvas" that was developed for "Tarzan" and brings it a giant step forward.
Along for the journey is fussy Dr. Doppler (David Hyde Pierce), yet another comic relief device who arranges in his awkward academic way (a way with which we're recently reacquainted in Disney's own Atlantis ) for the services of the feline Captain Amelia (Emma Thompson, modeling her chop-chop interspeciel love interest character on Minnie Driver's Jane (Tarzan)) and her ship, the R (obert) L (ouis) S (tevenson) Legacy.
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And it turns out when you use Deep Canvas indiscriminately, it starts to look really obvious, making Treasure Planet a throwback in another way: not since Pocahontas has a Disney film suffered so from CG effects that aren't properly integrated with the hand-drawn animation.
In this case, it's John Silver (Brian Murray, Bob Roberts) and a motley crew of cutthroat alien pirates.
The Walt Disney company does both (most notably with “Fantasia 2000,” which had an exclusive IMAX run before being released in standard format and now “Treasure Planet,” which has a special IMAX print).
John Musker and Ron Clements previously directed two of the finest ("The Little Mermaid" and "Aladdin") and two of the least memorable ("Hercules" and "The Great Mouse Detective") Disney animated features.
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In fact, the level of detail and artistry in the ships and backgrounds is enough to go head-to-head with any of Disney’s Pixar co-releases (e.g., “Toy Story,” “A Bug’s Life” and “Monsters, Inc.”).
But thus far, developing the perfect animated action/adventure film has proven difficult for the Mouse House, which has had better luck with its Pixar association ("Monsters, Inc." and "Toy Story").
Combining CGI with traditional hand-drawn animation worked in small doses, such as the way it was used in Beauty and the Beast's stunning ballroom scene.