We
all know the hype began on December 21st 1937 when Snow White and
the Seven Dwarfs, Disney’s first full length cell animated feature film, was
released. This was followed in the next five decades by hundreds of other
animated films, most of which became known as the Walt Disney animated
classics.
In
the mid-nineties there was another surge in Disney extravaganza when the first
Pixar animated feature was released. But how did this all come about?
In
1986, a man by the name of Steve Jobs, now known as one of the world’s greatest
revolutionaries in consumer electronics, bought The Graphics Group, a division
of the production company Lucafilm which was first established in 1979. The
group was later renamed Pixar Animation Studios. The company struggled
throughout the early nineties and Jobs considered selling it to other companies
on several occasions.
In
1991, Pixar made a $26 million deal with Walt Disney Feature Animations to
create three computer animated films. The unforgettable characters of Woody the
cowboy and Buzz Lightyear the Space Ranger skyrocketed into the global
spotlight after the partnership released Toy Story in 1995 bringing in a gross
income of $415,004,880.
In
the years that followed, Steve Jobs, now CEO of Pixar, had a series of
disagreements with Disney Chief Executive Michael Eisner. Even though Pixar was
responsible for the creation and production of the films leaving Disney to
handle marketing and distribution, Disney exclusively owned all story and
sequel rights. As a result, in 2004, Jobs announced he was seeking other
partners to work with. In May 2005, Disney finally agreed to buy Pixar for $7.4
billion in an all-stock deal. Jobs was now Disney’s biggest individual
shareholder and joined the board of Directors.
Pixar’s
timeless animations have been cherished by generations of children and adults,
the three most lucrative being Finding Nemo, Up and Toy Story 3. According to
the disneymovieslist.com poll, Finding Nemo, Toy Story and Toy Story 3 are the
most popular. Their humour filled characters, quirky concepts and creative
features have helped to elevate Disney’s fame and the novelty of modern day
technology. Global excitement has already began to mount as we await Finding
Dory, the sequel to Finding Nemo which is due to release in the US in 2016.
So
there we have it, the development of Pixar in the world of Disney. It is with
the success of Pixar Animations that one might ask how different Disney would
be if the partnership was never formed and to a greater extent, how different
the world would be if it were not for innovative geniuses like Steve Jobs who
when commenting on Pixar, stated: We believe it’s the biggest advance
in animation since Walt Disney started it all with the release of Snow
White.
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| Steve Jobs, 1955-2011 |
By Tasneem Mahmoud
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