Peter Pan: Platinum Edition (ign.com)

- ign.com -

November 22, 2006 - Disney really knows how to preview their new DVDs for the press. While it's not uncommon for the studio to hold pre-release events in order to whet reporters' appetites for their upcoming titles, the Mouse House's most recent function a few weeks ago took the cake. Held at the swanky National Arts Club — which is in an amazing old brownstone off of Manhattan's amazing old Gramercy Park — the event took on a particularly legit air, especially in light of the whole patron-of-the-arts vibe that the Club exudes.

On display that afternoon was a mix of art and commerce, of course, with Disney's reps pushing not just their upcoming Peter Pan: Platinum Edition release, but also their perhaps more commercial direct-to-video sequel Cinderella III: A Twist in Time. But hey, any artist will tell you that you can't make art without money! First up then would be Peter Pan, the more artistically respectable release of the pair.

"A two-disc DVD with enhanced picture and sound, and a home theater mix as well, this movie is the quintessential Disney magic movie," says Andy Siditsky, senior vice president of DVD production at the studio. "Whereas Cinderella was our quintessential fairy tale movie, this movie absolutely defines what most people attach to the words 'Disney magic.' Usually these are things people think of: It's Tinkerbell, it's pixie dust. So everything we did on the DVD kind of revolves around this concept of that kind of Disney magic."

That magic will be apparent to even the casual fan of classic animation, as Siditsky and his team have dug up some real rarities for the new Peter Pan release.

"In doing the research for the DVD, we're always looking for things that have never been seen before, anything that's new," he says. "And we found a bunch of stuff that we're pretty excited about. The first thing is actually something that Walt himself wrote. If you could interview Walt Disney on Peter Pan, I'm sure the first question would be, 'Why did you make Peter Pan?' Well, he actually wrote an article called 'Why I Made Peter Pan'! It was published in a very small publication and it's been out of print for many, many, many years, and I found it in the bottom of a drawer basically. So we pulled it out and have done some work with it. We got [animators] John Musker and Ron Clements, who we worked with on The Little Mermaid [DVD], and we brought them in to talk to us about Peter Pan and do an introduction to this piece."

The feature has a Disney impersonator reading portions of Walt's original article, while intermixed with artwork from the film are scenes from Disney's life being recreated onscreen, including a recollection of how he played Pan in a grade school production and wound up being hoisted up on a rope and falling into the audience. In his words, Disney claims that it was at that point that he decided that he would make Peter fly someday. And no matter how apocryphal that particular story may or may not be, there's no denying that he did eventually make the character fly, and that the stories and fairy tales like Peter Pan seemingly went back for Disney all the way to his own formative years as a child.

"You learn about a lot of other things, like what he thought of Peter Pan from the play and all the way to the film," explains Siditsky. "This is really a cool piece; it's something where you feel like you have Walt Disney sitting in your living room telling you why he made the movie and how he made the movie. And a lot of the material here no one has ever seen before, and some of those things are initial concepts. Peter Pan actually goes back to 1936, when they started development of it at Disney. The movie didn't come out until 1953, but the production began in '36 technically with concepts and ideas and stories. So a lot of these drawings have never been seen before."

Another feature on the disc is called "The Peter Pan That Almost Was," and it's also hosted by Musker and Clements. In the course of researching the film, the Disney team discovered a bunch of preproduction material that has never seen the light of day, and that even many of the studio's experts didn't realize still existed. This included an alternate opening to the film, alternate middle scenes, various bits that took place in Neverland that never happened in the movie, and more.

"We had to assemble all of this stuff so it could kind of make sense," says Siditsky. "That's where we brought John and Ron in to host this thing, to kind of guide you through some of the thought processes so you can understand what was done and why it was not used or why pieces of it were used. As they went through this, they were as excited as any of us would be. Going through some of this stuff, there's some old storyboards that no one has ever seen before, and some of them are fully rendered out. Today people do storyboards very rough and very fast, but back in those days they used to render these things with incredible detail and shadings. So when you see the artwork that's been done and the amount of effort that's been put into this, it's pretty stunning, especially for anyone who's in animation today."

Other newly discovered elements include a subplot for Wendy's dog Nana that brings him (or is that her?) to Neverland, whereas in the finished film the mutt never leaves London. This unfinished bit would have had Nana not just joining the kids, but also helping them out while in Neverland. The pirates also had various scenes that didn't make it to the final animation stage, including Captain Hook who discovers Wendy's book about Peter Pan and learns what the book has to say about him as well — nothing too pleasant, one imagines. And a particularly creepy dropped bit has Peter explaining his own origin: How he left for Neverland as a baby and by the time he returned to his mother's house she had had another baby and forgotten about him! Cue children's nightmares everywhere, please.

"That of course is replaced by the song that Wendy sings to the Lost Boys that makes them want to go back," laughs Siditsky, "but it's stuff like that that you find that makes you go, 'Wow, this is amazing.' Because you can see how much effort went into it."

Another interesting aspect of the film which is discussed in the set's extra features is the fact that the film was in development for some 17 years before finally being released. A clue to this long gestation period can be glimpsed in Disney's 1940 animated feature Pinocchio when Jiminy Cricket is perched on a bookcase and behind him the books Peter Pan and Alice in Wonderland can be spotted. (Wonderland wouldn't be released until 1951.)

"They were talking about this thing in the '30s, and it's amazing how it gelled through time," says Siditsky, before speculating on why it took so long to bring the film to completion. "I think there were a lot of things that happened with the war, and there were other projects that were going on like Dumbo and Fantasia. And they were in development for such a long time [with] all the different storylines they had [for Pan] that they really needed to just pick what direction to go with it. But that era that this came out, in 1953, was a pretty important time. If you think about the movies of that time, this falls in after Alice in Wonderland but before Lady and the Tramp and Sleeping Beauty, and then right after this movie Walt really got involved with the Wonderful World of Disney television show and the development of the Disneyland theme park. So there was an incredible amount of energy at this time, and this was kind of the bridge from that era of the '40s into the '50s, so you still have a lot of stuff in terms of richness of animation and storytelling from those earlier films."

There are of course other bonus features on the set, some of which are geared towards the kids such as "Peter Pan's Flight" (a guided tour through a virtual London by way of air), "Camp Neverland" (where the viewer becomes a Lost Boy and plays interactive games), and "Peter's Playful Prank DVD Story Book" (not demoed for reporters, but something involving innocuous pranks, one would think). There's also a newly finished song taken from the lyrics of a number that was never completed for the original film.

"What we did is we went to Richard Sherman, who's kind of our classic Disney composer, having written [music for] Mary Poppins and the Winnie the Pooh series [and] 'It's a Small World,'" recalls Siditsky. "There was just that whole style that he kind of embodies in the music, so we showed him the song and said, 'If Walt gave you this assignment, what would you do with it?' And we chose Paige O'Hara obviously because she's the voice of Belle, she's sung for Disney, and Richard loves her voice. When we played the song for her she just fell in love with it, and we put the two of them together and we just felt that it was magic. So we ended up filming Paige singing the song, we scored the whole thing, and that's a feature on the DVD we're calling 'The Lost Song.'"

From the lost song to the not-yet-released song we go then, shifting gears to the Cinderella release, which as most direct-to-video films tend to be these days is more aimed at its target demographic — tween-aged girls and younger in this case — than animation nerds. So, of course, one of Cinderella III: A Twist in Time's main selling points is its end credits song called "I Still Believe," sung by none other than Hayden Panettiere herself, one of the stars of NBC's hit show Heroes — and a budding recording artist as well.

"She's just signed a record deal with Hollywood Records," explains Siditsky of the triple-threat's appeal to Disney's audience for this release. "She has a CD coming out in late spring, and a music video will be on the DVD. She's really quite a talent. She's 17, she's got an incredible voice, and she's also a spokesperson for Neutrogena, so she's got a lot of visibility with kids right now. We're really excited to have her as part of the project, and it's a really terrific song as well."

As for the film itself, it obviously follows the original Cinderella from 1950 and its more recent 2002 direct-to-video sequel Cinderella II: Dreams Come True. The film's story sounds a bit like it's been ripped from the pages of Marvel's classic What If…? comic book series, with an alternate reality twist that might have the little ones' heads pounding.

"It really turned out beautifully," says Siditsky. "Story-wise, it's based on the original Cinderella movie which we just put out [on DVD] this past year. It starts about a year after 'Happily Ever After' and they're celebrating their first anniversary. The Fairy Godmother has decided to give them a little party, but she wants to do it discretely so she goes into a little portion of the woods and, using her magic, creates this beautiful little party environment. But unbeknownst to the Fairy Godmother, one of the stepsisters is stumbling along in the woods, hears a noise, peeks in, and realizes that there's Cinderella and some people. She hears the Fairy Godmother and the Prince and Cinderella talking about that night and about the magic and the slipper and all that stuff, so she runs back to her mother, Cinderella's evil stepmother, and says, 'You're not going to believe this, but that whole night was all magic.' So they start to plot to steal the wand and see if they can use magic to turn things back. The subtitle of this is Twist in Time, and that's what this story is really about."

Soon enough the evil stepmother gains possession of the wand, uses it to turn back time, and arranges for that ultimate moment of royalty verification — the fitting of the glass slipper — to magically insert her daughter into the proceedings rather than Cinderella. So the ugly stepsister Anastasia is soon on the fast track to becoming royalty, and Cinderella realizes that she's got a lot of floors to scrub and not too many showers lined up in her future unless she can awaken her prince from this dark spell. Of course, her faithful rodent friends Gus and Jaq are ready to help Cinderella plot to steal the wand and bring things back to normal. The extras on this release are much more kid-friendly than on the Peter Pan set, with a DVD-ROM game called "Cinderella's Ballroom" (which allows kids to have their own party and create "printables" like invitations and table designs), an interactive ballroom party, and the aforementioned video with Ms. Panettiere.

"When you watch the movie you'll have to see how it ends, but it's really well done," says Siditsky (and this reporter's three-year-old niece, currently addicted to the advance copy of the film Disney provided, readily agrees with him). "It's a really nice story, and what we did for the DVD to extend the experience, we had some real fun."

Cinderella III: A Twist in Time will be released in February and Peter Pan: Platinum Edition will follow in March.