Jungle Book- Historic and Economic context

A brief history of Disney:
" I don't make movies to make money. I make money so i can make more movies" - Walt Disney
 Walter Elias Disney: December 5 1901- December 15 1966
-Most Acadamy awards- 22 oscard/59 nominees
-2 golden globes
-Filmmaker, entrepreneur, animator and voice actor
-Several films included in national film registry
-Took art classes as a boy and became a commercial illustrator at 18.
-Made a studio with his brother (Disney Brothers Studio) in 1920, California
-Developed Mickey Mouse in 1928 
-As the business grew, he developed more skills like technicolour
(Results in snow white, dumbo etc furthered the development of animated film)
-New animated and live-action developed after World War Two.

1. Early animation: 1927- 1940s

In 1927 Disney began his first series of fully animated films featuring Oswald the Lucky rabbit. When his distributor promoted Oswald's rights, Disney altered Oswald's appearance and created a new character: Mortimer the mouse (Mickey Mouse). The first mickey cartoon was a sensation. In 1937, Disneys innovative fully length animation (Snow White and the seven dwarfs) was a worldwide success. In order to meet success, Disney knew he had to expand his studio- he was able to do this from the profits of snow-white. He got 51 acres of land and expanded the studio, making it more modern. He wanted to create a production factory that provided all the essential facilities. Scenes in the cartoons were composed and framed as they would be for live-action and surreal aspects of characters were kept at a minimum. This provoked criticism for Disney for discouraging experimentation. Pinocchio (1940) which features complex characters rendered in detailed full animation, is Disneys greatest achievement. Dumbo and Bambi also achieved recognition as masterpieces by effectively employing the devices Disney brought for Pinocchio; music, comedy, pathos, adventure and genuine horror.

    

      2. The movie to live action: 1940-1960s

Disney suffered a major set back in 1941, leaving top animators compelled to resign. The enthusiastic mood in the studio had dropped and it produced little on the level of Pinocchio for the next decade, concentrating on features like combining animation and live-action like song of the south (1946). Cinderella and Peter Pan were fine efforts but lacked the dimension of the early 40s features. The lady and the tramp was a return to form but Disney's attention was increased by live-action features, TV productions and the Disney land theme park in 1955 California. The studio lot expanded in the 1950s to include sound stages and productions craft facilities for live-action. Mary Poppins was Disneys greatest hit in more than 20 years and won 5 academy awards.

    3. Disney after the death of Walt Disney: 1960-1990s
The company was in financial disarray when he died, but enterprises he had planned assured the company's future. In 1965 he purchased 43 acres of land in Florida; the Walt Disney resort. Ray Disney supervised this and it opened in 1971 to great success, in 1982, the experimental prototype community of tomorrow (Epcot) was incorporated in parks and was a huge success and was a main attraction. It was the last project that Walt Disney envisioned and by the 21st century it had more than 10 million visitors. The 1990s were a hugely successful decade for Disney. The little mermaid was Disney's best effort in 40 years. Beauty and the beast, Aladdin, The lion king, fantasia and the hunch back of Notre-dame was very successful. They experimented with features of live-action and realized the technologies potential through Toy story and Toy story 2, films that Disney produced with Pixar animations studios. Live-action features were a success, especially in 101 Dalmatians. The Disney magic, first ship in Disney cruise line was launched on 30 June 1998 and offered vacation packages to the Caribbean Islands. The Disney channel network was expanded to the ABC network, ESPN sports cable network and radio Disney. The enterprise of 1990 found its way into Broadway musicals. Stage adaptations of Lion King and beauty and the beast was a long running success and premiered in 1994 and 97. At the end of the 20th century Walt Disney's company is the world's largest entertainment conglomerate and is ranked in America's top 50 corporations.
   4. The 21st Century and expansion:
New parks were opened in Paris, Tokyo and Hong Kong and Disney-quests indoor theme parks featuring interactive virtual reality arcades debuted in Orlando, Florida and Chicago. The latter subsequently closed. In early 21st century more than 115 million visited their attractions annually worldwide. They bought Pixar in 2006 for $7.4 billion. Jobs were the largest shareholder in Disney. The partnership continued to bear fruit (yield positive results) and their films challenged previously held notions of what could be done with computer animation. Films including Nemo and Toy Story 3 won academy awards for best animated films. Disney's own computer animated films proved popular like Tangled, frozen and wreck it Ralph. Disney experienced a rebirth with pirates of the Caribbean: curse of black pool scored huge numbers at the box office. It launched a franchise that grossed more than $3.7 billion worldwide. Disney acquired Marvel for $4 billion in 2009. Marvel produced hits like the avengers- one of the top grossing films. Disney have produced live-action remakes of animated classics. In 2012, Disney acquired Lucasfilm LTD for $4 billion. It brought the star wars franchise under Disney. In 2015 they produced a new star wars movie. In 2017, Disney agreed to purchase most of the holdings of 21st century fox in a deal which values at about $66 billion.

Global success

1967:

• Jungle Book was certainly a box office smash and easily recouped the original investment by Disney: the budget was $4 million but JB has now made $141 million gross in the US (29th highest grosssing film in the US) and $205 million worldwide,
• An estimated $6.8 million came from Germany alone, making it Germany's highest grossing film of all time, and the most successful film of all time in terms of ticket admissions in the country with 27.3 million tickets sold.

2016:

• JB16 cost an estimated $175 million to produce but opened with $103.6 million in North America, making it one of the biggest April debuts ever at the box office.
• It grossed over $996 million, making it the 5th highest-grossing film in 2016 and 35th of all time.
• In 2016 Disney's productions earned more at the box office than any of the other 6 majors; Disneys amassed $2.56 billion globally, well ahead of its next nearest rivals, Warner bros. and Universal, with roughly $1.8 billion.

The film was released in 70 countries, opening at different times depending on competition and school holiday dates. It was the biggest Hollywood release ever in India, having earned $36.8 million and was very successful in China, where the film was locally known as Fantasy Forest.