Why Disney’s 1967 The Jungle Book continues to… | Little White Lies

Why Disney’s 1967 The Jun­gle Book con­tin­ues to inspire

15 Apr 2016

Words by Matt Packer

Cartoon boy seated on large grey rock beside sleeping elephant, with purple flowers hanging overhead, in lush green natural setting.
Cartoon boy seated on large grey rock beside sleeping elephant, with purple flowers hanging overhead, in lush green natural setting.
Three self-con­fessed super fans of this ani­mat­ed clas­sic dis­cuss what makes it so special.

In our recent fea­ture on the mak­ing of Disney’s orig­i­nal adap­ta­tion of The Jun­gle Book’, vet­er­an ani­ma­tor Floyd Nor­man told us how the film came togeth­er after a shaky, false start to cement its posi­tion as a stand­out entry in the studio’s illus­tri­ous canon. Here, three oth­er film indus­try pro­fes­sion­als explain why the film has had a last­ing influ­ence on them.

The Jun­gle Book exem­pli­fies clas­sic Dis­ney char­ac­ter ani­ma­tion, with the famed Nine Old Men’ at the peak of their pow­ers. The xerox­ed, scratchy, unashamed­ly hand-drawn style was a step down in some people’s eyes from the glo­ri­ous hand-inked cels of Sleep­ing Beau­ty and Disney’s oth­er Gold­en Age clas­sics. But for me, see­ing the ani­ma­tors’ pure, rough-drawn lines onscreen was a delight. These were draw­ings – yet they lived and breathed. As a child, I delight­ed at the char­ac­ter­ful songs, the bub­bling tem­po of the piece and the feel-good cel­e­bra­tion of tak­ing it easy, espoused in Baloo’s The Bare Necessities’.

Mem­o­ries of the pure enter­tain­ment that hap­pens when music meets ani­ma­tion in The Jun­gle Book part­ly inspired Song of the Sea. As an ani­ma­tion stu­dent, Milt Kahl’s work on Shere Kahn seemed like some kind of voodoo that bog­gled my young mind: how could any human hand man­age the con­vinc­ing weight in how he moved – plus the men­ace and humour in his act­ing – while keep­ing track of all those stripes? To be hon­est, even after 16 years of work­ing pro­fes­sion­al­ly in hand-drawn ani­ma­tion, it still bog­gles my mind!”

I was sev­en years old when The Jun­gle Book was re-released, and it’s still my most vivid child­hood mem­o­ry of the cin­e­ma. That was just the begin­ning of what became a Jun­gle Book-themed bed­room full of cud­dly toys, books, draw­ings and – as it lat­er turned out – a very ear­ly dose of inspi­ra­tion. The Jun­gle Book was the first ani­mat­ed film that com­plete­ly cap­tured my imag­i­na­tion, and I couldn’t get enough of it. It was one of the key influ­ences that led me to study ani­ma­tion at uni­ver­si­ty, and I do remem­ber my lec­tur­er admit­ting that it was beyond him how Milt Kahl cre­at­ed such unbe­liev­ably real­is­tic weight in Shere Kahn.

I’ve been a pro­fes­sion­al ani­ma­tor for 16 years, but I still feel I have much to learn from look­ing at such beau­ti­ful work. To this day, I can think of few films that rival the sheer warmth, artistry and mem­o­ries that The Jun­gle Book encap­su­lates so completely.”

Disney’s The Jun­gle Book is almost 50 years old and it more than stands the test of time. While Kipling enthu­si­asts might have felt that it moved too far from his lit­er­ary vision, it’s clas­sic Dis­ney through and through. Mem­o­rable char­ac­ters, great Sher­man Broth­ers songs and plen­ty of heart; as the last film that Walt Dis­ney over­saw direct­ly, his mag­ic touch can still be felt through­out. If the new live-action ver­sion has man­aged to embrace Kipling’s sto­ry a lit­tle clos­er, but kept the heart and soul of its ani­mat­ed pre­de­ces­sor, it has every chance of being a huge success.”

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