Production

Essay on Jungle Book production

Walt Disney is a part of the big six and are an entertainment conglomerate; meaning they own many different media companies. They are the biggest media conglomerate in the United states s they own large stakes in Hulu (30%) and own the film and entertainment rights to Marvel, Pixar and the recently bought Lucas film from George Lucas to get all the rights towards Star wars and all the intellectual properties of Lucas film. Their biggest competition is 20^th century fox however with the latest deal they now own 20^th century fox and have much more room to produce more films with less competition. Disney is renowned in filmmaking as being perfectionists. Details, especially in the animation such as Pixar, are considered carefully before being undertaken. This is also shown in their business tactics, carefully reducing the competition. A state of limited competition, in which a market is shared by a small number of producers or sellers, five other major film studios include Columbia Pictures, 20th Century Fox, Warner Bros, Paramount Pictures, Universal Pictures.

Disney’s reputation in film making is quite impressive because of how they keep pulling off many re-makes of classics and also bringing out new ones that have never been seen before. They produce movies that have a sense of never being explored before and therefore are quite good trendsetters as they create a new path for many other companies, even though they believe theirs will always come out on top. Disney follow a formulaic approach for many of their most popular productions, which involves releasing a set number of films each year, such as releasing a few original productions (through Pixar), two live-action remakes (such as the Jungle Book) and also a franchise film (often times Star Wars). Following this approach allows Disney to almost skip half of the process, as they often times already have a main storyline which they can just ‘recycle’ and adapt to a modern audience. Disney also have access to a wide range of famous, high profile cast members to create some ‘star appeal’ towards the movie, all of which can drive a higher audience percentage to the Disney film.

Favreau used intertextuality in his live-action Jungle Book remake which proposes several questions. There is a scene in the Jungle Book which is not found in the original, where Mowgli jumps into a stampede of Wildebeest in order to escape Shere Khan the tiger. This scene is similar to that found in the Lion King, 1994. In 2019, the live-action remake of The Lion King is being released. Is this subliminal advertising or a Disney ‘easter-egg’ hinting at their newest release? Using simulacra and MPC, (Motion Picture Company). They put the Mowgli actor in front of a blue screen with 3D parts resembling the landscape, they also gave Mowgli props to resemble the other characters. The uncanny effect is when characters in a film are very similar to real life. The objects resemblance to real life is very prevalent. Disney wanted to avoid this because it can make characters look very robotic and the overall effect is not worthwhile.I feel as if the animals are very realistic in the film, which is a way to encourage an older audience to engage in the action. Even though they are realistic, they still have the ability to talk, which is what makes them childlike. MPC have helped Jungle Book by giving them the honour to be nominated for the “Best Visual Effects”. This would have given Jungle Book the positive recognition it deserved, which would have helped to increase its sales. Simulacra was the process of combining real world actors and sets with computer graphics actors and sets. Examples of this was when they had Mowgli and Baloo moving on the same scene but Baloo is computer generated while Mowgli is a real person which shows how they have merged two different types of visuals together.

The story boarding process of the film was to plan animations and create the music before the film was even thought about being made. They used the older darker version of the jungle book which was scrapped and not used due to it not being very child friendly as a reference point for making a fun more child friendly film. Rot scoping is the transfer (an image from live action film) into another film sequence using an otoscope. Xerography, also known as electrophotography, is a printing and photocopying technique that works on the basis of electrostatic charges. The xerography process is the dominant method of reproducing images and printing computer data and is used in photocopiers, laser printer s and fax machines.

To conclude, the production process of both Jungle book films places technology and the experience of the audience at the heart of development. This commitment has not changed in the 80 years since the release of Snow White and by examining the production processes of both Jungle Book movies you can tell that the focus on technological change is just as important now as it ever was.