Animation Artifacts &Disney &Models &Story & Storyboards 05 Feb 2008 08:51 am
Sword In the Stone extras
- A film I always thought somewhat under rated is Disney’s The Sword In The Stone. The background art is sensational, and several sequences are brilliantly animated.
Bill Peet‘s adaptation from TH White‘s book, The Once and Future King, loses some of its poetry in the adaptation, but the book’s storyline features a lot of rambling making it hard to construct a screen story. I’ve watched this film quite a few times over the years, and somehow it always gives me a bit of a charge that comes with many of the older classics.
The extras on the dvd seems to consist predominantly of storyboard drawings by Bill Peet. So why not show them off? There’s no continuity to attend to, hence the images are gathered in small clusters. The sequence everyone jumps to analyze and discuss is the Wizard Duel between Merlin and Madame Mim (animated by Milt Kahl.) Consequently, a lot of the drawings on the dvd come from this sequence. I, personally, would have loved seeing some of the squirrel section. I found it quite moving and full of real character stuff. It would be nice to see how Peet developed this.
There’s no hint of a continuity on the dvd, but I’ve heard that the storyboard drawings in the vault are just placed in manilla envelopes with no suggestion of an order. It would make sense that they’ve just plopped these images on the dvd as they have with no order, details or related information.
_______Here’s a creature that never made it to the battle of the wizards.
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_________________________(Click any image to enlarge.)
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___________Another fantastic creature that didn’t make it into the film.
I’m not sure if this drawing is also from the duel. Or was it another sequence where Wart becomes an animal – cut out of the film?
This looks like it may have been planned as a home for Merlin. Did it inspire anything for The Rescuers?
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___________It’s magic !
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Here are a couple of models Peet obviously did –
_______________________probably more for himself than anything.
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on 05 Feb 2008 at 1:39 pm 1.Stephen Macquignon said …
I have been known to say “Just one big medieval mess†I am sure it is not 100% accurate but it is one of my favorite lines
on 05 Feb 2008 at 1:41 pm 2.Eddie Fitzgerald said …
Holy Mackeral! These are great drawings! I wish they’d released a version of the film that was all preliminary artwork, like this!
on 05 Feb 2008 at 2:16 pm 3.Luke Farookhi said …
‘The Sword in the Stone’ is undoubtedly one of my favourite Disney films. Style and animation-wise, it’s second only to ‘One Hundred and One Dalmatians’ of the xerox films. Though it is somewhat episodic it contains some of Disney’s best sequences, such as the squirrel romance, Sir Ector’s gallant battle with the crockery, and the wizard’s duel.
I think the main strength of the film, though, is in the characterisations. Arthur is perhaps a little bland, but Merlin, Archimedes, Madame Mim, Ector, Kay and most of the minor players are all wonderfully conceived. I love the story that Bill Peet based Merlin on the stubborn Walt Disney – would that make Peet himself Archimedes?
on 05 Feb 2008 at 5:38 pm 4.Biblioadonis aka George said …
Thanks for sharing the artwork!
on 05 Feb 2008 at 6:20 pm 5.Thad Komorowski said …
Great preliminary artwork, but I never liked this film. The sketchy xerox animation looks awful in retrospect, and it simply doesn’t have enough going for it otherwise to make up for it (like “One Hundred and One Dalmatians” does). I could barely watch “The Jungle Book” DVD too.
on 06 Feb 2008 at 9:40 am 6.Bruce said …
This is brilliant, simply brilliant. That’s all I can say!
The Bill Peet sketches of Merlin are fascinating, and it’s interesting that the character’s personality was based on Walt’s.
Thanks for showing these inspirational sketches.
on 06 Feb 2008 at 10:02 am 7.slowtiger said …
The squirrrel sequence is the one I always show when I give an introductory workshop about animation – to show what it’s capable of.
on 06 Feb 2008 at 3:55 pm 8.Will Finn said …
I could be wrong, but some of these miscellaneous sketches of merlin and wart could be by Vance Gerry. Vance was working in story by this time. The drawings with the heavier ink lines look like his to me.
BTW- The wizard’s duel was “animated” by everybody but Milt Kahl, although he undoubtedly went over the keys and designed each animal model, based closely on Bill Peet’s meticulous sketch designs. Frank Thomas, John Sibley, John Lounsberry, Dick Lucas and Eric Larson are credited with the actual animation of the duel, in more or less chronological order.
This is the first Disney movie i remember being actually disappointed in as a piece of storytelling when I saw it as a kid; literally nothing adds up. In the first edition of T.H. White’s book, there is a climax where each lesson “Wart” has learned comes to bear on his ability to remove the sword from the anvil, but in the film it is a pre-ordained event that doesn’t seem to have much to do with anything that happens prior. To my complete surprise, Frank Thomas told me once that this was the most enjoyable film he and the other lead animators worked on and they were shocked it flopped. I still watch it a lot for the highly enjoyable animation in some of the sequences.
on 06 Feb 2008 at 4:02 pm 9.Michael said …
The dvd gives only Bill Peet’s name for the drawings. With additional photos, Peet is the highlighted artist. They give no additional information if, in fact, Vance Gerry did any of these drawings. It would make sense, though.
on 06 Feb 2008 at 6:39 pm 10.Nobuhiko Suzuki said …
I think that it is a very wonderful blog. Thank you.
on 06 Feb 2008 at 11:47 pm 11.Jim said …
Frank Thomas also told me one time that he thought it was a shame this film was always overlooked and that he counted it among his favorites. A beautiful-looking film.
on 31 Mar 2008 at 8:00 pm 12.Brian Sibley said …
The boat-house (or cottage) is a design not for Merlin’s house but Mim’s – the sign says so! Great post, fascinating imagery. Thank you.
on 19 Jun 2012 at 6:38 pm 13.Terry Waldron said …
This film is just wonderful. I’m 55 and still enjoy watching it with or without kids in the room. I really love the characters, their personalities and the way this film develops. I’ve been to Disney many times looking for any art to hang and it’s just not there – what a disappointment. Thanks for sharing these drawing.
on 17 Oct 2013 at 5:52 pm 14.Vaughn Caseres said …
Thanks for uploading this information and resources its really help full for my interests!