The brilliance of Disney Channel’s newest original movie is evident in its guileless title: it’s a Teen Beach Movie. Channel surfers (and actual surfers!) will know exactly what they’re getting into when they flip to the Disney Channel this Friday night, July 19th.
Promotional image for Teen Beach Movie, copyright Disney
Formerly titled Teen Beach Musical, Teen Beach Movie is a throwback to the 1960s genre of “beach party” movies, first popularized by the Gidget film series (and TV spinoff) which starred Sandra Dee as a teenage surfer girl in 1959’s Gidget. The 1963 Beach Party movie (starring Frankie Avalon and former Mouseketeer Annette Funicello) launched a series of films which debuted between 1963 and 1966, and the genre quickly spun off into dozens of other films by competing studios looking to take advantage of the explosion in popularity.
Read More: http://www.disney-blog.com/?p=3236
Although some Disney Parks are light on thrill rides (Epcot’s got Test Track, Mission:Space and not much else), what makes the Disney Parks superior to amusement parks like Six Flags is the theming.
Images from the line queues for Buzz Lightyear's Astro Blasters and Snow White's Scary Ride
All of the Disney Parks are fully immersive and themed inside-and-out, from interactive waiting queues like the spooky graveyard at the Magic Kingdom’s Haunted Mansion to Hollywood Studios’ Los Angeles backdrops and Epcot’s iconic Spaceship Earth – a ride inside of a giant globe.
The Disney Imagineers’ attention to detail is flawless, making every trip to the Disney Parks a magical and unparalleled experience. And now, you can “bring (some of) the magic home” by sprucing up your own interiors with an exclusive line of Disney Paints available only at Walmart.
Read More: http://www.disney-blog.com/?p=3222
Several months ago, I downloaded the Disney Fairies Fashion Boutique app for the iPhone with the intent to write a review for Blogging Disney. I didn’t expect to enjoy playing the app as much as I did, and yet here we are, weeks later, and I am still running a fashion boutique for fairies with clientele as illustrious as Tinker Bell herself.
Screenshot from Disney Fairies Fashion Boutique, copyright Disney
A middle-schooler I recently tutored saw an app notification pop up on my phone and expressed with surprise, “I didn’t know adults play Disney Fairies!” Well, we do. And we like it.
Read More: http://www.disney-blog.com/?p=3203
In the summer of 2011, the Disney Channel launched its first-ever nationwide dance competition: the Make Your Mark: Ultimate Dance Off ‘Shake It Up’ Edition.
Promotional image for Disney Channel's Make Your Mark: Shake It Up Dance Off, image copyright Disney
Solo and group dancers between the ages of 8 and 16 were invited to upload their auditions to the Make Your Mark website, with more than 28,000 audition videos submitted. Six finalists were chosen to compete in a televised event, and the winners, a team of four dancers known as AKsquared, were featured on an episode of Disney Channel’s hit series Shake It Up.
Read More: http://www.disney-blog.com/?p=3171
Pixar Animation Studios may have aced its early film efforts with such beloved standouts as Finding Nemo, Ratatouille and all three Toy Story movies, but since the start of the twenty-tens, Pixar’s cinematic efforts have floundered, earning middling grades from critics and audiences alike.
Screenshot from "Monsters University", copyright Disney/Pixar
2011’s Cars 2 received Pixar’s worst-ever reviews with a 39% rotten consensus on Rotten Tomatoes, less than half the score of the first Cars film (at 74%). 2012’s Brave performed better at 78%, but many critics felt the studio’s first girl-centric adventure was missing much of the charm and wit that defined early Pixar films.
Read More: http://www.disney-blog.com/?p=3112
