The movie Walt Disney admitted that he hated
The animated movies of Walt Disney are largely considered to be some of the greatest children’s films of all time, bringing unparalleled movie magic to young audiences and adults who remember the classics from the company’s history. From Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, which kicked off their industry prominence in the 1930s, to 2013s Frozen, one of its most recent financial hits, the company remains an establishment of contemporary cinema.
Yet, whilst many of Disney’s classic movies, such as Beauty and the Beast, The Lion King and Bambi, are universally praised, others, like Home on the Range, Strange World and Chicken Little, are mocked. Even still, you’d think that the higher powers behind the face of the ‘House of Mouse’ would support each and every one of their releases, but such isn’t the case.
But, if anyone could criticise a Disney film, the company would allow none other than Walt Disney himself to do so. Such came in the late 1930s when Disney himself would make The Golden Touch after decades and decades of success making similar short animations in the industry, including Alice’s Wonderland, Plane Crazy and the iconic 1928 film Steamboat Willie.
Ironically, however, despite the director’s proficiency in the industry, the film The Golden Touch would prove to be his downfall.
Telling the story of King Midas, the fictional Greek figure whose greed led everything he touches to turn into gold, Disney made several changes to the source material and created a piece of sub-par animation that was panned by critics. Said to be too slow and even too hateful, the failure of the film took the wind out of Disney’s sails and encouraged the director to take a step back from behind the camera entirely.
In a letter he penned to critics following the release of the film, as featured in the book The Animated Man: A Life of Walt Disney, Disney stated: “I know the picture is not good, but it is impossible to make any radical changes in it at this time. It is unfortunate we missed on MIDAS as I felt that it had possibilities of being a very good cartoon. About the best thing we can do at this stage is to profit by our mistakes in the making of future pictures”.
If he thought The Golden Touch was “not good” and a “mistake”, one wonders what his opinion would have been regarding the critical and commercial bomb of 2022’s Strange World.
