“I didn’t want to create another ‘Sleeping Beauty’ style castle but instead designed one constructed from human skeletons and other creature’s bones,” Peraza continued, instantly proving to be one rad human being with great ideas. “Did I mention that I was also pushing for songs? Tim and I didn’t stay long as far as doing the concepts but to [producer] Joe Hale’s ever-lasting credit, at least he was open to new approaches and gave us both a shot.”
Indeed, Disney wanted this to be something new and fresh, like a “Snow White” for a new generation. Unfortunately, but not very surprisingly, the movie flopped. Hard. After all, families went in thinking this was another fun animated movie from the studio that had just recently released the cute “The Fox and the Hound.” Instead, kids encountered the first PG-rated Disney animated movie, one starring a proto-Gollum, an army of gruesome zombies, and people melting to death. Sadly, this last scene got cut by then-chairman of Walt Disney Studios, Jeffrey “I created Quibi” Katzenberg because he cowardly decided kids shouldn’t be traumatized by cartoons.
Katzenberg also almost scrapped the entire Disney animation division around this time, but from the failure of “The Black Cauldron” the studio pivoted and eventually we got the Disney Renaissance. And despite most criticism being that the film was unlike any other Disney movie, there were some fans — like Roger Ebert who praised it as “a rip-roaring tale of swords and sorcery, evil and revenge, magic and pluck and luck … And it takes us on a journey through a kingdom of some of the more memorable characters in any recent Disney film.”
It is time to reappraise this gem of a movie, and finally give the books the adaptation they deserve, even if it is in live-action.