The Return of Family Films?

With the launch of Disney Plus, the company is making live-action family movies like they used to do.

The New York Times has an article about an interesting development related to the much ballyhooed launch of the Disney Plus streaming service.

The streaming era is here. Like a factory restarting an abandoned assembly line now that boom times have returned, Disney is reviving its smaller-scale movie operation to make content for Disney Plus, the company’s Netflix-style streaming service that blasts off on Tuesday.

Once again, Disney will make inspirational sports dramas, gentle teen romances, live-action animal adventure films and slapstick comedies — original-to-screen stories in the spirit of beloved Disney movies like “Remember the Titans” (2000), “The North Avenue Irregulars” (1979), and, yes, “Old Yeller.”

“Togo,” for instance, arrives on Disney Plus next month. Set in Alaska in 1925 and based on a true story, the $40 million film stars Willem Dafoe as a cranky musher. His top dog, Togo, once an unwanted runt, must summon the strength — in his twilight years — to do the impossible: lead a team of sled dogs through a blizzard and across a treacherous frozen lake so that medicine can be fetched for dying children back home. He’s the only hope.

“Got one more in you, pup?” Dafoe’s frontiersman asks, unsure himself of the answer.

Filmed in the Canadian Rockies, “Togo” is an edge-of-your-seat adventure — the cracking ice! the approaching cliff! — with a puddle-of-tears ending.

I have been tracking this move by Disney in part because I know two filmmakers who have directed a pair of Disney Plus family films — Julia Hart and Lena Khan.

Grace VanderWaal, a 15-year-old known for winning the “America’s Got Talent” televised talent show (trusty ukulele in tow), will make her acting debut in “Stargirl,” a bespoke little musical about being yourself and the thrill of young love. It has an indie vibe — something on the sunnier end of the Sundance Film Festival, perhaps, with a hat tip to “The Perks of Being a Wallflower,” an Independent Spirit Award winner in 2013.

“The whole be-yourself thing can start to feel very narrow and preachy,” said Julia Hart (“Fast Color”), who directed “Stargirl.” “I wanted to make something for young people that felt authentic.”

And then there is “Flora and Ulysses,” which focuses on a cynical girl and a squirrel who develops superpowers after getting caught in a vacuum cleaner. The fast-rising filmmaker Lena Khan (“The Tiger Hunter”) is directing this comedic romp, adapted from Kate DiCamillo’s children’s book, which won the John Newbery Medal in 2014.

Apart from the opportunity afforded these two writer-directors, I am also excited to see Disney doing what they have done so well: family movies. As recently as the early 90s, the company’s three production wings — Walt Disney Pictures, Touchstone Pictures, Hollywood Pictures — were releasing upward to 40 movies per year. That not only meant more entertainment choices for moviegoers, but more work for writers and the entire filmmaking community. Nowadays as the article notes: “Disney retrenched to focus exclusively on effects-driven megamovies that jackhammer people away from their Facebook and Fortnite accounts.”

However, it appears Disney Plus is bringing back low-to-moderate budget live-action movies: “Disney Plus will serve up 10 new films during its first year. Budgets range between $20 million and $60 million.”

Let’s hope this move works out and they expand that roster. More choices for consumers. More work for screenwriters!

For the rest of the New York Times article, go here.