Il Était une Fois les Imagineers, les Visionnaires Disney [Disney - 2019]

Un peu me même avis que Haendel et Brozen à la fois. C'est passionnant pour tout fan, on en voudrait tellement plus, mais en effet le ton est différent aux épisodes 5 et 6, mais c'est sans doute mérité (à voir dans le temps pour ce qui concerne SDL d'une part et SWGE d'autre part.

J'ai regardé le dernier épisode hier et j'ai vraiment beaucoup aimé cette série de documentaires.
J'aimerais beaucoup voir quelque chose de similaire sur les films d'animations Disney, au fil des décennies.

Excellente série de documentaires, traitée chronologiquement essentiellement et très instructive niveau attractions cultes dans le monde. En attendant d'avoir un spécial d'ici quelques années qui sait, la série pourrait revenir sur une autre thématiques comme sur les animateurs ou compositeurs des films Disney voire les productions Disney elles-mêmes.

Sur les compositeurs il y a un documentaire sur les frères Sherman.

cette série de documentaires est très très bien faites, tout est dans la justesse, tout les avis sont présent, ils n'hésitent pas à faire intervenir des anciens cast mêmes ceux qui ont été bannis (Eisner par exemple), j'aime que les problématiques n'ait pas été éludés, il y a un réel travail de reconnaissance des erreurs (les débuts difficlles de Euro disney, le manque d'attraction aux studios, l’échec du début de Hong-Kong et California adventure).
j'ai aimé les détails tel que le générique qui change d'épisodes en épisodes.

Ce serait sympa de développer des documentaires sur les attractions similaire à travers les différents parcs.

J'ai commencé à regarder la série mais ne l'ai pas encore terminée. Pour être honnête, je l'ai commencée plus par curiosité et "ennui pendant le confinement", je n'avais pas du tout de grandes attentes, ne m'étant jamais vraiment intéressée plus que ça dans "l'imagineering", l'histoire et la conception des parcs.
Pour le moment je trouve cette série documentaire vraiment très très bien réalisée et très instructive, je me suis totalement laissée plonger. Un plaisir d'écouter ces gens de l'ombre dont certains ont côtoyé notre cher Walt. Certains passages comme les témoignages sur la mort de Walt et la continuité de son empire sont très émouvants.

Il n'y a que 6 épisodes? je m'attendais à avoir un épisode aujourd'hui mais hélas non, c'est remplacé par la nouvelle série "Souvenir de Tournage"?

Disons qu'il est difficile de faire des épisodes sur des événements qui n'ont pas encore eu lieu.

La réalisatrice Leslie Iwerks et le Président de Walt Disney Imagineering Bob Weis ne ferment pas la porte à une seconde saison dans quelques années.

Une combinaison d'interviews réalisées mais coupées au montage final et de matériel additionel à réaliser dans les années à venir ?

Leslie Iwerks évoque également la possibilité d'une série centrée sur le centième anniversaire de The Walt Disney Company.

Citation :

“We were able to look at it as a big whole of a tapestry of everybody’s contributions and how they all intertwined and worked together,” Iwerks said.

But even in creating such an epic compilation of Disney Parks history, it was inevitable for the team behind The Imagineering Story to have to leave some content out. But as it turns out, they were left with a lot more material that didn’t make the final cut.

One element of The Imagineering Story that did not make it in the finished product was an interview with Susan Hoose, one of the original Disneyland mermaids.

“We found her through a lot of digging on social media and contacted her, and I had a long conversation with her over the phone and she had these really amazing stories,” Iwerks said.

They flew Hoose out to southern California and interviewed her at Disneyland right in front of where she used to work, the lagoon in between Fantasyland and Tomorrowland where the Finding Nemo Submarine Voyage is now. They even found archival footage of Hoose, and during her interview, she told the story of how she went straight from school to go to the Disneyland audition.

“But at the end of the day we ended up cutting it because it just felt a little bit tangential to the Imagineers,” Iwerks said. “It was more about the Cast and her story and it sort of took us off the main thread.”

But deleted scenes went beyond stories of Disneyland mermaids and the Yippee Day protests when young people invaded Disneyland in the 70s to protest the war. Weis and Iwerks shared that the Disney+ series originally included scenes of Pooh’s Hunny Hunt (the groundbreaking Winnie the Pooh dark ride at Tokyo Disneyland), Expedition Everest at Disney’s Animal Kingdom, Horizons at EPCOT, and even Castaway Cay.

There’s tons of “golden” interview footage that they weren’t able to fit in. Even Cast Member training films and attraction testing videos pulled from the Walt Disney Imagineering archives, which fans would have loved to see, couldn’t make the final cut of the series.

But given the surplus of material that Disney already had to work with, and given the many Imagineers who weren’t interviewed the first time around for the six-hour series, does that mean we could get more episodes coming to Disney+ in the future? Maybe even a season 2 ?

“I think there could have been so much more on Disneyland alone,” Iwerks said when asked if another series would be possible. “There’s a lot of archival footage about Disneyland. So if you wanted a really deep dive look into that, I think there’s a series even on that…It’s amazing, there’s a kind of material that people don’t even know exists.”

She even said that there could possibly be a series on the 100-year history of The Walt Disney Company since the 100-year anniversary is coming up in 2023.

Weis said, “We certainly believe the Imagineering story is not finished — we’re constantly doing new things, we’ve constantly got new projects underway, we have so much even in our immediate future in the next few years.”

https://insidethemagic.net/2020/05/more-imagineering-story-episodes-disney-plus-ba1/

Il faut quand-même que ça reste dans la thématique originelle de l'Imagineering mais il doit y avoir quantité de choses à faire comme évoquer la politique de protection par Brevet d'invention, expliquer des détails précis de conception de telle ou telle partie d'attractions (naavi flottant dans la file d'attente de Flight of Passage, système audio embarqué de SM, fonctionnement des ascenseurs de la TZToT, fabrication extérieure et intérieure de Spaceship Earth, conception d'un EMV ou de Test Track/RSR, système utilisé dans le WEDway People mover, théâtre tournant du carrousel of Progress, effets spéciaux d'Alien Extraterrorestrial Encounter et j'en passe)

Citation :

Leslie Iwerks reveals the biggest Disneyland secrets exposed in 'The Imagineering Story'

Leslie Iwerks has revealed that she wasn’t sure she’d be allowed to delve within the mythical innards of Disneyland’s Matterhorn for new documentary The Imagineering Story.

The ecosystem for staff within the bowels of the California attraction has always been a mystery, with rumours of a basketball court inside the mountain.

Telling the truth about what goes on within the Matterhorn was just one of the many secrets the director — the granddaughter of Mickey Mouse co-creator Ub Iwerks — was able to expose in The Imagineering Story, which will stream in six parts on Disney+.

The documentary focuses on the “Imagineers” — a portmanteau of imagination and engineers — responsible for realising the Disneyland vision.

When asked which elements of the documentary story Iwerks wasn’t sure she’d be able to tell, the 49-year-old filmmaker told Yahoo Movies UK that getting inside the Matterhorn was right up there.

She said: “That was something that was a myth prior, so that was fun. Going inside the utilidors [the network of private tunnels beneath Disney World in Florida] too — they were always a secret place.

“But really just going inside the walls of Imagineering was something that was kind of rare too.

“That behind the scenes access was just super cool. It’s giving the audience something new and fresh.”

Iwerks said she was given “a lot of leeway” by Disney to tell the truth about the difficulties faced in realising Walt Disney’s theme park vision in the 1950s, and the innovations since then.

She added: “Bob Weis, the President of Imagineering, and even prior to him the management who helped to greenlight it, were very supportive of telling the real story.

“It really started with [the late Imagineer and Disney ambassador] Marty Sklar. Marty had seen The Pixar Story [which Iwerks directed] and, even in that film, they were all in support of me telling the honest story of what were the trials and tribulations of getting Pixar off the ground.

“When Marty saw that, he said: ‘You should be doing that for us because we have lots of trials and tribulations and no one really knows them. We should tell that story.’”

How much of an honour was it for you to be able to tell this specific part of the Disney story ?

Leslie Iwerks : It definitely was an honour. I grew up in this world, behind the scenes at Disney, and I’ve known the Imagineers all my life. A lot of them were family friends. I’ve had a number of films under my belt and some experience, but for them to choose me to tell the story was a real honour. I think everybody was surprised as well because they hadn’t done this before and it was pretty unprecedented to have the access that we did to travel around the world, interview lots of people and go behind the scenes.

It was an evolving project. It started out as a 90-minute film and ultimately evolved into a six-hour cut. So it was a real adventure and a lot of fun.

You mentioned all of the access that you got and the interviews, but you also had such a huge amount of archive footage. Was that daunting, or did it make the process easier ?

There was so much that you had to really cull through, and it was the same with the interviews because we did so many. But I think that was good. We were also fortunate to have the time that we did. It wasn’t like we had to do this in eight months or something. We had five years to go through lots of footage and organise it so we could sort of let the story evolve and figure it out.

We had access to all of the archives around the world for the theme parks, so whenever we would get new material in, we were very excited. It was like putting together a big puzzle. You’ve got all of these little parts, but now you’ve got to put it into a puzzle and make it a complete picture. So, if you were missing puzzle parts, you weren’t sure if you could tell that story. It was interesting to say the least.

The documentary puts a lot of emphasis on how Disney, although it’s this huge behemoth, it’s also something of a family company. As someone who has come up through that yourself, how important was it to convey that ?

For me, I think I was riding that fine line. I’m just one of many people who have grown up in this world, like [legendary Imagineer] Rolly Crump’s son and [current Imagineer] Kim Irvine and a number of other folk who are fortunate enough to be kids of Disney employees. But really, for me, the story was not just about one person — if anyone, it was really Walt Disney.

Everybody else brought their own unique things to the table. By no means could we document and tell everyone’s stories, but we did try to choose the people who could best tell us and guide us through that particular journey or turning point in time. Through all of those folks, you get this tapestry of history and challenge and tribulations and triumph.

You give a lot of time to the key women involved in Disney, like Kim Irvine who you previously mentioned. Was the role of these amazing women something you were keen to spotlight ?

Yes, because I knew Harriet Burns — she was a family friend. She was really the First Lady of Imagineering and I heard her stories about working in a man’s world way back in the day in the model shop. She was one of the guys. She was fun and smart and could use a saw — you name it, she could do it. It wasn’t about being a woman or a man. It was about who was good at what they did. So I think it was important for me to at least tell a bit of her story because she was there for so many years.

But then you see the growth and the evolution of women through time, like how many women came in during the 70s and got roles right out of the gate. Disney was very wonderful in that way in that they brought in women as architects or you name it. Women were doing creative roles and it wasn’t an issue.

Now, over time, women are leading these projects and really running with them. They’re the creative leads and the project leads. Now, it’s not even a question mark. So that women’s story angle was one thread that I felt was important to include, but it wasn’t a driving force. It was just something that happened.

You mentioned earlier walking a fine line with your own personal connections. Did you also find you were walking a line between celebrating the genius of these people while trying not to just make it an advert for Disneyland? How difficult was that to do ?

We were given a lot of leeway to be really, really honest. Bob Weis, the President of Imagineering, and even prior to him the management who helped to greenlight it, were very supportive of telling the real story. It really started with [the late Imagineer and Disney ambassador] Marty Sklar. Marty had seen The Pixar Story [which Iwerks directed] and, even in that film, they were all in support of me telling the honest story of what were the trials and tribulations of getting Pixar off the ground.

When Marty saw that, he said: “You should be doing that for us because we have lots of trials and tribulations and no one really knows them. We should tell that story.”

It actually works, because not many companies were telling their own stories. I think I started doing that in my career and now lots of companies want to tell their stories. But it’s not really companies telling their stories, it’s people telling stories of a creative entity or enterprising entity. For me, I just felt like it was great to be able to share everyone’s stories as if they were all equal.

Were there any stories or elements that you were surprised they let you keep in? How close did you get to the line ?

I think getting inside the Matterhorn. That was something that was a myth prior, so that was fun. Going inside the utilidors too, they were always a secret place. But really just going inside the walls of Imagineering was something that was kind of rare too. That behind the scenes access was just super cool. It’s giving the audience something new and fresh.

You’re part of the first wave of content for Disney+ UK. How exciting is it to be there on day one ?

It’s thrilling for me because we worked for a long time on this project. It’s almost six years or so. It’s great to have this launch after not knowing whether it was going to be a 90-minute thing, or then where the six-hour cut would go or who would air it. Then Disney+ came in and it was a perfect fit, for the fans of Disney to have something like this at launch.

And now, with a lot of the parks closed [due to the coronavirus pandemic], it just feels like people can still get a bit of Imagineering and theme park access even if they may not be there physically.

As a final question. on day one for you, what was the first thing you wanted to seek out on Disney+ ?

You know what? People are going to think I’m nuts, but I actually watched The Shaggy D.A. I hadn’t seen that since I was on the backlot as a kid. I wanted to go back in time and relive the sets that I used to walk around on. That was fun. I also started to watch the first Herbie films because I was also running around the backlot as a kid when they were filming those. I used to see the Herbie car parked and I used to think “oh my God, it’s like a celebrity, there’s Herbie!”

So it was fun to relive those two movies because that was my era as a kid backstage. I wanted to confirm that my memories of what I had seen were correct

Tom Beasley - 26 mars 2020.

Merci Vinc pour cette vidéo.

Elle est rigolote avec son côté animé ^^

J'ai adoré cette série. Même s'il y un a quand même un côté "regardez comme on est géniaux et innovateurs", la série est intéressante pour voir les coulisses de la création des parcs et voir des documents que j'avais jamais eu.
Et revoir Philippe Gas.

Vinc a écrit:

La réalisatrice Leslie Iwerks et le Président de Walt Disney Imagineering Bob Weis ne ferment pas la porte à une seconde saison dans quelques années.

Tu viens de me saper le moral, je pensais que ça allait arriver dans les semaines à venir

Dash a écrit:

Disons qu'il est difficile de faire des épisodes sur des événements qui n'ont pas encore eu lieu

Certes, mais tout n'a pas été dit dans ces 6 épisodes. J'attendais encore beaucoup de choses

Superbe série sur le parc <3

Citation :

‘The Imagineering Story’ Director Leslie Iwerks on Disney Parks in a Troubling Time

The filmmaker also talks about the possibility of more episodes in the future.

Leslie Iwerks is genuine Disney royalty.

Her father, Don Iwerks, is a Disney legend who worked alongside Walt developing camera systems for Disney live-action features like 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea and later influential Disney theme park attractions like the Circlevision-360 technology that powered things like America the Beautiful and 3D systems that powered the company’s inaugural 3D attraction Magic Journeys. And her grandfather, Ub Iwerks, was one of Walt’s original business partners and the designer of Oswald the Lucky Rabbit and Mickey Mouse. Some of those original, highly influential short films, like “Steamboat Willie” or “The Skeleton Dance,” were animated almost entirely by Ub. So, like I said: Disney royalty.

As a documentarian, Leslie Iwerks has covered a number of pressing societal and environmental issues, but also returned to the company her father and grandfather called home, creating features about her grandfather, the Pixar legacy and, most recently, The Imagineering Story, an illuminating, 6-part documentary series that debuted with Disney+ in November. With The Imagineering Story, she went behind-the-scenes of the secretive group responsible for Disney’s theme parks, resorts and cruise ships. The access Imagineering afforded Iwerks, and the stories that the Imagineers told, were unprecedented. For Disney fans like myself, the series was a near-religious experience.

And it’s been a thrill to chat with Iwerks about the impact the documentary has had, how th Disney Parks are faring in these difficult times, being on the last Disney Cruise before quarantine, and whether she’d come back for more episodes.

How hard is it for you to not think about additional episodes of this documentary during this unprecedented time for the parks ?

Well, you know, I just miss being in the parks, as everybody does. And it's hard to see so much stalled at the moment, as far as expansions and new lands and new attractions, on hold. They'll get back to it soon enough and this all be behind us. We’re just doing what we’ve got to do. I'm glad that The Imagineering Story is out there for people to at least watch during this time.

One of the most emotional moments in the documentary is the reopening of the Japanese parks after the tsunami. Do you expect similarly emotional reactions to when the parks open back up? Have you thought about that at all ?

Yeah, I have. Obviously Shanghai just reopened and by what I saw, it seemed very similar and people were just thrilled to be back, obviously under different circumstances, social distancing and lines and things like that. I think just what you read in social media, what people are posting about, they just can't wait to get back and these parks are special to people. They are a place for happiness and we're missing that right now in this world. And I think more than ever, I think people are just going really appreciate the parks.

The ups and downs of Imagineering is such a huge part of this documentary. Was there anything compare this current situation to in terms hardships that they faced ?

Well, I think what was fun about the documentary covering the whole history was that they have probably dealt with more than most realize over a 60-year history. You've got lots of different trials and tribulations that impact the parks, whether, it’s the economic or be physical, environmental things. And this is one that is unprecedented. Not all parks have been shut down all at once before. That's a real blow to the company and you're seeing the impact of that. But, you know, the reality is that I know that they can get through this. There's a need for these parks, more than I think a lot of physical brick and mortar places in the world.

The hotel and restaurant industry is getting impacted so severely, as well as the airline industry, et cetera. I mean, you can say, “Well, most people want to go back to a Disney theme park.” You going to have some say, “Well, that’s my first priority.” But there's a lot of people that say, “I need joy back in my life again.” And that's what these parks more than any place really offer. It just feels like it's unprecedented. There is unprecedented need for joy and happiness and places where families can get together and enjoy themselves and be outside and have exhilaration. And I think that's what these parks will be welcoming them back once things are settled.

What’s so fascinating is that the documentary seems to have impacted the culture of Imagineering. Bob Weis [President of Walt Disney Imagineering] has talked about how it’s starting to open the doors of the division now, in part because of the documentary. How do you feel about having impacted them in such a way ?

Well, I don't know if I've had an impact. I think the reality is that the Imagineers have always been there. Now they have a film that has told their story, and if it wasn't me, maybe somebody would have done it down the road in some way, shape or form. But I'm glad to be the one to have done it. But I do think that the story of the Imagineers is something that they realized was so beloved by so many people. For them, it's like the lid got lifted off of this wonderful, magical institution that has always been very closed down and coveted and private and veiled in secrecy. And now maybe the film has given them that A-OK to say, well, we can be a little bit more open and we can share what we're doing, or we can share at least the fun that we're having.

It's put the spotlight on them a little more and given them the opportunity to say, it's okay to be a little more exposed. Bob Weis told me that he was at Starbucks one day and somebody was standing behind him in line and they said, “Oh my God, are you that guy in The Imagineering Story?” And he's like, “Yeah, I am.” And he's like, “Now I'm getting recognized, in places.” I think it's a compliment to him and a compliment to all the Imagineers who've worked so hard and who are getting the proper credit for their work. And they've created such joy for people that love the parks. And it’s a joy for me to see that.

Well what have your interactions been like with people since the documentary came out ?

Good. A lot of it's been on social media in quarantine, so I haven't seen a lot of people. But when we were at the park for my dad, my dad had a speaking event at Club 33 for his book, his recent book on my grandfather. And we were going up, I said, let's go on Haunted Mansion. And we're walking in and the guy at the front said, “Are you Leslie Iwerks, director of The Imagineering Story? I loved it!” And I'm like, “How do you even know who I am?”

And then, when we were on Pirates of the Caribbean, I'm sitting there with my cousin, Mike Iwerks and my sister and her husband.. My parents were in front of them. We’re in the back, and there's two strangers behind us in the last row of the boat. And we’re going through it and the couple behind me go, “Oh my God, I remember seeing this in that documentary The Imagineering Story. I love that show.” And then my cousin just hits me and I'm like, “Oh my God, that's awesome.” Good timing to be in that boat I suppose.

That's amazing.

It’s fun to hear the reactions. It’s the thing with everything going into streaming versus theatrical now, not that this was ever going to be theatrical, but filmmakers love to hear response from their work. You're sitting in an editing room for months and months, if not years. And you think you've got a scene that works, you think you’ve got a scene that might make people cry because I cry when I watch it, or make people laugh. So, no. Right. But then when you finally get it in front of the audience, it's nice to get validated or not validated and to learn from it. So I didn't really get that opportunity on this at all, except we had the first two episodes we screened at the studio for the Imagineers and then that was it.

I screened it with friends but never really got that sort of live visceral reaction. And then when we went on Disney+, the social media reaction was exciting – people were Facebook messaging me and saying, “Thank you,” and this and that. And even from people around the world to reach out was fun. I felt really thrilled and honored to be part of the Disney+ launch, to get that kind of attention for the series was really great, after all the hard work that we put into it for so many years.

Actually we did screen it. I was on that last Disney Cruise and for the Panama Canal trip. We were the last boat out at sea and we couldn't go into port because things are shutting down. We were supposed to screen just episode one. And I did like five presentations on the ship and they ended up screening all six episodes because they wanted to fill our time when everybody was on the boat longer. So that gave me an opportunity finally, to watch it with an audience. All of the episodes. And that was fun because it was like diehard Disney fans. They loved it. They were happy. They were thinking me afterwards. Pretty soon I couldn't walk anywhere on the ship without everybody coming up and saying something. If there was a button or a bow at the end of this whole process, it was to be on the last happiest place on earth cruise and watching six episodes of the show. I'm feeling like I've come full circle to show it there and get the feedback that I never had gotten prior.

You’ve accidentally said seven episodes. Do you have any more in you ?

There’s more in me and I hope we can do more. That’s all I can tell you on that one.

People got their ears up recently about a potential spinoff exclusively about Disneyland. Is that something you are working on ?

I had no idea that was even being out there. But no. There's just so many different subjects that we could be doing and there's a lot of topics being discussed at the moment but nothing concrete, nothing solid that I can even announce. We've done so much work on the series, we have seen so much footage that could be used for a lot of different purposes. And so now it's just really like looking at like, “What could we do?” And I'm working on a bunch of other projects too, outside of Disney and developing some narrative work, so just busy during quarantine is all I can say.

The documentary unfolds in a kind of chronological way, but is there any way of adding additional content or interviews into the series as it stands? And is there a subject within the series that you’d like to devote more time to ?

I have interest in a lot of the different subjects that I can totally deep dive in. I'm not saying that they would want to make it or that Disney would do it. Like I have a real interest in animatronics and I would love to do a deep dive on just the evolution of animatronics. But it might just end up becoming a science show. The evolution of different things within the Disney realm is great. And there's characters within the Disney realm that could easily be spinoffs or episodes or partial episodes, like mini-biographies on various people in their backgrounds and how they evolved And some of the challenges they faced on certain things.

The good thing about Disney is that it did record itself quite a bit. It did self-document and not every studio or every company has done that. So it's a real gift for biographers and filmmakers who have their sleeves rolled up into this history like I do. I haven’t spent a lot of time in the archives but knowing the photos and the binders and where things are. I'm certainly no archivist, but we've done enough on the series that we know where to go now, you know who to talk to.

It’s not too much of a guessing game anymore. We know we need to go to this person or this archive. And we also know what this binder kind of holds. That’s cool when you feel like you've gotten to a certain level of institutional knowledge about the company. No matter what I do going forward, I think that history that we've spent on the last seven years roaming around will help.

https://collider.com/the-imagineering-story-director-leslie-iwerks-interview-disney-plus/

The Imagineering Story: A History of Disney's Theme Parks as Told by the Designers Le livre de Leslie Iwerks devrait sortir le 8 novembre 2022 et est disponible en précommande. Les informations sur Amazon indiquent que le livre fera 640 pages.

En voilà une bonne nouvelle, il complètera ma collection

Oui c'est pour bientôt.

Vidéo produite par Iwerks & Co, le studio derrière la série The Imagineering Story (Il Était une Fois les Imagineers, les Visionnaires Disney) sur Disney+, à l'occasion du 70ème anniversaire de Walt Disney Imagineering :

Citation :

For seventy years, Imagineers have blended imagination with cutting-edge technology to create groundbreaking experiences that bring people together from all over the world. Produced by Iwerks & Co, the studio behind The Imagineering Story on Disney+, this video captures meaningful moments and milestones from the last seven decades – and invites you to watch … and listen closely … as we share a glimpse of Walt Disney Imagineering’s legacy.

A huge thank you to all Imagineers, past and present, for your contributions to this incredible legacy. As Walt would say, “we’re just getting started!”