Mulan, too bad that Osmond song is in the middle but fuck it, beautiful movie.
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I thought I was the only one. 
I remember the first time I saw the trailer for Mulan on ABC. Within a couple quick minutes it became one of my most anticipated movies of all time. When I saw the movie, I liked it, but it didn't live up to my expectations. Watching it again as an older person was quite painful.
Mulan demonstrates Disney's biggest problem in recent years: the dumbing down of their content. Every Disney cartoon contains a mixture of dramatic elements with comedic breaks; this formula has worked very well at maintaining adult interest in the cartoons while entertaining small chidlren at the same time, a feat many animators today still cannot get right. So in Bambi, for instance, many remember the various bunnies and the laughs, but the death of Bambi's mother is carved in our minds. The Lion King comes on as a giant musical extravaganza, but eventually the movie's tone takes a drastic turn with the death of Muphasa. This pattern is quite clear, and it expands all the way to Walt Disney's original work, such as
Pinocchio .
Mulan, like the rest of Disney's more recent animated features, suffered from breaking this formula. The forced laughs increased, the dumbed down comedic tricks piled up, and in the end the movies suffered. Mulan starts off in a very serious manner, and it's rather violent for a Disney movie. But I think most people will tell you that Eddie Murphy ruined the movie in so many ways. Sure Robin Williams was quite over the top in Alladin, but the Genie was actually funny and rather iconic; I don't even remember the dragon's name in Mulan, and I wish I could forget Murphy's preformance.
The Hunchback of Notre Dame, on the other hand, faltered with the theory from the opposite point. At the time, it was quite controversial, and I have always felt it was ahead of its time; today, a movie featuring an abusive
priest as an antagonist wouldn't be a problem. Yet in the 90's, this caused a stir. From the very
beginning of the movie, it became evident that it would break the traditional Disney mold. Although the movie featured the stereotypical Disney comedic characters, the majority of the movie was quite serious. My mind is rather muddied right now, but from memory I'm pretty sure this was the first Disney movie to feature human blood (Phoebus gets shot with an arrow, and it actually goes throw his back). It also featured a murder less than four minutes into the movie, as well as the most
...dramatic (and one of the best) songs in Disney history.
The movie was popular among many older viewers, but smaller kids were confused. My 5 year old cousin kept begging me to turn off the movie at various parts (many metioned above). Personally, I love much of the movie.
