Originally Tigs gave me some titles that didn’t quite hit me, not for lack of effort on his part. Then he gave me “Black Hole Fun.” I wanted to write it really bad but coudln’t concentrate and just kept singing it STP style. So I went back to the bottomelss well of creativity that is Tigs and came back with this. NO PART OF THIS FILM IS BASED ON FACT, I mean there are dates, but I made up the rest.
Marketeers
Movie opens with Mickey, a WWI vet looking for work in the mid 1920s, California. He has a wife and a new born son at home but is struggling to find much except work as a bouncer. He meets a struggling animator one day who we find is Walt Disney.
Walt tells him about the animation business and how he has had some success with his silent features but sound is coming. He hires Mickey to be muscle for him. Mickey puts together a crew and starts strong arming other animators. They get all sorts of illegal backing and such and Disney renames Mortimer Mouse, Mickey as Steamboat Willie is released in 1928. From there they live as kings. Disney gets more and more famous as his cartoons become more popular. Of course other people try to copy his success but luckily Mickey is there to squash the competition. Mickey gets made head of Marketing but the title is mainly to hide the illegal activity.
Mickey kid who is now a pre teen, jokes with Disney about how his cartoons are so short and Disney comes up with doing a full length feature. Mickey has his work cut out for him getting financing and the animators to fall in line to produce what becomes Snow White.
They of course get more and more money but then Pearl Harbor happens. Mickey is of course rich enough to keep his son out of the war but his now teenage son ignores him and enlists. Disney tries to make some propaganda cartoons but his success in waning as the war rages. Mickey gets word that his son has been killed and leaves Disney.
Now in the late 40s Mickey is a angry and bitter man. Disney hasn’t really had the same success since the war began and tracks down Mickey. His wife has left him and he’s squandered all his money on booze. Disney persuades him to help him get back on top. Mickey comes back but is much more violent. Cinderella is made in 1950 and is a huge hit. Disney keeps hitting big with Alice in Wonderland and Peter Pan but the blood is piling at Mickey’s feet.
Disney starts getting his own ABC show in 1954 to promote the soon to be opening Disneyland. There is a lot of attention on them and Walt starts worrying about Mickey. Mickey is drunk most of the time and hurting too many people. In the days proceeding the opening of the park in 1955 Walt sends others after Mickey to take him out. There is a huge fight in the unfinished park. Before Mickey is capture. Disney tries to get mickey to just go quietly into hiding and live out his life. Mickey flips and is clearly haunted by all the harm he’s cost and the death of his son. Walt kills Mickey and they bury him in the concrete at teh opening of the park, the camera fades to Walt standing over the spot greeting families as they enter Disneyland.