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The Walt Disney Co. is expected to begin layoffs in the coming weeks, with the cuts centering on the company's movie studio, a source with knowledge of the matter has confirmed. The cuts, first reported by trade publication Variety, are said to be the result of an internal corporate review. Layoffs are expected to affect the studio's marketing and home entertainment divisions, and possibly other areas, according to a source. Variety reported that the cuts would also be made in the production department. It's not clear how many reductions there will be at the company. Reuters reported Thursday that cuts...

If you have never heeded my posts, I ask you to heed this one.... Years ago Walt Disney produced this great movie explaining liberty, and in the newly released DVD it includes special segments where uncle Walt himself explained liberty, what it means, why it is important and why it must be defended.... Not only you, but your children will understand it's lessons, and if many of us will die fighting this criminal bama, then it will fall to our children to understand why he is wrong and we and the founders where right.... Take this gift from Walt Disney...

The absolutely disastrous past week America had prompts the pick for this week's feature. For a little levity(in both senses of the word), the film that introduced flubber(flying rubber) to our popular culture, the Disney sci-fi comedy classic, "The Absent-Minded Professor". One of the best of the Disney studio's live action films made when Walt was still with us. Absolutely the best part of the film can be found at 1:32:16-1:33:06, especially 1:32:44 to 1:32:55.

Who Owns The Media? The 6 Monolithic Corporations That Control Almost Everything We Watch, Hear And Read Back in 1983, approximately 0 corporations controlled the vast majority of all news media in the United States. Today, ownership of the news media has been concentrated in the hands of just six incredibly powerful media corporations. These corporate behemoths control most of what we watch, hear and read every single day. They own television networks, cable channels, movie studios, newspapers, magazines, publishing houses, music labels and even many of our favorite websites. Sadly, most Americans don't even stop to think about who...

Back in the day, Mickey Mouse attempted suicide and fought opium smugglers Intrepid readers will remember that one time Mickey Mouse and Goofy espoused the salubrious effects of amphetamine-laced soft drinks. The truth is, that helium-voiced cartoon rodent weathered many a dubiously family-friendly moment during his early years. Let's look at those occasions Mickey tried to kill himself and extolled the virtues of gigolos. Perhaps the most bizarrely bleak Mickey adventure was the story arc that ran from October 8 to October 20, 1930. According to cartoonist Floyd Gottfredson, Walt Disney was inspired by the 1920 Harold Lloyd comedy Haunted...

EXCLUSIVE: I’ve learned that the Motion Picture Association Of America representing the Hollywood movie studios will be co-hosting a tribute to Ronald Reagan’s film career on November 14th in Washington DC. The other host will be the Ronald Reagan Centennial Celebration, which is the year-long commemoration of Reagan’s 100th birthday in 2011. All the movie studios are obtaining old footage of Reagan’s 53-movie legacy from 1937 to 1965 and are putting together around 5 cinematic profiles of the former Screen Actors Guild president for the bipartisan event. But I suspect the real reason behind this Reagan tribute is to remind...

The soundtrack to the 1979 Disney space epic has been remastered, expanded, and now available from Disney and Intrada records. The music was composed by the late English movie music master John Barry, who is widely known for his work on the James Bond films between 1963 and 1987. Here is a suite of the OST on youtube

As the interest in counter-terrorism soars, the Walt Disney Company is attempting to trademark the name Navy “Seal Team 6,” the unit responsible for taking down Osama Bin Laden. Counter-terrorism is becoming a big market since the death of Osama Bin Laden and it appears the Walt Disney Company is ready to cash in. Disney is currently trying to trademark the name Navy “Seal Team 6,” the unit responsible for killing Bin Laden. On May 3, just one day after the news was out about the death of Bin Laden, Disney applied to trademark the name “Seal Team 6.” The...

Ban Ki-moon, the normally buttoned-up Secretary General of the United Nations, swept into Los Angeles during Oscar week playing the role of Hollywood pitchman. His message: Make global warming a Hot issue. "I need your support," he told entertainment industry insiders during a daylong forum Tuesday that focused on recent heat waves, floods, fires and drought, which scientists link to human-induced climate change. ....about 400 writers, directors, producers, agents and network executives attended the outreach events. ....To coordinate with Hollywood, the U.N. has set up an office, the "Creative Community Outreach Initiative" in partnership with the United Nations Foundation, funded...

LOS ANGELES (AP) ― Roy E. Disney, the nephew of Walt Disney whose powerful behind-the-scenes influence on The Walt Disney Co. led to the departure of former chief Michael Eisner, has died. He was 79. The company announced that Disney died Wednesday in Newport Beach, Calif., after a yearlong bout with stomach cancer. Company president and chief executive Bob Iger said Disney was much more than a valued 56-year company veteran. "Roy's commitment to the art of animation was unparalleled and will always remain his personal legacy and one of his greatest contributions to Disney's past, present and future," Iger...

Insanity: electing the same kind of politician and expecting a different result. http://www.wiseandfrugalgovernment.blogspot.com/ "Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results." Albert Einstein Albert Einstein said it. In California, we're living it. The map of California's district ten is an amoeba-shaped tribute to gerrymandering. Proof that when it is in their interest our legislators can put their heads down and color outside the lines. And in district ten they created a masterpiece, invading four separate counties: Alameda, Contra Costa, Solano and Sacramento to gather a voter population with an 18% advantage of registered Democrats to...

WALT Disney's first black princess is steeped in controversy, with the studio changing her name and job, but still facing claims of racial insensitivity. Following claims of racial insensitivity, the studio -- known for its wholesome and predominantly white family values -- has made several changes to its first African-American princess, Tiana. Voiced by Anika Noni Rose, Tiana is the star of a new animated film to be released this Christmas, titled The Princess and the Frog. Tiana's mother will be played by talk-show host Oprah Winfrey. Disney has changed the profession of the princess to an aspiring restaurant entrepreneur,...

Remember to good ole days when you could enjoy a movie without "reading between the lines" or having to worry about political overtones? My concerns regarding this topic are not so much the content in Disney’s newest animated feature “Bolt”, but rather the reaction of the critics. Certainly we all have our own taste, opinions and (with a grateful nod to our founding fathers) the freedom to express. It seems I wonder more often these days if the author’s work is objective truth or a piece written to influence opinion, perspective and power. In the movie “Bolt”, both the left...

" ... and then there were none." For over three decades now, animation fans have been quietly counting down. As first John Lounsbury, and then Les Clark slipped away. Followed by Woolie Reitherman, Milt Kahl and Eric Larsen. Then Marc Davis, Ward Kimball and Frank Thomas. And today word came out of Sequim, WA. that Ollie Johnston -- the last of Walt's Nine Old Men -- had passed away...

Christians laud Walt, criticize Disney Co. Religious filmmakers study the innovator's virtues but say his firm forgot family values. From Reuters October 23, 2007 Hundreds of Christian filmmakers gathered in Texas on Monday to study the work of Walt Disney and discuss their belief that his corporate heirs at Walt Disney Co. have strayed from his family-friendly legacy. The Christian Filmmakers Academy, which trains aspiring filmmakers and promotes films with "biblical values," contends that Disney Co. has become "an engine of cultural decline after Walt's death" that exercises an alarmingly vast global influence. The two-day analysis of Disney, the man...

ORLANDO, Fla. - Walt Disney Co.'s 1946 film "Song of the South" was historic. It was Disney's first big live-action picture and produced one of the company's most famous songs _ the Oscar-winning "Zip-a-Dee-Doo-Dah." It also carries the story line of the Splash Mountain rides at its theme parks. But the movie remains hidden in the Disney archives _ never released on video in the United States and criticized as racist for its depiction of Southern plantation blacks. The film's 60th anniversary passed last year without a whisper of official rerelease, which is unusual for Disney, but President and CEO...

'Song of the South' pits art vs. cultural sensitivity http://www.charleston.net/assets/webPages/departmental/news/Stories.aspx?section=localnews&tableId=136791&pubDate=3/31/2007 http://tinyurl.com/2w5vty BY RON MENCHACA The Post and Courier Talk of a possible re-release of the 1946 Walt Disney film 'Song of the South,' which is criticized for its plantation-era depictions of blacks as the happy servants of wealthy whites, already is sparking a debate. The film was reshown in theaters as recently as 1986, but it never was released on video in the United States. Its cultural and cinematic significance have been the subject of scholarly debate for decades, and bootlegged copies of the film are popular on the black...

Walt Disney teaches us how to use the Boys AT rifle, in three parts. Part 1http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rODm7HF5lFU Part 2http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z9lIO8AL3ds Part 3http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dsifcQnSv94 And also, Männer gegen Panzer, auf Deutsch: Part 1http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=STQHH_hJlhM Part 2http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bb7SixS9PAw

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - The Walt Disney Co. on Thursday said it took "appropriate action" against employees at its Paris theme park who were caught simulating sex while dressed as Disney characters in a digital video that has received wide attention on the Internet. Disney would not say whether it had dismissed any of the costumed employees featured in the grainy video, which appears to have been shot with a hidden camera at a backstage dressing room at Disneyland Resort Paris. "The behaviour shown on the video is unacceptable and inexcusable," Disney said in a statement. "The video was taken...

With virtually no questions asked, an undercover ABC News team was able to purchase a half ton of one of the world's most dangerous bomb-making materials and move it into a storage shed only a few miles from the White House and the U.S. Capitol. Despite its use in the bombing of the Oklahoma City Federal Building, there are still no federal laws restricting the purchase of ammonium nitrate, a chemical fertilizer, widely sold at farm supply stores. The ABC News undercover team made the purchases, in cash, at farm supply stores in North Carolina and Virginia and were never...

An attorney was arrested Thursday on charges of embezzling $150,000 from the trust fund he set up for an elderly woman who once worked as Walt Disney's secretary. Prosecutors say Salvatore Patrick Osio, 68, set up the trust for Alicia Waters and her husband in 2002 and took $150,000 out of it for his personal use. Osio was jailed on $150,000 bail after being arrested at his Palos Verdes home. He was scheduled to be arraigned Friday on one count each of grand theft, theft from an elder, forgery and perjury. It couldn't be immediately determined if Osio has hired...

“PAIN is temporary, film is forever.” That hopeful thought, which found its way into the original script of Peter Jackson's recent re-make of “King Kong”, might be seized upon by today's beleaguered entertainment industry. Media companies are suffering intense pain—and it is starting to seem worryingly permanent. In America shares of “old” media firms such as News Corporation, Comcast and other giants of television, film, radio and print, have fallen 25% behind the S&P 500 in the past two years, despite some heroic financial results. Meanwhile, the market value of Google, which made its debut on the stockmarket in 2004,...

Excerpt - LONDON (Dow Jones) -- Walt Disney Co. is reported to be in serious talks to buy Pixar Animation Studios for slightly more than the $6.7 billion that Pixar already is worth. The deal between Walt Disney Co.(DIS)and Pixar Animation Studios(PIXR)would leave Pixar CEO Steve Jobs as Disney's largest individual stockholder, The Wall Street Journal reported Thursday, citing anonymous sources. Jobs also is head of Apple Computer(AAPL). The report said Disney is negotiating to pay a "nominal" premium to Pixar's current $6.7 billion market capitalization. Both sides accept that Pixar's stock price has a takeover premium built in after...

A contestant on ABC's Wife Swap is suing the Walt Disney Company and the show's producer, RDF Media, for $10,225,000 after the person involved in the swap turned out to be a gay man. Jeffrey D. Bedford of Haileyville, OK told the Muskogee Phoenix that he could not comment on the case but provided a copy of his lawsuit in which he claims that the producers told him that if he did not proceed with the filming, they would not tell him his wife's whereabouts and would not pay for her return home; that the gay man invited members of...

LOS ANGELES -- At some of the largest and most influential Christian churches in the country, the lights dim and congregants watch a sneak preview of a new movie -- about golf. The Walt Disney Co. is marketing "The Greatest Game Ever Played" to faith-based groups even though the film, about Francis Ouimet's improbable win in the 1913 U.S. Open, isn't overtly religious.

Mel Gibson had Hollywood insiders scratching their heads when he announced that his film "The Passion of the Christ" would have dialogue only in Latin and Aramaic. Now comes word that the next movie Gibson will direct, "Apocalypto," will be filmed in an obscure Mayan dialect. The movie will star a neophyte cast indigenous to the region of Mexico where Gibson will shoot the film, according to the trade paper Variety, which says it will "presumably" have the "same kind of subtitles Gibson reluctantly added to 'The Passion of the Christ.'" Earlier reports claimed the movie would be set 3,000...

Title: Apocalypto. Log Line: Set in an ancient civilization 3,000 years ago. Writer: Mel Gibson. Agent: Ed Limato of ICM and atty. Tom Hansen of Hansen, Jacobson, Teller, Hoberman, Newman, Warren & Richman, LLP. Buyer: Walt Disney Pictures and Icon. Genre: Action. Logged: 7/22/05. More: Icon's Mel Gibson and Bruce Davey will produce. Gibson will also direct. Icon fully financed this script and will also handle all foreign territories, with Disney handling domestic.

Walt Disney yelled at me. It happened at Disneyland, the happiest place on Earth, at least when you're not getting yelled at by the fellow who built it. Actually, Disney yelled at me a couple of times, and he frowned at me once. In the great man's defense, I had it coming, although kindly Uncle Walt turned out to be as avuncular as Grumpy the dwarf. As a kid growing up in L.A., I forked over much of my allowance and my childhood to the Disney cartel. Our family kept Walt's place solvent in its early years. We were there...

Walt Disney is to promote its $100 million adaptation of C S Lewis's The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe as a "Passion of the Christ for kids" in an attempt to secure worldwide Christian support for the film. Disney executives have organised private meetings with several church groups in America to emphasise the themes of Christian redemption and sacrifice contained in the film, which will open in December with an all-star cast. They have also hired a public relations company to market the film directly to Christian groups to ensure that the powerful evangelical movement, which is particularly strong...

Walt Disney Co.'s board is expected to name President Robert Iger as its new chief executive shortly, according to a person familiar with the situation. Mr. Iger would succeed longtime chief Michael Eisner, who has announced plans to step down. Disney's board met late Saturday to discuss the CEO search and could announce Mr. Iger's promotion as early as Sunday. The leading external contender in the succession battle, EBay Inc. Chief Executive Meg Whitman, withdrew her candidacy for the position Friday. Having been stripped of his chairman title after a shareholder revolt last year, Mr. Eisner announced plans to depart...

Walt Disney is to promote its $100 million adaptation of C S Lewis's The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe as a "Passion of the Christ for kids" in an attempt to secure worldwide Christian support for the film. Disney executives have organised private meetings with several church groups in America to emphasise the themes of Christian redemption and sacrifice contained in the film, which will open in December with an all-star cast. They have also hired a public relations company to market the film directly to Christian groups to ensure that the powerful evangelical movement, which is particularly strong...

The Aviator on National Review Online E-mail Author Send to a Friend <% printurl = Request.ServerVariables("URL")%> Print Version February 25, 2005, 3:14 p.m. Howard Hughes's Last HurrahWhat The Aviator misses. by John Meroney Fifty-three years ago this week, Howard Hughes found himself locked in a battle against powerful political forces he believed were bent on undermining the free-market system. The billionaire industrialist, airplane manufacturer, and filmmaker became so passionate about the fight that he summoned all his emotional and physical strength to overcome a crippling fear of the public so he could make his case for what he saw as...

In a new video to be distributed to 61,000 schools across the nation, homosexual activists are using popular children's TV characters such as SpongeBob SquarePants and Barney the dinosaur to surreptitiously indoctrinate young children into their lifestyle, a pro-family activist group charges. SpongeBob Squarepants is one of the popular children's TV characters appearing in a new 'tolerance' video. Based on the 1970s hit song "We Are Family," the video will be distributed to public and private elementary schools nationwide March 11, along with lesson plans for teachers, points out the American Family Association. The distribution, sponsored by FedEx, will coincide...

Year In Review: Entertainment Industry (Originally published on May 25, 2004) A Christian activist group has developed a three-point strategy to warn unsuspecting families coming to Orlando, Florida, about the very family-unfriendly homosexual pride festival known as "Gay Days at Walt Disney World." The Christian Action Network (CAN) is engaging in an all-out effort to inform families, school groups, and others of what they can expect from the homosexual event long before they enter the so-called Magic Kingdom. The group plans to use literature, road signs, and even a mobile advertisement to get the word out about the offensive and...

Mommy, have I done something wrong?            Andrea Yates was the mother of five beautiful, innocent children. She drowned them all in a bathtub and we are supposed to feel sorry for her. When her seven year old son saw his baby sister lying lifeless on the floor of the bathroom, he asked if she was all right, to which Andrea answered, “get in the tub”, Noah ran, but not far enough or fast enough. The last words he spoke just before his mother drowned him in the bathtub was: “Mother, have I done something wrong?”          I say we are...

Is anyone else trying to watch the Christmas programming on "ABC Family"? There are several good programs on, many of them are the old Clay-mation Christmas shows that I remember from my childhood. And before I get bashed for not knowing that Jesus is the reason for the season, I do. But I also know that these are good, wholesome classics and are a Christmas tradition in my family. The problem is: nearly every commercial break contains a plug for the "ABC Family" show "Degrassi High", which appears to be aimed at teenagers and has at least one positively-portrayed gay...

The nation's chief media regulator expressed disappointment Wednesday over the steamy locker room opening to ABC's "Monday Night Football" broadcast. AP Photo "I wonder if Walt Disney would be proud," said Michael Powell, chairman of the Federal Communications Commission (news - web sites). ABC is owned by The Walt Disney Co. The opening, which has generated complaints to ABC and the FCC (news - web sites), featured actress Nicollette Sheridan in the locker room, supposedly dressed only in a white towel. She drops the towel and jumps into the arms of Philadelphia Eagles star Terrell Owens. Sheridan was shown only...

In a deal it hopes will produce a trove of new properties to exploit across various media, Walt Disney Co. has bought the assets of CrossGen Entertainment, a comic book publisher whose fantasy and sci-fi titles include "Abadazad," "Mystic" and "Route 666." Terms were not disclosed. The acquisition of the more than two dozen titles comes as Disney is set to launch a TV series in the United States based on "W.I.T.C.H.," a comic magazine for tween girls that debuted in 2001 in Italy. Disney says "W.I.T.C.H." is now the fourth-largest magazine in the world in terms of international editions....

...[T]he TV networks... say they have revamped the way they collect and analyze polling data, using more sophisticated equipment and better communications. To tone down their competitive instincts in "calling" states for either candidate, some are blocking their news desks from watching rivals' shows. All the networks are also striving to get their respective "decision desks" -- the units that make the calls -- to work more closely with the producers and reporters.... CBS News said the computers VNS used weren't sophisticated enough to compare voting data with historical information and were incapable of raising red flags where they were...

Walt Disney, which refused to distribute Michael Moore's controversial Fahrenheit 9/11, is using the Fourth of July holiday to launch a feelgood feature film about the American people. Borrowing a tactic from the grassroots campaign that made Mel Gibson's The Passion of the Christ a surprise hit, the media giant has used early screenings for select groups and is encouraging people to "spread the word" about the patriotic film, with invitations, posters, and guidelines for group outings on its website. America's Heart & Soul, which opens today on 100 screens across the US, offers a flag-draped look at the country....

On the June 2 NBC Nightly News, Brokaw announced: "An award- winning film about President Bush and his team, by documentarian and liberal activist Michael Moore, will show up in American theaters after all. The Walt Disney Company at first refused to release the film for political reasons, so a separate partnership was formed headed by the Weinstein brothers of Miramax Films. They began publicizing the film, Fahrenheit 9/11, today with selected clips." NBC viewers were then treated to film excerpts with a fast- paced rock musical background. Bush in black tie at a podium at a dinner: "This is...

(AgapePress) - A Christian activist group has developed a three-point strategy to warn unsuspecting families coming to Orlando, Florida, about the very family-unfriendly homosexual pride festival known as "Gay Days at Walt Disney World." The Christian Action Network (CAN) is engaging in an all-out effort to inform families, school groups, and others of what they can expect from the homosexual event long before they enter the so-called Magic Kingdom. The group plans to use literature, road signs, and even a mobile advertisement to get the word out about the offensive and often X-rated goings on at the Walt Disney World...

The long-dreaded 2004 Olympics in Greece will be the ultimate crossroads for sports and politics in this new and vicious century. The recent photos of cruelty at the Abu Grahaib all-american prison in Baghdad have taken care of that. Yes, sir. We have taken the bull by the horns on this one, sports fans. These horrifying digital snapshots of the American dream in action on foreign soil are worse than anything even I could have expected. I have been in this business a long time and I have seen many staggering things, but this one is over the line. Now...

NewsBlues.com is reporting [no free link] that Sinclair Broadcast Group has ordered its ABC-affiliated stations not to carry tomorrow's "Nightline," which will air the names and photos of soldiers who have been killed in combat in Iraq. Sinclair General Counsel Barry Faber tells the site: "We find it to be contrary to the public interest." The boycott will affect eight ABC-affiliated Sinclair stations.

I saw a commercial for next Friday's edition of 20/20 last night. The ad consisted of something that just left me stunned and unable to form any words, save one. The ad is plugging a story helmed by Barbara Walters. This is the gist of it: Five couples are vying to adopt a single baby. Of course, only one will be able to, and four others will be heartbroken. Who will the mother choose? This was followed by a shot of the four couples standing behind Walters and the mother, holding her baby, and Walters saying something along the lines...

A Los Angeles judge on Monday delivered the first good news Walt Disney has had this year when he dismissed a 13-year-old multimillion-dollar lawsuit over its rights to exploit Winnie the Pooh and his 100-Aker Wood associates. "It is all over," said Disney lawyer Daniel Petrocelli. The ruling appeared to end a colourful struggle over a group of Disney's most profitable film, merchandise and theme park characters that had stirred allegations of skullduggery on both sides. In a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission, the entertainment group warned that losing the case would have cost it hundreds of millions...

<p>How to even begin criticizing the idea behind The Swan, Fox's new reality show that finds unhappy women and offers them a combo of plastic surgery, life coaching, therapy and a beauty-pageant finale, as they compete for our entertainment all the while?</p>

Network has produced another show loaded with liberal theologians and permeated with a sense of unbelief. Peter Jennings is at it again. The "ABC World News Tonight" anchor is the driving force behind Monday night's three-hour network special "Jesus and Paul -- the Word and the Witness." Like "The Search for Jesus," a previous ABC special Jennings shepherded, the new show is filled with "expert" analysis from liberal theologians and carries the underlying worldview of unbelief in Scripture and Jesus' divinity. "Jennings repeatedly refers to 'the Jesus movement' as if it were just another political party or faction," Focus on...