The Typography of Disney Animation Logos #6: The Early-to-Mid ’50s

After years of anthology features and saving on money, Walt Disney finally took the big gamble… A new, single-story, feature-length animated film. It was released at the beginning of the new decade, the 1950s…

1. Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs and Pinocchio
2. Fantasia
3. Dumbo and Bambi
4. Saludos Amigos, The Three Caballeros, and Make Mine Music
5. Fun & Fancy Free, Melody Time, and The Adventures of the Ichabod and Mr. Toad
6. From Cinderella to Lady and the Tramp
   
7. Sleeping Beauty, 101 Dalmatians, and The Sword in the Stone
8. The Jungle Book, The Aristocats, and Robin Hood
9. The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh, The Rescuers, and The Fox and the Hound
10. The Black Cauldron, The Great Mouse Detective, and Oliver & Company
11. From The Little Mermaid to Aladdin
12. From The Lion King to Hercules
13. From Tarzan to Atlantis: The Lost Empire
14. From Lilo & Stitch to Chicken Little
15. From Meet The Robinsons to Now…

CINDERELLA

The Film Proper…

Cinderella was essentially Snow White II. Instead of continuing the adventures of Snow White and her seven dwarf friends, Walt Disney turned to a story that ended with its heroine becoming a princess, a heroine who suffered from similar things Snow White had dealt with. Cinderella is a tale that’s centuries older the Snow White’s, but most people associate Cinderella with classic fairy tales. There’s a Grimm’s version, but Disney’s film – as you can see from the title card – takes more from the Charles Perrault version of the story. As such, we see a return of the fairy tale-like font. A sort of post-medieval look, but still an old world-like type. It suits the credits more so than a poster, which brings us to…

The First Three Releases…

The original release poster went for a more grand look for the font.

I think this one blends quite nicely with the poster art and the film’s art direction, which was mostly in the style of artist Mary Blair, who had a major influence over the look of several post-war Disney animated features and shorts.

The 1957 re-release used the same font, but straightened it out…

The 1965 re-release poster added a little dimension to the letters, putting in some nice shadows…

Less details on the letters themselves, though. The poster does give you that mid-60s big event musical feel, too. Cinderella was already one of Disney’s most popular films, a smash hit on its 1950 debut, so I can only assume this particular re-release struck big.

Future Re-releases

I am unable to find the 1973 re-release poster for Cinderella…

So here’s a UK one from probably the late 70s/early 80s, that uses a logo for the film that wasn’t used in America.

I get more of a medieval epic fantasy tone out of this type than the others…

Moving on.

I haven’t found a trailer for the 1973 American re-release, either. One floating around YouTube is actually the trailer for the 1981 re-release, and you can tell because the announcer says it’s a Christmas release. Cinderella‘s 1973 re-release occurred in March, while the 1981 re-release occurred in December…

Speaking of which, an all-new logo for the film was introduced in 1981, one that paved the way for the logos you would see on video releases…

Eschewing the fairy tale look and the more grand-event type look, this font still matches because you kind of associate the ballroom, the castle, and Cinderella’s ballgown with elegance. I think the cursive fits in with that…

The Last Re-release and First Home Video Release…

For the final theatrical re-release in 1987, that was pushed further, and simplified… Yet it still looked very nice…

This one, for me, works perfectly in terms of the modern logos… Sometimes, simplifying the type really makes a difference. Here, the almost quasi-cursive look keeps that elegant feel the 1981 logo has, while it doesn’t quite ring fairy tale – you still get the glittery dress princess aspect out of it. Lastly, I really like how big the “C” is… Just really good contrast right there, and the logo stays symmetric.

Of course, the video release followed this final theatrical release in the fall of 1988. The video release uses the same logo, but modifies it a bit. It’s a little stretched out now, and it’s not as detailed. It still looks very nice nonetheless…

My copy!

Oh, and look… A home video cover where she’s NOT in the ballroom gown! What a surprise.

Future Video Releases…

The 1995 video release introduced a more questionable font for the film’s logo, though it is housed nicely within a shape… That was common for the Walt Disney Masterpiece Collection.

There’s good ideas in this one, but I feel that the all-caps doesn’t entirely work. Definitely a 180 from a decades-worth of logo designs, but something about this one isn’t a home run. When taken away from the plaque it’s on top of, it looks a little off… Though the type does feel like something you’d see on an old book cover or spine.

The 2005 Platinum Edition DVD did away with this altogether and brought back the 1987/1988 font, and gave it a modern, glossy tweak… But I prefer the original look from the 1987 poster, personally. The rest of the name also juts out a little more, which wasn’t a necessary change to me.

The 2012 Diamond Edition Blu-ray contains the weakest logo for the film…

While it tries to emulate earlier ones by having the “i” within a big “C,” it’s bland. A very typical-looking serif font that just doesn’t match the film’s aesthetic. Cinderella‘s Diamond Edition is also one of those releases that oddly has the title in vertical form… Like, why? I didn’t really work for the Diamond Edition cover of Bambi, or the Signature Edition of Snow White…

The upcoming Signature Edition has, to me, a better font, even if it’s still kind of basic. I kind of like what they do with the “C”, but otherwise kind of unremarkable. It looks nicer on the Steelbook.

For the most part, Cinderella‘s poster campaigns and video covers never really deviated from a base design. While I will give the 1995 logo props for doing so, the strongest for me is either the original poster logo or the late 80s one.

ALICE IN WONDERLAND

The Film Proper…

Much simpler than what you’d expect, but something about the letter placement sets the tone of the film quite nicely, and gives it a classic literature feel… But with a little twist, lining up nicely with the topsy-turvy nature of the book. Also amusing is the misspelling of Lewis Carroll’s last name…

The Theatrical Releases…

The font for the original release poster isn’t dissimilar. Bolder, a little less disjointed but still fun. The thickness of the text really makes it stand out.

Alice in Wonderland was never re-released theatrically during Walt Disney’s lifetime. The film failed to recoup its costs at the box office, and was given scathing reviews on both sides of the Atlantic. Walt seemed to have felt some real shame, as he didn’t hesitate to point out what he felt didn’t work. Perhaps him choosing to show it on television (albeit in truncated form, much like Dumbo) instead of putting it back in theaters indicates that he really wasn’t fond of how this one turned out, but you couldn’t see the psychedelic fun on the big screen in its entirety until… 1974. Disney belatedly responded to the film’s popularity amongst the very audiences that propelled Fantasia‘s late ’60s re-release: College students and the hippie crowd.

Alice in Wonderland‘s 1974 re-release poster looks more like it’s from five years earlier, but it’s still a psychedelic beauty. The font used for the title is groovy and fun, fitting the trippy, pop art-esque illustration. Lots of fun flourishes on the letterforms, like the wavy middle of the “A”s and the “E”s. Disney apparently re-used the poster for the 1981 re-release as well, and the following video release…

Home Video…

Like Dumbo, Alice in Wonderland‘s initial video release in fall 1981 was for rental only. A sale only version went to market a year later, both sported the same font used for the poster. My copy below…

For the 1986 release, Disney went back to the original theatrical poster font. Of course, my copy is pictured below as well. This is the original version of the 1986 release, which came in a cardboard slipcover case as opposed to a clamshell.

Disney used this cover all the way up until 1994, when the title was inducted into the Walt Disney Masterpiece Collection.s

This font doesn’t match up as much as the previous ones, but it is serviceable and appealing. Perhaps a little too cursive? The second release in the Masterpiece Collection, which came out in 1999, tried to find a middle ground. A year later, this exact same cover was used for the Gold Classic Collection edition. That one is pictured below:

I think the little rhombus-diamond in the “A” is a very nice tough, and I guess the letterforms are supposed to suggest a more royal, regal theme? I guess to sync up with the Queen of Hearts and her kingdom? After all, the trial scene is very much the subject of the ’99 and ’00 cover, which is a little unusual considering that Disney often goes right for the Mad Tea Party sequence when it comes to covers for this movie. A nice change of pace, and I do like the underline as well!

The 2004 DVD cover, for me, is a step down. The logo for the film looks like a basic shiny gold 3D font, but warped a little bit, just to suggest the psychedelic nature of the movie.

The 2010 “Un-Anniversary” DVD, released to promote the Tim Burton adaptation, fares better. The same logo is used for the 2011 60th Anniversary Blu-ray edition:

Same glossiness, but the letterforms on “Alice” are more like the opening credits. They go back to the cursive for “Wonderland”, for whatever reason. I guess from 1994 onward, “Wonderland” had to be in cursive? I couldn’t tell you why. Still, it’s a nice cover, the logo’s decent, so it’s a step up from the 2004 DVD.

Years later, the Alice Blu-ray got a second cover, which was a Disney Movie Club exclusive to my understanding.

I would assume this edition was put out to promote the sequel to the Tim Burton Alice movie, but a second Blu-ray cover for Dumbo came out the same time, so… Maybe both? Twisty letterforms all around… I’m mixed on this. It’s not bad on the eyes, but compared to many of the other logos? I think it’s just kind of there.

PETER PAN

The Film Proper…

One of the few logos for Peter Pan that actually integrates the hat feather into the typography, this one’s a basic old world type that fits nicely with the timeless adventure theme of the movie.

The Theatrical Releases…

The original release one-sheet’s type, also used for the film’s 1958, 1969, and 1976 re-releases, by contrast is a lot simpler…

I’d say this one is very early ’50s in its design, and not just the typography, but it has all the loveliness of a Disneyland poster, the park of the same name having opened two years later. It’s no wonder Disney used almost the exact same poster for the late ’50s re-release. Strange that Disney didn’t make a new, more contemporary one for the 1969 and 1976 re-releases. I guess because Peter Pan was such a big hit right off the bat, they didn’t need to? Even then, other Disney super-hits regularly got new posters over time…

Finally, in 1982, Disney made an all-new poster and an all-new font for the film… But they still used that SAME artwork of Peter himself!

This is very nice, and a precedent to the type used on many of the film’s home video releases. Like the title card for the movie, this font suggests classic adventure, and again… I look at Peter Pan, aesthetically, as an old-school kind of fun adventure movie. It fits right in with Disney’s vision in the mid 1950s, if other aspects of the film arguably may not.

The 1989 re-release introduces the font we’d see on a majority of the home video releases. While the glossy green’s a bit off here, the letterforms are big, bold, and very nice to look at. Like the 1982 poster type, it suits the film.

Home Video…

Peter Pan‘s 1990 video release (my copy of which is in the pic below, to the left) used the same font, but did away with the gradient. The 1998 release did the same, as well as the 2002 release.

For the 2007 Platinum Edition, we got something of an all-caps variation of what was working before… No arching on the logo, though.

The Diamond Edition Blu-ray cover, from 2013, downplayed the flair a bit… But the 2018 Signature Edition Blu-ray brought it back.

It’s fascinating that none of the North American posters or video covers for Peter Pan ever utilized either the typography used in the film or even the feather flourish to the “t” in “Peter”… I will say though, at least the Signature Edition didn’t go the route of the early SE covers, like Snow White, Pinocchio, and Bambi. Good to see Disney dropping the rather barebones designs they were using beforehand.

Lastly…

LADY AND THE TRAMP

The Film Proper…

In case you were wondering… We’ve gone widescreen here! Lady and the Tramp was the first feature-length Disney animated film to be shot in CinemaScope, and also the first to be distributed by Walt and Roy O. Disney’s self-distribution company, Buena Vista. The type here aligns with the film’s turn of the century American setting, even resembling the architecture of Lady’s neighborhood somewhat.

The Theatrical Releases…

The first release poster from 1955 nicely complements the type used in the opening credits. Much like Peter Pan, Disney used the base design for the first two re-releases of the film. However, for the latter of the two – from 1971 – they changed the font to something more bubbly and Winnie the Pooh-esque, though the checkering at least makes it distinctive. The 1962 poster swapped the bright blue for red, and did away with the rhombus flourishes in the letterforms.

For the 1980 re-release, a new artwork and logo were introduced, one that laid the groundwork for all future releases of this movie… For it featured, front and center, the iconic ‘Bella Notte’ sequence.

The font is very late 70s/early 80s, but it actually works here. The 1986 re-release poster went for something a little simpler, a lot old-fashioned… A logo Disney would use from here on out on many releases…

Home Video…

The home video cover for the 1987 release is almost exactly the same as the one-sheet from the ’86 re-release. The font was re-used for the 1998 video release.

The 2006 Platinum Edition DVD introduced a simple logo, but one that didn’t make Lady’s name cursive. This is what I think makes it a little more plain and basic, but it is at least nice on the eyes. A very similar font was used for the 2012 Diamond Edition Blu-ray.

The 2018 Signature Edition, however, went super-basic much like its predecessors. Not my thing, as I’ve said before.

So only the original release poster and the 1962 re-release were close to what we saw in the film itself, while some of the releases did their own thing with the type quite successfully. Some of them, not so much to these eyes. Like many a pre-Renaissance Disney animated classics, these films’ logos have changed a lot over time and it remains fascinating to see how something as simple as the presentation of the film’s title can be pretty varied and maybe even a little complex…