in disney’s 1998 MULAN we had a song A GIRL WORTH FIGHTING FOR before the big hun attack. it was planned as a fun, relaxing moment before the horror started. the soldiers are crossing the country at that point and we showed some of the beauty of china in several wide shots. the song was supposed to fit into this very ‘chinese’ moment and I did some stylized sketches of the characters in the song, done with a chinese brush and elements of chinese calligraphy. earlier in the film I had sketched another song sequence with mushu, a kind of ‘pink elephant parade’ with chinese dragons, where mushu goes through 70 years of modern art painting. that didn’t happen, so I was curious if the calligraphy sequence would be approved. it was, with some stylistic changes, but it still looks pretty close to what I had in mind as you can see below. the animation was done by AARON BLAISE and BROOSE JOHNSON.
© disney enterprises, inc
my name is hans bacher, – I work as production designer in the animation film industry. for the last 40 years I lived and worked in duesseldorf, london, paris, los angeles, manila and tokyo. now I am professor for film-design at the nanyang techn. university in singapore.
Your sketches are way better!
Oh what memories, i remember when I first saw Mulan, this sequence was one of my favorite things in the whole movie, LOVED it! What a wonderful idea, so glad it was approved.
one of my favourite sequence