Disneyland and Spectatorship in the 1950s April 8, 2008

The distribution of Cinerama and Cinemascope were technological reactions to the dwindling audience numbers in the 1950s, and the rise of television. They created new viewing methods, which were both beneficial to spectator participation, as well as costly to the studios. The result was a novelty, which had ended by the sixties. However, the disney corporation sought to increase box office receipts by developing a cross-promotional theme park, which would link into other aspects of its media empire. They enabled the spectator to immerse themselves in an experience of the filmic medium, by taking it out of the cinema and creating a material reality. However, like Cinerama and CinemaScope, the Disney experience was driven by ideological demands. This essay shall discuss the changing relationship between viewer, television and film, with a close reading of John Belton’s work on 1950s screen innovation, in regard to the development of Disneyland. Firstly, the circumstances giving rise to the different filmic phenomenological addresses shall be discussed. Secondly, the effect of the disneyland experience on the viewer, and how this mode of address went beyond the boundaries set up by widescreen cinema of the fifties. Thirdly, though the experience is not visually constrained, there are exclusionary mechanism at work, which set up a particular ideology and audience to be addressed. Finally, Frontierland and Tomorrowland shall be used as examples of how the media conglomerate operated, as well as their effects upon the spectator. Both were used to reaffirm the identity of Americans, and address Cold War tensions. Therefore, this essay shall argue the these factors worked to create a Disney viewing experience, which was drawn together by ideological concerns. 

 

Innovations in cinema were driven by declining audience numbers at the end of the second world war. 

 

“it [cinemascope] satisfied a historically specific need for a motion picture format that could effectively compete with the variety of recreational activities available to the new, postwar consumer market” (Belton, 1988, 38)

 

Disney reacted differently to declining audience numbers, by using television, film and the theme park to create a mass viewing experience. Spectators had the ability to watch a television program centered on the developments at Tomorrowland, physically engage with the developments at Disneyland, and the attend a film featuring the characters they had encountered at the theme park. 

“Motion pictures attempted to maximise their participatory potential by adopting two dramatically different model of recreational participation-the amusement park and the legitimate theatre- around which they then constructed new definitions of spectatorship” (Belton, 1992, 188)

 

“ a performative and kinetic space that make the electronic of filmic product and its promotion literally material”.  (Davis, 1996, 411)

While audience may presume, this enables them to gain a greater level of participation in the onscreen spectacle, they are invaraibly placed in a subjective position. 

Belton discusses the spectatorship theory developed by Baudry (1996, 183-184). He suggests the emphasis in contemporary theory is the ability of an audience member to imbue an image with a particular meaning, due to the “(mis)recognition” of the screen as reality. Spectatorial theory address the static physical position of the viewer in the movie theatre. However, once they are moved into the open air of the theme park are they able to break the framing and organised vision Belton discusses? 

It could be suggested that theme-parks are a real like experience, which frees the viewer from the static prison of the cinema. While the theme park goes beyond the film in creating a liberated viewing position, they are still a subject. Marling argues, “the tension between perfection and reality..was the primary sources of the visitor’s delight” (1996, 93). While, this maybe true, it is reflective of the “suture” discussed by Belton (1996, 187), a fundamental concern of spectatorship. During the viewing experience of widescreen the audience was supposed to be so absorbed in the image that they considered it reality. However, technological difficulties created jarring moments, which pointed to the artifice of the production. Similarly, Disneyland attempted a similar kind of suture through the creation of rides, and “life size characters”. The sensorial experience is not limited to sound and sight, but expands into smell and touch (and probably to some degree taste.

While the theme park can engage all the sense, it is still a managed reality. The viewer cannot discover anything new in Disneyland, which has not been created by the Disney corporation.arling suggests, “The once-passive viewer now became an actor, a real-lie participant “face up in the rain” as a rackety little boat plowed under Schweitzer fall. It was better than the movies” (1996, 93). Though, this is true it ignores the elements of structure and control, which are fundamental to the maintenance of the theme park. While the the fantasy is not limited by a cinematic frame, the theme park’s operation is controlled and regulated within stringent boundaries, both spatial and temporal. Parades take place every half hour on the main street. Operating times are maintained, thus the spectator cannot access the Disney reality whenever they please. While the audience is fully immersed in the Disney reality, they are still in a structured subject position. M Disneyland’s Main Street uses “forced perspective” to create a sense of safety amongst the audience; buildings were scaled to at most seventh-eights of their regular size (Marling, 1996, 114).  Though Disneyland appeals to many aspects of reality, it does not liberate the viewer into a sense of the real experience.

 

While Disneyland created reality, it focused upon a nostalgic time in the form of Frontierland, free from the tensions and fear of the Cold War. 

Indeed, the particular focus upon frontier land acted to reaffirm the American Identity as a pioneer and innovator. 

Davy Crockett:

 

 

Tomorrowland created a futuristic view, which helped to reaffirm the victory of America in the Cold War

Man in Space:

“President Eisenhower called from the White House to offer his thanks and congratulations in person” (Marling, 1996, 123

 

While Disneyland was used to liberate the viewer from the fixed cinematic position, it created a particular audience for its product. 

“Navigating the interstate to the theme park required, of course, a car, a factor that again cut out the amusement park’s younger and poorer audience. The theme park became an ‘away’ place, separated from the everyday life of the city by distance as as by imagistic control.” (Davis, 1996, 404)

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