What 8 Disney Live-Action Remakes Looked Like Behind The Scenes | Movies Insider

From motion capture to virtual production, Disney has been able to bring everything from the Pride Lands to Agrabah into the real world. But it's never easy trying to translate these hand-drawn animation classics into

live

action

while maintaining everything audiences loved about the originals. How do you make a photorealistic lion that can also sing songs? ♪ It means don't worry ♪ ♪ For the rest of your days ♪ To see how they did it, check out

what

eight Disney

live

-

action

remakes

looked

like behind the

scenes

. Actress Liu Yifei trained for three months, six to seven hours a day, to play Mulan.

Like here, where you can see her preparing for one of the film's epic sword fights. According to cinematographer Mandy Walker, the actress did about 90% of her own stunts. The cast had to learn everything from martial arts to horseback riding for the action-packed film. Meanwhile, many of the film's gravity-defying stunts were achieved with impressive wire work. This film featured around 70 different animal species created using innovative CGI. There was one key step in the process to ensure that all the animals

looked

so realistic: facial manipulation. During this stage, the animators explored

what

muscles animals have that humans don't.

By doing that, they could make sure the animals did things like growl the right way. To ensure that the animals looked convincing when they spoke, the animators used a combination of human and animal muscles for the characters' mouths. Another crucial advance had to do with putting hair on animals. They had to figure out the direction an animal's hair would move, how it clumps together, and how it interacts with the world around it. Perhaps most impressive is that Neel Sethi, who played Mowgli, acted completely alone on set, as all the animals were CGI and the other stars recorded their voices.

But he had some company. Actors in blue suits and crew members held animal puppets and wore googly eyes in their hands, like these pesky monkeys that steal food from Mowgli, which were later replaced by CGI versions of the animals. "The Jungle Book" paved the way for 2019's "The Lion King." The film was shot using virtual production, allowing director Jon Favreau and crew to enter the world they were creating and film everything as if it were really real action. The biggest challenge for the film's visual effects team was creating a photorealistic version of the African savanna while remaining faithful to the source material.

Take the part where Rafiki stands and pick up Simba. In reality, baboons can't stand up like this. So in the remake, they animated the character sitting down while lifting Simba into the air. And the animals still needed to be able to talk and also sing some of those iconic songs. So, the animators tried to reposition the animals' heads when they could so that the audience wouldn't look directly into their mouths. And they synchronized the characters' breathing with their dialogue and at the same time let the characters' abdominal and diaphragm muscles tense so that it really looked like they were letting out air as they spoke.

Many CGI dogs were created for this live-action remake. However, the two main stars were real. A stray dog ​​named Monte played the Tramp, while a cocker spaniel named Rose played Lady. Perhaps nothing was more challenging than filming the most iconic scene from the 1955 original, when the two dogs share a plate of spaghetti and meatballs. This scene took three days to film, and while I was filming it, the noodles kept breaking. So instead of using real noodles, they used undyed licorice soaked in chicken broth. This ensured that the noodles were strong enough to take and also that the dogs had something quite tasty to eat.

But the moment when the two dogs' snouts touch? That was CGI. The elephants were created with masterful visual effects work by MPC Film. However, the actors still needed something on set to sell the

scenes

. So an actor and a stuntman in green suits replaced baby Dumbo. But first, they had to learn to move like a baby elephant, which included walking on all fours using these stilts, no easy task on long days of filming. Instead of making the Genie character an entirely computer-generated creation, Will Smith managed to completely embody him and his dance moves, and it was all captured by a motion capture suit.

While "Aladdin" initially received criticism for the Genie's appearance in his blue form, the film ended up having him in human form whenever it could. And to get an idea of ​​some of the film's impressive stunts, just watch the "Leap Forward" sequence. While most

movies

are filmed at 24 frames per second, some parts of these sequences were filmed in slow motion at 36 frames per second, while others were filmed at an incredibly fast 18 frames per second. According to director Guy Ritchie, actor Mena Massoud had to make sure he sang completely in sync. So in some parts he had to sing very fast and in others very slow. "Mistress of Evil" is a sequel to the 2014 version of "Sleeping Beauty" from the villain's perspective.

This movie had to make its main character and many other characters fly. They achieved this using two different methods. The first was using cables, a more traditional hands-on method of lifting characters into the air. The second way was to lift the actress Angelina Jolie and the other flying characters with these two-pronged forks. The forks are operated by these blue-suited extras you see here, who would later become CGI backgrounds. The fork fits on both sides of a person's body. This device gives them mobility and allows them to turn a person backwards, forwards or side to side, a "360-degree movement" while the actor is held securely in place.

Meanwhile, Maleficent's wings were created with CGI. While she was on set, Jolie wore them on her back, which would later be replaced with wings. The visual effects team was tasked with creating convincing wings and also making sure those wings moved in sync with the artist's body movements. To fully embody the role of Beast, actor Dan Stevens wore a motion capture suit on stilts. The stilts ensured that the actor had the correct height of the Beast on set so that the actors were looking in the right place. However, they didn't just have the characters standing in front of green screens;

In fact, they built many of these sets in England and they are impressive. Take the ballroom, for example, which was built with 12,000 square feet of faux marble. And they paid special attention to the costumes. Belle's dress was decorated with around 2,160 Swarovski crystals and, according to actress Emma Watson, the costume designers created it to look like it was floating as Belle and the Beast danced. What are some of your favorite Disney live-action

remakes

? And which ones are you most looking forward to? Let us know in the comments.