-
(单词翻译:双击或拖选)
VOICE ONE:
I'm Shirley Griffith.
VOICE TWO:
And I'm Ray Freeman with the VOA Special English program, PEOPLE IN AMERICA. Every week we tell about a person who was important in the history of the United States. Today, we tell about Walt Disney and the movie company he created.
(MUSIC: "When You Wish Upon a Star)
VOICE ONE:
Walt Disney
That was the song "When You Wish Upon a Star." It is from Walt Disney's animated2 movie "Pinocchio." For many people, it is the song most often linked with Walt Disney and his work. The song is about dreams -- and making dreams come true. That is what the Walt Disney Company tries to do. It produces movies that capture3 the imagination of children and adults all over the world.
VOICE TWO:
Millions of people have seen Disney films and television programs. They have made friends with all the Disney heroes: Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck, Snow White, Pinocchio, Peter Pan1. Millions more have visited the company's major entertainment parks. There is Disneyland in California. Disney World in Florida. Tokyo Disneyland in Japan. Euro Disney in France.
Probably no other company has pleased so many children. It is not surprising that it has been called a dream factory.
(MUSIC)
VOICE ONE:
Walter Elias Disney was born in Chicago, Illinois in nineteen-oh-one. His family moved to the state of Missouri. He grew up on a farm there. At the age of sixteen, Disney began to study art in Chicago. Four years later, he joined the Kansas City Film Ad Company. He helped make cartoon advertisements to be shown in movie theaters. Advertisements help sell products.
In nineteen twenty-three, Walt Disney moved to Hollywood, California to join his brother Roy. He wanted to be a movie producer or director. But he failed to find a job. So he decided4 to make animated movies. In them, drawings are made to move in a lifelike way. We call them cartoons. Disney the artist wanted to bring his pictures to life.
VOICE TWO:
A cartoon is a series of pictures on film. Each picture is a little different from the one before. Each shows a tiny change in movement. When we see the movie, the pictures seem to be alive. The cartoon people and animals move. They speak with voices recorded by real actors.
Disney opened his first movie company in the back of an office. For several years, he struggled to earn enough money to pay his expenses. He believed that cartoon movies could be as popular as movies made with actors. To do this, he decided he needed a cartoon hero. Help for his idea came from an unexpected5 place.
VOICE ONE:
Walt Disney drawing
Disney worked with Ub Iwerks, another young artist. They often saw mice running in and out of the old building where they worked. So they drew a cartoon mouse. It was not exactly like a real mouse. For one thing, it stood on two legs like a human.
It had big eyes and ears. And it wore white gloves on its hands. The artists called him "Mickey." Earlier filmmakers had found that animals were easier to use in cartoons than people. Mickey Mouse was drawn6 with a series of circles. He was perfect for animation7.
The public first saw Mickey Mouse in a movie called "Steamboat Willie." Walt Disney himself provided8 the voice for Mickey Mouse. The film was produced in nineteen twenty-eight. It was a huge success.
VOICE TWO:
Mickey Mouse appeared in hundreds of cartoons during the years that followed. He became known all over the world. In Japan, he was called "Miki Kuchi." In Italy, he was "Topolino." In Latin9 America, he was "Raton Miquelito." Mickey soon was joined by several other cartoon creatures. One was the female10 mouse called "Minnie." Another was the duck named "Donald," with his sailor clothes and funny voice. And there was the dog called Pluto11.
VOICE ONE:
Mickey Mouse cartoons were extremely popular. But Walt Disney wanted to make other kinds of animated movies, too. In the middle nineteen thirties, he was working on his first long movie.
It was about a lovely young girl, her cruel stepmother, and the handsome prince who saves her. It was "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs12." "Snow White" was completed in nineteen thirty-seven after three years of work. It was the first full-length animated movie to be produced by a studio. It became one of Hollywood's most successful movies.
VOICE TWO:
Movie experts say Walt Disney was responsible for the development of the art of animation. Disney's artists tried to put life into every drawing. That meant they had to feel all the emotions of the cartoon creatures. Happiness. Sadness. Anger. Fear. The artists looked in a mirror and expressed each emotion. A smile. Tears. A red face. Wide eyes. Then they drew that look on the face of each cartoon creature.
VOICE ONE:
Many movie experts say Disney's art of animation reached its highest point in nineteen forty with the movie "Pinocchio." The story is about a wooden toy that comes to life as a little boy.
Disney's artists drew two-and-one-half million pictures to make "Pinocchio." The artists drew flat pictures. Yet they created a look of space and solid objects. "Pinocchio" was an imaginary13 world. Yet it looked very real. Disney made other extremely popular animated movies in the nineteen forties and nineteen fifties. They include "Fantasia," "Dumbo," "Bambi," "Cinderella," "Alice in Wonderland," "Peter Pan," "Lady and the Tramp," and "Sleeping Beauty." These movies are still popular today.
VOICE TWO:
In addition to cartoons, Walt Disney produced many movies and television programs with real actors. He also produced movies about wild animals in their natural surroundings14. Real or imaginary, all his programs had similar ideas. In most of them, innocence15, loyalty16 and family love were threatened by evil17 forces. Sad things sometimes happened. But there were always funny incidents and creatures. In the end, good always won over evil. Disney won thirty-two Academy18 Awards for his movies and for scientific and technical inventions in filmmaking.
(MUSIC)
VOICE ONE:
Walt Disney with models of Disneyland
In nineteen fifty-five, Walt Disney opened an entertainment park not far from Hollywood, California. He called it "Disneyland." He wanted it to be the happiest place on Earth. Disneyland recreated imaginary places from Disney movies. It also recreated real places -- as Disney imagined them. For example, one area looked like a nineteenth century town in the American West. Another looked like the world of the future.
Disneyland also had exciting rides. Children could fly on an elephant. Or spin in a teacup. Or climb a mountain. Or float on a jungle river. And -- best of all -- children got to meet Mickey Mouse himself. Actors dressed as Mickey and all the Disney cartoon creatures walked around the park shaking hands.
VOICE TWO:
Some critics said Disneyland was just a huge money machine. They said it cost so much money that many families could not go. And they said it did not represent the best of American culture. But most visitors loved it. They came from near and far to see it. Presidents of the United States. Leaders of other countries. And families from around the world.
Disneyland was so successful that Disney developed plans for a second entertainment and educational park to be built in Florida. The project, Walt Disney World, opened in Florida in nineteen seventy-one, after Disney's death.
The man who started it all, Walt Disney, died in nineteen sixty-six. But the company he began continues to help people escape the problems of life through its movies and entertainment parks.
(MUSIC)
VOICE ONE:
This Special English program was written by Shelley Gollust. I'm Shirley Griffith.
VOICE TWO:
And I'm Ray Freeman. Join us again next week for another PEOPLE IN AMERICA program in Special English on the Voice of America.
1 pan | |
n.平底锅;v.严厉批评 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
2 animated | |
adj.生气勃勃的,活跃的,愉快的 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
3 capture | |
vt.捕获,俘获;占领,夺得;n.抓住,捕获 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
4 decided | |
adj.决定了的,坚决的;明显的,明确的 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
5 unexpected | |
adj.想不到的,意外的 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
6 drawn | |
v.拖,拉,拔出;adj.憔悴的,紧张的 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
7 animation | |
n.活泼,兴奋,卡通片/动画片的制作 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
8 provided | |
conj.假如,若是;adj.预备好的,由...供给的 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
9 Latin | |
adj.拉丁的,拉丁语的,拉丁人的;n.拉丁语 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
10 female | |
adj.雌的,女(性)的;n.雌性的动物,女子 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
11 Pluto | |
n.冥王星 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
12 dwarfs | |
n.侏儒,矮子(dwarf的复数形式)vt.(使)显得矮小(dwarf的第三人称单数形式) | |
参考例句: |
|
|
13 imaginary | |
adj.想象中的,假想的,虚构的,幻想的;虚数的 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
14 surroundings | |
n.周围的事物(或情况),环境 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
15 innocence | |
n.无罪;天真;无害 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
16 loyalty | |
n.忠诚,忠心 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
17 evil | |
n.邪恶,不幸,罪恶;adj.邪恶的,不幸的,有害的,诽谤的 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
18 academy | |
n.(高等)专科院校;学术社团,协会,研究院 | |
参考例句: |
|
|