Modern animation in the United States

Modern animation of the United States from the late 1980s onward is sometimes referred to as the "American animation renaissance". During this period, many large American entertainment companies reformed and reinvigorated their animation departments following a general decline during the 1970s and 1980s. The United States has had a profound effect on animation worldwide.

At the start of the 1980s, Walt Disney Productions had been struggling since Walt Disney's death in 1966, and the 1979 departure of Don Bluth and eleven other associates from the animation department dealt Disney a major blow. Bluth formed a new studio, in direct competition with Disney.

Disney's "Nine Old Men", the animators responsible for Disney's most famous earlier works, and their associates began to hand their traditions down to a new generation of Disney animators. New faces such as Glen Keane, Ron Clements, John Musker, Andreas Deja, and others came to the studio in the late 1970s and early 1980s, a period that produced such features as The Rescuers, Pete's Dragon (a live-action/animation hybrid), and The Fox and the Hound, as well as the featurettes The Small One (Bluth's only Disney-directed credit) and Mickey's Christmas Carol (the first screen appearance of Mickey Mouse since 1953).

At the same time, animator Steven Lisberger brought to the studio a concept about a computer programmer who is launched into a computerized world. The film would mix live action sequences with computer animation, which had not yet been used to such an extent. The studio was impressed with the idea; the result was an ambitious $17 million film ($42.2 million in today's dollars) entitled Tron. While Disney's stock dropped four percent after a screening for unenthusiastic investment analysts, and in spite of only moderate grosses at the box office,Tron received enthusiastic praise from film critic Roger Ebert, became a cult favorite and turned out—many years later—to have a greater influence on animation (at Disney and elsewhere) than expected.

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