Why didn’t mine ever turn out this way?
Written: Feb 03 '02
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Product Rating:
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Pros: Shows a lot of ingenuity; Lines are very rare.
Cons: Stairs; Not for those seeking cheap thrills.
The Bottom Line: The attraction may come from a simpler time, but it’s still quite capable of invoking wonder.
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| cactus_matt's Full Review: Swiss Family Treehouse |
The treehouses we as children spent entire Saturday afternoons engineering all but paled in comparison to Walt Disney’s own. It was thus likely no surprise the wonder with which a child might explore the Swiss Family Treehouse – it’s everything we’d been hoping for but just couldn’t seem to make happen. And that was part of what made the Disney experience such a special one.
The Swiss Family Treehouse comes straight out of the 1960 Disney film, Swiss Family Robinson. Father, Mother, and sons, Ernst, Fritz, and Francis, find themselves shipwrecked on a remote island with little choice but to set up a dwelling and make a new life for themselves. Using a combination of salvaged supplies from their ship and various implements from the surrounding jungle, they built a grand and fully-functional treehouse in which to live out the rest of their days. Okay, so maybe the Robinsons’ skill as carpenters was of far more use to them than was our creative ambition as children, but it still looked like a fun place to live.
The thought must have been mutual at the time, as the Swiss Family Treehouse opened as a Disneyland attraction in 1964. The enormous tree, a “Disneyodendron eximus” (or “Out of the Ordinary Disney Tree”), was fashioned from steel and concrete and adorned with thousands of polythene leaves. You may not be able to live in it, but a series of stairways and bridges allows you to tour various rooms and marvel at the intricate waterworks drawing off from a stream below. The treehouse became a pivotal part of the Adventureland scenery, and did similarly in Disney World when it opened in 1971, where it still resides today. Disneyland’s version, on the other hand, found itself revamped in 1999, but more on that momentarily.
The Swiss Family Treehouse is one of the very few self-service attractions at Disney World’s Magic Kingdom, as you’re given free reign to take the plaque-guided “tour” at your own pace. The person with the slowest pace tends to dictate the length of tour for everyone behind them, but crowds here are typically sparse enough that it shouldn’t become frustrating. If one happens to be looking for something particularly flashy or humorous, however, they may be disappointed. All too often people speed through without the slightest inclination that the wonder and personality of the Swiss Family Treehouse lay within its simplistic concept and its meticulous attention to detail. There aren’t any animatronics or cartoon animals – just an impressive feat of craftsmanship and a whole lot of charm.
The stair-climbing may not sound like an inviting venture in the midst of a full day of walking, but it’s not an especially strenuous feat. The stairs are spread out gradually as you go along, and there is a bench available halfway through for anyone who needs a breather. As far as people having difficulty with the height, I honestly wouldn’t worry. The railings are high enough, and it’s not as if the walkways are shaky or unstable. Personally, I’m terrified of heights, but I don’t even realize it when I’m up there. For those interested in photography, a few vantage points offer a decent view of the park, most notably of Cinderella’s castle and Space Mountain, although somewhat obstructed by large branches and other trees. I’ve never been in the treehouse during fireworks, but considering that the attraction is relatively unattended, you might be able to stick around up there for the duration.
The unfortunate aspect of the Swiss Family Treehouse is that the movie has become less and less known over the years, leaving a some younger children confused as to who the Swiss Family Robinson is and why exactly they’re living in a tree. I don’t see this to be a terrible problem, given that the treehouse is a wonder in itself and tends to stand alone without the story behind it, as have done many other attractions without popular license. Nonetheless, Disney is always looking for an opportunity to cash in for cheap these days, as was apparent with what happened in Disneyland in 1999.
In my opinion, it’s bad enough that the Disney management of today is always looking for the easiest shortcut towards making an unmarketable attraction into a marketable one, most often by way of inserting characters from a recent, similarly-themed animated movie. If the characters are popular, however, I can at least understand Disney’s motivation towards including them as part of the park. This was not the case when Disneyland’s Swiss Family Treehouse became “Tarzan’s Treehouse” in 1999.
Disney’s Tarzan movie, which sounds a whole lot like scraping the bottom of the barrel for ideas as it is, had yet to even be released when conversion began. This is to say that regardless of if the movie was a flop, and I’m pretty sure it was, that Disneyland would already be stuck with an attraction based on it. The movie and the new, redesigned attraction opened just days apart in what might possibly be the most repulsive and reckless attempt at cross-marketing yet demonstrated on behalf of modern-day Disney management.
Thankfully, they didn’t try and do the same with Disney World’s version.
Although Disneyland replaced theirs with a colorful “playland”-style attraction, the Swiss Family Treehouse still stands here in Florida, and I recommend it to anyone who continues to believe that imagination is half the fun.
Recommended:
Yes
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Epinions.com ID:
cactus_matt
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Location: Florida
Reviews written: 40
Trusted by: 24 members
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