The most devastating development since Walt's death occurred in September 1979, when studio animator Don Bluth led a walkout of himself and 11 of his supporters (a large chunk of the studio's animation department at the time), including Gary Goldman and John Pomeroy. Fed up with the status quo at Disney, he and his acolytes left to start his own studio, which produced the short film Banjo the Woodpile Cat and the feature film The Secret of NIMH. Disney entered the 1980s facing an uncertain future, despite the respectable $39,900,000 gross and some good reviews for The Fox and the Hound, and the animation department faced more jeopardy and pandemonium in 1985 with The Black Cauldron, which was the Disney studio’s first PG-rated animated film and the most expensive animated film ever made at the time.
The most devastating development since Walt's death occurred in September 1979, when studio animator Don Bluth led a walkout of himself and 11 of his supporters (a large chunk of the studio's animation department at the time), including Gary Goldman and John Pomeroy. Fed up with the status quo at Disney, he and his acolytes left to start his own studio, which produced the short film Banjo the Woodpile Cat and the feature film The Secret of NIMH. Disney entered the 1980s facing an uncertain future, despite the respectable $39,900,000 gross and some good reviews for The Fox and the Hound, and the animation department faced more jeopardy and pandemonium in 1985 with The Black Cauldron, which was the Disney studio’s first PG-rated animated film and the most expensive animated film ever made at the time.