In the first example, Hotel Transylvania we see a variety of unreal phenomenon. We are thrown in a 3D cartoony world where monsters and human beings exist. So already we have a mix of a real and unreal just by looking at the bare minimum description. The world that has been created has room for error and allows for a break in how reality is. With monsters and non human creatures we automatically come to suspect things that wouldn't be true in reality to come true. A specific shot in particular that shows the break in the first law is when Mavis just arrived at the “human village” and she walks down a wall. In reality we are constantly being pulled down by gravity. That is the force that is constantly being applied to us, as well as the force in our legs keeping us upright against gravity. In this situation, we see a gravity shift similar to what happens as we walk along different points on the earths surface. We are constantly being pulled towards the center of the earth whether we are in San Jose, or in China, or somewhere in the north pole. The way Mavis changed orientation on that building is a similar situation. It is as if, that building had a gravitational force of its own, or Mavis designates her own gravitational pull. Whatever the case, this situation is unrealistic. However, the movie itself as well as common vampire lore gave this moment plausibility. Regardless of how unreal it is.
Another example can be found in the Disney short film Paperman in the seen where our male protagonist is storming off and the paper airplanes he threw earlier begin to come to life and bounce after him. Up till this point the story and physics were very believable and plausible. There was nothing to insinuate that this story was going to be magical at all. It felt like an animation that took place in our world without Disney magic. This unrealistic act with the bobbing up and down airplanes felt out of place, especially at that point in the movie. The only way this phenomenon could occur is if there was a force to push the planes upward like the wind. The plane on the ground being undisturbed being its natural state and then wind being the outside force pushing it up. There were parts where they used the wind as justification for the actions of the airplanes, but in that particular scene there was no hint of wind. There were people walking by and also our main protagonist in that scene, and their clothes were undisturbed by this “wind” that was causing the planes to go up every now and then. Overall this was an odd turn of events in the story that truly felt unreal. However, it did create a means to reach the ending of the story.
The final film that breaks Newton's first law is from Kiki's delivery service. It is the scene where Kiki is taking off from the ground and leaving her home at the beginning of the film. In this scene Kiki is using her “witches powers” to take off from the ground, as well as giving her broom “life” in order to create flight. For logical flight to occur there would need to be enough force to take her off into the air. Also there would need enough force to keep her in the air continuously and propel her forward. Because of her lack of wing span she can not use the wind to push herself up and maintain glide as a plane does. This movie heavily relies on magic and lore behind witches to create the plausibility of this event. However, like Hotel Transylvania, the environment and scenario had been set before hand to allow for that. There was an introduction for witches brewing potions and flying beforehand, there fore we were fully aware that it was going to occur. But we didn't know what it looked like till this point. The saving grace for physics when flight was involved in this movie is how inertia was dealt with. When Kiki's broom would change direction abruptly, Kiki would continue fly in the direction of the motion that the broom was previously going in. This simple addition added a layer of realism over her flight that brought it back to making it a little more realist and plausible.
Animated films are easily capable of creating worlds that are not real and follow laws that are not correct for reality, but in order to create a well received film, the physics and rules of the world must be similar to ours. If they are not similar, they should be given a reason for them to be broken. In the 3 films that were discussed previously, it is evident that Newton's first law has been broken, and if it wasn't broken, it was altered to fit the a non realistic situation. In Hotel Transylvania we found Mavis changing what objects she had gravity towards. In Paperman we found an unrealistic representation of ways paper airplanes could act whether the wind was involved in pushing them up or not. In Kiki's Delivery service we see “magic” to be the source of flight. All of these things are very non realistic. However in the case of Hotel Transylvania and Kiki's Delivery Service, the world presented is one of magic and allowance for these unrealistic things. These events served to make sure we knew it was a different world we were looking into. Unrealistic actions, if done correctly add as a way to make sure we know we are not in the realistic world. If done incorrectly, they create a wall between the audience and the film that makes the movie not enjoyable and not absorbing enough.
