Fantasia (1940)

 Fantasia

Bonus: 

Trailer #12!?

Summary: Classical music w/ animation.

Commentary: My wife and I went to see one of those movie/orchestra things with Fantasia the other day. The set list was kind of odd. They did:

Toccata and Fugue (without the animation)

Nutcracker

Symphony #5 (from Fantasia 2000)

Firebird (Fantasia 2000)

Intermission (without the "song")

Clair De Lune (Cut from the original)

The Pastoral Symphony

Dance of The Hours

The Sorcerer's Apprentice

Might've swapped those orders a little, but that's just gist.

That means that they cut out Night on Bald Mountain and Rites of Spring. I would guess that's because Spring is so long, and Bald Mountain has nipples in it. (Have you seen that bra on the centaur lady in Pastoral? It's pretty close.)

No nipples here...

Toccata in Fugue is fine. The animation is only in the end and pretty light, so I guess cutting it isn't too bad. They cut all the between bits, but our conductor did a pretty good job of filling in, so that was fine.

Nutcracker is good. I think the variety in the animation (without resorting to actual nutcrackers fighting rats at any point) is impressive. Kind of weird that the racist-taurs get cut later, but we keep the "Oriental Mushrooms"

We are Chi-a-nese if you ple-ase

Rites of Spring has 40s dinosaurs, which is great. The animation itself doesn't stand out among the all around greatness of the rest of the show, but it's cool to see how the portrayals have changes. Presumably cut for length, which is a shame, but understandable

Check out the Thagomizer on that guy!

The Pastoral Symphony is a lot stronger in the second half than the first. But, as a general rule, if you're going to cut numbers from a show, you should always cut the one you have to censor.

All or nothing!

Dance of The Hours is my favorite. The animation is in a great spot, transitioning from the 30s rubber hose to a more modern style, and it works, especially for the ostriches. It's the best of the "story" cartoons in Fantasia by a long shot.

I'm not saying there's a lot of competition, but definitely the sexiest hippo in the Disney canon.

Night on Bald Mountain is too sexy with the harpy nipples. It's probably the most well animated of the set. So much going on, and a lot of stuff that's really impressive for the time period.

FEMALE PRESENTING NIPPLES!

Sorcerer's Apprentice sucks. It's a "plot" short with a plot that's obvious, and doesn't really make sense. The above mentioned not-quite-hose animation doesn't work for the less goofy Mickey. They moved it to the end since it's "the" Fantasia short, but I'd have gladly cut it for either of the cut shorts or most of Fantasia 2000.

Overall, I enjoy Fantasia, and the performance we went to. I want to take a quick minute to talk about the whole idea of it though. Fantasia exists during a high water mark in Disney's history. Smack in the middle of the first "golden age" (after Pinocchio, before Dumbo), and while they were also still producing shorts (like the Silly Symphonies) that form sort of a prototype.

It's also a big contrast with modern Disney, which is the sloppiest of all slop. Nipples? Classical Music? Art!? Disney cares not for these things, anymore. The whole story of its production, with Walt personally going to Stokowski, the work that went into distributing it, the experimental nature of the whole thing. It's so different from the safe, boring, "mid brow" Disney we see today. It's a shame.