Mr. Bug Goes to Town

Mr. Bug Goes to Town:

Release date(s): 12/5/1941

Distributed by: Paramount Pictures

Studio: Fleischer Studios

Running time: 78 minutes

Director: Dave Fleischer

Producer: Max Fleischer

Writers: Kenny Gardner, Gwen Williams, Jack Mercer, Tedd Pierce, Carl Meyer, Stan Freed, Pauline Loth

Inspired by Maurice Maeterlinck's The Life of the Bee

Music: Leigh Harline, Frank Loesser

Country: United States

Language: English

Background:

Mr. Bug Goes to Town, also known as Hoppity Goes to Town and Bugville, is an animated feature produced by Fleischer Studios and released to theaters by Paramount Pictures on December 5, 1941. It was originally meant to be an adaptation of Maurice Maeterlinck's The Life of the Bee, but the Fleischers were unable to get the rights to the book, and the studio came up with its own story inspired by The Life of the Bee instead. The film was produced by Max Fleischer and Dave Fleischer, who was credited as director. The sequences for the film were supervised by Willard Bowsky, Shamus Culhane, H.C. Ellison, Thomas Johnson, Graham Place, Stanley Quackenbush, David Tendlar and Myron Waldman.

Plot:

The plot describes the return of Hoppity the Grasshopper, after a period spent away, to an American city. He finds that all is not as he left it, and his good insect friends (who live in the "lowlands" just outside the garden which belongs to a songwriter and his wife) are now under threat from the 'human ones', who are trampling through the broken down fence which prefaces the property, using it as a shortcut.

Insect houses are being flattened by their feet, and are also often burned by cast away cigar butts and matches. Old Mr. Bumble and his beautiful daughter Honey (Hoppity's childhood sweetheart) are in grave danger of losing their Honey Shop to this threat.

To compound their problems, devious insect "property magnate" C. Bagley Beetle has romantic designs on Honey Bee himself, and hopes, with the help of his henchmen Swat the Fly and Smack the Mosquito, to force Bumble to give him her hand in marriage.

Voice Cast:

Dick: Kenny Gardner

Mary: Gwen Williams

Mr. Bumble/Swat: Jack Mercer

C. Bagley Beetle: Ted Pierce

Smack: Carl Meyer

Hoppity: Stan Freed

Honey: Pauline Loth

The Four Marshals (Mute)

The Royal Guards (Mute)

Production:

Mr. Bug Goes to Town was beset by problems early on. To produce their first animated feature, Gulliver's Travels, the Fleischers had moved their studio from New York City to Miami, Florida, and expanded their staff, at great expense. Immediately after Gulliver was completed and released, the studio began development on a second feature, eventually going into production on Mr. Bug. The studio was already deeply in debt from the expense of "Mr. Bug" and the expensive costs of the Superman shorts which were in production around the same time. The Fleischers were forced to sell their studio to Paramount mid-way through production on Mr. Bug, on May 24, 1941. Paramount kept the Fleischers in production, but they were required to deliver unsigned letters of resignation to Paramount, to be used at the studio's discretion, as the brothers were growing apart.

Release:

Mr. Bug was originally going to be released in November 1941, but since the Fleischers' rival, Walt Disney Productions, had its film Dumbo released weeks earlier in October and was already a success, Paramount changed the date to December. Having the misfortune of opening two days before the attack on Pearl Harbor, Mr. Bug was a financial disaster (although having slightly positive reviews) and led to the ousting of Max and Dave Fleischer from the studio they had established in 1919.

Paramount reorganized the company as Famous Studios.  Max and Dave had not spoken to each other since early in 1940 due to personal and professional disputes. Apart from this, before Mr. Bug 's release, Walter Lantz, Paul Terry and Leon Schlesinger were considering producing animated feature films, but after responding to the disappointing results of this film and the initial failures of Walt Disney's other own two films Pinocchio and Fantasia, the projects were later eventually canceled.

Paramount later re-released Mr. Bug as Hoppity Goes to Town; the original title is a parody of the title of the 1936 film Mr. Deeds Goes to Town. The film cost $713,511 to make, and had only made $241,000 back by 1946, the year it was withdrawn from circulation. The film had apparently failed at the box office. Under the reissue title, Hoppity has had multiple re-releases on home video (with inferior image quality) throughout the 1970s to its recent DVD release by Legend Films, in which the studio re-titled the film again to Bugville. The film has now become a cult favorite with a younger generation of animators and animation buffs.

The film was acquired by U.M. &M. T.V. Corp. in 1955, which was later bought out by National Telefilm Associates (which became Republic). The film (as Hoppity Goes to Town) was officially released by Republic Pictures on VHS and laserdisc in May 1989. While NTA failed to renew copyrights to many of the films they acquired, Mr. Bug Goes to Town was one of the only few films that did get its copyright renewed. Despite the fact that the film is still copyrighted (by Republic successor Melange Pictures, managed by parent company Viacom, which also owns Paramount Pictures), public domain companies have released the film on VHS and DVD.

In Japan, the movie was released on December 19, 2009 as part of Studio Ghibli's Ghibli Museum Library. A DVD was released on April 2010 by Walt Disney Studios Home Entertainment in Japan, and it has been reported to be a restoration of an NTA re-releases print. Recently, Mr. Bug, along with many other Fleischer-produced cartoons (including the Fleischers' previous film, Gulliver's Travels), was restored from the original three-strip negatives by the UCLA Film and Television Archive. Though a few art-house theaters have recently screened the restoration which features the original titles, there are currently no plans to release it on DVD or Blu-ray.

On October 21, 2012, the Turner Classic Movies channel debuted the film, transferred from an original 35mm Technicolor release print owned by the Museum of Modern Art Department of Film, for the first time on television in a special hosted by Robert Osborne and Jerry Beck dedicated to rare animated films, including Gulliver's Travels, Lotte Reiniger's The Adventures of Prince Achmed, the UPA cartoons and the silent cartoons of 1907 to 1932 of the New York Studios.

Movie Links:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0vCe-DKKK-8

Dumbo

Dumbo:
Release date(s): October 23, 1941
Distributed by: RKO Radio Pictures
Studio: Walt Disney Productions
Running time: 64 minutes

Director: Ben Sharpsteen

Producer: Walt Disney

Writers: Otto Englander/Joe Grant/Dick Huemer

Based on Dumbo by Helen Aberson

Music: Frank Churchill/Oliver Wallace

Country: United States

Language: English

Background:

Dumbo is a 1941 American animated film produced by Walt Disney and released on October 23, 1941, by RKO Radio Pictures in the Sonovox sound format.

Dumbo, the fourth animated feature in the Walt Disney Animated Classics series, is based upon the storyline written by Helen Aberson and illustrated by Harold Pearl for the prototype of a novelty toy ("Roll-a-Book"). The main character is Jumbo Jr., a semi-anthropomorphic elephant who is cruelly nicknamed "Dumbo". He is ridiculed for his big ears, but in fact he is capable of flying by using his ears as wings. Throughout most of the film, his only true friend, aside from his mother, is the mouse, Timothy — a relationship parodying the stereotypical animosity between mice and elephants.

Dumbo was made to recoup the financial losses of Fantasia. It was a deliberate pursuit of simplicity and economy for the Disney studio, and at 64 minutes, it is one of Disney's shortest animated features.

Plot:

While circus animals are being transported, Mrs. Jumbo, one of the elephants, receives her baby from a stork. The baby elephant is quickly taunted by the other elephants because of his large ears, and they nickname him "Dumbo".

Once the circus is set up, Mrs. Jumbo loses her temper at a group of boys for making fun of her son, so she is locked up and deemed mad. Dumbo is shunned by the other elephants and with no mother to care for him, he is now alone. Timothy Q. Mouse, who feels sympathy for Dumbo and becomes determined to make him happy again, appoints himself as Dumbo's mentor and protector.

The circus director makes Dumbo the top of an elephant pyramid stunt, but Dumbo trips over his ears and misses his target, injuring the other elephants and bringing down the big top. Dumbo is made a clown as a result, and plays the main role in an act that involves him falling into a vat of pie filling. Despite his newfound popularity and fame, Dumbo hates this job and is now more miserable than ever. To cheer Dumbo up, Timothy takes him to visit his mother. On the way back Dumbo cries and then starts to hiccup, so Timothy takes him for a drink of water from a bucket which, unknown to them, has accidentally had a bottle of champagne knocked into it. As a result, Dumbo and Timothy both become drunk and see hallucinations of pink elephants.

The next morning, Dumbo and Timothy wake up in a tree. Timothy wonders how they got up in the tree, and concludes that Dumbo flew up there using his large ears as wings. With the help of a group of crows, Timothy is able to get Dumbo to fly again, using a psychological trick of a "magic feather" to boost his confidence.

Back at the circus, Dumbo must perform his stunt of jumping from a high building, this time from a much higher platform. On the way down, Dumbo loses the feather; Timothy quickly tells him that the feather was never magical, and that he is still able to fly. Dumbo is able to pull out of the dive and flies around the circus, finally striking back at his tormentors as the stunned audience looks on in amazement.

After this performance, Dumbo becomes a media sensation, Timothy becomes his manager, and Dumbo and Mrs. Jumbo are given a private car on the circus train.

Voice Cast:

Dumbo: (Mute)

Edward Brophy: Timothy Q. Mouse

Verna Felton: Mrs. Jumbo, Dumbo's mother/Elephant Matriarch

Herman Bing: The Ringmaster

Margaret Wright: Casey Junior

Sterling Holloway: Mr. Stork

Cliff Edwards: Jim Crow

The Hall Johnson Choir: Crow Chorus

Noreen Gammill: Elephant Catty

Dorothy Scott: Elephant Giddy

Sarah Selby: Elephant Prissy

Malcolm Hutton:  Skinny

John McLeish:  The Narrator

Development:

Dumbo is based upon a children's story written by Helen Aberson and illustrated by Harold Pearl that was prepared to demonstrate the prototype of a toy storytelling display device called Roll-A-Book, which was similar in principle to a panorama. It involved only eight drawings and just a few lines of text, and had Red Robin as Dumbo's ally instead of Timothy Mouse.

Dumbo was first brought to the attention of Walt Disney in late 1939 by Disney's head of merchandise licensing Kay Kamen, who showed a prototype of the Roll-A-Book that included Dumbo. Disney immediately grasped its possibilities and heartwarming story and purchased the rights to it.

Originally it was intended to be a short film; however, Disney soon found that the only way to do justice to the book was to make it feature-length. At the time, the Disney Studio was in serious financial trouble due to the war in Europe, which caused Pinocchio and Fantasia to fail at the box office, so Dumbo was intended to be a low-budget feature designed to bring revenue to the studio. Storymen Dick Huemer and Joe Grant were the primary figures in developing the plot. They wrote the script in chapters, much like a book, an unusual way of writing a film script. Regardless of this, very little was changed from the original draft.

Casting:

None of the voice actors for Dumbo received screen credit, much like in Snow White and Pinocchio. Timothy Mouse was voiced by Edward Brophy, a character actor known for portraying gangsters. He has no other known animation voice credits. The pompous matriarch of the elephants was voiced by Verna Felton, who also played the Fairy Godmother in Cinderella, the Queen of Hearts in Alice in Wonderland, and Flora of the Three Good Fairies in Sleeping Beauty. Other voice actors include the perennial Sterling Holloway in a cameo role as Mr. Stork, Cliff Edwards, better known as the voice of Jiminy Cricket, as Jim Crow, the leader of the crows, and John McLeish, best known for narrating the Goofy "How To" cartoons, providing the opening narration.

Animation:

When the film went into production in early 1941, supervising director Ben Sharpsteen was given orders to keep the film simple and inexpensive. As a result, Dumbo lacks the lavish detail of the previous three Disney animated features (Fantasia, Pinocchio, and Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs): character designs are simpler, background paintings are less detailed, and a number of held cels (or frames) were used in the character animation. Although the film is more "cartoony" than previous Disney films the animators brought elephants and other animals into the studio to study their movement.

Watercolor paint was used to render the backgrounds. Dumbo and Snow White are the only two classic Disney features to use the technique, which was regularly employed for the various Disney cartoon shorts. The other Disney features used oil paint and gouache. 2002's Lilo & Stitch, which drew influences from Dumbo, also made use of watercolor backgrounds.

Distribution:

Completed in fall 1941, Disney's distributor RKO Radio Pictures initially balked at the film's 64-minute length and wanted Disney to either make it longer, edit it down to a short subject length, or allow them to release it as a B-movie. Disney refused all three options, and RKO reluctantly issued Dumbo, unaltered, as an A-film.

Songs and Performers:

"Baby Mine" (Betty Noyes)

"Casey Junior" (The Sportsmen)

"Look Out for Mr. Stork" (The Sportsmen)

"Song of the Roustabouts" (The King's Men)

"The Clown Song" (A.K.A."We're gonna hit the big boss for a raise") (Billy Bletcher, Eddie Holden and Billy Sheets)

"Pink Elephants on Parade" (The Sportsmen) (preceded by two minutes of music on soundtrack version)

"When I See an Elephant Fly" (Cliff Edwards and the Hall Johnson Choir)

"When I See an Elephant Fly" (Reprise)

On Classic Disney: 60 Years of Musical Magic, "Pink Elephants on Parade" is included on the green disc, "Baby Mine" is on the purple disc, and "When I See an Elephant Fly" is on the orange disc. On Disney's Greatest Hits, "Pink Elephants on Parade" is on the red disc.

Awards and nominations:

Dumbo won the 1941 Academy Award for Original Music Score, awarded to musical directors Frank Churchill and Oliver Wallace. Churchill and lyricist Ned Washington were also nominated for the Academy Award for Best Song for "Baby Mine" (the song that plays during Dumbo's visit to his mother's cell), but did not win for this category. The film also won Best Animation Design at the 1947 Cannes Film Festival.

Allegations of racial stereotyping:

Writer Richard Schickel charged that the crow characters in the film are African-American stereotypes in his 1968 book, The Disney Version. The leader crow, played by Cliff Edwards, was originally named "Jim Crow" for script purposes, and is listed as such in the credits. However, all of other crows are voiced by African-American actors, who were all members of the popular all-black Hall Johnson Choir. Despite suggestions by writers such as Schickel who have criticized the portrayal as racist, others reject these claims. Defenders note that the crows form the majority of the characters in the movie who are sympathetic to Dumbo's plight, that they are free spirits who bow to no one, and that they are intelligent characters aware of the power of self-confidence, unlike the Stepin Fetchit stereotype common in the previous decade. Furthermore, the crows' song "When I See An Elephant Fly", which uses intricate wordplay in the lyrics, is oriented more toward mocking Timothy Mouse than Dumbo's large ears.

Funny Tidbits You Didn’t Know:

 -- During the production of Dumbo, Herbert Sorrell leader of the Screen Cartoonists Guild, demanded Disney sign with his union. Disney declined saying that he would put it to a vote. Sorrel again demanded that Disney sign with his union, but Disney once again refused. On May 29, 1941, shortly after rough animation on Dumbo was complete, much of the Disney studio staff went on strike. A number of strikers are caricatured in the feature as clowns who go to "hit the big boss for a raise". The strike lasted five weeks, and ended the "family" atmosphere and camaraderie at the studio.

Movie Links:

http://www.sockshare.com/file/862FA40636CB8CCC

http://www.putlocker.com/file/DB433FA65524A3AE

The Adventures of Prince Achmed

The Adventures of Prince Achmed:

Directed by: Lotte Reiniger/Carl Koch(Uncredited)

Written by: Lotte Reiniger

Cinematography: Carl Koch

Distributed by: Comenius-Film GmbH/Milestone Films

Release date(s):  July 1926 (France)

Running time: 65 minutes (at 24 frames/s)

Country: Weimar Republic

Language: German

Historical Significance:

- First use of silhouette animation
- Oldest surviving animated feature film

Background/Animation Style/Production:

The Adventures of Prince Achmed, transalated in German as Die Abenteuer des Prinzen Achmed, is a 1926 German animated fairytale film by Lotte Reiniger. It is the oldest surviving animated feature film; two earlier ones were made in Argentina by Quirino Cristiani, but they are considered lost. The Adventures of Prince Achmed features a silhouette animation technique Reiniger had invented which involved manipulated cutouts made from cardboard and thin sheets of lead under a camera. The technique she used for the camera is similar to Wayang shadow puppets, though hers were animated frame by frame, not manipulated in live action. The original prints featured color tinting.

Several famous avant-garde animators worked on this film with Lotte Reiniger. These included Walter Ruttmann, Berthold Bartosch, and Carl Koch.

Plot:

The story is based on elements taken from the collection 1001 Arabian Nights, specifically The Story of Prince Ahmed and the Fairy Paribanou featured in Andrew Lang's The Blue Fairy Book. With the assistance of Aladdin, the Witch of the Fiery Mountain, and a magic horse, the title character reclaims the magic lamp and conquers the African sorcerer. The culminating scene in the film is the battle between "die Hexe" (the witch) and "der afrikanische Zauberer" (the African sorcerer), in which those characters undergo fabulous transformations. All is well in the end: Aladdin marries Dinarsade (Achmed's sister and daughter of the Caliph); Achmed marries Pari Banu; the African sorcerer is defeated; and the foursome return to the Caliph's kingdom.

Restoration:

No original German nitrate prints of the film are known to still exist. While the original film featured color tinting, prints available just prior to the restoration had all been in black and white. Working from surviving nitrate prints, German and British archivists restored the film during 1998 and 1999 including reinstating the original tinted image by using the Desmet method.

Score:

The original score was composed by German composer Wolfgang Zeller in direct collaboration with the animation of the film. Reiniger created photograms for the orchestras, which were common in better theatres of the time, to follow along the filmic action.

The Silk Road Ensemble accompanied the film with a live improvised performance on Western strings and instruments such as the oud, ney and sheng in October 2006 at the Rubin Museum of Art in New York, NY. The Silk Road Ensemble repeated the performance at the Avon Cinema in Providence, RI, in February 2007.

The British film composer Geoff Smith composed a new score for the film in 2008, which he performed live as an accompaniment to screenings of the film.

An alternative score was written and presented to the public December 16, 2009 by Indian composer and guitarist, Rahul Roy (not to be confused with an actor of the same name). The authorized screening was presented at Forbes Library in Northampton, Massachusetts on that date, with over fifty people in attendance.

Another alternative score was conceived and performed by the British-Asian clarinettist and composer, Arun Ghosh and featured Adriano Adewale, Shabaka Hutchings, Jenny Adejayan, Corey Mwamba and Liran Donin to a packed house at the Albany in Deptford, the main space being transformed into a Bedouin lounge, as part of the Future Fusions Takeover festival on 18th March 2010. Arun Ghosh's score was presented as a live-action silhouette film with the musicians seen by the audience as shadows behind a screen in homage to Lotte Reiniger's cinematic style.Seattle composers David Miles Keenan and Nova Karina Devonie, aka "Miles and Karina", were commissioned by the Northwest Film Forum in 2007 to compose a new score to be performed live for its annual Children's Film Festival '08 and again in '09. The duo continue to perform their score with the film and have done so at Australia's Woodford Folk Festival '09/'10; The Tucson Fox Theater Nov. 2010; Denver Film Society's Starz Cinema Mar. 2010; Waterloo Festival for Animated Cinema Nov. 2008; St. Louis Art Museum Sept. 2008; Seattle International Film Festival April 2011; Bainbridge Performing Arts April 2011 and others. Their score uses accordion, guitar, banjo, glockenspiel, viola, percussion, slide whistle and other contraptions.

Movie Links:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mulqoZ2LXeM

The Apostle

The Apostle/ El Apóstol:
Release Date: November 9, 1917
Language: Silent Film/Spanish Subtitles
Running Time: 70 Minutes
Director: Quirino Cristiani
Producer: Federico Valle
Writer: Quirino Cristiani


Historical Significance:
-first feature film to use cut-out animation
-first animated feature film ever created


Background/Animation Style and Production:

     Hipólito Irigoyen, the charismatic leader of the Argentinian Radical Party, won the 1916 presidential elections by a large majority, thus ending the long rule of the conservatives. The Radical Party was the party of the lower middle class and the "populist," activist segments of society. Irigoyen was an honest man, but somewhat absentminded; the victim, some said, of unscrupulous associates. Moreover, he and his fellow Radicals lacked the polished style of the conservatives: they tended to be long-winded, with a certain tendency toward demagoguery. All these factors made Irigoyen an ideal target for the young cartoonist, who was eager to make fun of everyone and everything.

     The film, El Apóstol (The Apostle), showed Irigoyen wanting to bring morality to public life and eliminate corruption in Buenos Aires. To accomplish his lofty aims, he ascends to heaven where Jupiter lends the new president his thunderbolts. Irigoyen then hurled the redemptive fire at the city, which made for a most impressive blaze. The audience particularly enjoyed the final sequence, which combined models built by the French architect Andrés Ducaud and special effects.

     El Apóstol had its premiere on November 9, 1917 at the Select Theater (which co-producer Franchini owned). "The film is magnificent," said the review in the newspaper Critica, "and demonstrates the wonderful progress our national cinema has made."La Razon agreed, saying it was, "A graphic work that reveals enormous labor, patience and even genius." A good many other papers praised Valle, the film, and the country. But hardly anyone noticed that Cristiani had the one true claim to authorship: He had conceived the film, made the drawings, and animated the characters. In those days, no one thought of filmmakers--films were spoken of something "produced" by someone.

     Cristiani's life was complicated by the fact that Valle had hired Diógenes Taborda, known as "El Mono" ("The Monkey," as was apparently very ugly), to design characters for the film. El Mono was the most famous humorous cartoonist of the time; a veritable star, his vaguely art nouveau cartoons would sell any journal in which they appeared. But Taborda had no desire to devote his life to something he knew nothing about, and cared to know nothing about. He would make two or three drawings and then turn the rest over to Cristiani, who could do whatever he wanted ... as long as Taborda's name got the largest billing in the credits. Everyone was happy with this arrangement (especially Valle, who was only interested in buying El Mono's popularity), and so the deal had been struck. The friendship between the two artists was sealed when Taborda served as best man at Cristiani's wedding. (The press, who had not heard otherwise, printed the name of Taborda as the artist who made El Apóstol, forgetting the film's humble "animator.")

     El Apóstol was an hour and ten minutes long and was said to be composed of 58,000 drawings, which means 58,000 frames, as the film was made utilizing cutouts. All known copies of the film were lost in a fire in Federico Valle's vaults in 1926.

The Tale of the Fox

The Tale of the Fox/Le Roman de Renard:    

Release Date: Germany: April 10, 1937/France: April 10, 1941  

Language: French/German

Running Time: 65 minutes

Director: Irene Starevich/ Ladislas Starevich

Producer: Louis Nalpas (1929-31)/Roger Richebé (1939-41)

Historical Significance: 

- the third animated feature film to have sound
- stop-motion animation pioneer Ladislas Starevich's first fully animated feature film
- one of the world's first-ever animated feature films and one of the first to use puppet animation

Background:

     The question of animation in the Nazi era has been largely ignored or even falsified. Starewich's Le Roman de Renard,  although it was largely shot in Paris around 1930, has been completely ignored in discussions of "the first feature-length animation film" because it finally received its finishing funds from German sources (since Goethe had written a classic version of the Reynard legend) and had its world premiere in Berlin in April 1937--still eight months before Disney's Snow White (December 1937).

     In fact, dozens of animators worked in Germany before and during the Nazi era, including such relatively forgotten names as Kurt Wiese, Otto Hermann, Hans Zoozmann, Lore Bierling, Toni Rabolt, Harry Jaeger, Kurt Wolfe, Kurt Kiesslich, Curt Schumann, Kurt Stordel, Richard Felgenauer, Bernhard Klein, Paul Peroff, the team of Hedwig and Gerda Otto, the team of Schwab and Gerhardt--as well as such slightly better-known figures as Louis Seel, the Diehl brothers (who made more than fifty puppet films), Rudolf Pfenninger, Wolfgang Kaskeline, Lotte Reiniger, and the Fischinger brothers--Hans and Oskar.

Plot Summary:

     In the kingdom of animals, the fox Renard is used to tricking and fooling everyone. Consequently, the King (a lion), receives more and more complaints. Finally, he orders Renard to be arrested and brought before the throne.

Animation Style and Production:

     The Tale of the Fox, called Le Roman de Renard in France, and Reinecke Fuchs in Germany, was stop-motion animation pioneer Ladislas Starevich's first fully animated feature film. It is based on the tales of Renard the Fox. Although the animation was finished in Paris after an 18-month period (1929-1930), there were major problems with adding a soundtrack to the film. Finally, funding was given for a German soundtrack by the Nazi regime (Goethe had written a classic version of the Renard legend) and this version had its premiere in Berlin in April 1937. Released eight months before Disney's Snow White, it is the world's sixth-ever animated feature film. The film was released in France with a French language soundtrack in 1941. 

Funny Tidbits You Didn't Know:

- As you are aware by reading this post, the German version of this film was funded by the Nazi regime. While I cannot condone the director's need to let them pollute this film, artistically and story-wise, this is film will be featured and discussed on the original French version, as it was meant to be. As the German version has cease to exist, and for personal reasons, I will only focus on this version. Hate the directors, not the movie. 

Movie Links:

http://www.youtube.com/playlist?p=PL678BAA1CD650D332&feature=mh_lolz

Fantasia

Fantasia:

Release Date: 11/13/1940

Distributed by: Walt Disney Productions/RKO Radio Productions

Studio: Walt Disney Productions

Running Time: 125 minutes

Director: Multiple Directors Per Segment

Producer: Walt Disney

Historical Significance: 

-first animated movie to combine music and animation, originally an experimental film

-third to be produced by Walt Disney

-third in the Walt Disney Animated Classics canon

Background:
Fantasia, a Disney animated feature-length "concert" film milestone, is an experimental film integrating eight magnificent classical musical compositions with enchanting, exhilarating, and imaginative, artistically-choreographed animation. The conceptual framework of the individual pieces embraces such areas as prehistoric times, the four seasons, nature, hell and heaven, the themes of light vs. darkness and chaos vs. order, dancing animals, classical mythology, and legend.

Program:

Introduction - Live-action photography of members of the orchestra gathering and tuning their instruments. Deems Taylor joins the orchestra to introduce the film's program.
Toccata and Fugue in D Minor – Live-action shots of the orchestra illuminated in blue and gold, backed by superimposed shadows. The number segues into abstract animated patterns, lines, shapes and cloud formations.
Nutcracker Suite – A selection of pieces from the ballet depicts the changing of the seasons from summer to autumn to winter, with no plot. A variety of dances are presented with fairies, fish, flowers, mushrooms, and leaves, including "Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy," "Chinese Dance," "Dance of the Flutes," "Arabian Dance," "Russian Dance" and "Waltz of the Flowers."
The Sorcerer's Apprentice – Based on Goethe's 1797 poem Der Zauberlehrling. Mickey Mouse, an apprentice of the Sorcerer, Yen Sid, attempts some of his master's magic tricks before knowing how to control them.
The Rite of Spring – A visual history of the earth's beginnings is depicted to selected sections of the ballet, from the planet's formation to the first living creatures, followed by the reign and extinction of the dinosaurs.
Intermission - The musicians depart and the Fantasia title card is revealed. After the intermission there is a brief jam session of jazz music led by the clarinet player as the orchestra members return.
Meet the Soundtrack – A humorously stylized demonstration of how sound is rendered on film. The animated soundtrack, initially a straight white line, changes into different shapes and colors based on the sounds played.
The Pastoral Symphony – A mythical ancient Greek world of centaurs, cupids, fauns and other figures from classical mythology. A gathering for a festival to honor Bacchus, the god of wine, is interrupted by Zeus who creates a storm and throws lightning bolts at the attendees.
Dance of the Hours – A comic ballet featuring Madame Upanova and her ostriches (Morning); Hyacinth Hippo and her servants (Afternoon); Elephanchine and her bubble-blowing elephant troupe (Evening); and Ben Ali Gator and his troop of alligators (Night). The finale sees all the characters dancing together until the palace collapses.
Night on Bald Mountain and Ave Maria – At midnight the devil Chernabog summons evil spirits and restless souls from their graves. The spirits dance and fly through the air until driven back by the sound of an Angelus bell as night fades into dawn. A chorus is heard singing Ave Maria as a line of robed monks is depicted walking with lighted torches through a forest and into the ruins of a cathedral.

Animation Style and Production:

     From November 1938 to October 1939, artist Oskar Fischinger worked on the film's first segment, the Toccata and Fugue. He was a pioneer in producing abstract animation set to music, but Disney felt his designs were too abstract for a mass audience. Fischinger left the studio in apparent disgust and despair, as he was not used to working in a group and with little control. An Arabian dancer was brought into the studios to study the movements for the goldfish in Arab Dance.
     To obtain ideas for The Rite of Spring, animators studied comets and nebulae at the Mount Wilson Observatory in California and drew portraits of prehistoric animals at the American Museum of Natural History in New York City. A herd of iguanas and a baby alligator were brought into the studios for observation. In December 1939, Stravinsky visited the studios to see The Sorcerer's Apprentice, hear Stokowski's arrangement of The Rite of Spring and view the sketches, storyboards and models for the segment. For inspiration on the routines in Dance of the Hours, animators studied real life ballet performers including Marge Champion and Irina Baronova.
     Béla Lugosi, most known for his role in Dracula, was brought in to provide reference poses for Chernabog. As animator Bill Tytla disliked the results, he used colleague Wilfred Jackson to pose shirtless which gave him the images he needed. The Ave Maria sequence was completed and spliced into the film just four hours before its premiere. Over 1,000 artists and technicians were used in the making of Fantasia, which features more than 500 characters.

     This Disney production was an ambitious experiment to try to popularize classical music, especially by accompanying it with animation. Originally, the film was to consist of only The Sorcerer's Apprentice segment, but it was expanded to include the full anthology of shorts. And it was slightly controversial for its depiction of bare-breasted centaurettes in the Pastoral Symphony segment and other stereotypical racial depictions. [Adhering to the Hays Production Code and its strict rules, the figures were garlanded with flower bras for cover-up after swimming topless (still uncensored) in a waterfall and pond (seen from a distance). Also, in later releases of the film, in the Pastoral Symphony segment (again), two black Nubian/zebra centaurs who attend the Bacchus celebration were edited out, along with a female pickaninny centaurette with braided hair named Sunflower who shines the hoof of a white female centaurette. The black centaurette was first abruptly cut from the film and as technology improved, the scene was edited or 'resized' by zooming in on the frames with the character in them so that she was not seen in the shot.]
     Other segments, such as Ride Of The Valkyries, Swan of Tuonela, and Flight of the Bumblebee were storyboarded but never fully animated, and thus were never put into production for inclusion in future Fantasia-style releases.

Awards and Nominations:
     At the 14th Academy Awards in 1942, Disney called Fantasia a mistake. "We all make mistakes. Fantasia was one but it was an honest mistake. I shall now rededicate myself to my old ideals"
     Fantasia ranked fifth at the 1940 National Board of Review Awards in the Top Ten Films category. Disney and Stokowski won a Special Award for the film at the 1940 New York Film Critics Circle Awards. Fantasia was the subject of two Academy Honorary Awards on February 26, 1942 — one for Disney, William Garity, John N. A. Hawkins and the RCA Manufacturing Company for their "outstanding contribution to the advancement of the use of sound in motion pictures through the production of Fantasia," and the other to Stokowski "and his associates for their unique achievement in the creation of a new form of visualized music in Walt Disney's production Fantasia, thereby widening the scope of the motion picture as entertainment and as an art form."
     In 1990, Fantasia was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant."The film is featured in three lists that rank the greatest American films as determined by the American Film Institute.

Funny Tidbits You Didn't Know:

- The idea behind Fantasia came out of a chance meeting between Walt Disney and conductor Leopold Stokowski, who suggested to Walt that he produce a feature that would match animated sequences to classical music.
- Composer Igor Stravinsky, whose composition provided the inspiration for the musical segment, "Rite of Spring," was the only living composer whose work was used in Fantasia.
- In the Sorcerer's Apprentice sequence, the name of the sorcerer is Yen Sid, which is Disney, spelled backwards.

Movie Links:

http://www.sockshare.com/file/1B2DACA55E476DD3

Pinocchio

Pinocchio

Release Date: 2/7/1940

Distributed by: RKO Radio Pictures

Studio: Walt Disney Productions

Running Time: 88 minutes

Directors: Ben Sharpsteen, Hamilton Luske, Norman Ferguson, 

T. Hee, Wilfred Jackson, Jack Kinney, Bill Roberts

Producer: Walt Disney

Country: United States

Language: English

Historical Significance: 

-Second film by Walt Disney Studios

-Groundbreaking advancements in effect animation

Background:

     Production on Pinocchio started in the middle of 1937, during the production of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. Pinocchio was intended to be the studio's third film, after Bambi. However, Bambi proved to be a challenging film to adapt, so Pinocchio was moved ahead in production while Bambi was put on hold.

     The plan for the original film was considerably different from what was released. Numerous characters and plot points, many of which came from the original novel, were used in early drafts. Producer Walt Disney was displeased with the work that was being done and called a halt to the project midway into production so that the concept could be rethought and the characters redesigned.

Plot Summary:

The plot of the film involves an old wood-carver named Geppetto who carves a wooden puppet named Pinocchio being brought to life by a blue fairy, who tells him he can become a real boy if he proves himself "brave, truthful, and unselfish". Thus begin the puppet's adventures to become a real boy, which involve many encounters with a host of unsavory characters.

Voice Cast:

Pinocchio: Dickie Jones

Jiminy Cricket: Cliff Edwards

Mister Geppetto: Christian Rub

Figaro and Cleo (Mute)

John Worthington Foulfellow: Walter Catlett

Gideon (Mute) Originally Mel Blanc, but he provides the sound of Gideon's hiccups 

Stromboli: Charles Judels

The Blue Fairy: Evelyn Venable

The Coachman: Charles Judels

Lampwick: Frankie Darro

Monstro (Mute)

Alexander: Dickie Jones

Animation Style and Production:

     Originally, Pinocchio was to be depicted as a Charlie McCarthy-esque wise guy, equally as rambunctious and sarcastic as the puppet in the original novel. He looked exactly like a real wooden puppet with, among other things, a long pointed nose, a peaked cap, and bare wooden hands. But Walt found that no one could really sympathize with such a character and so the designer Milt Kahl had to redesign the puppet as much as possible. Eventually, they revised the puppet to make him look more like a real boy, with, among other things, a button nose, a child's Tyrolean hat, and standard cartoon character 4-fingered (or 3 and a thumb) hands with Mickey Mouse-type gloves on them. Milt quoted, "I do not think of him as a puppet, I think of him as a little boy". The only parts of him that still looked more or less like a puppet were his arms and legs. In this film, he is still led astray by deceiving characters, but gradually learns bit by bit, and even exhibits his good heart when he is offered to go to Pleasure Island by saying he needs to go home two times, before Honest John and Gideon pick him up themselves and carry him away.

     Additionally, it was at this stage that the character of the cricket was expanded. Jiminy Cricket became central to the story. Originally the cricket was not even in the film. Once added, he was depicted as an actual (that is, less anthropomorphized) cricket with toothed legs and waving antennae. But again Walt wanted something more likable, so Ward Kimball conjured up "a little man with no ears. That was the only thing about him that was like an insect."

     In order for the animators to see how a character looks in three-dimensions, clay models of the characters, known as maquettes were built during the production of the film. The artists also built working models of Geppetto's cuckoo clocks, as well as Stromboli's gypsy wagon and The Coachman's carriage. However since it is difficult to animate a realistic moving vehicle, the wagons were filmed on a miniature set using stop motion. After the carriages were filmed the staff would create photostats (pictures of every frame of the animation), then "ink and paint" the photostats onto animation cels and overlay the cels with those of the characters on the rostrum camera.

     Pinocchio is a ground breaking achievement in effects animation. Effects animators animate everything that is not the characters or the background. This includes smoke from cigars, shadows, magic, rain, and the ocean - none of which had been attempted to an extreme level of realism until this film. Pinocchio remains to this day the standard film for effects animation.

Awards and Nominations:

    Pinocchio won two Academy Awards, one for Best Original Score and one for Best Original Song for the song "When You Wish upon a Star".

Music:

     The songs in Pinocchio were composed by Leigh Harline and Lyrics by Ned Washington. Leigh Harline and Paul J. Smith composed the incidental music score.

"When You Wish upon a Star" - Jiminy Cricket, Chorus

"Little Wooden Head" - Geppetto

"Give a Little Whistle" - Jiminy Cricket, Pinocchio

"Hi-Diddle-Dee-Dee (An Actor's Life for Me)" - J. Worthington Foulfellow

"I've Got No Strings" - Pinocchio

"Hi-Diddle-Dee-Dee (An Actor's Life for Me) (reprise)" - J. Worthington Foulfellow

"When You Wish upon a Star (reprise)" - Jiminy Cricket, Chorus

     The album was described as being "recorded from the original soundtrack of the Walt Disney Production Pinocchio". According to Walt Disney Records, "this is the first time the phrase 'original soundtrack' was used to refer to a commercially available movie recording."

     The original version of "When You Wish upon a Star" was sung by Cliff Edwards in the character of Jiminy Cricket and is heard over the opening credits and again in the final scene of the film. The song has since become the theme song to The Walt Disney Company.

Funny Tidbits You Didn't Know:

- Mel Blanc (most famous for voicing many of the characters in Warner Bros. Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies cartoons), was hired to perform the voice of Gideon the Cat, who was Foulfellow the Fox's sidekick. However, it was eventually decided for Gideon to be mute (just like Dopey, whose whimsical, Harpo Marx-style persona made him one of Snow White's most comic and popular characters). All of Blanc's recorded dialogue in this film was subsequently deleted, save for a solitary hiccup, which was heard three times in the film.

- Pinocchio was a success in the United States alone, however it had poor box office results internationally. The film budget was a total of almost $2.3 million and Disney recouped only a little more than half of the film's cost. This was due to the fact that the film's release in Europe and Asia was delayed because of World War II and its immediate aftermath, which hindered its financial success initially.

Movie Links: 

http://www.putlocker.com/file/F8E2E0152A1DEC13
http://www.sockshare.com/file/XQKRSJAK5S0WGK