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Disney film incorporating several animated shorts with live-action tour of Walt Disney's studio in Burbank, California. Robert Benchley gives a colorful "performance" as a guest of Walt's (who makes a cameo), meeting animators and storyboard-editors while pitching the movie idea of a shy dragon. This picture, more a playful stunt than a memorable entry in the Disney canon, features some gorgeous animation and a lovely switch from black-and-white to color early on. It's more likely to appeal to nostalgia-crazy grown-ups however, instead of restless kids. Look for appearances by Goofy, Donald Duck, Bambi, and...Alan Ladd?! **1/2 from ****

I am sure a lot of younger folks watching it will be disappointed. That's because the story of the "Reluctant Dragon" only makes up a tiny portion of this movie. So, if you expect to see a full-length cartoon, you are in for a big surprise.

The film is a behind the scenes look at the Disney Studio, though I must confess that it's VERY heavily orchestrated to give a happy look to the workers--even though at the time a VERY divisive strike was taking place. To make this image of one big happy family, many of the animators and other workers at the studio are actually portrayed by actors! This is dishonest but interesting as you see a very young Alan Ladd pretending to be a Disney animator! In addition, you'll see the prolific character actor John Dehner along side Ladd--but you might not recognize Dehner, as he's VERY skinny here! However, I must confess that despite being a faux look, many of the techniques were real and it still was very satisfying to watch.

This is all part of an over-arching story involving the witty Robert Benchley. His wife nags him to go talk to Walt Disney about making a cartoon out of his story, "The Reluctant Dragon". But, Benchley's heart isn't in it and he mostly just wanders about the studio--watching the workers doing their craft and interacting with them. In addition, you see a rough version of a cartoon about a genius baby and, at the end, the story of this dragon--which is downright adorable. In fact, the film is worth seeing just to see this great dragon tale--it's among the studio's best work, albeit short in length.

The whole package is great--well worth seeing--especially if you are interested in the craft of animation. And, some of the scenes are shot in some of the most vivid color of the era. A nice film in every way--just not what the kiddies might be expecting!

The film stars Robert Benchley as a man whose wife encourages him to pitch an idea to Walt Disney about adapting a children's book into a movie. So Benchley goes to the Disney Studios, where he wanders around and gets a behind-the-scenes look at the animation process. He's treated to a brief bit of Donald Duck, Bambi, and the storyboarding of a cartoon in production called Baby Weems. He also gets to watch a new Goofy cartoon, How to Ride a Horse. Then he meets Walt Disney and gets to see a 20-minute cartoon based on the book Benchley wanted to be adapted, The Reluctant Dragon.

The first 20 minutes or so of the live-action part of the movie is in black & white then it changes to beautiful Technicolor. It's a nice time capsule that shows us the goings-on at the Disney Studios back in the day and how they made cartoons. I found a lot of this fascinating. I absolutely loved the "paint mill" part! Robert Benchley is always funny. Walt Disney himself appears (wearing a groovy suit). Alan Ladd, Frances Gifford, and Frank Faylen all play Disney employees. The two major cartoons are the Goofy short and The Reluctant Dragon itself. The Goofy short is amusing.

The Dragon cartoon, which is I imagine why most people went to see this, is about a boy who befriends a shy, poetry-spouting dragon that doesn't like to fight. Well, for some reason, the boy is intent on getting the dragon to fight elderly knight, Sir Giles. Even after Sir Giles and the dragon meet and realize they both have a love of poetry in common, the boy still pushes for the fight. Finally the fight takes place, sort of, with Sir Giles and the dragon putting on a show for the villagers. I have to admit I didn't get the point of most of this. Why was the boy so intent on getting the dragon, whom he seemed to genuinely like, to fight? Once Sir Giles proposes the idea of faking the fight, he seems okay with it. So what was the point of pushing for the fight in the first place? Just let the dragon be! I know I'm probably looking too closely at it but it just seemed weird to me. Anyway, it's easy to see why this story wasn't enough for its own feature. It's animated nicely and has a sweet charm and humor about it, but the story needed reworking for sure. The dragon is impossible to dislike. Love his "Ode to Upside-Down Cake."

This movie was a flop at the time of its release, which is understandable. It was a very different kind of movie for Disney. Still, it's a joy to watch if you like little glimpses back in time as well as great old Technicolor and some nice cartoons. There are no hidden Pinocchios here or anything but they are pleasant with lovely animation. Robert Benchley is great fun. This probably isn't for everybody, and will especially turn off people expecting it to be a feature-length cartoon, but I liked it.

God, I love this film. It's just such fun.

At the time this film was made, Disney was primarily known for his animation but was positively itching to branch out into live-action. This is his first venture into "traditional" filmmaking. The story concerns comedic actor Robert Benchley (whose "How To" film series inspired many classic Goofy shorts) who, at the urging of his wife, searches the Disney studio top to bottom trying to sell Walt on the idea of making a movie about Kenneth Grahame's "The Reluctant Dragon" (Grahame's masterpiece "The Wind in the Willows" wouldn't become a Disney film for many years yet.) On the way he meets voice actors, musicians, animators (one played by Alan Ladd) and even Donald Duck and Goofy. When he finally finds Walt, he is shocked to see that his story has already been produced as one of Disney's most charming animated shorts.

Needless to say, this film is pretty dated in the age of "Toy Story" and "Finding Nemo" (I refuse to put the Dreamworks' "S" word in the same category as these two features) but the interesting thing is how many of these tried-and-true practices remain in effect to this day.

Surprisingly, this live-action film is ideal for animation fans. Not so much for the "How does it work?" element, but just the thrill in being immersed in that world. From sound effects recording to paint application. And Benchley's funny, let's not forget that.

Humorist Robert Benchley is at home. His wife convinces him to sell the rights for his story 'The Reluctant Dragon' to Walt Disney. She drags him to the studio and leaves him there. He wanders around the studio and discovers the animation process along the way. Finally he meets Walt Disney himself.

This starts as a black and white live action fictional drama. The fact that it's not animation made it less than successful originally. However it's fascinating to see where Disney began and what it looked like. It's a studio tour dressed up as a little story. This is terrific as a time capsule and a fun way to see how it was made. This is probably a good movie to show new hires at the time. After 25 minutes, the movie turns into technicolor with some animation. Goofy has a cartoon about how to ride a horse. The final section has the Reluctant Dragon cartoon. This movie has a bit of historical values but as a story, this is rather bland.

I can see why the public was less than amused with this movie by Walt Disney (yeah, I can see people thinking they were cheated out of their movie ticket). It has very poor animation, and lots of corny live-action stuff.

BUT... when watched along the rest of the tin DVD box (Behind the Studios), the movie becomes a joy to behold. The whole animation process is shown as a nice overview of what people had to go through just to get a 10 minute short ready. Absolutely amazing!

Reluctant Dragon is best viewed in the Disney Treasures Behind the Scenes DVD.this story combined with baby weems and Goofys "how to ride a horse" make this a magical treat for all ages,Timeless Disney classic.The live action scenes of the original voices of Donald Duck and Clara Cluck are a rare joy to see.

While not necessarily a childhood favourite, The Reluctant Dragon is very sweet and engrossing as well as easy to like. The animation is lovely, very colourful and nice to look at, fairly simplistic in its construction but very nice all the same. The music is very pleasant, very playful and sweet. I really liked the characters here, the reluctant dragon himself is very lovable, and I admit I mistook his voice actor for Ed Wynn when I first saw this. And the little boy's voice reminds me of the voice of Pinnocchio in the Disney film of the same name. Sir Gyles, despite not being in it very much, is a good character. The poetry is great too; the script isn't the best in the world, but all the same it is a sweet and thoroughly enjoyable mini-classic. 9/10 Bethany Cox

I liked the initial part more, with the live-action, in black and white with the backstage of Disney production with the participation of Disney artists Donald Duck, Goofy, and the cutest of all, the baby genius, the animation of the Dragon is cute, but not as interesting and captivating when the first half...

This little classic spends just short of an hour touring the Disney Studios in the company of Robert Benchley, the humorist who acts like a big kid in a candy store (and is thus the perfect guide for something like this).

We see how the cartoons are made, moving from the recording studio - where the real-life voices of Donald Duck and Clara Cluck sing an aria - through to clay models of the characters to be animated - the sound effects dept. (we see the full Casey Junior sequence, some of which ended up in 1941's 'Dumbo') - the scenario department (we see a whole cartoon - Baby Weems - in storyboard format) - the animation department (we see a cartoon feature on riding a horse, and see Donald Duck showing us how he walks) - and much more. There's also a neat segue from black and white to Technicolor.

'The Reluctant Dragon' is a book which Benchley hopes to pitch to Disney, only to find the film has already been made; the last 20 minutes of this feature is the cartoon about the (rather camp) dragon, and a classic bit of Disney work.

The whole movie is engrossing and a fantastic overview of the state-of-the-art work being done by the Disney Studios at the beginning of the 40s.

Robert Benchley proves to be an engaging guide in a movie that provides a rare insight into how Disney's favourite characters make it to the screen. Ironically, these scenes are more entertaining than the cartoon interludes - although the camp title character, who's more interested in dancing and reciting poetry than burning villages, is something of a hoot.

This is the fourth disney movie to get a theatrical release after Snow White and The Seven Dwarfs, Pinocchio and Fantasia the movie begins with a real woman reading us the book by Kenneth Grahame who also did The Wind In The Willows she reads the book to his husband who was in the pool playing until she finishes reading it and they sell the book to Walt Disney we hear the jingle Whistle While You Work then they see a police man they say that they were looking to Mr Disney we see stuff like drawing the elephant and listening to the music we also see Clarence Nash who does the Donald Duck impression we even hear stuff like Casey Junior that was before they did Dumbo (1941) we also see that Donald Duck also makes a cameo in one scene and there was even Bambi but this movie came after The Reluctant Dragon and the same mentioned movie and much more.

The Reluctant Dragon is a decent trip back in time, with some fun animations and a lot of 40s humor. If you were looking for a more genuine look behind the scenes though this isn't it. It's heavily scripted, to the smiling people walking outside and every word that's said.

There's not a lot to say about this. I went into it hoping for a bit of a behind the scenes look of WDP and how they actually make it all, but it stays very light on depth and just shows you the bare minimum.

The main character that takes you through is alright, but didn't click with me. Might just be the age of the show. It's fairly bland and the humor is slapstick.

The animations featured here are decent. But none of them have made a lasting impact. Also if I were interested in this to see Walt Disney for a couple minutes, well, you get about 10 seconds. So yeah.. expected a bit more from this.

I wasn't familiar with this movie and didn't even have any idea what it was supposed to be about before I started watching, so I didn't know what to expect. The dialogue was cheesey, and there wasn't really a plot. But it was a fascinating look behind the scenes of how Disney made animated films in the early 1940s. The movie shows a lesson in the drawing studio, a recording session of Donald Duck's voice (which I had no idea wasn't a special effect), and then a recording session for the sound effects for Casey Junior. That was pretty cool to see how creative they were with making the sounds and how orchestrated everything was. We also see a multiplane camera, learn that the paints were made onsite, and see how cells were made. A storyboard is also shown. Throughout, there are short animated stories shown that were supposed to be movies being made in the studio (they weren't movies in real life, it's part of the plot). The shorts were pretty strange, and I think too much time was given to them - it doesn't do anything to advance the pretty non-existent "plot" of this movie. So this definitely isn't the greatest film, but it's worth seeing just to see the history of animation, which was so interesting.

The Reluctant Dragon is about a childlike children's book author who goes to Walt Disney Studios to see about having his book adapted into a cartoon, his adventure through the studio gives a look at how they created cartoons back in the 40's.

Seeing cartoons in process is very interesting in itself, it features a cast of many known Disney talents including the original voice of Donald Duck, it's a treat seeing how these Disney Legends did what they did.

Then you add in the animated bits, shorts like Baby Weems, How to Ride a horse Starring Goofy, and of course The Reluctant Dragon. These shorts are very funny, they each deserve a viewing on their own.

It's a shame how few people have even heard of this Disney film. If you can get your hands on the Adventures of Ichabod & Mr. Toad with Fun & Fancy Free Blu-ray this film is included as well.

All around I give it two thumbs up!

I enjoyed all the Disney cartoons when I was at a really young age. I used to rent the Mini Classics out of my local video store. As soon as I saw this particular cartoon, I knew that this would be the all-time best in my opinion. It's a fantastic cartoon.

The characters breathe life into the story, and are not what you would expect. If you think the Dragon is going to be a ferocious beast, you're wrong. He's just a shy, fun and flamboyant creature who loves to recite poetry, drink tea and sing songs. He steals each scene. Sir Giles and the Boy are also brilliant supporting characters.

The animation is a sight to see. There is so much detail. It's extraordinary to see a cartoon from the Forties that has amazing colour. It's very good for its time.

The most important thing about this cartoon is the message of not putting people into their anticipated stereotypes. Just because the main character happens to be a dragon doesn't mean he will be ferocious. The same goes for Sir Giles. He is apparently a dragon slayer, yet he is portrayed as an old man with the same interest as the Dragon, which is poetry. He seems like someone who has never slain a dragon before, yet is praised for being something he is not.

I really recommend this. It's warm and funny, and will entertain people of all ages.

After filming the live-action sequences of "Fantasia" and hurting for a "feature release" following the financial fiascos of the aforementioned feature, presumably Disney rushed this into production (with most of it live-action, it not only cost less than a fully-animated counterpart of equal length, it took much less time to complete).

It purports to tell the story of how Disney animated cartoons are made, but, courtesy of a disclaimer at the beginning of the movie, it turns out to be more fiction than fact.

Various processes - like sound recording, paint-mixing, cell-photographing, multi-planing, etc - are all upended for the sake of humor (in one instance, a complete cel of Donald Duck comes to life, in another instance, the sound effects crew creates an "unplanned" cacophony by knocking over all the equipment).

More to the point is that the sequences are not just staged, but they employ professional actors (such as Alan Ladd!) portraying Disney animators and other staff (although in certain instances, actual animators such as Woolie Reitherman and Ward Kimball make appearances).

The "Baby Weems" sequence is often commended by many for being innovative and the forerunner of the UPA-style that would dominant the art of animation in the 1950s, but the fact is that "Weems" is nothing more than a sleek, streamlined version of a "leica reel" (a film which combines the pre-recorded soundtrack with the animators' storyboard sketches, as a way of assessing how story pacing and timing are before *before* any time and effort are spent creating fully-animated sequences). The story is cute, the drawings are more fully- rendered than they would be in a genuine Leica reel so they are nice to see, but "innovative"? I don't think so.

The Goofy "How-to" sequence is okay (I never cared for the "How-To" series, but I know a similarly-themed version in "Saludos Amigos" with Goofy trying to be a Gaucho is funnier).

The title short - "The Reluctant Dragon" - is cute and funny. I don't think it rates as a classic, but because it is such a rarely-viewed piece it needs to be watched by all Disney-philes.

Considering its historic value, this movie is hardly a waste of time. It's just not one that deserves repeated viewings.

"The Reluctant Dragon" is one of the most fascinating "one off", genre-bending children's films ever made. The historical aspect of the film, giving as it does, an insight into the 1940s Disney studio empire, sets it apart, with the actual appearance of Walt Disney himself really topping it off. The colour sequences are a (deliberately) totally stunning example of the Technicolor process.

I've seen it several times, normally with my young children as an early "rite of passage". This time, however, I'm digging it out to show my film students, who are looking at CGI. Not all things filmic change, as a side by side comparison of this film with "The Making of Ice Age" can verify, for instance. Maybe I'll make some more in-depth comments once I've seen the film again.

Meanwhile, all I have to do is actually locate my video copy of the film... lurking not too reluctantly, I hope, in the storage space under my stairs...

• Two years later, and I have finally located my VHS copy of this film! Now to watch it with my 8 year old son, and then maybe I'll add some insight from his perspective here in this review! If you found this 'mini-review' helpful, then please checkout my full length IMDb reviews, written for post-viewing discussion with live audiences. This postscript added 21st June 2006.

I happened upon this film during a late night when nothing else was on TV, and couldn't have been happier that I came across it.

In this, we're taken behind-the-scenes of Disney studios circa 1941, and given a humorous (and, I'm sure, highly fictionalized) tour of the studio and its various departments. While I've always been a fan of Disney's animation, I'd never been given a glimpse of the animators themselves, and I always thought that they deserved to be as well known as the Warner Brothers stable of talent. Well, here they're given a chance to hog the spotlight (as Disney himself doesn't show up until the final few moments of the film) and show off their talents.

Not only is this a good chance for you to see how some of your Disney favorites were brought to screen, the linking device with comic Robert Benchley is charming throughout, and the attitude is more than a little self-deprecating (playing up the notion that one is indoctrinated into the "Disney way of life" in working for the Mouse, Benchley's guide is portrayed as a militarily-garbed, wormy little walking Disney Rule Book). The animation itself is great (as is usual for Disney of this vintage) and the live-action work is funny in a way that most Disney live-action works aren't. All of this adds up to a most rewarding, and highly neglected, classic from the Vaults of Disney.