Tiempo de melodía

Seven animated musical shorts from Walt Disney (with some live-action interspersed) include themes of young love and the wonders of nature. Highlights are the raucous "Pecos Bill" segment and the story of "Johnny Appleseed". Obviously, "Melody Time" was a holding-pattern release for the studio while they completed their more high-profile pictures. Certainly it is filled with gorgeous color, animated grandeur, and old-fashioned songs, but it's considered to be one of Disney's lesser efforts, and for good reason. The lack of a strong theme, matched with Disney's penchant for cuteness, may cause some non-Disney buffs to start squirming after thirty minutes or so. Pretty much interchangeable with "Make Mine Music", which was released in 1946. **1/2 from ****

If you like Fantasia, Fantasia 2000 this nearly lost film is worth checking out. It is an anthology of shorts set to popular music from the 40's. It is a lot more accessible to the average viewer than the classic music of fantasia. The shorts-like always-are a mixed bag but each has its charm that make each worth watching once. I particularly liked "Little Toot" and "Bumble Boogie."

The WWII years were not good to 'ol Walt Disney. First, a crippling strike occurred just before the war (in which he lost about a third of his animators) and then the war took a whole bunch more. Plus, apart from making military training films and a few shorts here and there, the production of full-length films ground to a complete halt. Up until this time, Disney had produced some amazingly good cartoons such as "Snow White", "Pinocchio" and "Bambi" among others. Once the war was over, the studio was a mess and they were in no shape to try to replicate their past glorious films. So, the studio worked on a wide variety of short films--intended as experimental productions and opportunities for the new animators to hone their craft. To put it bluntly, it was almost like the minor leagues of Disney--or perhaps the pre-season! Regardless, by 1946-8, they had A LOT of shorts and decided to clump them together (sometimes clumsily) and release them as full-length films, such as "Make Mine Music", "Saludos Amigos" and this film. Unfortunately, these all were wildly uneven pictures--full of very good stuff, some poor stuff and some downright awful stuff. For kids, in particular, they were second or third-rate films--often full of dull songs and varying wildly in style, content and focus.

Of the collections marketed as full-length films, "Melody Time" might just be the most consistent of them. While it still is uneven and occasionally bad (Once Upon a Winter Time), it also had more good stuff--though nothing exactly great. The best of them were probably "Pecos Bill" and "Little Toot"....though I also liked "Bumble Boogie". The rest of the crop would fall somewhere between these extremes. Enjoyable but probably a film best for die-hard Disney fans or people who adore animation...REALLY adore animation. Otherwise, I anticipate some very disappointed people out there.

During the '40s many of the animated films released by the Disney studios were compilation-style movies. By that, I mean that instead of telling one story over the course of 80 or so minutes, the films were made up of a series of short animated stories linked together. The most successful example of this approach was "Fantasia" (which was linked together by pieces of classical music), but nowadays many people are not aware that the studio made several films of this kind. "The Three Caballeros", "Make Music Mine", "Saludos Amigos", "Fun and Fancy Free" and "Melody Time" are some of the other examples.

Melody Time is split into seven sections. "Once Upon A Wintertime" deals with a loving couple who go ice-skating on a frozen river; "Bumble Boogie" deals with a bee which is pursued by a variety of living musical instruments to the accompaniment of Rimsky Korsakov's Flight Of The Bumblebee; "Johnny Appleseed" retells an old American legend about a pioneer who struck out west and planted the first apple forests; "Little Toot" deals with a mischievous young tugboat which redeems itself by saving a liner in a storm; "Trees" is a short poetic sequence in which the title tells you all you need to know; "Blame It On The Samba" is a simple dance sequence starring Donald Duck; and "Pecos Bill", which begins with real-life actors (among them Bobby Driscoll) talking around a desert campfire, and proceeds to relate the animated story of the titular Wild West character who was raised by coyotes and got into various wacky adventures.

Generally-speaking, I find the longer sequences the best. The opening sequence, "Wintertime", is excellent, with just the right touch of comedy and excitement. "Little Toot" is excellent too - arguably the best episode in the film in fact. And "Pecos Bill" is thoroughly entertaining and has some laugh-out-loud moments. Of the longer episodes, only "Johnny Appleseed" feels laboured and frankly dull. The shorter episodes are actually rather disappointing. "Bumble Boogie" has terrific musical accompaniment, but is forgettable; "Trees" is pleasant but ordinary; and "Blame It On The Samba" looks like a rejected sequence from The Three Caballeros (1947), and is by far the most irritating sequence in this film, despite the presence of the perennially popular Donald Duck. On the whole, Melody Time might only really appeal to Disney completists; it has amusing and ingenious moments though you have to wade through some dull stretches to find them.

Buddy Clark's voice hosts and introduces 7 shorts set to popular and folk music sung by contemporary talent of the era ranging from the Andrew Sisters to Roy Rogers.

The anthology film produced by Walt Disney pictures and second to last "package film" which would conclude with the following year's The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad, Melody Time like other projects of the mid to late 40s was intended to be cheaply produced by the studio, but unlike previous films made either out of necessity or under contract to the State Department, the goal of Melody Time as well as the following Year's Ichabod and Mr. Toad was to accumulate capital to return to single narrative features with 1950's Cinderella. Like many of the post Fantasia anthologies produced by Disney it lacks the grandiosity and artistry of Fantasia, but some of its shorts do come close to reaching the same level.

Most of the shorts of Melody Time are pretty well in line with the standards of a typical Silly Symphony cartoon with segments such as Once Upon a Wintertime, Little Toot, and Bumble Boogie being technically well made, but not all that memorable or substantive. Even Bumble Boogie which tries for a more surreal approach feels rather rote at this point because it looks so similar in style and execution to Pink Elephants for Dumbo or sequences to Three Caballeros there's a feeling of "been there, done that" that's hard to escape. Blame It on the Samba features a reteam of Donald Duck and Jose Carioca who are livened up by the Aracuan Bird introducing both of them to the Samba which leads to a live-action/animated mix where the three cartoon birds interact with organist Ethel Smith in what's admittedly a retread of the Baia segment from Three Caballeros, but the syncing of animation with live-action actors has gotten noticeably better with more in depth levels of interaction and some more ambitious camera work. The only weird part of this short is that Jose and Donald are completely mute and lacking in personality and I'm not entirely sure why. Both Jose and Donald are really expressive characters with distinguished personalities and without Jose's suave charm and energy or Donald Duck's anger, annoyance, and irritability it's kind of strange seeing them without the usual traits associated with them.

The other shorts are slightly above average with a retelling of the Legend of Pecos Bill being a well animated slapstick comedy with some creative imagery (even if it's kind of an odd note to end the movie on), a recitation of the Joyce Kilmer poem "Trees" brought to life with animation to show a single tree in all four seasons that's quite beautiful, but easily the best short is The Legend of Johnny Appleseed where we look at the life of John Chapman who goes from humble apple farmer to American legend with the help of his guardian angel. Johnny Appleseed despite it's short length shows grand ambitions and encompasses all the best parts of the ideals of America and humanity as we see Johnny befriend nature and spread apples and kindness across the land solely for its own sake and to help bring a sense of decency and community. The imagery in this short is nothing short of epic with a scene of Johnny's shadow stretching across the land, or apple blossoms transitioning to clouds being some truly memorable sights.

Melody Time like all the other package films Disney produced during the 40s has some okay segments and some segments that are awe inspiring. I don't think the movie's all that impressive as a whole and would say it's probably preferable to experience these shorts on their own, but there is some really strong work on display despite it being disjointed.