Fantasia

Disney's "Fantasia" is a pure classic.

What we are shown are a few animated musicals, filled with grand splendor and vivid colors.

"Fantasia" is one of those films that everyone knows by heart, and has watched since being a child.

My personal favorite was always the Mickey Mouse short - one of the darkest Mickey cartoons I've ever seen.

If you haven't seen "Fantasia" yet, then you must be from another planet. It is one of the best Disney musicals ever, which some push aside and forget too easily.

5/5 stars-

John Ulmer

This is one of the truly rare, one of a kind movie going experiences, kind of in the same league as watching 2001: A Space Odyssey. I like to watch this film repeatedly; often times I'll just close my eyes and daydream, letting my own imagination go in place of whats on the screen. My favorite part is the opening sequence, with its dramatic music and free flowing imagery foreshadowing the state of the world in 1940. The end of Ave Maria is the perfect bookend to this masterpiece; death has withdrawn and peace has finally arrived. It would, but not for another five years and millions of lives. I can never watch this movie without seeing it in this context; for me its a work of art, both a part and ahead of its time.

In 1940, Walt Disney released "Fantasia", the third feature of his studio and maybe his most ambitious project, with a beautiful combination of classical music conducted by Leopold Stokowski and animation. The result is a movie that has been worshiped by every generation.

Yesterday I saw "Fantasia" again, now on the Special 60th Anniversary Edition DVD, restored and remastered with audio in THX inclusive with intermission. The program, for those that have eventually never seen or want to recall, is composed by the following:

(1) Toccata and Fugue in D Minor by Johann Sebastian Bach.

(2) Nutcracker Suite by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky.

(3) The Sorcerer's Apprentice by Paul Dukas.

(4) Rite of Spring by Igor Stravinsky.

(5) Intermission/Meet the Soundtrack.

(6) The Pastoral Symphony by Ludwig van Beethoven.

(7) Dance of the Hours by Amilcare Ponchielli.

(8) Night on Bald Mountain by Modest Mussorgsky.

(9) Ave Maria by Franz Schubert.

My vote is eight.

Title (Brazil): "Fantasia"

This without a doubt the greatest animated film in history. While highly acclaimed and well-known today, it was not terribly popular when it was first released. The idea of "Fantasia" is to take great pieces of music and draw animated sequences that match them. In doing so, it reverses the purpose of a movie's score; the movie serves and matches the music, not the other way around. This set up also means that there is no typical formula plot that is present in the vast majority of movies. In the first piece, the animation is vague and abstract, but in later ones it is of definite actions, objects, and stories. The two most famous(and my favorite) parts are probably "The Sorcerer's Apprentice" and "Rite of Spring". "Fantasia" is not only the best animated film ever made, but one of the greatest films period.

I first remember hearing about this movie when I was very little, and ever since I first watched it on VHS, it has always been one of the many examples of my favorite movies of all time. This is so unique, because unlike a typical Disney movie, in this movie we do not hear any dialog from the characters, and all of the music is instrumental (except for "Ave Maria" at the end). The film is divided into eight sequences, each of them being introduced by a guy named Deems Taylor, who was a very well-known music critique.

The eight segments are as follows:

1.) "Tocatta & Fugue in D-minor" composed by Johanne Sebastian Bach. This segment consists of shots of the Philadelphia Orchestra and their conductor Leopold Stokowski with a lot of cool shadow and color effects during the first three minutes, then we see a lot of shapes and random objects that Taylor would suggest to us might pop into our brains when listening to the music.

2.) "The Nutcracker Suite" composed by Tchaikovsky. In this part of the movie, we listen to excerpts of the famous ballet suite, and we see various fairies, flowers, fish and other nature-related creatures.

3.) Everyone's favorite "The Sorcerer's Apprentice" starring Sorcerer Mickey and Yen Sid (the sorcerer whose name is "Disney" spelled backwards). This is also the only segment to be seen again in this film's sequel, "Fantasia/2000" 60 years later, and in it the apprentice brings to life a magical broomstick to try to fill a cauldron with water, and the spell goes wrong so the apprentice gets reprimanded. This is then followed by Mickey greeting conductor Stokowski.

4.) "Rite of Spring" composed by Igor Stravinsky. This segment takes place billions and billions of years ago with the coming of the dinosaurs, where we see the creation of Earth in the beginning of time, and are later introduced to all of the different dinosaurs including the tyrannosaurus rex, which become extinct in the end of the segment.

5.) "Intermission/Meet the Soundtrack". At this point in the film, Deems Taylor introduces this string thingamajigger called the "Soundtrack" that he asks to make a lot of sounds resembling various instrument sounds.

6.) "Pastoral Symphony No. 6" composed by Beethoven. This segment is about a day in the countryside, and in it we see a lot of Greek mythology creatures like unicorns, satyrs, centaurs and centaurettes, cupids, Bacchus, Zeus, Iris, Apollo and Diana.

7.) "Dance of the Hours". This is where we see dancing ostriches, alligators, elephants and hippos. Each part of the piece suggests different hours of the day, and it all ends with a triumphant finale where the dancing hippo takes center stage.

8.) A combination of two pieces that are utterly different in mood and tone. They are "Night on Bald Mountain" in which a bat villain named Chernabog has Satan's evil spirits dance furiously until the coming of the sacred dawn, and then Franz Schubert's "Ave Maria" which is the one and only part of the whole film in which we hear lyrics sung, and then the movie ends.

I simply must say that not only is this film one of my all time favorite animated masterpieces, but it is also an example of a big highlight of the 1940's in cinematic history, all because of the ways it is so unique and special. In addition to this masterpiece, I also think "The Wizard of Oz", "Gone with the Wind", "Citizen Kane" and "Casablanca" are main icons of cinematic successes. I definitely think this should have been the first animated movie to be nominated for the Best Picture Academy Award instead of "Beauty and the Beast".