Review by jwkenne

I chanced to catch this on US television many years ago, under the title of "The Treasure of Swamp Castle", and was astounded as I watched it to realize that it was an alternate version of a live show that I'd been in in New York in 1984. It's based on the novel "A cigánybáró" (1885), by Mór Jókai, which is also the source of the operetta "Die Zigeunerbaron" ("The Gypsy Baron") by Johann Strauss, II. Although it is not an operetta, much of Strauss's music is used as underscoring, most amusingly when the famous Pig-farmer's Song ("I've no time for learning writing. / Breeding pigs is too exciting.") is adapted as a formal gavotte.

The film is in the style of animation known as "International", and a tad surreal. Some bits of the plot seemed a bit vague, but perhaps that was the English translation.