Les Trois Caballeros

The Three Caballeros is a lot of fun, using a mix of live action and animation to bring Brazil and Mexico alive to birthday boy Donald Duck. As he's joined by Panchito and José he realises what he has been missing all these years, falls in love with Aurora Miranda (sister of Carmen), learns to dance, and much more.

With eye-poppingly beautiful animation and lovely colours, it is no surprise that that was the one cartoon Disney veteran Ward Kimball claimed he was truly proud of. The idea of the three birds as international musketeers living the good life is inspired and the running time is just about right.

Funny, people nowadays don't seem to realize that this was a World War II propaganda film -- only one comment below makes that point. Many such features and shorts were turned out during this time, and not just from Disney; Warner Bros., MGM and others did as well. Keep this in mind and it makes a little more sense. Even more of the fractured, surreal nature of this film is explainable when viewed in the context of other Disney animated features of this time. "Fantasia" (of course), "Dumbo," "Pinocchio" and other movies contained what seemed like drug- or alcohol-induced sequences (maybe someone with more intimate knowledge of Disney productions of the time can shed some light on those!). Disney also seemed eager to experiment with blending of animation and live action during this time ("Song of the South"). Anyway, this was aimed primarily at engendering better relations between North Americans and our ostensible allies in Latin America. The animation is very good and some of the music (especially the title song) is memorable. Watch it for what it is and enjoy!

Most everything about this neat little movie has been said by previous posters, except this.

The motivation for making it was, of all things, the US State Department! The US was deeply involved in fighting World War Two. At this point in time the average American knew almost NOTHING about South America, and the Nazi government was busy making business and political connections there, especially in Paraguay... there, transplanted Germans were a well established colony. They were aiding Hitler's war effort with the operation of industrial concerns, as well as providing espionage support.

South America promised to become a new battlefront if German successes and infiltration continued. The region produced vital strategic raw materials, key among them rubber.

Our strongest ally in the region was Brazil. The US Navy had a number of installations there, both sea and air. The Brazilian Navy worked closely with US forces in hunting U-boats in the Atlantic narrows; a number of US Navy vessels were transferred to them. American air bases (the largest of which was at Recife) provides home base for American aircraft, both fixed wing and lighter than air blimps, to provide air support coverage to trans Atlantic convoy operations.

The State department felt it would be a good idea to familiarize Americans with the land, people, and way of life of South America, and called on Disney to produce THE THREE CABALLEROS. The movie was, first and foremost, a TEACHING TOOL for both military forces and the general public during a global war.

BTW... I love the crazy little bird too! HE'S the best part of the film!

There are two other Disney films made for the Government that I'd LOVE to find copies of.

One is VICTORY THROUGH AIR POWER, another WW2 product.

The other is one that I saw back in Basic Training in the 1970s. Believe it or not, the Walt Disney studios produced a military training film on the prevention of VENEREAL DISEASE!!! The unfortunate Lady dispensing said commodity bore a VERY striking resemblance to Snow White!

Because of that film I can never view SNOW WHITE in quite the same way ever again!

This was my favorite movie when I was four. Now that I'm older, I still watch it every once in awhile, even though there are movies I like better. The Three Caballeros is full of cute humor early in the movie, and the rapport between Donald Duck and Joe Carioca is wonderful. The animated short `The Cold-Blooded Penguin' is *very* cute, and the song `Baia' is one of my favorite Disney songs of all time. Then Panchito arrives, and after the wonderful `Three Caballeros' song, things start to go a little bit crazy. The plot, such as it was, completely evaporates as Donald seems to descend into a girl-crazy madness. I'm not saying this is necessarily a bad thing, however; the final part of the movie is very entertaining, even though it's odd at the same time. I gave this movie an 8 out of 10.

It was a cold January Saturday evening. The park was beautifully lit. People were cheery. We could see the Matterhorn on our right hand side. Magical is the best description I could find.

Suddenly, I started singing...

"Somos los tres carros, los Tres Caballeros, y nadie es igual a nosotros..."

What do I know. My friends all knew the words. 4 guys, ranging from 27 to 31 years old, began forming a chrous line and singing off the top of our lungs...

I don't know how this happened. This is not, by any stretch of imagination, a popular or wildly succesful film. I guess it just touched us, the way Donald Duck had a mexican friend (Panchito), or the wild "Piñata" scene, or the strong latin flavour of the film.

Memories notwithstanding, we kept on singing... and singing... and singing.

People around us seemed to enjoy the show, too.

"Valientes brillamos, como brilla un peso

-Quien dice?!?

NOSOTROS, LOS TRES CABALLEROS!"