This sequence still amazes me, both conceptually and especially for the date. I am truly blown away by it. 1941? They didn't have the internet or anything back then!

:D

Pink Elephants (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=944cPciN-kw)

Best when viewed high...

Surely that scene was a prelude to Fantasia.

A masterpiece of creativity and artistic execution.

They must have had some pretty good stuff back then! :smoke:

No, seriously, that comes from the era when the Walt Disney Company was still run by Walt Disney. Sheer genius at animation and entertainment, combined with near-perfectionism in the execution. Some of the best cartoon work ever made came from that company.

When Walt passed on (God rest his soul), the company was rudderless-to-misguided, and facing society's movement away from decent family values that began in the sixties, it began to lose money.

In the end, it had to be sold (out). Alas, under Michael Eisner, Disney regained profitability, but lost its soul, lost its genius, lost much of its real creativity. It became just another greedy, calculating company that didn't care about anything any more except the bottom line. Along the way, it lost the support of many who had been ardent fans for years, based on things like those elephants, Fantasia, Snow White, and all the other wonderful things that were created under guidance of the company's founder.

Once up on a time, Disney was known as a GOOD company, a special company... a company that you felt proud to love, because you knew what the founding father whose name was on the company was all about. Not any more. Today it is just another bunch of greedy execs trying to make a buck. Morals and quality (beyond what it takes to make money) be damned. Today, I try NOT to give the soulless beast of a company very much of my money.

But every time I see the old cartoons they did way back when [I have some on Laserdisc], I feel grateful that a man like Walt Disney lived on this earth, and left us such a wonderful legacy.

Walt Disney is so cool...:D

:naughty:

I like the square bubbles being blown by the elephant with the square cross-section trunk.

EDIT: The Heffalumps and Woozles scene from whichever Winnie the Pooh movie is cut from similarly psychedelic cloth.

I'll add that the black crows that Dumbo hangs with have something to do with the Black Crowes.

When Dumbo hangs with the crows in the movie, it is obvious that he is hanging with the underclass of the day who accept Dumbo as himself rather than succumbing to prejudice that they must have been all to familiar with. Walt Disney was a class act.

Ken

I seen a house fly!

There is no animation of the era to equal Disney - so many of the films are "dimensional" in appearance because of the complete animation of the frame, not just a few elements. The multi-plane cameras they developed put even the still background paintings in motion. True "cinematography", not simply flat sequential drawings.

I made a point of collecting them all in the early days of the VHS releases, then started over in DVD. I recall a time when the early films were on 7-year cycles in the theater... I have fond memories of seeing a "green line" Fantasia print. :)

There is no animation of the era to equal Disney - so many of the films are "dimensional" in appearance because of the complete animation of the frame, not just a few elements. The multi-plane cameras they developed put even the still background paintings in motion. True "cinematography", not simply flat sequential drawings.

I made a point of collecting them all in the early days of the VHS releases, then started over in DVD. I recall a time when the early films were on 7-year cycles in the theater... I have fond memories of seeing a "green line" Fantasia print. :)

I always enjoyed the classic Disney cartoons growing up. They were the benchmark to every other cartoon I watched. I never truly appreciated their technical merit until after my first was old enough to want to watch them too. I had a hot-rodded Advent projector TV back then with 7.5' screen and the detail was great. I was staggered when I watched Snow White as she dances with the Dwarves. The fluidity of movement and depth is incredible and the multiplane process to thank for it; in 1937!