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roskirambles · 4 months

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(Archive) Animated movie of the day: Fantasia (1940)

Originally posted: January 4th, 2022 Walter Elias Disney, a controversial man in life and legacy. A businessman at heart, selling an illusion to audiences he so called magic, and tried to hide many of his lesser traits and allegiances throughout his life. Nonetheless, if there's one thing I can actually admire about the man is that he respected animation as a medium, and this is reflected in one of his passion projects: the unprecedented masterpiece that is Fantasia.

A joint work between the Walt Disney company, professional critic Deems Taylor as the Master of Ceremonies and Leopold Stokowski in the direction of the Philadelphia Orchestra, this anthology of classical music with animation of different styles and flavors ranges from abstract and surreal imagery, to the whimsical, frightening and sublime when it comes to the more defined storytelling of other segments. Music from Bach, Tchaikovsky, Dukas, Stravinsky, Bethooven, Ponchielli and Mussorgksy is featured, each as their own dedicated short, along with a small intermission where a sound track is given characterization.

The end result is a highly varied compilation of shorts with both subtle and stark differences in art direction, and a very experimental approach to what animation is about. In many, many ways it was impressively ahead of it's time, which only makes it's dissapointing performance at the box office back in the day all the more saddening.

This isn't to say everything about it is timeless or feels contemporary. While still a remarkable achievement of animation, where just short of 80 years later it's still engrossing and impressive, instances like the now cut character of Sunflower in the Pastoral Symphony segment reflect the ugly, racist side of American culture at the time. There's other less insulting but still dated bits, like how Taylor claims nobody performs the Nutcracker ballet anymore. Yeah, right. Even so, for any animation enthusiast it's a must watch.

Honestly, this movie gives so much to talk about for an animation enthusiast. I think it warrants writing some thoughts about each segment.

Toccata and Fugue in D Minor(Johann Sebastian Bach): A powerful musical piece to start, but visually speaking it's not the strongest opening. While I do appreciate(immensely I might add) that Disney did NOT go for the stereotyped scary imagery associated with this piece but instead something more sublime (given the dynamic range the toccata actually offers), the abstract imagery doesn't necessarily lend anything substantial to the music, even when it goes from dark places to the very heavens. That is, when the animation actually starts, since a not so small segment of the short is the performers shot in silhouette. Stokowski's arrangement of the piece isn't the most evocative version of this musical milestone either.

Still, on a technical level, the animation is remarkable, and given the significant shifts in the musical structure they did what they could.

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Nutcracker suite(Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky): While the narrative is less abstract, it's certainly not very defined either. The animation, however, is much more evocative and beautiful to look at, with soft movements of ballet like quality; all too fitting for the piece.

Given it is associated to a narrative that is already well defined, the animators pretty much gave themselves a challenge by pursuing a significantly different direction that, while still using imagery related to fairies, it has a focus entirely put on the beauty of nature. Giving flowers and mushrooms alike anthropomorphic qualities but also allowing them to just move at the pace of the wind, the effects animation here is as stunning as it is educational for any aspiring animator. Colorful and soft, it's just a visual delight.

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The Sorcerer's Apprentice(Paul Dukas): By far the most popular and well known segment of the film, this short based on a poem from Goethe puts Mickey Mouse in the role of said apprentice under the guide of Yen Sid(subtle reference right there). The irony of the impressionist piece being the first one to get a proper narrative aside, this short is still as charming as ever was.

While the effects animation isn't any less remarkable(in fact, my hat goes off for all those involved in the water animation of this segment), the pressence of Mickey Mouse and the broom make the character animation be the star of the show this time, and it still holds up. It goes all the way to show the power of well composed body language that you can follow the story even without Taylor's prior introduction.

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Rite of the Spring(Igor Fyodorovich Stravinsky): A piece from the only composer that was still alive to see the film(who also GREATLY disliked the interpretation of his piece, calling the performance execrable) this is a valiant effort of wordless stoytelling with creatures of minimal anthropomorphic qualities.

While Taylor's introduction already hammers in the era in which this was made(he has to tiptoe around calling scientific observations "facts" to not get flak from conservative Christians), the representation of dinosaurs is anachronistic and dated as well, so is the vagueness of what destroyed them(the crater of the meteor that caused their mass extinction wasn't discovered until 1978).

Still. the segment creates genuine feelings of menace from the Tyrannosaurus Rex, and the effects animation is still remarkable(special mention goes to the magma and the smoke, even though fire doesn't look quite right in some shots). It does what it sets to do in presenting the power of nature.

--- Intermission/Meet the Soundtrack: The brief jazz number by the orchestra is nice, and honestly, the Sound track is pretty adorable for a non descriptive collection of shapes. It's also impressive how they managed to give different sounds visual abstract equivalents.

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Pastoral Symphony(Ludwig van Beethoven): The only part of Disney's Movie canon to feature female nudity along with the Night on Bald Mountain segment(at least until later rereleases), it's whimsical depiction of Greek Mythology still manages to be more accurate to the source material than future endeavors of the company such as Hercules, humorously enough. The greek gods weren't nice people, and this segment has some fun with that(remember kids, Zeus is a jerk). The extremely simple love story between the centaurs is still wholesome though, and the imagery is very creative.

The animation complexity of this short lead to some small animation errors but you're not gonna notice if you're not looking for them. It also has in my opinion the most beautiful backgrounds of the film, rivalled only by some segments of the naturalistic beauty of the Nutcracker Suite.

--- Dance of the Hours(Amilcare Ponchielli): Charmingly innocent in a way that it's not seen very often anymore, it uses it's ballet roots in a fairly literal fashion by making a ballet number with different species of animals representing different hours of the day. The body language of these animals is just brilliant, they're expressive, carry a well defined movement to each one(that isn't realistic but definitely distinctive) and there's something inherently comical about how they dance, even when they do it effectively.

Honestly given the premise of the ballet this is the one short where I'd have gone abstract. I can't complain though, since the humorous gags and silly imagery just make it a sincerely funny experience, albeit not the most remarkable among the anthology(plus, female ostriches don't have the black and white plumage, but let's not get too nitpicky here).

--- Night on Bald Mountain/Ave Maria(Modest Petrovich Mussorgsky/ Franz Peter Schubert): Try to act surprised when I tell you the spooky segment is my favorite part of the movie. At the same time, however, I think it's warranted in this case. Horror is not something animation was known for back in the day. Even if movies like Pinocchio had some remarkably dark imagery, the medium in general was being pushed towards this kid oriented market, so this short was in many ways daring. And the end result both hits the mark with the fear and also happens to deliver one of the more complete narratives in the film. It's not just about the spooks, but the catharsis afterwards.

Chernabog(or as it is referred by Taylor, Satan himself) has such a commanding presence it's overwhelming. Even if you don't find him scary you WILL remember his face, full of wickedness and evil(Vladimir Tytla's animation of the character is one of the biggest achievements in the entire film, which is saying something). The imagery is adequately hellish as well, thanks to a masterful art direction that brings the shadows of Walpurgis night to life. The use of experimental animation techniques helped as well, with the ghosts requiring some clever use of distorted mirrors to create. And the release from the nightmare with the Ave Maria, which was the most demanding shot for the animators at the time(and not just on this project but maybe in animation as a whole at that point)? The perfect cap for a movie that made history for good reason.

So yeah, that's Fantasia. Man, that was a long one.

#roskirambles #animated films #walt disney #johan sebastian bach #pyotr ilyich tchaikovsky #paul dukas #johan wolfgang von goethe #igor stravinsky #ludwig van beethoven #amilcare ponchielli #modest mussorgsky #franz schubert #mickey mouse #chernabog #fantasia #greek mythology #leopold stokowski #deems taylor

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