146. DUMBO (1941)

Running Time: 64 minutes
Directed By: Ben Sharpsteen
Written By: Otto Englander, from book by Helen Aberson
Main Cast: (voices): Edward Brophy, Verna Felton, Herman Bing, Margaret Wright, Sterling Holloway
Click here to view the trailer

Note: For the curious, my watching of the seven movies that will make up "Seven Shadows Week" is finished. Therefore, I'll be returning to the blog full-time, so expect reviews to be fired at you at a fast & furious pace from here until 501.

TECHNICOLOR PACHYDERM

I figured I'd better go ahead and watch this before Disney yanked "Dumbo" by the trunk and threw him into their famous vault. It's an early Disney movie, so I pretty much knew what to expect going in and I got what I bargained for.

The setting is a traveling circus and the main characters are the animals. When the film opens, the stork is delivering baby animals to all their respective species. Infant tigers, lions, bears and kangaroos fall from the sky, attached to parachutes and into their awaiting mothers' arms. The only expecting mother who fails to receive her little bundle of joy is Mrs. Jumbo, the elephant (funny, there's no Mr. Jumbo). Later that night, as the animals board the circus train and head to the next town, the story, who had been running late, delivers to Mrs. Jumbo a baby boy, whom she names Jumbo Jr. The little guy is later dubbed Dumbo by his elephant peers, due to his extra large ears and when a crowd of people at the circus make fun of him, Mrs. Jumbo loses her cool and winds up in "the clink". With his mother behind bars, Dumbo is all alone. That is until Timothy L. Mouse sees him and decides to help him out. Timothy keeps Dumbo company as he's assigned to become the newest clown in the circus. One night, as they're coming from visiting Mrs. Jumbo, Timothy and Dumbo get drunk when they accidentally drink some alcohol from a washtub. Later, they awaken to find themselves in a tree and are helped along by a group of swingin' crows.

Here's my question: Are all Disney animated features (excluding Pixar) still told in musical form? I always forget when I go to watch one of these old Disney films that not only is it animated, but it's also loaded with songs. I haven't seen a new Disney movie since "The Lion King", perhaps and I know that too was a musical. What can I say about "Dumbo"? I'm a twenty-eight year old film lover and this is something that obviously wasn't meant to get me all giddy. It wasn't made for a man of my age and it's certainly not one that is aimed toward both adults and children. No, this one is strictly for kids or teenage girls who refuse to grow up. However, that psychedelic elephant scene is wild! Whoever came up with the idea to get a baby elephant drunk and then have him hallucinate pink elephants putting on a parade is quite possibly a genius. The only thing that could've made it better is if the scene was set to "In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida" by Iron Butterfly. And I'm not even joking when I say that if Disney had cut this down to a short film about the mouse and the elephant getting snockered and then their visions, I'd have given it a '10' and found a spot for it on my next TOP 20.

RATING: 4/10 But, as it is, it's about a '4' from me. I think the only Disney film left in THE BOOK is "The Lion King" and I better get on that one before the vault is opened.

MOVIES WATCHED: 423
MOVIES LEFT TO WATCH: 578

April 9, 2012 3:51pm