Fantasia Discussion

[AwallaceUNC]

Still taking my cue from DDMan26... let's all discuss the next animated classic, Fantasia, now that discussion on Pinocchio seems to have died off.

-Aaron

[Ludwig Von Drake]

I think and Fantasia and Fantasia 2000 are two of the best disney films of all times. They are very inovative and interesting in that they combine art and classical music. I highly recomend them to anyone who has yet to see them.

[MickeyMousePal]

I love Fantasia it's great and also the first segment mini movies.
Since WWII artist were drafted to the war or layed off.

But it was very great I love all the segments very much.

"Toccata and Fugue", "The Nutcracker Suite", "The Sorcerer's Apprentice", "Rite of Spring", "The Pastoral Symphony", "Dance of the Hours", "A Night on Bald Mountain", "Ave Maria"

My favorites are "A Night on Bald Mountain", " The Sorcerer's Apprentice", "Ave Maria" and " Dance of the Hours"

This was a very powerful film and still is.

[PatrickvD]

I wish Disney would make more classic stuff like that... more Mickey Donald, classics stories and classical music.. much like Fantasia and the anthology features.... ah..good times

[Matty-Mouse]

I love Fantasia (everything about it is right) but Fantasia 2000 is a really poor movie (IMO). I really love the Donald Duck section but everything else feels flat.

[luigi_atlante]

It's difficult to compare Fantasia and Fantasia 2000, while the second one is only a good movie, the first one is a classic, a masterpiece...what else can i say...I LOVE FANTASIA!!!!

[DisneyVillains]

I recently purchased the Fantasia Anthology set before it went out of print. I was worried that I was not going to like the film because I remember not liking it when I was younger. After watching Fantasia, all I have to say is I love the film!! The animation set to classic music I was able to actually recognize was great.

Perhaps some of the best sequences, and my favorites, are the Nutcracker Suite, Sorcerer's Apprentice, Dance of the Hours, and Night on Bald Mountain (Got to love Chernabog ). After watching the film, being a bit older, I think I was better able to appreciate it. I never thought I was going to love it as much as I did. It was just ashame that more people did not have a better appreciation for it when it was first released so that Walt could have continued his dream...

[AwallaceUNC]

I love Fantasia (though I prefer Fantasia 2000). As a kid, I only watched it in segments, which I found amusing (though memorable) at best. Now that I'm older and have developed an appreciation for such things, I love it. The animation is really amazing, and I'm so impressed by their ability to coordinate music and animation with the sophistication that they did back then.

The music is great, and I dare say most people know it, which makes it more relatable. The concept of having a vivid set of images to bring those sounds to life (and so appropriately!) is, simply put, cool. Color animation is really the perfect medium for that. I like all the segments, though The Sorcerer's Apprentice is by far my favorite.

The name itself is also very creative, and I think it kind of accented the magical side of Mickey and the Disney name that later became its whole focus.

I also find it very brave that Walt & Co stepped out on a project like this so early on in the game!

-Aaro

[DVDFreak]

I have the Fantasia DVD, only cuz it went out of print, and I wanted to get it for my collection. I was able to get it at a very good price, although I've tried watching it and got bored pretty fast. However, I knew I wanted to get it anyways, eventhough I was sure I wasn't going to like it cuz I didn't want to pay huge amounts of money for it down the road for something that I know I won't watch.

[DDMAN26]

Fantasia is simply an incredible movie. It's one of the few animated films that can truly be called a work of art. The Nutcracker Suite might be the studios crowing acheivement it's just dazzling.

[deathie mouse]

mmmm the fantastic Fantasia

Everytime I see those brushstrokes in movement. Paintings brought to life...
The detail, the inventivness. Wondering how that might looked to an audience that was raised on mainly black and white live action movies and suddenly seeing a (color) canvas moving and surrounded by music from all directions. For two hours! (Yes I know it wasn't such a success at the time but i'm sure there were some that appreciated it The way the music seems to fit the visual plots and viceversa. As if they were written toguether as a single entity. That's the skill and creativity of the animators and the conductor, but still it's impressive.

Also, the posibilities left undone. There could have been a whole series of Fantasia movies, like a Jazz Fantasia. Today it might be Electronica Fantasia. I know Melody Time and Make Mine Music are similar, but they're a kind of Fantasia light. Fantasia is kind of, ok, we know that animation is much more than just entertaining fun stuff, lets see how far we can push the envelope, let's show how much it is Art.

The 2nd in the series (2000) tis great but it seems less cohesive somehow, maybe it's the lighter tone of the interstitials, like "we're not taking us so seriously this time" . Some of the segments have a bit feeling of see how much we can push the technology. A little different in tone in my opinion. (I still think it's great and that it got made. So now that the ball started rolling, do Fantasia '10) (as in 2010. So by 2040 you'll have 5 just in time to celebrate Fantasia's 100th presenting it in IMAX) Would make a Huge box set. The Fantasia Music Collection.

I think it's great, a miracle, that the original 4-track Fantasound survived almost intact after 60+ years (If you've heard the story of how it was copied over the phone) and that with today's technology it can be recreated at home in DTS. The FIRST multichannel movie! In your home!

Disney created the home theater surround experience!

My favorite segment is Night On Bald Mountain and I'm eagerly awaiting the day DVD goes High Definition so i can make the mountain and it's Master as tall as the walls of my room and have to look up at them as when I was little. The Pastoral is so much eye candy i can taste it. The Nutcracker is a masterpiece of beauty and motion. The prehistoric segment it's a (altho not completely accurate) mini school lesson that probably condenses and gets across a million science books better in a few minutes. For years I didn't like the ostriches, elephants, and others, but for some reason I now enjoy them a lot today. Maybe is the way they make the elephants seem to be weightless as they float away in the wind

The abstract segment is what I think makes many people start the movie and give up at the begginning. They come with other expectations and it starts in such a serious note after the lenghty introduction, that somehow it changes many peoples mood and turns them off to what comes next. I think it's a great piece of animation, like preparing the things for was to come, a warm up. And it works for me. But the movie might have been more succesful if it had started with a more lively section. Then most audiences might been ready for the rest.

Today, with DVD branching, you could have the option of choosing a more errr... "family friendly" version with very minimal interstitials ("and now the Pastoral Symphony") and maybe with the Dance of the Hours opening, while Toccata preludes the Night, setting up the dark tone, with the other option to have it the way it was shown originally when you want to see, The Concert Feature.

This should also have the option, or the option may be hidden as an Easter egg, to address the most controversial aspect of Fantasia, the Pastoral unedited, maybe with Maltin showing up in a Tuxedo before a blue lit stage like Deems Taylor, setting up the Concert you're about to watch.

I'm all against stereotyping and mocking any cultures or races, but I'm also against trying to blot the sun with our hands. If we hide that this things happened forever I think we're kind of going into a collective denial instead of facing it and moving foward as a species.

Anyway that's where Easter eggs and Parental locks can be useful. You can use them to choose the apropiate moment to explain things and teach.

Well aaaaanyway Fantasia is great my favorite Disney film and I love it and it's one of the Arts Masterpieces and will be for years, if not centuries, to come.

And I'm sure Mr. Disney knew it and was mighty proud to have left his mark with it forever, into an Art form he helped create and develop.

[Loomis]

To quote myself from a previous discussion (in which I also quote myself, meaning this is the third time I have discussed this, but love talking about myself so much I don't care) I said (on Sun Mar 21, 2004 11:29 pm):

http://www.ultimatedisney.com/forum/vie ... php?t=3176
To quote myself from the Animated Classics Countdown:

"Not everybody remembers the first time they saw a Disney film, and I can't say I do either. For some reason, though, Fantasia sticks in my head as my earliest Disney memory. Whether it was dancing mushrooms, marching broomsticks, or fiery mountain tops, there is something intense about Fantasia that you just can’t shake from your head. Like a good song, the images stay in your head, playing out over and over. It is that sense of familiar that will always keep people coming back to the idea of Fantasia – in 1940, 2000 or beyond…"

Fantasia is certainly one of my favourite Disney films ever, and as I said, it is largely because the images stay in your head for a long time.

The sequel never works quite as well as the original, but in some ways it doesn't have to - the Fanstaia "idea" is at the core: take a bunch of music, and set animation to it. For every individual, music is "visualized" in a different way, but there is no denying that the Disney animators have in both instances created some of the most interesting animation of the last 60 years.

So, while I like the original better, it is largely because the images have been in my head so long, that I can't help but feeling that film had a lasting impact on me for a reason. Even though I saw F2000 for the first time on an IMAX screen, I never got the same "feeling" I did watching a version on the TV/VHS of the original as a kid.

The only regret is that we do not have an unedited version of the original Fantasia availale on DVD. I can see WHY they chose to remove the offending scene, and it certainly doesn't detract from the film, it would just be nice to have it in a "complete" form.

Fantasia Segment(s) Most Liked: Night on Bald Mountain , Nutcracker Suite and I know it is naff, but Sorceror's Apprentice.
Fantasia 2000 Segment(s) most liked: Rhapsody in Blue (pure animated brilliance, IMO) and Pomp and Circumstance .

[pleasurebay]

How do you tell people that the first true music video was produced over 50 years ago by Walt Disney.

[AwallaceUNC]

To quote myself from a previous discussion (in which I also quote myself, meaning this is the third time I have discussed this, but love talking about myself so much I don't care) I said (on Sun Mar 21, 2004 11:29 pm):

http://www.ultimatedisney.com/forum/vie ... php?t=3176
To quote myself from the Animated Classics Countdown:

I can actually recite it now... and do so regularly



-Aaron