Hamilton Luske, Clyde Geronimi & Wilfred Jackson (1953)
When there’s a smile in your heart There’s no better time to start Think of all the joy you’ll find When you leave the world behind And bid your cares good-bye You can fly, you can fly, you can fly, you can fly, you can fly!
Peter Pan is a 1953 animated adventure fantasy film produced in 1952 by Walt Disney Productions. Based on J. M. Barrie’s 1904 play Peter Pan, or the Boy Who Wouldn’t Grow Up, it is the 14th Disney animated feature film. The film was directed by Hamilton Luske, Clyde Geronimi, and Wilfred Jackson. Featuring the voices of Bobby Driscoll, Kathryn Beaumont, Hans Conried, and Bill Thompson, the film’s plot follows Wendy Darling and her two brothers, who meet the never-growing-up Peter Pan and travel with him to the island of Neverland to stay young, where they also have to face Peter’s archenemy, Captain Hook.
In 1935, Walt Disney began considering plans to adapt Barrie’s play into an animated feature. He purchased the film rights from Paramount Pictures in 1938, and began preliminary development in the next year. However, following the attack on Pearl Harbor, Disney shelved the project when his studio was contracted by the United States government to produce training and war propaganda films. The project sat idle in development for the rest of the decade until it experienced a turnaround in 1949. To assist the animators, live-action reference footage was shot with actors on soundstages. It also marked the last Disney film in which all nine members of Disney’s Nine Old Men worked together as directing animators.
Disney’s Nine Old Men were Walt Disney Productions’ core animators, some of whom later became directors, who created some of Disney’s most famous animated cartoons, from Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs onward to The Rescuers, and were referred to as such by Walt Disney himself. The Nine Old Men consisted of Milt Kahl, Marc Davis, Frank Thomas, Eric Larson, Ollie Johnston, Woolie Reitherman, Les Clark, Ward Kimball, and John Lounsbery.
Peter Pan was released on February 5, 1953, becoming the final Disney animated feature released through RKO before Disney founded his own distribution company. The film was entered into the 1953 Cannes Film Festival, Upon its release, the film earned positive reviews from film critics and was a box office success. Its representation of the Native Americans received retrospective criticism.
In this Disney animated film, Wendy and her two brothers are amazed when a magical boy named Peter Pan flies into their bedroom in pursuit of his rebellious shadow. He and his fairy friend Tinkerbell come from a far-off place called Neverland, where children stay perpetually young. Enchanted, the kids follow him back. But when Pan’s nemesis the pirate Captain Hook causes trouble, the kids begin to miss their old life.
The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad is a 1949 animated anthology film produced by Walt Disney Productions and directed by Clyde Geronimi, Jack Kinney and James Algar. It consists of two segments: the first based on the 1908 children’s novel The Wind in the Willows by British author Kenneth Grahame, and the second based on the 1820 short story “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow” by American author Washington Irving.
The Wind in the Willows
This segment is based on the novel by Kenneth Grahame. The story is set in and around London, England, United Kingdom between June 10, 1907 and January 1, 1908. The protagonist J. Thaddeus Toad, Esq. is introduced as an “incurable adventurer” who “never counted the cost”. As the story’s “one disturbing element”, although he is the wealthy proprietor of the Toad Hall estate, Toad’s adventures and “positive mania for fads” have brought him to the brink of bankruptcy. As a last resort, Toad’s friend Angus MacBadger volunteers as Toad’s bookkeeper to help Toad keep his estate which is a source of pride in the community.
One summer day, MacBadger asks Toad’s best friends Ratty and Moley to persuade Toad to give up his latest mania of recklessly driving about the countryside in a horse and gypsy cart, which could accumulate a great deal of financial liability in damaged property. Ratty and Moley confront Toad, but are unable to change his mind. Toad then sees a motor car for the first time and becomes entranced by the new machine, having been taken over by “motor-mania”.
To cure Toad’s new mania, Ratty and Moley put Toad under house arrest. However, Toad escapes and is later arrested and charged with car theft. At his trial, Toad represents himself and calls his horse Cyril Proudbottom as his first witness. Cyril testifies that the car which Toad was accused of stealing had already been stolen by a gang of weasels. Toad had entered a tavern where the car was parked and offered to buy the car from the weasels. However, since Toad had no money, he instead offered to trade Toad Hall for the car. The prosecutor and judge show disbelief toward the statement, so Toad then calls the bartender Mr. Winky as a witness to the agreement; however, when told by Toad to explain what actually happened, Mr. Winky claims instead that Toad had tried to sell him the stolen car. Toad is found guilty on the spot and sentenced to 20 years in the Tower of London. As the months passed by, Toad’s friends make every effort to appeal his case, but to no avail.
On Christmas Eve, Cyril visits Toad in disguise as his grandmother and helps him escape by giving him a disguise of his own. Toad quickly runs to a railway station and hijacks a steam locomotive and drives out of the station heading toward the river bank without getting caught by the police on another train, coming to Ratty and Moley’s house. Just then, MacBadger vists Ratty and Moley to tell them that he discovered that Mr. Winky is the leader of the weasel gang, and that Toad had indeed traded his estate for the stolen car; Mr. Winky himself is in possession of the deed. Knowing that Toad is still guilty in the eyes of the law and the deed bearing his and Mr. Winky’s signature would prove Toad’s innocence, the four friends sneak into Toad Hall and take the document after a grueling chase around the estate.
The film then ends on New Year’s Day with Toad exonerated and regaining his house while it is implied that Mr. Winky and the weasels have been arrested and imprisoned. As MacBadger, Ratty, and Moley celebrate the New Year with a toast to Toad, who they believe has completely reformed, Toad and Cyril recklessly fly past on a 1903 Wright Flyer; Toad has not truly reformed and has developed a mania for airplanes.
The Legend of Sleepy Hollow
The second segment is based on the original story by Washington Irving. Although the film introduces the story as Ichabod Crane, later individual releases retained the story’s original title. (As a short story, “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow” was originally published in The Sketch Book with other stories, not as a single volume as pictured in the film.)
In October 1790, Ichabod Crane, a lanky, superstitious yet charming dandy arrives in Sleepy Hollow, New York, a small village outside Tarrytown that is renowned for its ghostly hauntings, to be the town’s new schoolmaster. Despite his odd behavior, appearance, and effeminate mannerisms, Ichabod soon wins the hearts of the village’s women and forms good friendships with his students. Brom Bones, the roguish town hero, does his best to pull pranks to Ichabod. However, he is very good at ignoring these taunts and continues to interact with the townspeople. One day, Ichabod meets and falls in love with Katrina van Tassel, the beautiful daughter of the wealthy Baltus van Tassel and Brom’s unofficial fiancee. Despite being obsessed with Katrina’s beauty, Ichabod mainly desires to take her family’s money for himself. Brom, who has never been challenged like this, proceeds to compete with the schoolmaster, but Ichabod wins Katrina over at every opportunity. Unbeknownst to both men, Katrina is only using Ichabod to make Brom jealous and force him to try harder for her affections.
The two love rivals are invited to the van Tassel Halloween party. Brom attempts to get Ichabod to dance with a plump woman instead of Katrina, and later attempts to have him fall through a cellar door, but both attempts backfire. While both men dine, Brom catches Ichabod accidentally knocking the salt shaker over and nervously tossing salt over his shoulder. Discovering that Ichabod’s weakness is superstition, he decides to sing the tale of the legendary Headless Horseman. The horseman supposedly travels the woods on Halloween each year, searching for a living head to replace the one which he has lost, and the only way to escape the ghost is to cross a covered bridge. Everyone else, including Katrina, finds the song amusing, while Ichabod on the other hand starts to fear for his life.
Riding home from the party, Ichabod becomes frightened of every sound and sight which he hears in the dark woods. While traveling through the old cemetery, Ichabod believes he hears the sound of a horse galloping toward him, but discovers the sound is being made by nearby cattails bumping on a log. He and his horse begin to laugh â however, their laughter is cut short by the appearance of the Headless Horseman, wielding a sword and riding on the back of a black horse. After being chased through the dark forest, Ichabod, remembering Brom’s advice, rides across the covered bridge to stop the ghost’s pursuit. The horseman stops and throws his flaming head, revealed to be a jack-o’-lantern, right at Ichabod’s face.
The next morning, Ichabod’s hat is found at the bridge next to the shattered jack-o-lantern, but Ichabod himself is nowhere to be found. Sometime later, Brom takes Katrina as his wife. Rumors begin to spread that Ichabod is still alive, married to a wealthy widow in a distant county with children who all look like him. However, the superstitious people of Sleepy Hollow insist that he has been “spirited away” by the Headless Horseman.
Clyde Geronimi, Wilfred Jackson, Hamilton Luske & Jack Kinney (1948)
Melody Time is a 1948 American live-action/animated musical film produced by Walt Disney. The tenth Disney animated feature film, it was released to theatres by RKO Radio Pictures on May 27, 1948. Made up of seven segments set to popular music and folk music, the film is, like Make Mine Music before it, the popular music version of Fantasia. Melody Time, while not meeting the artistic accomplishments of Fantasia, was mildly successful. It is the fifth Disney package film following Saludos Amigos, The Three Caballeros, Make Mine Music, and Fun and Fancy Free.
“In the grand tradition of Disney’s greatest musical classics, such as Fantasia, Melody Time features seven classic stories, each enhanced with high-spirited music and unforgettable characters. A feast for the eyes and ears full of wit and charm. A delightful Disney classic with something for everyone”.
Walt Disney
Melody Time is considered to be the last anthology feature made by the Walt Disney Animation Studios. These package features were little-known short-film compilations that Disney produced and released as feature films during World War II. They were financially and artistically lightweight productions meant to bring in profits to allow the studio to return to fairy tale single-narrative feature form, an endeavour which they successfully completed two years later with Cinderella. While the shorts contrast in length, form, and style, a common thread throughout is that each is accompanied by songs from musicians and vocalists of the ’40s. This sets it apart from the similarly structured Fantasia, whose segments were set to classical music instead. As opposed to Fun and Fancy Free, whose story was bound to the tales of Bongo and Jack and the Beanstalk, in this film Walt Disney has let his animators and his color magicians have free rein.
Rose Pelswick, in a 1948 review for The News-Sentinel, described the film as an ‘adventure into the intriguing make-believe world peopled by Walt Disney’s Cartoon characters”. It also explains that “with the off-screen voice of Buddy Clark doing the introductions, the episodes include fantasy, folklore, South American rhythms, poetry, and slapstick”. A 1948 review by the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette described it as a “mixture of fantasy, abstraction, parable, music, color, and movement”.
Once Upon a Wintertime
This segment features Frances Langford singing the title song about two romantic young lovers on a winter day in December, during the late 19th century. The couple are Jenny and Joe (unlike most Disney cartoons, Jenny and Joe lack spoken dialogue). Joe shows off on the ice for Jenny, and near-tragedy and a timely rescue ensues. This is intertwined with a similar rabbit couple.
Bumble Boogie
This segment presents a surrealistic battle for a solitary bumblebee as he tries to ward off a visual and musical frenzy. The music, courtesy of Freddy Martin and His Orchestra (with Jack Fina playing the piano), is a swing-jazz variation of Rimsky-Korsakov’s Flight of the Bumblebee, which was one of the many pieces considered for inclusion in Fantasia.
The Legend of Johnny Appleseed
A retelling of the story of John Chapman, who spent most of his life roaming the Midwestern United States (mainly Ohio and Indiana) in the pioneer days, and planting apple trees, thus earning his famous nickname. He also spread Christianity. Dennis Day narrates (as an “old settler who knew Johnny well”) and provides the voices of both Johnny and his guardian angel.
Little Toot
The story of Little Toot by Hardie Gramatky, in which the title protagonist, a small tugboat in New York City, wanted to be just like his father Big Toot, but could not seem to stay out of trouble. The Andrews Sisters provide vocals.
Trees
A recitation of the 1913 poem Trees by Joyce Kilmer, featuring music by Oscar Rasbach and performed by Fred Waring and the Pennsylvanians. The lyrical setting accompanies animation of bucolic scenes seen through the changing of the seasons. To preserve the look of the original story sketches, layout artist Ken O’Connor came up with the idea of using frosted cels and rendering the pastel images right onto the cel. Before being photographed each cel was laminated in clear lacquer to protect the pastel. The result was a look that had never been seen in animation before.
The finale follows about Texas’ famous hero Pecos Bill. Raised by coyotes, he became the biggest and best cowboy that ever lived. He out hissed the Rattlesnake. And learned about all of the animals. It also features his horse Widowmaker, whoâs been saved by the vultures that try to eat him. He brought the rain from California to save Texas from the drought. But when he woke up from the river, he heard a cow mooing. There was the band of evil rustlers stealing the herd of cattle. But they didnât know the herd they stole was Billâs. So he lassoed them and knocked out all of their teeth one by one. The Rustlers were now finally reformed and started to sing, âYippee-I-Yay!â Then, Bill and Widowmaker traveled through the desert. He got a stick and then he dug the rio grande. And it recounts the ill-fated romance between Bill and a beautiful cowgirl named Slue Foot Sue, with whom he fell in love at first sight until a jealous Widowmaker made Sue to get literally stranded at the Moon at their wedding day. This retelling features Roy Rogers, Bob Nolan, the former’s horse Trigger, and the Sons of the Pioneers telling the story to Bobby Driscoll and Luana Patten in a live-action frame story.
Jack Kinney, Hamilton Luske, William Morgan, & Bill Roberts (1947)
Fun and Fancy Free is a 1947 animated musical fantasy film produced by Walt Disney and released on September 27, 1947 by RKO Radio Pictures. It is the ninth Disney animated feature film and the fourth of the package films that the studio produced in the 1940s to save money during World War II. The Disney package films of the late 1940s helped finance Cinderella, Alice in Wonderland, and Peter Pan.
This film is a compilation of two stories: Bongo, narrated by Dinah Shore which is loosely based on the short story Little Bear Bongo by Sinclair Lewis, and Mickey and the Beanstalk, narrated by Edgar Bergen which is based on the Jack and the Beanstalk fairy tale. Though the film is primarily animated, it also uses live-action segments to join its two stories. Mickey and the Beanstalk marked the last time that Walt Disney voiced Mickey Mouse, as he was too busy on other projects to continue voicing the character. Disney replaced himself with sound-effects artist Jimmy MacDonald.
When a car hits young Victor’s pet dog Sparky, Victor decides to bring him back to life the only way he knows how. But when the bolt-necked “monster” wreaks havoc and terror in the hearts of Victor’s neighbors, he has to convince them that Sparky’s still the good, loyal friend.
Frankenweenie is a 1984 featurette directed by Tim Burton and co-written by Burton with Leonard Ripps. It is both a parody and homage to the 1931 film Frankenstein based on Mary Shelley’s 1818 novel Frankenstein.
Burton was fired by Disney after the film was completed, as the studio claimed that he had been wasting company resources and felt the film was not suitable for the targeted young audiences.
Tim Burton later directed a feature-length stop-motion animated remake of Frankenweenie with production help from Disney, which was released on October 5, 2012.
The 2012 feature-length remake of Burton’s 1984 short film of the same name is also both a parody of and homage to the 1931 film Frankenstein, based on Mary Shelley’s 1818 book Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus. In the film, a boy named Victor Frankenstein uses the power of electricity to resurrect his dead Bull Terrier, Sparky, but his peers discover what he has done and reanimate their own deceased pets and other creatures, resulting in mayhem. The tongue-in-cheek film contains numerous references to and parodies of elements of Frankenstein and past film versions of it, other literary classics, various horror and science-fiction films, and other films which Burton has directed or produced.
Vincent is a 1982 stop motion short horror film written, designed, and directed by Tim Burton. It’s produced by Rick Heinrichs. It is the second Disney horror film, the first being The Watcher in the Woods. At approximately six minutes in length, there is currently no individual release of the film except for a few bootleg releases. It can be found on the 2008 Special Edition and Collector’s Edition DVDs of The Nightmare Before Christmas as a bonus feature and on the Cinema16 DVD American Short Films.
While working as a conceptual artist at Walt Disney Productions, Tim Burton found himself two allies in Disney executive Julie Hickson, and Head of Creative Development Tom Wilhite. The two were impressed with Burton’s unique talents and, while not “Disney material”, they felt he deserved respect. As such, in 1982, Wilhite gave Burton $60,000 to produce an adaptation of a poem Burton had written titled Vincent. Burton had originally planned the poem to be a children’s short story book but thought otherwise.
Together with fellow Disney animator Rick Heinrichs, stop motion animator Stephen Chiodo and cameraman Victor Abdalov, Burton worked on the project for two months and came up with the six-minute short film. Shot in stark black-and-white in the style of the German Expressionist films of the 1920s, Vincent imagines himself in a series of situations inspired by the Vincent Price/Edgar Allan Poe films that had such an effect on Burton as a child, including experimenting on his dog â a theme that would subsequently appear in Frankenweenie â and welcoming his aunt home while simultaneously conjuring up the image of her dipped in hot wax. Vincent Malloy, the main character in the film, bears a striking resemblance to Tim Burton himself.
The film was narrated by Burton’s childhood idol, Vincent Price, and marked the beginning of a friendship between them that lasted until Price’s death in 1993. Burton credits the experience as one of the most formative experiences of his life.
The film was theatrically released for two weeks in one Los Angeles cinema with the teen drama Tex. Before it was consigned to the Disney vaults, it garnered several critical accolades when it played at film festivals in London, Chicago and Seattle, winning two awards at Chicago and the Critics’ Prize at the Annecy Film Festival in France.
The film is narrated by actor Vincent Price, a lifelong idol and inspiration for Burton. From this relationship, Price would go on to appear in Burton’s Edward Scissorhands. Price later made the following statement:
“Vincent was the most gratifying thing that ever happened. It was immortality â better than a star on Hollywood Boulevard.”
When you wish upon a starâŠ. Well, I guess you get another live action remake of a beloved Disney classic. In this case, the remake is Pinocchio. Now before anyone rolls their eyes at another Disney remake, it should perhaps be considered that this one is being directed by Robert Zemeckis and it stars Tom [âŠ]
Clyde Geronimi, Wilfred Jackson & Hamilton Luske (1951)
Alice in Wonderland is a 1951 American animated musical fantasy comedy film produced by Walt Disney Productions and based on the Alice books by Lewis Carroll. The thirteenth release of Disney’s animated features, the film premiered in London on July 26, 1951, and in New York City on July 28, 1951. The film features the voices of Kathryn Beaumont as Alice, Sterling Holloway as the Cheshire Cat, Verna Felton as the Queen of Hearts, and Ed Wynn as the Mad Hatter. Walt Disney first tried to adapt Alice into a feature-length animated film in the 1930s and revived the idea in the 1940s. The film was originally intended to be a live-action/animated film; however, Disney decided to make it a fully animated film in 1946.
The film was considered a disappointment on its initial release, therefore was shown on television as one of the first episodes of Disneyland. Its 1974 re-release in theaters proved to be much more successful, leading to subsequent re-releases, merchandising and home video releases. Although the film received generally negative critical reviews on its initial release, it has been more positively reviewed over the years.
In fall 1945, shortly after the war ended, Disney revived Alice in Wonderland and hired British author AldousHuxley to re-write the script. Huxley devised a story in which Lewis Carroll and AliceLiddell (the inspiration for Alice) were misunderstood and persecuted following the book’s publication. In Huxley’s story, stage actress EllenTerry was sympathetic to both Carroll and Liddell, and Queen Victoria served as the deus ex machina, validating Carroll due to her appreciation for the book. Disney considered child actress Margaret O’Brien for the title role. However, he felt that Huxley’s version was too literal an adaptation of Carroll’s book. Background artist Mary Blair submitted some concept drawings for Alice in Wonderland. Blair’s paintings moved away from Tenniel’s detailed illustrations by taking a modernist stance, using bold and unreal colors. Walt liked Blair’s designs, and the script was re-written to focus on comedy, music, and the whimsical side of Carroll’s books.
Around this time, Disney considered making a live-action-and-animated version of Alice in Wonderland (similar to his short Alice Comedies) that would star Ginger Rogers and would utilize the recently developed sodium vapor process. Lisa Davis (who later voiced Anita Radcliffe in One Hundred and One Dalmatians) and Luana Patten were also considered for the role of Alice. However, Disney soon realized that he could only do justice to the book by making an all-animated feature and, in 1946, work began on Alice in Wonderland. With the film tentatively scheduled for release in 1950, animation crews on Alice in Wonderland and Cinderella effectively competed against each other to see which film would finish first. By early 1948, Cinderella had progressed further than Alice in Wonderland.
A legal dispute with Dallas Bower’s 1949 film version was also under way. Disney sued to prevent release of the British version in the U.S., and the case was extensively covered in Time magazine. The company that released the British version accused Disney of trying to exploit their film by releasing its version at virtually the same time.
Norman Ferguson, Jack Kinney, John Elliotte, Wilfred Jackson, Bill Roberts, Ben Sharpsteen, Samuel Armstrong (1941)
Meet Dumbo, Mrs. Jumbo’s sweet little “Baby Mine” who charms all who see him, until it’s discovered that he has huge floppy ears! With the support of his very best friend, Timothy the mouse, Dumbo soon learns that his spectacular ears make him unique and special, allowing him to soar to fame as the world’s only flying elephant.
In 1941, in order to compensate for the relative poor box office of Pinocchio and Fantasia, Disney produced a low-budget feature film, Dumbo. Dumbo was a major hit and today is one of the most critically acclaimed animated movies ever made. Just a few days after rough animation was complete on Dumbo, the Disney animatorsâ strike broke out. This was caused by the Screen Cartoonistsâ Guild, who severed many ties between Walt Disney and his staff, while encouraging many members of the Disney studio to leave and seek greener pastures. Later that year, Dumbo became a big success, the first time since Snow White. The critically acclaimed film brought in much-needed revenue and kept the studio afloat.
Dumbo is a 1941 American animated film produced by Walt Disney Productions and released by RKO Radio Pictures. The fourth Disney animated feature film, it is based upon the storyline written by Helen Aberson and Harold Pearl illustrated by Helen Durney for the prototype of a novelty toy. The main character is Jumbo Jr., a semi-anthropomorphic elephant who is cruelly nicknamed âDumboâ, as in âdumbâ. He is ridiculed for his big ears, but in fact he is capable of flying by using his ears as wings. Throughout most of the film, his only true friend, aside from his mother, is the mouse, Timothy â a relationship parodying the stereotypical animosity between mice and elephants.
Dumbo was released on October 23, 1941; made to recoup the financial losses of Fantasia, it was a deliberate pursuit of simplicity and economy for the Disney studio. At 64 minutes, it is one of Disneyâs shortest animated features. Sound was recorded conventionally using the RCA System. One voice was synthesized using the Sonovox system, but it, too, was recorded using the RCA System.
In 2017, the film was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being âculturally, historically, or aesthetically significantâ.
A live-action adaptation of the film directed by Tim Burton is scheduled to be released on March 29, 2019.
Written by Otto Englander, Bill Peet, Joe Grant, Joe Rinaldi, Aurelius Battaglia, Harold Pearl, Helen Aberson, Webb Smith, Vernon Stallings, and Dick Huemer.
Starring Edward Brophy, Billy Bletcher, Malcolm Hutton, John McLeish, Verna Felton, Eddie Holden, The King’s Men, James Baskett, Jim Carmichael, Harold Manley, Noreen Gammill, Hall Johnson Choir, Sterling Holloway, Cliff Edwards, Verna Felton, and Herman Bing.
Hobo Moon Cartoons aims to preserve the beloved Halloween classics of yesteryear for future generations to enjoy!
Spend this Devil’s Night with Mickey and the gang as they attempt to eradicate three ghosts from an abandoned haunted house. Lonesome Ghosts is a 1937 Disney animated cartoon, released through RKO Radio Pictures on December 24, 1937, three days after Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs made its debut. It was directed by Burt Gillett, written by Dick Friel, and animated by Izzy Klein, Ed Love, Milt Kahl, Marvin Woodward, Bob Wickersham, Clyde Geronimi, Dick Huemer, Dick Williams, Art Babbitt, and Rex Cox.
This short marked the first use of one of Goofy’s catchphrases, “Somethin’ wrong here!”.
Now here is a corny educational film for ya. It’s obvious Disney didn’t put much time and effort into this one, but it’s fun nonetheless. Disney’s Haunted Halloween is a 1983 American animated educational short film, It is a montage piece telling children about the history of Halloween, hosted by Goofy and the jack o’lantern from Disney’s Halloween Treat. Intermixed throughout it are numerous clips from many different Disney cartoons, plus footage of the Disney attraction The Haunted Mansion.
The film follows the misadventures of Jack Skellington, Halloweentown’s beloved pumpkin king, who has become bored with the same annual routine of frightening people in the “real world.” When Jack accidentally stumbles on Christmastown, all bright colors and warm spirits, he gets a new lease on life — he plots to bring Christmas under his control by kidnapping Santa Claus and taking over the role. But Jack soon discovers even the best-laid plans of mice and skeleton men can go seriously awry.
Director: Henry Selick Story by: Tim Burton Music: Danny Elfman
Danny Elfman wrote the film score and provided the singing voice of Jack, as well as other minor characters.
The Nightmare Before Christmas originated in a poem written by Tim Burton in 1982 while he was working as an animator at Walt Disney Productions. With the success of Vincent in the same year, Burton began to consider developing The Nightmare Before Christmas as either a short film or 30-minute television special to no avail. Over the years, Burton’s thoughts regularly returned to the project and in 1990, he made a development deal with Walt Disney Studios. Production started in July 1991 in San Francisco.
Inspired by Walt Disney’s and Ub Iwerks’ Silly Symphonies animated short The Skeleton Dance, Tim Burton pays homage to the frolicking skeletons of swing in this fun little diddy, Remains of the Day.
Happy Halloween!
Hey! Give me a listen, you corpses of cheer. Least less of you who still got an ear, Iâll tell âya a story, make your skeleton cry, of our own judiciously lovely corpse bride. Die, die we all pass away, but donât wear a frown âcuz itâs really okay. You might try nâ hide, and you might try nâ pray, but we all end up the remains of the day.
Die die die yeah yeah, die die die.
Well! Our girl is a beauty known for miles around. A mysterious stranger came into town. He was plenty good lookinâ but down on his cash, and our poor little baby she fell hard and fast, when her daddy said no, she just couldnât cope, so our lovers came up with a plan to elope.
Die, die we all pass away, but donât wear a frown âcuz itâs really okay. You might try nâ hide, and you might try nâ pray, but we all end up the remains of the day.
Die die die yeah yeah, die die die yeah yeah die die die yeah yeah die die die yeah yeah
Yeah, so they conjured up a plan to meet late at night, they told not a soul kept the whole thing tight. Now her motherâs wedding dress fit like a glove, you donât need much when youâre really in love. Except for a few things or so Iâm told, like the family jewels and a satchel of gold. Then next to the graveyard by the old oak tree, on a dark foggy night at a quarter to three, she was ready to go, but where was he?
(And then?) She waited (And then?) There in the shadows, was it a man? (And then?) Her little heart beat sooo loud! (And THEN?) And then baby, everything went black.
Now when she opened her eyes, she was dead as dust, her jewels were missinâ and her heart was bust, so she made a vow lyinâ under that tree that sheâd wait for her true love to come set her free. Always waitinâ for someone to ask for her hand, when outta the blue comes this groovy young man, who vows forever, to be by her side, and thatâs the story of our own, corpse bride
Die, die we all pass away, but donât wear a frown âcuz itâs really okay. You might try nâ hide, and you might try nâ pray, but we all end up the remains of the day.
Vincent is a 1982 stop motion short horror film written, designed, and directed by Tim Burton. It’s produced by Rick Heinrichs. It is the second Disney horror film, the first being The Watcher in the Woods. At approximately six minutes in length, there is currently no individual release of the film except for a few bootleg releases. It can be found on the 2008 Special Edition and Collector’s Edition DVDs of The Nightmare Before Christmas as a bonus feature and on the Cinema16 DVD American Short Films.
The film is narrated by actor Vincent Price, a lifelong idol and inspiration for Burton. From this relationship, Price would go on to appear in Burton’s Edward Scissorhands. Price later made the following statement:
“Vincent was the most gratifying thing that ever happened. It was immortality â better than a star on Hollywood Boulevard.”
Clyde Geronimi, Jack Hannah & Wilfred Jackson (1956)
Happy Halloween!
Hobo Moon Cartoons aims to preserve the beloved Halloween classics of yesteryear for future generations to enjoy!
Clip from Disneyland episode The Great Cat Family narrated by Walt Disney. I love the spooky visuals and gorgeous vintage animation.
Walt talks about the cat family, primarily focusing on lions and domestic cats. It is explained particularly on the cats’ importance to ancient Egypt and how some people would respect them, and others would fear them as superstitious beings.
Walt then shows the cats of fiction by showing clips from his past films. He recounts Pinocchio’s friendship with Figaro, Alice’s pet Dina and meeting with the crazy Cheshire Cat and how Cinderella’s mouse friends barely escaped the clutches of Lucifer. Finally, he shows a classic cartoon featuring Lambert, the “black sheep” of the great cat family.
Until now, only the first 13 minutes with Walt discussing the history of cats in Egypt to their superstitious origins had been available as a bonus on home video releases of The Aristocats. These first 13 minutes were trimmed down, specifically without Walt’s footage, for A Disney Halloween (1983) where it was then followed by the Siamese musical number from Lady and the Tramp, which for whatever reason wasn’t included in this program.
Hobo Moon Cartoons aims to preserve the beloved Halloween classics of yesteryear for future generations to enjoy!
EgyptianMelodies is a 1931 Silly Symphonies animated short cartoon produced by Walt Disney and directed by Wilfred Jackson. It follows a brave little spiders journey into the heart of a dark and eerie Egyptian tomb where he awakens several mummies from their slumber who begin to dance as the hieroglyphics come to life.
Skeleton Frolic is a 1937 Color Rhapsodies short directed by Ub Iwerks.
Happy Halloween!
Hobo Moon Cartoons aims to preserve the beloved Halloween classics of yesteryear for future generations to enjoy!
Ub Iwerks dusts off the skeletons from his early-Disney days and puts them to work at ColumbiaâŠin a graveyard replete with eerie owls and surrealistic bats. Skeletons begin to rise from their graves and form a loosely-jointed band.
In the middle of the night, a tiptoeing tree knocks on a gravestone and wakes up three skeletons. A yowling black cat frightens them. The skeletons retaliate by throwing their skulls at the animal and breaking it into several smaller cats. It’s time for the skeletons to frolic. They form an orchestra and play music. They dance. But they don’t always get along. One skeleton loses its skull and makes several efforts to steal another skull from his fellow. Another pair enjoys dancing together, but one of them can’t seem to remain intact. At five AM, a crowing rooster alerts the skeletons to the hour. In a panic, they all rush back into their graves.
Hobo Moon Cartoons aims to preserve the beloved Halloween classics of yesteryear for future generations to enjoy!
The Old Mill is a 1937 Silly Symphony cartoon produced by Walt Disney, directed by Wilfred Jackson, scored by Leigh Harline, and released to theatres by RKO Radio Pictures on November 5, 1937. The film depicts the natural community of animals populating an old abandoned windmill in the country, and how they deal with a severe summer thunderstorm that nearly destroys their habitat. It incorporates the song One Day When We Were Young from Johann Strauss II’s operetta The Gypsy Baron.
Like many of the later Silly Symphonies, The Old Mill was a testing ground for advanced animation techniques. Marking the first use of Disney’s multiplane camera, the film also incorporates realistic depictions of animal behavior, complex lighting and color effects, depictions of rain, wind, lightning, ripples, splashes and reflections, three-dimensional rotation of detailed objects, and the use of timing to produce specific dramatic and emotional effects. All of the lessons learned from making The Old Mill would subsequently be incorporated into Disney’s feature-length animated films, such as Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937), which was released a month later, as well as Pinocchio (1940), Fantasia (1940) and Bambi (1942).
In 2015, the United States Library of Congress selected the film for preservation in the National Film Registry, finding it “culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant”.
The Mad Doctor is a classic Mickey Mouse cartoon released in 1933. It is known as the first appearance of the title character “The Mad Doctor”, or “Dr. XXX”.
Happy Halloween!
Hobo Moon Cartoons aims to preserve the beloved Halloween classics of yesteryear for future generations to enjoy!
The short’s horror overtones made it unusual for a Mickey Mouse cartoon. Some theaters refused to show it, believing it to be too scary for kids. At one time, for this reason, it was banned entirely in the United Kingdom, as well as Nazi Germany.
The short’s horror overtones made it unusual for a Mickey Mouse cartoon. Some theaters refused to show it, believing it to be too scary for kids. At one time, for this reason, it was banned entirely in England.
A Corny Concerto is a 1943 Warner Bros. Merrie Melodies directed by Bob Clampett. The short was released on September 25, 1943, and stars Bugs Bunny, Porky Pig, Elmer Fudd and Daffy Duck. They perform a parody of Disney’s Silly Symphony cartoon series and specifically his 1940 feature Fantasia. The film uses two of Johann Strauss’ best known waltzes, “Tales from the Vienna Woods” and “The Blue Danube”.
Fantasia was marketed to highbrow music fans; the Looney Tunes staff responded by violating the ivory tower of classical music and concert hall culture. A Corny Concerto parodies Fantasia’s Silly Symphonies-derived balletic approach to storytelling. Elmer Fudd stands in for Deems Taylor, and in an anti-highbrow gag, his starched shirtfront keeps erupting from his shirt to hit him on the face.
Paul Bunyan is a 1958 American animated musical short film produced by Walt Disney Productions. The short was based on the North American folk hero and lumberjack Paul Bunyan and was inspired after meeting with Les Kangas of Paul Bunyan Productions, who gave Disney the idea for the film.
Story by Lance Nolley & Ted Berman
Animation by John Sibley, George Nicholas, Bob Youngouist, George Goepper, Fred Kopietz, Ken Hultgren, Jerry Hathcock, Jack Parr, & Jack Boyd (effects animation)
Congo Jazz is a Looney Tunes cartoon starring Warner Bros.’ first cartoon star, Bosko. The cartoon was released in September 1930. It was distributed by Warner Bros. and The Vitaphone Corporation. Congo Jazz was the first cartoon to feature Bosko’s falsetto voice that he would use for the bulk of the series’ run. It has the earliest instance of a “trombone gobble” in animation.
In 1927, Harman and Ising were still working for the Walt Disney Studios on a series of live-action/animated short subjects known as the Alice Comedies. The two animators created Bosko in 1927 to capitalize on the new “talkie” craze that was sweeping the motion picture industry. They began thinking about making a sound cartoon with Bosko in 1927, before even leaving Walt Disney. Hugh Harman made drawings of the new character and registered it with the copyright office on 3 January 1928.
After leaving Walt Disney in early 1928, Harman and Ising went to work for Charles Mintz on Universal’s second-season Oswald the Lucky Rabbit cartoons. April 1929 found them moving on again, leaving Universal to market their new cartoon character. In May 1929, they produced a short pilot cartoon, similar to Max Fleischer’s Out of the Inkwell cartoons, Bosko, the Talk-Ink Kid that showcased their ability to animate soundtrack-synchronized speech and dancing. The short, plotless cartoon opens with live action footage of Ising at a drafting table. After he draws Bosko on the page, the character springs to life, talks, sings, and dances. Ising returns Bosko to the inkwell, and the short ends. This short is a landmark in animation history as being the first cartoon to predominantly feature synchronized speech, though Fleischer Studios’ Song Car-Tune My Old Kentucky Home was the first cartoon to contain animated dialogue a few years earlier. This cartoon set Harman and Ising “apart from early Disney sound cartoons because it emphasized not music but dialogue.” The short was marketed to various people by Harman and Ising until Leon Schlesinger offered them a contract to produce a series of cartoons for the Warner Bros. It would not be seen by a wide audience until 71 years later, in 2000, as part of Cartoon Network’s special Toonheads: The Lost Cartoons, a compilation special of rare material from the WB/Turner archives.
In his book, Of Mice and Magic, Leonard Maltin states that this early version of Bosko:
“was in fact a cartoonized version of a young black boy… he spoke in a Southern Negro dialect… in subsequent films this characterization was eschewed, or perhaps forgotten. This could be called sloppiness on the part of Harman and Ising, but it also indicates the uncertain nature of the character itself.”
Flip the Frog is the featured performer at an outdoor nightclub in the forest. He entertains the woodland creatures with his dancing and piano-playing.
Animated by Ub Iwerks, Fred Kopietz, and Tony Pabian
Backgrounds by Fred Kopietz
Fiddlesticks is a 1930 Celebrity Producitons theatrical cartoon short directed and animated by Ub Iwerks, in his first cartoon since he departed from Walt Disney’s studio. The short features Iwerks’ character Flip the Frog. It is the first complete sound cartoon to be photographed in color.
Fiddlesticks was the first film in the Flip the Frog series. The sound system was Powers Cinephone, the same system used for Disney’s Steamboat Willie in 1928.
The unnamed mouse in the cartoon bears a striking resemblance to Mortimer Mouse, the original concept behind Mickey Mouse, both of whom were first animated by Ub Iwerks.
The Ugly Duckling is the titular protagonist of Disney’s 1939 Silly Symphonies short film of the same name. Actually a cygnet (a baby swan), his egg somehow found its way into the nest of a duck family who mistook him for one of their own, and hatched him, only to immediately reject him for not looking the way a duckling should.
Mickey, Minnie, Donald, Goofy, and Pluto relax in sunny Hawaii in this classic 1937 Walt Disney cartoon!
Hawaiian Holiday is a 1937 American animated short film produced by Walt Disney Productions and released by RKO Radio Pictures. The cartoon stars an ensemble cast of Mickey Mouse, Minnie Mouse, Pluto, Donald Duck, and Goofy while vacationing in Hawaii. The film was directed by Ben Sharpsteen, produced by John Sutherland and features the voices of Walt Disney as Mickey, Marcellite Garner as Minnie, Clarence Nash as Donald, and Pinto Colvig as Goofy and Pluto. It was Disney’s first film to be released by RKO, ending a five-year distributing partnership with United Artists.
Flip the Frog is an animated cartoon character created by American animator Ub Iwerks. He starred in a series of cartoons produced by Celebrity Pictures and distributed through Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer from 1930 to 1933. The series had many recurring characters besides Flip; including Flip’s dog, the mule Orace, and a dizzy neighborhood spinster.
Flip was created by Ub Iwerks, animator for the Walt Disney Studios and a personal friend of Walt Disney in 1930, at the Iwerks Studios. After a series of disputes between the two, Iwerks left Disney and went on to accept an offer from Pat Powers to open a cartoon studio of his own and receive a salary of $300 a week, an offer that Disney was unable to match at the time. Iwerks was to produce new cartoons under Powers’ Celebrity Pictures auspices and distributed by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. The first series he was to produce was to feature a character called Tony the Frog, but Iwerks disliked the name and it was subsequently changed to Flip.
Iwerks’ studio quickly began accumulating new talent, such as animators Fred Kopietz, Irv Spence, Grim Natwick, and Chuck Jones. After the first two cartoons, the appearance of Flip the Frog gradually became less froglike. This was done under the encouragement of MGM, who thought that the series would sell better if the character were more humanized. Flip’s major redesign is attributed to Grim Natwick, who made a name for himself at Fleischer Studios with the creation of Betty Boop. Natwick also had a hand in changing Flip’s girlfriend. In earlier films, she was consistently a cat, but Natwick made Flip’s new girlfriend, Fifi, a human who shared distinct similarities with Betty.
The character eventually wore out his welcome at MGM. His final short was Soda Squirt, released in 1933. Subsequently, Iwerks replaced the series with a new one starring an imaginative liar named Willie Whopper. Flip became largely forgotten by the public in the ensuing years. However, the character would make a small comeback when animation enthusiasts and historians began digging up the old Iwerks shorts.
This clip was eventually discovered by a Hollywood producer and incorporated into the 1976 movie Futureworld.
This historical video was recently re-discovered after being lost for many years. It was produced in 1972 and is believed to be the world’s first computer-generated 3D animation. It was created by Ed Catmull, a true pioneer of 3D technology, who was a computer scientist at the University of Utah and founder of Pixar.
Raya and the Last Dragon takes us on an exciting, epic journey to the fantasy world of Kumandra, where humans and dragons lived together long ago in harmony. But when an evil force threatened the land, the dragons sacrificed themselves to save humanity. Now, 500 years later, that same evil has returned and itâs up to a lone warrior, Raya, to track down the legendary last dragon to restore the fractured land and its divided people. However, along her journey, sheâll learn that itâll take more than a dragon to save the worldâitâs going to take trust and teamwork as well.
Raya and the Last Dragon features an outstanding voice cast, including Kelly Marie Tran as the voice of the intrepid warrior Raya; Awkwafina as the legendary dragon, Sisu; Gemma Chan as Rayaâs nemesis, Namaari; Daniel Dae Kim as Rayaâs visionary father, Benja; Sandra Oh as Namaariâs powerful mother, Virana; Benedict Wong as Tong, a formidable giant; Izaac Wang as Boun, a 10-year-old entrepreneur; Thalia Tran as the mischievous toddler Little Noi; Alan Tudyk as Tuk Tuk, Rayaâs best friend and trusty steed; Lucille Soong as Dang Hu, the leader of the land of Talon; Patti Harrison as the chief of the Tail land; and Ross Butler as chief of the Spine land.
Destino is an animated short film released in 2003 by Walt Disney. Destino is unique in that its production originally began in 1945, 58 years before its eventual completion. The project was originally a collaboration between Walt Disney and Spanish surrealist painter Salvador DalĂ, and features music written by Mexican songwriter Armando DomĂnguez and performed by Mexican singer Dora Luz. It was included in the Animation Show of Shows in 2003.
The short was intended to be one of the segments for the proposed but never completed third Fantasia film.
Destino was storyboarded by Disney studio artist John Hench and artist Salvador DalĂ for eight months in late 1945 and 1946. However, production ceased not long after. Walt Disney Studios was plagued by many financial woes in the World War II era. Hench compiled a short animation test of about 17 seconds in the hopes of rekindling Disney’s interest in the project, but the production was no longer deemed financially viable and put on indefinite hiatus.
The Jungle Book is a 1967 American animated musical comedy film produced by Walt Disney Productions. Based on Rudyard Kipling’s 1894 book of the same name, it is the 19th Disney animated feature film. Directed by Wolfgang Reitherman, it was the last film to be produced by Walt Disney, who died during its production. The plot follows Mowgli, a feral child raised in the Indian jungle by wolves, as his friends Bagheera the panther and Baloo the bear try to convince him to leave the jungle before the evil tiger Shere Khan arrives.
The early versions of both the screenplay and the soundtrack followed Kipling’s work more closely, with a dramatic, dark, and sinister tone which Disney did not want in his family film, leading to writer Bill Peet and songwriter Terry Gilkyson being replaced. The casting employed famous actors and musicians Phil Harris, Sebastian Cabot, George Sanders, and Louis Prima, as well as Disney regulars such as Sterling Holloway, J. Pat O’Malley, Verna Felton, and the director’s son Bruce Reitherman as Mowgli.
The Jungle Book was released on October 18, 1967, to positive reception, with acclaim for its soundtrack, featuring five songs by the Sherman Brothers and one by Gilkyson, The Bare Necessities. The film initially became Disney’s second-highest-grossing animated film in the United States and Canada, and was also successful during its re-releases.
Snoopy Come Home is a 1972 American animated musical comedy-drama film directed by Bill Melendez and written by Charles M. Schulz based on the Peanuts comic strip. The film marks the on-screen debut of Woodstock, who had first appeared in the strip in 1967. It was the only Peanuts film during composer Vince Guaraldiâs lifetime that did not have a score composed by him. Its music was composed by the Sherman Brothers, who composed the music for various Disney films like Mary Poppins, The Jungle Book, and Bedknobs and Broomsticks. The film was released on August 9, 1972 by National General Pictures, produced by Lee Mendelson Films and Cinema Center Films.
Despite receiving largely positive reviews, the film was a box-office bomb.
Raya and the Last Dragon is an upcoming American computer-animated adventure fantasy film produced by Walt Disney Pictures and Walt Disney Animation Studios for distribution by Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures. The 59th film produced by the studio, it is directed by Don Hall and Carlos LĂłpez Estrada, co-directed by Paul Briggs and John Ripa produced by Osnat Shurer and Peter Del Vecho, written by Qui Nguyen and Adele Lim, and music score composed by James Newton Howard. The film features an almost-entirely Asian American cast, including the voices of Kelly Marie Tran as the titular Raya and Awkwafina as Sisu, the last dragon, along with Gemma Chan, Daniel Dae Kim, Sandra Oh, Benedict Wong, Izaac Wang, Thalia Tran, and Alan Tudyk.
Raya and the Last Dragon is scheduled to be released theatrically in the United States on March 5, 2021. The film will also be simultaneously available on Disney+ with Premier Access, particularly in response to the COVID-19 pandemic’s negative impact on movie theatres across the United States, with many of them remaining closed.
Vincent is a 1982 stop motion short horror film written, designed, and directed by Tim Burton, and produced by Rick Heinrichs. It is the second Disney horror film, the first being The Watcher in the Woods. At approximately six minutes in length, there is currently no individual release of the film except for a few bootleg releases. It can be found on the 2008 Special Edition and Collector’s Edition DVDs of The Nightmare Before Christmas as a bonus feature and on the Cinema16 DVD American Short Films.
The film is narrated by actor Vincent Price, a lifelong idol and inspiration for Burton. From this relationship, Price would go on to appear in Burton’s Edward Scissorhands. Vincent Price later said that Vincent was “the most gratifying thing that ever happened. It was immortality â better than a star on Hollywood Boulevard”.
Frankenweenie is a 1984 short film directed by Tim Burton and co-written by Burton with Leonard Ripps. It is both a parody and homage to the 1931 film Frankenstein based on Mary Shelley’s novel of the same name. Burton later directed a feature-length stop-motion animated remake, released in 2012.
