FilmSnark

This is a mixed bag. If I was ranking some individual elements, they'd be rated differently; as a compilation, this is okay but the cartoons don't really feel like they go together.

The Martins and the Coys is all right. It starts out cute, I like that the families all look exactly the same, it's a funny visual gag. I don't like that it ends with Grace and Henry beating the hell out of each other as a joke.

Blue Bayou is an outtake from Fantasia and it's clear that it belongs there. All the Cats Join In is one of my favorite short cartoons ever for the simple fact that it's got bobby soxers swing dancing. It's really cute (notwithstanding the grossness listed above). I love the drawing-while-cartoons-are-moving concept usually, and it's used to great effect here. Without You only doesn't belong in Fantasia because it's a vocal song. But it's very abstract and it's a 40s ballad, so.....eh, yawn. Casey at the Bat is another classic. I wish the beginning didn't say "the ladies come out to the park, and they don't know the difference between a ball and a strike, but they're here to ogle Casey" (paraphrased). Like....why can't we do both? But I think the animation belies their intention; after Casey's first strike, one of the ladies shouts "KILL THE UMPIRE" and pulls out a hatpin so she can stab the umpire with it - that's a lady who knows the game, I tell ya.

Two Silhouettes is a ballet to a ballad. Like........ech. There are a couple of tiny neat special effects, but ugh, it's just too sappy. It looks like they did an interesting animation technique - where they would normally have real actors in an animated scene (think Mary Poppins, Bert and the kids when they go through the chalk drawing), they turned the live actors into silhouettes on the background instead. Little too on the nose for me, symbolism-wise.

Peter and the Wolf...is Peter and the Wolf. It's fine. It also feels like it belongs in Fantasia, even with narration. I don't think the narration adds anything. The version I saw was a re-recording with David Bowie doing the narration. I looked up the history of Peter and the Wolf, and I didn't realize it was written in the 30s as a bit of Russian propaganda for children (showing good Soviet values), I thought it was much older than that.

Johnny Fedora and Alice Blue Bonnet was one of my favorites as a kid. It's adorable and I love the vocals, they feel so 40s to me. It reminds me a lot of Johnny Guitar because of the refrain from Alice. Nothing exceptional in the animation but it's pleasant. Johnny getting beat up and chomped on by a dog always makes me sad.

The Whale Who Wanted to Sing at the Met is okay, but uses a minstrel song. Also - I'm not a big fan of most opera, so it's an awful lot of operatic singing. 'Largo al Factotum' from 'Barber of Seville' is an exception, I never get sick of that song. Willie the Whale at the Met in the fantasy sequence, in a bunch of different costumes and special effects, was funny. It's a weird story with a weird outcome though, ending with some weirdly religious "miracle" and "heaven" talk.