Directed by Ben Sharpsteen
Written by Aberson and Pearl & Grant and Huemer
There was a considerable amount of magic here. The opening storks reminded me a lot of “Partly Cloudy”, which is a great thing. Seeing all of the small animals was adorable. I’m such a sucker for baby animals, especially animated ones. Another great thing was the train that pulled the circus cars. Another great, adorable piece of animation magic. The film began in a way similar to Wall-E I thought. There was very limited dialogue and the story progressed with what was happening on screen instead, a tribute to the animators.
Dumbo as a character is one of the best ever created by Disney. He is just so cute and you can’t help but feel sorry for him and pull for him when everybody is putting him down. The only thing I really had against it, and the only reason really I’m not rating this a perfect 4, was the dream sequence. Similar to Easy Rider and Midnight Cowboy, two much more serious films, there is a scene where Dumbo gets drunk because some wine has fallen into his water bucket and he drinks it. As a result he has a dream/hallucination involving pink elephants. It just went on for way too long and was off-putting to me. The story could have done without it, they could have found a better way to convey that, or at least made it less sprawling.
However, I did love every other minute of the film, and as such it is one of my favorite that I have seen during this marathon. Some real imagination and great animation. I mean who doesn’t love a flying elephant?
Corndog Chats 