In the last days I've been rediscovering Disney's "minor" features ("Make Mine Music", "Fun and Fancy Free", etc.).
Among them my favorite one still remains "The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad", expecially for the beautiful animation and enjoable characters.
In fact I do consider it one of the best Disney's works. Classification as a feature is straining though, considering those are actually two featurettes tied together with very little link among themselves.
If you have not seen this production, buy the DVD because Disney officially released it years ago. I was extremely pleased to discover it in his uncut beauty (the Toad's featurette was baly edited in Europe, expecially in UK and in Italy, were many scenes were cut or shirtened).
I hope you'll like this charming musical bit from the first half of the movie. Now wouldn't you want to be for one day one of those two happy-go-lucky fellows?
The following sequence is a classic, a favorite of mine since my tender years (when I first saw a compilation of "horror"-themed shorts released on VHS by Disney)
Well, I'll be seein' ya,
Duck Dodgers
Man, that version of "Sleepy Hollow" is bar none, the best ever on film. I remember vividly the combination of dread and excitement watching it on Sunday's around Halloween broadcast of "Wonderful World of Disney." Crosby's read is sheer genius, and the tension is racheted up with the sort of finesse that no modern cartoon maker can even hope to muster.
ReplyDeleteI LOVE this movie! Been years since I've seen it though, so thanks for posting.
ReplyDeletethat toon always really scared me as a kid. It was a toss up between that and the midnight on bald mountain sequence from fantasia. I was always such a wuss. Although I love the character design of Ichabod.
ReplyDeleteWonderful post. The Ichabod chase scene is amazing. A few weeks ago I checked the dvd again of this film and I'd almost forgotten how good it actually is. With lots of talent in the crew (Milt Kahl, Mary Blair, Ward Kimball, Fred Moore) this is really one of my Disney favourites.
ReplyDeleteYou posted 2 of the best scenes from this film. Another fantastic scene from Wind in the Willows is when they're trying to get the deed of Toad Hall back from the weasels. The same kind of actionscene is later used in The Jungle Book when Baloo and Bagheera are chasing the monkeys to get Mowgli back.
I volunteer at a historic site in Sleepy Hollow, NY just down the road from the "Old Dutch Church" and cemetery where the story is supposed to take place. The Disney artists did an awesome job of re-creating what the area would have looked like at the time--that background painting of the church is spot-on accurate.
ReplyDeleteEvery year, on the weekend before Halloween, we hold "Legend of Sleepy Hollow Day" and as part of the events show this cartoon in the visitor center auditorium.
The same kind of actionscene is later used in The Jungle Book when Baloo and Bagheera are chasing the monkeys to get Mowgli back.
ReplyDeleteIt's the exact, same scene! The animation is reused point-for-point from Wind in the Willows in The Jungle Book, with Mowgli replacing the deed.
You're right Thad, Cartoon brew actually just posted those sequences on their site:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.cartoonbrew.com/disney/disneys-gettin-lazy
Nice post - great colors in those clips.
ReplyDeleteIf you had been in Texas in 2001 you could have seen this film on the big screen at the Quentin Tarantino Film Festival #5.