Dumbo (1941)

	Also Known As: -
	Year of first release: 1941
	Director: Ben Sharpsteen (Pinocchio)
	Actors (voices): Sterling Holloway, Edward Brophy, James Baskett
	Country: USA
	Genre: Animation, Music
	Conditions of visioning: 23.06.2015, Blu-ray, Home cinema
Synopsis: In a travelling circus, Mrs. Jumbo is expecting and she receives from the Stork a cute baby with immense ears.
Review: After Fantasia, Pinocchio and Bambi, I keep on acquiring the first five classic Disney animated films of the Golden Age. Only Snow White is still missing to my Blu-ray collection. I literally hadn't seen Dumbo in decades, so this is the first time that I get the jokes around the names Mrs Jumbo (for a female elephant) and Dumb-o (for a child others are making fun of). I may be wrong, but the arrival of Dumbo looked to me like a metaphor against racism: a single mother receives a baby under the criticism of her female co-workers; where is the father? And Dumbo has large ears in comparison to the ones of all the adult females; could the father have been an African elephant? In a similar topic, I know that there has been some controversy around the characters of the (black) crows that remind of a Jazz band and whose movements have been inspired by the cabaret performance of two afro-american dancers. Dumbo was created after the financial failures of Pinocchio and Fantasia and managed to bring a lot of income although a strike started at the Disney studios and the whole country was about to go to war. Hence it doesn't display the visual extravagance of its predecessors and it lasts only 63 minutes, but wonderful ones. The story and characters are quite straight-forward but the movie nonetheless overflows with ideas like the USA map seen from the sky, the Storks delivering babies, the brave train that carries the troupe through mountains and valleys, the mouse companion, the scenes shown in shadows through the tents, the exaggerated circus scenes, and my favorite: the so-called "Pink Elephants on Parade", a metaphor for what you see when under the influence of alcohol. It comes as a surprise at two-thirds of the movie, reminds of the expressionists scenes in Fantasia and I found it even a bit scary with those elephants with black empty eyes. There are also other musical scenes of quality in Dumbo: "Song of the Roustabouts" (when the tent is erected), "When I see an elephant fly" (scene with the Jazzy crows) or "Baby Mine" when his mother is comforting Dumbo. This is a movie I should actually watch again once in a while to appreciate all of its details and qualities.
Rating: 8 /10