Fantasia 2000
|
List Price: Our Price: $26.54 You Save: $3.45 (12%) Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Buy Used: from $2.97 (click here) Category: DVD See more DVD releases |
|---|
Canada
Movie Reviews of Fantasia 2000
Movie Review: A worthy successor to the original
Summary: 5 Stars
Continuing the legacy of the original Fantasia was planned as far back as 1940 (with concepts developed and a Clair de Lune sequence fully produced), but due to the failure of Fantasia in 1940, the closest Disney ever came to replicating Fantasia was with Fun and Fancy Free, Make Mine Music, and Melody Time. However, as the 60th anniversary of Fantasia neared, Roy Disney saw fit to continue his uncle's legacy, and the result is Fantasia/2000.While a significantly different feature in many respects, Fantasia/2000 owes much stylistically to its predecessor. Firstly, as with Fantasia, much of the music has been adapted to better fit the animation. Secondly, many pieces correspond with sections from Fantasia: Beethoven's 5th is an abstract piece much like the Toccata And Fugue In D Minor, Carnival Of the Animals is a humorous piece in the vein of Dance Of The Hours, and The Firebird Suite concludes this sequel much like Night On Bald Mountain and Ave Maria ended Fantasia.
The centerpiece of this new Fantasia is clearly Rhapsody In Blue, which is a dynamic use of jazz and the art of Al Hirschfeld to bring forth a uniquely New York-themed piece. Other highlights include The Sorcerer's Apprentice (returning from the first Fantasia, and still a wonderful Mickey Mouse cartoon), Pomp And Circumstance (a fittingly humorous retelling of Noah's Ark with Donald and Daisy), Carnival Of The Animals (which answers that oh so important question, "What happens when you give a flamingo a yo-yo?"), and the beautiful Firebird Suite.
The DVD is equally well presented, with commentaries, a booklet, and two of Disney's (and, more importantly, Ward Kimball's) finer short subjects, "Melody" and "Toot, Whistle, Plunk, and Boom" (the latter having some racial stereotypes that are surprisingly still present given the continued editing of the original Fantasia). While a different beast from its predecessor, Fantasia/2000 is just as wonderful and highly recommended.
Movie Review: Wonderful match for animation and classical music
Summary: 5 Stars
After decades of waiting, Walt Disney finally published the first sequel to this title. Supporters for Fantasia has waited too long already. With the enhancement of graphical and computer technique, Fantasia 2000 is a good mix of high level animation and classical music.Same as the last one, Fantasia 2000 was divided into segments of musical production with introductions slipping in between. Nonetheless, what we waited for was the actual animation.
The Pines of Rome is a surprise as it was originally a picturesque symphonic poem of Reshpigi depicting the glory and beauty of different pine trees in the city. The whale movements in the artic area does provide a very good alternative for the music and the music and the animation were blended together so nicely that if you don't know the title of the music, you would thought that the music was built for the picture.
Another similar section is the Rhapsody in Blue, with all the New Yorkers running up and down the screen, looking for their dreams. Nonetheless, Rhapsody in Blue was itself a good match for live in metropolitans, so it is not as surprising and imaginative as the Pines of Rome.
The carnivals of animals is cute too, short but carefully plotted.
Mickey Mouse appeared again in his old fashion, so no surprises but just reminders of the past. Donald Duck made his debut in the 2000 with Daisy. The concept of the Noah's Ark is really cool, though the love between them were overtaken by the superb animals and visual effects around them.
For the Fire Bird suite, the picture was as Stravinsky as the music, depicting the resemblance of graphical music feeling for both, though the construction look somewhat similar with the Night on the Bare Mountain in the first Fantasia.
All in all, Disney once again proved that they are the ruler of the animation kingdom in the western world, no matter how their opponents tried, the thoughts and feelings are no match with them.
Movie Review: A Must-See
Summary: 5 Stars
I saw Fantasia 2000 in a non-IMAX theater and it was still a breathtaking performance. It didn't enchant me quite as much as the 1940 original, but that's only because I'm a more detached adult, not a child as when I saw the original in a re-release.Seven of the eight segments are new. The first movement of Beethoven's Fifth Symphony is entirely an abstract piece of swirling colors. The second piece, set to Respighi's "The Pines of Rome," uses concrete images in a non-concrete way. I won't tell you what, but it's as far as possible from pines and Rome! There follow two longish pieces: "The Steadfast Tin Soldier" is a H.C. Andersen fairy tale set to a Shostakovich concerto and (my favorite) Gershwin's "Rhapsody in Blue" takes us through a day in 1930's New York where all the characters look like caricatures out of Hirschfeld. There's a short blow-off piece based on "The Carnival of the Animals" that asks the musical question, "What happens when you give a yo-yo to a bunch of flamingos?"
The vintage piece included here is "The Sorcerer's Apprecentice" with Mickey Mouse, and I'm glad they put it in. That's followed by the story of Noah's Ark with Donald and Daisy Duck (!) set to Elgar's "Pomp and Circumstance" and finally Stravinsky's "Firebird" which is almost, but not quite, a literal interpretation.
The movie is quite short, eighty minutes or so, but it was enormously entertaining. Just as the original Fantasia, it had a mix of abstract, pictorial and story-telling animation, and the classical music was about half very familiar and half not-so-familiar. I'm only sorry the Disney people didn't haul out Fantasia every 20 years or so (1960, 1980) and update it. Also, some of the sequences were introduced by people like Steve Martin and Penn and Teller--if it's another forty years 'til the next Fantasia, will anyone remember them?
Movie Review: Fantasia 2000, A Trip through the Future and the Past!!!
Summary: 5 Stars
A combination of music and animation makes up one of Disney's latest movies of all time, Fantasia 2000. With a wide variety of music this makes for a treat for a person of any age or background. You start with "Symphony No.5" one of the best selections of music in the whole movie. The picture creates a Picasso type setting and as they fly and flutter, the music takes you on a journey though time unknown. Then though "Pines of Rome" a quieter setting evolves. Computer takes this animations to the next level. "Rhapsody in Blue" one of my favorite songs ever. A story unravels itself as this song progresses. You can feel the storyline pull together, it almost takes your heart away. How sad can they get. Mystery takes place next in "Piano Concerto No.2 Allegro, Opus 102". Rain comes down and thunder strikes, will the good ever win??? In this you shall never know. "Carnival of Animals", ahhh what a perker. Yo-yo's flying, it just can't get any funnier, wait, flamingos!! Out with the new and in with the old," The Sorcerer's Apprentice" comes to life. Just the good old times. "Pomp and Circumstance- Marches 1,2,3,And 4". Are we graduating??? No, but Noah's Ark evolves, in a different pair of shoes, and it's not Noahs. And the ending "Firebird Suite- 1919 Version". A tale of good and bad around the forest. Can it get any better??? Not now that's for sure. A great selection of music and animations makes this movie one of the best I've ever seen. if you haven't seen it, hurry up, rent it today.Movie Review: A diverse showcase for some fine animation
Summary: 5 Stars
This hangs together well as a series of linked cartoons based on the theme of music. Even after over one hundred years of making films, we still find that the simplest ways of telling stories are the best . These could be looked at as our modern equivalent of silent movies. They speak a universal language as intelligible to deaf people as to hearing, to children as much as to adults, and to Chinamen just as much as to Englishmen.The flow is interrupted somewhat by the evening-dressed stars explaining everything to us, and these could have been cut down or even eliminated without departing too much from the original Fantasia concept. The films are masterpieces of the animators' art, showing us traditional animation, computer animation that looks like traditional animation (Firebird Suite), computer animation that looks real (The Pines Of Rome), and computer animation that looks like computer animation(Shostakovich's Piano Concerto 2).
For me, the best segment here was Rhapsody In Blue, based around the New Yorker cartoons. This stylistic masterpiece is very easy to watch and very funny as well as being well drawn. The music is adapted so well you wouldn't notice any changes unless you knew it intimately. I would say that the best reason to watch this film is for the pictures rather than the music. If you want the music, you would be better off buying the whole C.D. or record of the piece concerned as you only hear short excerpts from most of them. Having said that, the music is treated with respect, James Levine's arrangements suit their purpose admirably.