MovieChat Forums > Fantasia (1941) Discussion > I Don't get It.......

I Don't get It.......


I know I will be called a troll, but I don't get this. Feel free to check out my other posts, I am not a troll and I apologize if people find me to be one. Is there some secret rule against disliking this movie, even a little?

I watched it because it was the only movie in the AFI top 100 I had not seen. Everyone I talked to about this told me it was terrible. I have never heard an actual person say anything good about this. I looked at the threads and really don't see anyone ripping the movie (ALL OTHER MOVIES DO). I have never heard a negative review online, by a critic or anyone who I don't actually know. So I had hopes, as I have liked many movies my friends and family have hated.

I watched it thinking my friends and family were wrong, but I found them to be correct. I can't put in to context what was bad, except I just felt like it was nothing more than a series of meaningless cartoons meant for someone on heavy drugs.

The closest I can compare to anything I have ever seen is some psychedelic (spelling is wrong) hippee movies that I would never have forced my self to sit through. It was like a bad Pink Floyd album like Atom Heart Mother Suite, Saucerful of Secrets or Ummagumma or the Beatles song Revolution Number 9. Only this lasted 2 painful hours.

It seems to be pretentious tripe that everyone who is "anyone" has to say is good. But it seems average people hate it. I truly want to find an actual person who likes this so they can explain to me why.

Maybe I lack class. Always a possibility. Maybe I am not smart enough. Always a possibility.

Out of over 3200 movies ranked I have only given 10 other rankings of 1. I feel I am being unfair to the other 1's by giving this a 1. It is so much worse

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[deleted]

I'm an actual person who likes it. Why do I like it? The music is beautiful, the animations that go with it are in turns interesting and fun and tell the stories of the music in different ways (though I have to admit that I don't care for the hippos and Crocs doing "Dance of the hours") and it's entertaining, to me (again, except for the hippos, always fast forward through that part, myself).

I can understand your thinking. It is meant to be 'an experience'. That's how Disney intended it to be taken. It's supposed to be like going to the Symphony but instead of coming up with the pictures in your head yourself, the animators show their version of what they think the music is saying to you.




Morgan Grimes: "I know Kung Fu."

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Do you not even like The Sorcerer's Apprentice? That's the closest thing in the film to a conventional story, and it's more accessible than the other segments. The rest isn't traditional movie-making, where there's a clear-cut storyline to follow; it's more an attempt at a visualization of popular classical pieces, meant to be taken in the same way we take in a piece of music.

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You just don't like artsy fils, neither do I. I haven't seen this, so I don't know if I'd like it. To me it seems almost as a dream film seeing as it was done in the 40's.

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Thank you for your replies. I do like plenty of "artsy" movies. So I don't think that applies. I guess I just can't get it. I admit it is me, and my classless circle.

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what is there not to get? maybe you just don't like it? but not getting it? even four year olds "get" fantasia...

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I for one do not like the movie at all. This is mostly for the music's sake – it is so heavily disfigured by cuts, reorganization and re-orchestration, that everything you might love it for is thrown completely out of the window.

The sugary optics are abominable at best. And then, the kind of "knowledge" or "classical education" bits thrown in at random to make grown-up audiences a bit more comfortable are goofy throughout.

Some things are interesting at least – for example the interpretation of "The Sorcerer's Apprentice" in which – other than in the Goethe (no, not 2000 years old) original – the broomstick, when attacked, doesn't merely double but multiply into a horrible fascist army, shown in Leni-Riefenstahl-like lighting.

But then, the phony Greek scenery and fauna in the Beethoven bit (in which one just shudders at the tempi and the violent cuts applied to a perfect piece of music) isn't just pukingly infantile but most stupidly wrong, and sexistic in a way that had been abandoned even by major Hollywood filmmakers by the 1930ies. E. g. the "funny", frock-hunting old drunkard in the bacchanal scene is introduced as Bacchus himself. In antique iconology, however, the Roman god of wine is depicted as being young, strong, and handsome even at bacchanals, while the more ridiculous aspects of drinking are embodied in Silen, an old man who can't hold his drink – who is actually shown here, Bacchus being left out entirely.

Oh yes, and nipples are only for witches. "Centaurettes" don't have them. They're no mammals, apparently (but witches are?!).

It's not that I am high-brow all the time. I do like Star Trek IV, The Incredibles, even Avatar. But this is much effort for a really crappy result.

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Yeah what's up with only the witches having nipples? Bright red ones at that? I don't think I ever watched this movie in its entirety until tonight and I said to myself "OK, that's something you don't normally see in a Disney movie"
I can't decide if I like this movie. I don't hate it, but I don't see myself rewatching it again anytime soon. I can understand what they were trying to do in the 40s and applaud their ambition, but it's too much. I mean, the thing's over 2 hours long. Normally that's no big deal but when something is disjointed and is a series of unrelated segments it can wear on you or make one lose interest, especially young children. Maybe if they released a series of featurettes for a select number of musical pieces it would've been more focused, people could pick and choose which pieces to see out of preference, there could've been ones more entertaining to kids and different ones more high-brow for the adults, and so forth. I dunno. It's not a horrible movie, but it is overrated.

Also, I too, love Star Trek IV. It's my favorite out of all the Star Trek films.

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Don't feel bad OP, I personally HATE Citizen Kane which is supposed to be "the best movie" of all time (I've never met a flesh and blood human that enjoyed it, just critics.
My favorite part of Fantasia is the Pastoral Symphony . It's just so beautiful. And the arab dance. I think I had a crush on the shy fish as a child.

...Don't look now, but I think the monotremes are out to get me...

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Citizen Kane is another movie I did not like....didn't hate it, just kinda boring. I understand why some like it though.

By the way, I just have to say, thank you to all who have responded. I came on a popular movie's thread, attacked the movie with my hatred for it, and got all rational reasoned responses. Not one person has flamed me or called me an idiot. I don't think I have seen that on any negative threads for popular movies.

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I love classical music (although I didn't know any of the pieces in this film well enough to notice the edits)... but I'd somehow never seen Fantasia until tonight. To my complete surprise, I HATED this movie. Other than the Sorcerer's Apprentice (the only piece that isn't a complete snooze-fest) I thought this film ruined a handful of perfectly good tunes. I KNOW the music is great on its own; maybe the cartoons would be good with their OWN music. All I know is they did NOT go well together.

I have an insanely short attention span, but there's few things I love more than getting rid of all distractions and listening to one of the great composers: my favorites are Schubert, Shostakovich, and Mozart. The music does so well on its own, I really don't need some retarded, unimaginative cartoons to watch while listening to it. (I consider it unimaginative because it so rarely goes outside of my expectations. The Sorcerer's Apprentice, again, is the exception.)

I've never been a fan of impressionism in film. I like to be entertained, or made to think. This style does neither. I'm not sure WHAT it does. Nothing for me!


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Its okay if you don't like it. Everyone has there own opinions. And in my opinion this is one of my favorite movies ever. I always loved it and I remember when I was little I used to cry at the end because I was so sad it was over.

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