Fantasia: 75th Anniversary
By Justin Smith
Last week in January, The Aero Theatre in Santa Monica celebrated its 75th anniversary. As a celebration, they decided to screen a film that was also celebrating it's 75th anniversary: Walt Disney's Fantasia! Being unsure whether D23 would acknowledge the film's anniversary with a screening, I jumped at the chance to see this. After all, with Disney animator David Pacheco in attendance and with a raffle that included a 30th anniversary poster of Disneyland(and free Disneyland tickets!!), I thought the event was just too good to pass up.
The price-tag for this particular screening was a bit high at $30, as it was intended to raise money for the Aero, but the opportunity to see Fantasia on the big screen was worth it, especially considering all the perks the Aero Theater offered. Popcorn, candy and crackerjacks were literally sold with 1940s prices! Ordering my 15¢ popcorn, it was easily the first time I ever asked the question "Do you have change for a quarter?" What's more, they even gave out complimentary cookies!
I mentioned that they had raffling to give out. They gave out one ticket for free, and you could purchase individual tickets for $2.00 each. The prizes consisted of free theatre membership, yearlong-tickets and tickets for restaurants and attractions around Santa Monica. For Disney themed prizes, in addition to the Disneyland tickets and 30th anniversary poster I mentioned earlier, they were also offering a concept print of "The Sorcerer's Apprentice" on canvas, two Walt Disney-themed posters, they even had a raffle for tickets to the Pantages Theatre to see Newsies! I put in tickets to all those except Newsies.
A little after 7:30, a full of all ages took their seats. A couple of volunteers welcomed and thanked us for our support for the Aero Theatre and reminded the audience of some of the upcoming events the theater had in store. After that, one of the managers gave us a brief history of the Aero Theatre, how it was built in 1940 by Donald Douglas Aircraft, originally intended to give free 24-hour screenings to aircraft workers who worked long-day shifts(thus given the name "Aero"), until it eventually became a beloved local theatre embraced by the city of Santa Monica. It the 90s the theater suffered due to the popularity of theater chains, and the Aero mostly became a run-down place that showed second-run movies. It very nearly face extinction as Hollywood icon Robert Redford tried to renovate the theater, expressing his fondness for his childhood theater, only to have pulled out of its financing. If even the Sundance Kid thinks you're a lost cause, things begin to look rather bleak.
Then, in 2005, American Cinematheque, the very same non-profit organization that saved the iconic Egyptian Theatre in Hollywood, came to rescue to finance and preserve the theater and have been the theater's sponsor ever since, consistently screening classic movies, foreign films, smaller independent films, even having celebrities to come introduce their films in person and have QnAs.
Speaking of celebrities, the mayor of Santa Monica was there to share his memories of growing up with the theater, before declaring Jan. 30th as "Aero Theatre Day" in Santa Monica. But most exciting was when they announced that they had a filmmaker who was a member of the American Cinematheque in the audience here to support the theater, who was none other than Jon Favreau! Yes, the same Jon Favreau who directed Iron Man, Iron Man 2 and Disney's upcoming The Jungle Book remake scheduled for early 2016. After joking that he didn't actually make Fantasia, he then went on to speak highly of the movie, before speaking quite fondly of the Aero Theater, sharing both his childhood memories to how much screening his latest film, Chef, at a QnA last year really meant to him, as well as having the opportunity to take his children to see Mary Poppins on the big screen.
Then they finally drew the raffle tickets, to which: I lost every single one of them. Pity, but hey, you win some and lose some.
Finally it was Disney animator David Pacheco's turn to come to the stage, where he gave a powerpoint on Fantasia.
Chances are if you've at all followed the movie's production history over the years, chances are you've heard most of the stories he's shared before(though when he asked if anyone in the audience had never seen Fantasia, though, an embarrassingly big number of hands went up, though even I raised my hand for never having seen in it theaters). Such as how Fantasia merely started off as a Mickey Mouse short, how Walt held a special fondness for that mouse even after Donald Duck easily eclipsed him in popularity, and decided to do a very special short with a high concept and elaborate production values in order to help showcase his beloved icon. He even got Leopold Stokowski, a very popular composer of the day, to agree to composed the short for free. However, the production quality of the animation ended up being so high that The Sorcerer's Apprentice ended up going over-budget, to the point that it would've lost money no matter how popular it given that nature of short films. So, it was then decided that The Sorcerer's Apprentice would expand into a film titled The Concert Feature, with the original intention of having it be a showcase for shorts that could've easily been Silly Symphonies. They even showed some sketches of the original plans for instrument-playing insects. Ultimately, those plans were ditched for a more classical a high-brow approach.
Among the other tidbits he talked about were how the ostrich in "Dance of the Hours" was modeled after a dancer named "Margie Bell" who later became MGM star, and Disney Legend, Marge Champion, and that Chernobog from "Night on Bald Mountain" was modeled after none other than horror icon Bela Lugosi(though animator Wilfred Jackson stepped in for a lot of it). That Yen Sid, the sorcerer from Sorcerer's Apprentice, was based on Walt, particularly his raised eyebrow to sign his anger. Or how in the Pastoral Symphony there was an accident in the art department involving a cherry food item only to completely alter the color scheme of the entire segment. Perhaps the most interesting story though was that in 1940 there was an earthquake and the glass of the multi-plane camera broke and that Fantasia literally didn't get complete until 4 hours before its first screening.
He also talked a bit about Fantasia's legacy, how, like Alice In Wonderland, it was not particularly successful until the drug-culture of the late '60s-early '70s came along. He also did mention Fantasia 2000. He finally concluded by quoting a tagline that was first uttered before Fantasia's first premiere in New York: "Fantasia Will Amasia".
The best case scenario would've been if they had screened a 35mm print of the 2-hour cut last released in 1990. Unfortunately, it was DLP, essentially being just the Blu-Ray version, complete with a Corey Burton-sounding Deems Taylor. It was still very cool to see the movie on the big screen, but with multiple version of the film around, its a shame Disney insists only on releasing one(it also would've been cool to see Sunflower, but that would've been a god-given miracle).
Since everyone who'll bother reading this pretty much already know Fantasia is a work of art, I won't really bother reviewing the movie itself, explaining how it was decades ahead of its time and paved the way for everything from Terrence Malick's The Tree of Life to Michael Jackson's Thriller, nor will I bore you with personal likes "'Sorcerer's Apprentice' inspired me to actually water the plants as a kid" or anything like that. I will say, though, the one thing that surprised me most about seeing the film for the first time on a big-screen with an audience, actually was not the animated segments, but the live-action concert footage with the musicians. As a kid, I was always under the impression the live-action footage were very serious if somewhat dry, that basically helped framed the movie as very elite and sophisticated. What surprised me was how funny those scenes were, with Deems Taylor getting some of the biggest laughs of the night. Even as an adult, I never really picked up on the sly wit of Taylor until that screening until that screening, and that actually made for some of the more interesting parts of that screening. Of course, there a couple more obvious attempts at humor such as the interview of the "soundtrack" or a band member stumbling through the chimes, but I guess I never really had given it much thought before(of course, all of the humor is extremely subtle in comparison to its sequel).
After the screening, they gave out complimentary food, which included chocolate, grapes, dip, alcoholic beverages, even Welches grape-juice!(Did You Know: Disneyland sold Welch's Grape Juice in a Fantasia theme store?)
Jon Favreau, as I expected, had long ventured out by the time the movie was over. However, I did manage to chat with animator David Pacheco a bit though. For those not in know, perhaps his biggest accomplishment was the "Walt Disney Classic Collection" figures to. Longtime Fromscreentotheme.com readers may recall I actually [LINK TO MY WALT DISNEY CLASSIC COLLECTION THURSDAY TREASURE]collected Walt Disney Classic Collection[/LINK]. Among many of the figures a booklet with David Pacheco's picture and a desc. Essentially, its just a now outdated ad for the Walt Disney Treasure Society, not overly fancy but I knew I'd regret it if I didn't managed to get him to sign it! He happily obliged, and seemed to get a real kick out of the fact somebody wanted his autograph, let alone wanted a 20-year-old photo of him signed. That made the night worth the trip!
There was even a model of the Centaurette, almost as impressives as the Centaurettes that actually showed up to the screening!
If you happen to live in a big city and have any local single, art-house, independent or classic-film theaters by you, please, by all means, utilize them as much as you can. Oftentimes its a struggle for them to remain operational, with many of the staff being volunteers who do it for the joy of cinema rather than financial gain. Even if they don't happen to screen Disney movies, there's a high chance you'll discover treasures among them. It would be a great pity if we ever have to live in world that solely realizes on Netflix Instant Streaming. May the theater-going experience thrive!
