Springtime for Pluto

i have seen this short on video and what really won me over(and this is true for many of the disney shorts)the wonderful wonderful music done by oliver wallace. i have seen this short on video since i was a little kid out of all the disney cartoons this is my favorite one. I grew up with this short. My favorite part in this short was when the catapiller turned into a female butterfly.

A Walt Disney PLUTO Cartoon.

A new SPRINGTIME FOR PLUTO brings butterflies & birds to delight him - but also a fair share of vicious bees, poison ivy, pollen & hail.

There are some good laughs in this amusing little film - the Pup's modern dance with the beehive (a probable salute to Charlie Chaplin & the globe in THE GREAT DICTATOR from 1940) is hilarious. The Spirit of Spring looks like a Greek demigod escaped from FANTASIA (1940). The inimitable Thurl Ravenscroft, who would add his voice to so many Disney projects over the coming decades, is the bass singer heard briefly vocalizing about caterpillars spinning cocoons

Walt Disney (1901-1966) was always intrigued by pictures & drawings. As a lad in Marceline, Missouri, he sketched farm animals on scraps of paper; later, as an ambulance driver in France during the First World War, he drew comic figures on the sides of his vehicle. Back in Kansas City, along with artist Ub Iwerks, Walt developed a primitive animation studio that provided animated commercials and tiny cartoons for the local movie theaters. Always the innovator, his ALICE IN CARTOONLAND series broke ground in placing a live figure in a cartoon universe. Business reversals sent Disney & Iwerks to Hollywood in 1923, where Walt's older brother Roy became his lifelong business manager & counselor. When a mildly successful series with Oswald The Lucky Rabbit was snatched away by the distributor, the character of Mickey Mouse sprung into Walt's imagination, ensuring Disney's immortality. The happy arrival of sound technology made Mickey's screen debut, STEAMBOAT WILLIE (1928), a tremendous audience success with its use of synchronized music. The SILLY SYMPHONIES soon appeared, and Walt's growing crew of marvelously talented animators were quickly conquering new territory with full color, illusions of depth and radical advancements in personality development, an arena in which Walt's genius was unbeatable. Mickey's feisty, naughty behavior had captured millions of fans, but he was soon to be joined by other animated companions: temperamental Donald Duck, intellectually-challenged Goofy and energetic Pluto. All this was in preparation for Walt's grandest dream - feature length animated films. Against a blizzard of doomsayers, Walt persevered and over the next decades delighted children of all ages with the adventures of Snow White, Pinocchio, Dumbo, Bambi & Peter Pan. Walt never forgot that his fortunes were all started by a mouse, or that childlike simplicity of message and lots of hard work always pay off.

Springtime for Pluto (1944)

** 1/2 (out of 4)

Pluto is sleeping in his doghouse when spring wakes him up. He then goes on a journey through various springtime scenarios. For the most part this is a pleasant short that manages to certainly make you feel as if you are in a spring setting. There's no doubt that the highlight of this is the animation and the warm colors that pop off the screen. The short really doesn't contain any real laughs, although it's certainly mildly charming seeing Pluto running around and doing various funny faces and gestures.

If you like Pluto, you'll like Springtime for Pluto. As with most Pluto cartoons don't expect much from the story, we could have done with less of the narrator going on about the beauty of spring and a couple of the pastoral moments might have a little more effective without Pluto, a couple of his antics jarred a tad. The animation is a real beauty, there is so much detail in the drawing and it's very vibrantly coloured, at its best in the caterpillar turning into the butterfly and the dance that is done afterwards. It is a bizarre moment, but also a fun one. The music is full of character and matches Pluto's liveliness. It is beautifully scored too, and merges very well with the visuals. The gags are funny, the bit with the cocoon on Pluto's muzzle and the beehive dance standing out as real corkers. The pastoral scenes are lovely. Pluto is cute and energetic as ever, a good choice for the type of short Springtime for Pluto is. The caterpillar/butterfly is a great character, and provides some of the short's best moments. In conclusion, very pleasant stuff but don't expect something exceptional. 8/10 Bethany Cox

This is a very nice Pluto cartoon, where the dog experiences the beautiful nature of Springtime, including wildflowers, chirping birds and busy bees. The highlight of the cartoon, I think, is the singing caterpillar and its cocooned transformation into a beautiful butterfly. I loved listening to the Latin music during the butterfly's dance scene - very catchy and harmonic.

Pluto also experienced his fair share of the negatives Spring has to offer, including Poison Ivy and rainstorms - pretty funny to watch Pluto to go through that. The music that accompanies each scene and action were brilliantly done. Great cartoon!

Grade A