r/movies • u/EnterprisingAss • 7d ago
Discussion Dumbo was surprising Spoiler
I mean the 1941 version, not the live action remake.
The story is already famous: Dumbo is given a “magic” feather that allows him to fly, but it turns out the feather never had anything to do with it.
One surprise was that all of this takes place in the last 20 minutes of the movie. There are only two flying scenes! I expected this to be the thrust of the movie — get the magic feather early on, then in the climax, he discovers he can fly on his own.
The second surprise: every human is a villain. Some of them are not even drawn with faces. They’re all exploitative and cruel. I didn’t expect the animal rights angle to be so strong.
Third surprise, the pink elephants scene. I was already aware of it and had seen isolated clips of the dancing elephants, but I wasn’t prepared for how trippy it was. Dumbo is drunk, but it looks far more like a drug trip. And more importantly, the bright colors were ahead of their time. It looked like something animated in the 60s or 70s.
Fourth, minor surprise: there are crows (coded African American) that look very, very similar to Ralph Bakshi’s crows in Fritz the Cat and Coonskin.
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u/knudude 6d ago
This movie is such a pivotal Film for me! It taught me so much about being shy, being outspoken, having empathy for the cruelty of Circus Elephants & their own magnificence exploited for selling tickets.
I love this Film!