DISNEY - SWORD IN THE STONE(1963)
When I was young, this was one of my favorite movies from
Disney!! The colors and story really jumped out at me! I've recently
watched this again, and boy what a difference 40 years makes!!
This is decidedly a great kids movie, but not so much for adults! B-
From a reviewer at IMDb.com
I only had very vague recollections of this movie until I watched
it again just recently and I've decided this is kind of an underrated
film.
I'm not all that familiar with the original story of the Sword in the
Stone aside from the obvious more famous bits but I imagine the
story guys on this movie took a lot of liberties. When it comes right
down to it the plot is little more than a lot of fluff to fill running time
until Arthur AKA Wart gets to the sword. Fluff or not though the film's
entertaining enough and allows for the great animation that I found
to be the stand out quality here.
I'm an animator myself so maybe this means more to me than the
average audience, but the character animation on Merlin and Madam
Mim can easily go head to head with Disney's more highly regarded
classics and the use of effects is remarkable (in classical animation,
effects refer to any animation that's not a character i.e. water, smoke,
fire, dust etc.) Everything from rain storms to pixy dust is masterly
handled and adds a whole layer of wonder to the whole thing. The
highlight for me was a showdown between Merlin and Mim in which
they morph into a variety of creatures to battle one another and no
morph looks the same twice.
This is just light hearted entertainment. It's definitely geared more
for kids but if you're an animation fan it's worth watching for that
alone. - on_the_can