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After Walt Disney released the world’s first animated feature film, the wildly successful Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, the studio struggled with a couple of ambitious financial failures. Pinocchio and Fantasia were creatively and technologically advanced films, but both bombed at the box office in their initial releases. Dumbo, their fourth release, was conceived to save the studio from ruin — it was a budget film in comparison to its predecessors, with a much shorter run time (sixty-three minutes) and a simplified, more ‘cartoony’ animation style. But what Dumbo lacks in visual sophistication, it more than makes up in character and heart.
The film begins with baby Dumbo being delivered by a stork to Mrs. Jumbo, an elephant in a traveling circus longing to have a child. But immediately upon his arrival, Dumbo is ridiculed by the other elephants for having over-sized ears. Mrs. Jumbo goes out of her way to protect her child from bullying, but when paying circus customers begin manhandling him, she attacks in retaliation. The circus brands her a ‘mad elephant’ and locks her away in a tiny, jail-like train car, separating her from Dumbo except through a small barred window through which they can touch trunks by the cover of night. A mouse named Timothy takes pity on Dumbo and decides to help him find his purpose within the circus. But after his ears trip him up during a dangerous show number, the circus demotes Dumbo to a clown. At the lowest point in their journey, Dumbo and Timothy accidentally get drunk together. Waking up in a tree top, Timothy begins to realize that Dumbo may have a special gift that can win him confidence and earn him respect within the circus — that the bullied little pachyderm can fly.
Dumbo never speaks, yet through skilled animation and potent storytelling we empathize tremendously with him. I challenge anyone to remain straight-faced while watching Mrs. Jumbo cradle Dumbo in her trunk through her cage bars during the Oscar-nominated song “Baby Mine”. And speaking of musical numbers, Dumbo has multiple catchy tunes, including the jive “When I See an Elephant Fly” and a ditty I’ve been humming for my entire life, “Casey Junior”. Then there’s the phenomenal, surrealist hallucination sequence set to “Pink Elephants on Parade”. As economic in its storytelling as Dumbo is, it somehow manages to afford a non-essential grace note like this one — a fan favorite scene if there ever was one.
Even though Dumbo looks more simple and unadorned than any of Disney’s other Golden Age classics, it holds a rightful place among them — a testament to the power of character, story, and music over production values and technology. Disney’s budget-conscience approach paid off, too. Dumbo was released just before America entered World War II, providing a touching escape from the horrors of reality. It was the first animated film to earn a profit since Snow White, keeping the studio afloat to continue its growing legacy. If this wonderful film has any shortcoming, it might be that the final act feels a bit too compressed and the ending comes too abruptly. But when a film touches your heart like this one does, it’s almost critic-proof. For anyone who has ever felt like a freak or been bullied for reasons beyond their control, Dumbo is an inspiration.
With the uncredited voices of Sterling Holloway, Edward Brophy, and Verna Felton.
Academy Award: Best Score (Frank Churchill & Oliver Wallace)
Oscar Nomination: Best Song (“Baby Mine”)