Fantasia / Fantasia 2000 (1940-1999) (Special Edition)

[Ernest Rister]

Originally Posted by McCrutchy

Ernest, if I can get just the "Fantasia Legacy" DVD from the Anthology set (i.e. this item), am I right in thinking that I would then have all of the extras not included on the physical BD discs?

Unfortunately, both the old DVDs for Fantasia and Fantasia 2000 have making of documentaries and short music-related cartoons not included on Disc 3. But most of the content is on Disc 3.

[Ernest Rister]

Originally Posted by Moleman1138

Ultimate Disney says that despite just coming out, Fantasia/Fantasia 2000 is going back in the vault in March. WTF?!?

http://www.dvdizzy.com/index.html

It was delayed for almost nine months for reasons unknown to the general public, and the F2K disc is reportedly giving people fits. I suspect Disney is eyeing a 3-D conversion, and that's why they are yanking it so fast. Beauty and the Beast 3-D is on the way, Fantasia would be a natural choice for the format (along with Bambi, Hunchback, Rescuers Down Under, Tarzan, Pinocchio, Treasure Planet, Dinosaur and Sleeping Beauty).

[Crimson King]

Originally Posted by Ernest Rister

Unfortunately, both the old DVDs for Fantasia and Fantasia 2000 have making of documentaries and short music-related cartoons not included on Disc 3. But most of the content is on Disc 3.

Glad I still got mine, the Fantasia Anthology WAS a great release back in 2000.

[Yeha-Noha]

Originally Posted by BillyJack

The Pastoral Synphony is again censored! Films like Fantasia should be presented the way the were filmed/intended. The transfer on the blu is prestine i must say.

+1

If you mean in China, North Korea, and in many of the fundamentalist Islamic countries, I wouldn't be surprised.

However, here in the USA, I don't believe it. If so what did they edit out of the original Fantasia?

[Show spoiler]I bet it was the topless female centaurs?

[Show spoiler]BTW, I still have my 25 year old Scrabble dictionary before the word police censored it! That I can believe because it had every dirty word in the English language imaginable! As far as I am concerned though, that still is the official Scrabble dictionary.

[Yeha-Noha]

Originally Posted by P@t_Mtl

I enjoy Fantasia 2000, not on the same level as the original but it does have it's charm.

However, Sorcerer's Apprentice shouldn't have been included in 2000. It's really out of date. Stravinsky's Rite of Spring because of it's evolutionary theme would be more fitting for this century. In fact that was one of my favorite pieces in Fantasia. It probably would have gotten censored too because it suggests that life came from the stars instead of being created by some supernatural being. My other favorite is Beethoven's Pastoral Symphony and would have loved to have that in Fantasia 2000 too.

What I don't like about the original Fantasia is the sound. It does indeed sound like it was recorded in the late 1930's despite the attempts in restoration and mixing it for 7.1. Although clear, clean undistorted sound can be heard in all 8 channels quite well, it's lacking. It lacks in the high frequencies especially. The bass is ok, but not that great either. It is no match for the sound that I get in my 7.1 surround sound operas and other symphonic music in 7.1 tracks that are part of movie soundtracks. Don't get me wrong. The sound in Fantasia is surprisingly good for it's age. However, it is no where near the the full range 20 Hz to 20K Hz sound quality of Fantasia 2000.

[gregmasciola]

Originally Posted by pj_campbell

I actually really hate the whole putting stuff in the Disney Vault for years because it's made it hard to collect some of the older movies I needed on DVD to finish my collection.

I hate it, too. I know some say that it generates more sales because people will buy the release more quickly. But there are lots of people who don't know about the Vault, so when they decide to buy a movie, and find out that it's not available anymore, the only other choice is to pretty much search on Ebay or from sellers on Amazon. And most of the copies being sold on those sites are pirated copies, so I still say that the vault strategy is costing Disney money, because who knows how many people own those pirated copies? Almost all of my Disney DVDs are pirated copies from Ebay. The first few times I got them, I sent them back to the seller and eventually found a legitimate one, but eventually it wasn't worth the time to keep buying them and sending them back 3 or 4 times until I could find the real thing. Those are all DVDs I would have gladly bought in stores if Disney didn't pull them off the shelves after a certain amount of time. I guess it doesn't matter for me now, since I'll just be slowly replacing them all on Blu-Ray, but I still feel sorry for those who aren't aware of the Vault policy and aren't able to buy copies of these movies for their children.

[The Blu Knight]

Originally Posted by rwojtalewicz

+1

If you mean in China, North Korea, and in many of the fundamentalist Islamic countries, I wouldn't be surprised.

However, here in the USA, I don't believe it. If so what did they edit out of the original Fantasia?

[Show spoiler]I bet it was the topless female centaurs?

[Show spoiler]BTW, I still have my 25 year old Scrabble dictionary before the word police censored it! That I can believe because it had every dirty word in the English language imaginable! As far as I am concerned though, that still is the official Scrabble dictionary.

Fantasia was edited way back in the '60s. Certain frames were zoomed in on to remove the black centaurettes, and that is present in this release as well as a few more of them being removed. I believe the only black centaurettes left are the zebra-legged adult ones with Bacchus. The topless centaurettes are still present, as are the topless fairies, and as are the topless-with-detail harpies in Night on Bald Mountain. Those Chinese mushrooms and Russian flowers are still present as well. But don't worry all the possibly offensive material is gone.

[PeterTHX]

Originally Posted by rwojtalewicz

What I don't like about the original Fantasia is the sound. It does indeed sound like it was recorded in the late 1930's despite the attempts in restoration and mixing it for 7.1. Although clear, clean undistorted sound can be heard in all 8 channels quite well, it's lacking. It lacks in the high frequencies especially. The bass is ok, but not that great either. It is no match for the sound that I get in my 7.1 surround sound operas and other symphonic music in 7.1 tracks that are part of movie soundtracks. Don't get me wrong. The sound in Fantasia is surprisingly good for it's age. However, it is no where near the the full range 20 Hz to 20K Hz sound quality of Fantasia 2000.

I believe the original soundtrack has been lost, so a reproduction produced via phone lines has been the source for all these years.

[Yeha-Noha]

Originally Posted by The Blu Knight

Fantasia was edited way back in the '60s. Certain frames were zoomed in on to remove the black centaurettes, and that is present in this release as well as a few more of them being removed. I believe the only black centaurettes left are the zebra-legged adult ones with Bacchus. The topless centaurettes are still present, as are the topless fairies, and as are the topless-with-detail harpies in Night on Bald Mountain. Those Chinese mushrooms and Russian flowers are still present as well. But don't worry all the possibly offensive material is gone.

Oh yes, of course, I forgot about those days. I was just a little kid way back then. My parents took me and my sister to see Fantasia around the time President Kennedy was shot. I certainly don't recall seeing any black centaurettes. However, I"m not surprised that the black centaurettes got censored. I am surpised that the zebras weren't censored too if you know what I am referring to.

Nowadays, all of that would have included. I don't understand then why Disney didn't restore Fantasia to the original uncensored version in later releases, like in 2000. Anyway thanks for the info!

[Yeha-Noha]

Originally Posted by PeterTHX

I believe the original soundtrack has been lost, so a reproduction produced via phone lines has been the source for all these years.

What's with you man?

I didn't say anything about Fantasia sounding as such. Maybe that's the way it sounds to you. However, to me, Fantasia sounds fantastic, and it's respectable sound for it's day and age. It just doesn't have near the sound quality of Fantasia 2000 if you care to compare the Sorcerer's Apprentice in 2000 to some of the other pieces in 2000. If you can't tell the difference between, then it's too bad. You need to invest in a better sound system!

[Lyle_JP]

Originally Posted by PeterTHX

Seems like your TV's "zoom" function here would be your friend.

If the vault function were actually centered on screen, which it is not.

[EricJ]

Originally Posted by Ernest Rister

It was delayed for almost nine months for reasons unknown to the general public, and the F2K disc is reportedly giving people fits. I suspect Disney is eyeing a 3-D conversion, and that's why they are yanking it so fast.

I suspect it has more to do with their old traumas of thinking that F40 has more "reputation" than audience love (we like it now, but it had a white-elephant image back in the 60's)--coupled with the equal inferiority complex that "nobody wants to buy" F2K, which is why they're packaging it together in the first place--that it's always been sold as a distant, out of reach item that generates sales hype from its very elusiveness, as with its first VHS back in '90.

But I'd still expect to see some single disks a year later during an animation promotion.

[Chaotic]

Watching Fantasia 2000. wow, the animation in this is just amazing. i love these movies.

[thelittleprince]

I'm surprised Disney hasn't capitalized on this and do a Fantasia movie at least every 10 years. Would love to see more classical music set to animation.

[bigshot]

Originally Posted by PeterTHX

I believe the original soundtrack has been lost, so a reproduction produced via phone lines has been the source for all these years.

That's correct. I don't know all the details, but I think they needed to tap into the Bell Labs facility back East to recreate Fantasound back in the late sixties. It was a special high quality phone line, not a standard voice one.

[EricJ]

Originally Posted by thelittleprince

I'm surprised Disney hasn't capitalized on this and do a Fantasia movie at least every 10 years. Would love to see more classical music set to animation.

At last report, "The Little Match Girl" (which everyone expected to be on this disk, but is still safely on the Little Mermaid disk) was originally intended for a projected "Fantasia 2007"--
But, sadly, the diminishing returns and "F2K's wimpy!" vocal minority scuttled that project.

[bigshot]

Little Match Girl is a complete rip off of the Valse Triste sequence of Bruno Bozzetto's Allegro non Troppo. Why isn't that film out on bluray? It's a lot better than Fantasia 2000.

[Pyoko]

Originally Posted by bigshot

Little Match Girl is a complete rip off of the Valse Triste sequence of Bruno Bozzetto's Allegro non Troppo.

Do you have any idea what The Little Match Girl is?

I bet they also used a time machine back in 1937 just for the purpose of ripping off a sequence Bozzetto's future film.

[waaimasjien.]

Actually, it's even older than that. The story was first published in 1845.

[miniroll32]

Originally Posted by bigshot

That's correct. I don't know all the details, but I think they needed to tap into the Bell Labs facility back East to recreate Fantasound back in the late sixties. It was a special high quality phone line, not a standard voice one.

They had to use Bell phone lines because the original Fantasound equipment couldn't be moved from the sound-stage building. I guess they paid the price for building it inside the building!

Anywho, from the research I've been doing for a thesis, the actual transfer was done not just for commercial reasons but because the nitrate films were already deteriorating. So while the definition of the original recordings hadn't been lost a great deal, they at least had a far more 'hardy' medium to keep the music on.

I've got the 50's vinyl release (which in the sleeve notes, talks about the "brand new magnetic transfer") and it sounds far superior to the any release you'll have heard since the 90's. This can only be because it was printed straight after the transfer, and therefore only the clarity of the records themselves are subject to damage. Its amazing how much clearer the dynamic range is, and even the reverberation of the concert hall! Best of all, the Stereo is far more fierce than the past releases.