#9 Fun and Fancy Free

Quite possibly the best of the package films, Fun and Fancy Free released in 1947 and restricted itself to two stories, feeling quite restrained after the glut of shorts present in Make Mine Music. Jiminy Cricket returns in the framing segments, presenting us with the stories of "Bongo," a love story about two bears, and "Mickey and the Beanstalk," the last time Walt Disney himself would voice his most iconic creation.

"Bongo" is an enjoyable little story about a circus bear running away to the wilderness and falling in love with a girl bear. The environments are all quite beautifully painted, but essentially retread territory present in Dumbo and Bambi. Interestingly, the sound design of "Bongo" is one of its standout features, with a variety of amusing slapstick sound effects. It's quickly dwarfed, however, by "Mickey and the Beanstalk," hands-down one of the best shorts of the package film era. Tonally, it's midway between the Golden and Silver Ages of Disney, making it feel more like a true part of Disney's evolution than any of the previous package films. The sequence of the beanstalk growing around Mickey, Donald and Goofy's house and lifting it up into the sky allows the animators to flex their talents, while a fun sequence of the three running around on the giant's table and eating his giant food allows the artists to ply their skills.

The odd part about "Mickey and the Beanstalk" (and the part that detracts somewhat from it) is its presentation. The tale is recounted by comedian-ventriloquist Edgar Bergen at a party attended by Luana Patten and his own puppets, Charlie McCarthy and Mortimer Snerd. Bergen's narration is consistently punctuated by snarky asides from the dummies, practically giving the film a built-in riff track and breaking any immersion the story could have had. The entire segment is further broken up by frequently cutting back to the live-action scene at the party, which, while not inherently bad, certainly doesn't add anything that would have been missed.

Despite its flaws, Fun and Fancy Free manages to be a standout of the package film era, recapturing some of the essential Disney style absent from previous films. Maintaining a consistency of tone and quality, it feels more like a complete product than merely a compilation. While the package film era was an odd period in Disney's history, Fun and Fancy Free stands out as an entry truly worthy of its place in Disney's canon.