Dumbo is a 1941 American animated musical fantasy film produced by Walt Disney Productions and released by RKO Radio Pictures. It is based upon the storyline written by Helen Aberson and Harold Pearl, and illustrated by Helen Durney for the prototype of a novelty toy ("Roll-a-Book").
The main character is Jumbo Jr., an elephant who is ridiculed for his oversized ears and mockingly nicknamed "Dumbo", but in fact he is capable of flying by using his ears as wings. Throughout most of the film, his only true friend, aside from his mother, is a mouse named Timothy – a relationship parodying the stereotypical animosity between mice and elephants.
Produced to recoup the financial losses of both Pinocchio and Fantasia, Dumbo was a deliberate pursuit of simplicity and economy. At 64 minutes, it is one of the studio's shortest animated features. Sound was recorded conventionally using the RCA System. One voice was synthesized using the Sonovox system, but it too was recorded using the RCA System.
Dumbo was released on October 23, 1941, where it was met with critical acclaim for its story, humor, visuals, and music. The film was later criticized for stereotyping of black people. Its accolades include an Academy Award for Best Scoring of a Musical Picture. In 2017, this film was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically and aesthetically significant".
In the years following its initial release, Dumbo has remained popular, spawning a popular theme park attraction, merchandise products, a television series, and a live-action adaptation.
Plot
In Florida, while a large circus spends the off-season in its winter grounds, a flock of white storks delivers many babies to the animals. One elephant, Mrs. Jumbo, does not receive her baby, and keeps scanning the sky in hope. The next spring, the circus loads up its train, Casey Jr., and sets out on a new tour. A belated stork catches up with the train and drops off the expected baby elephant, Jumbo Jr. The other elephants are initially delighted, until the baby sneezes and reveals far-oversized ears; they then mockingly nickname him "Dumbo". Mrs. Jumbo shows her baby great care and love, defending him from the others' abuse.
Being clumsy due to his ears, Dumbo is made into a sideshow attraction. When some rowdy boys start to bully Dumbo, even breaking into his pen to tug on his ears, a furious Mrs. Jumbo spanks their leader and starts throwing hay bales at other spectators. The ringmaster and his staff separate Mrs. Jumbo and her baby, causing her to douse the Ringmaster in a water vat and attack the other men. She is eventually restrained in a locked train car as a mad elephant; the other elephants blame the incident on Dumbo being a "freak", and continue to shun him.
Timothy, a mouse that travels with the circus, decides to intervene in the situation; scaring off the adult elephants, he befriends Dumbo and decides to make him a star. He whispers in the ringmaster's ear while the latter sleeps, convincing him to try a new stunt with Dumbo as the top of a pyramid of elephants. Dumbo trips on his ears during the show and knocks over the pyramid, injuring the others and causing the big top to collapse. Dumbo is demoted to being a part of the clowns' fireman act, in which he has to dress as a baby and jump from a burning platform into a vat of pie filling. The other elephants disown Dumbo as an elephant for disgracing himself in this way; despite his newfound popularity with the clowns, Dumbo becomes depressed.
Timothy decides to take Dumbo to see Mrs. Jumbo, but they cannot see each other's faces and can only intertwine trunks. Meanwhile, the clowns decide to increase the popularity of their fireman act by dangerously raising the platform Dumbo jumps from. In celebration of the plan, they drink champagne, and a bottle of it falls into a water vat. Crying after visiting his mother, Dumbo has an unsettling case of the hiccups, so Timothy takes him to the vat for some water, only to discover too late that the water contains champagne. Both of them get drunk, and hallucinate pink elephants.
Dumbo and Timothy are awakened the next morning by Jim and his gang of crows, who discover them sleeping high up in their tree. Initially making fun of Timothy's assertion that Dumbo must have flown into the tree with his ears while being drunk, the crows are soon moved by Dumbo's sad story. They decide to help Timothy, giving him a "magic feather" to help Dumbo fly. Holding the feather, Dumbo does indeed take off a second time. He and Timothy return to the circus with plans to surprise the audience.
During the clowns' fire act, Dumbo jumps off the platform and prepares to fly. He drops the feather, but Timothy assures him it was only a psychological aid. As Dumbo successfully flies about the big top, he uses his trunk and various props to humiliate the clowns, Ringmaster, and other elephants; the audience applauds, believing this to be part of the act. Dumbo gains fame and fortune, Timothy becomes his new manager and signs him to a Hollywood contract, and Mrs. Jumbo is freed. She and Dumbo are given a private coach on Casey Jr., and the crows wave goodbye to the duo as they travel away.
Voice cast The voice actors are uncredited for their roles in the film. The title character is Dumbo, whose real name is Jumbo Jr. He is a newborn elephant who has huge ears and is able to use them to fly, carrying what he thinks of as a magic feather. Dumbo is speechless in this film. Edward Brophy as Timothy Q. Mouse, an anthropomorphic mouse who becomes the only friend of Dumbo after his mother is locked up and does his best to make Dumbo happy again. He is never referred to by name save for a mention in a newspaper article near the end of the film. Verna Felton as Elephant Matriarch, the well-meaning but pompous leader of the elephants who is cold toward Dumbo. Mrs. Jumbo, Dumbo's mother, who not only speaks just once in the film to give Dumbo's name, but also sings her lullaby "Baby Mine" to him. Cliff Edwards as Dandy Crow (previously named Jim Crow on the original model sheets), the leader of a group of anthropomorphic crows. Though he initially jokes and ridicules Timothy's idea that Dumbo can fly, he hears Dumbo's tragic history and becomes determined to help Dumbo fly for real. He is never mentioned by name in the film. Herman Bing as the ringmaster, who is the strict, and foolish owner of the circus. Due to being misinformed about Mrs. Jumbo's attack on the rowdy boys, he assumes she simply snapped and locks her up. Sterling Holloway as Mr. Stork, Dumbo's carrier stork seen at the beginning of the film. Margaret Wright as Casey Junior, an anthropomorphic 2-4-0 tender locomotive hauling the circus train. The Hall Johnson Choir as Crow Chorus Hall Johnson as Deacon Crow James Baskett as Fats Crow Nick Stewart as Specks Crow Jim Carmichael as Dopey Crow The King's Men as the Roustabout Chorus Noreen Gammill as Elephant Catty Dorothy Scott as Elephant Giddy Sarah Selby as Elephant Prissy Billy Bletcher as Clown Malcolm Hutton as Skinny, the boy who taunts Dumbo John McLeish as the narrator
Production Development Dumbo is based upon a children's story written by Helen Aberson-Mayer and Harold Pearl, with illustrations by Helen Durney. The children's book was first brought to the attention of Walt Disney in late 1939 by Kay Kamen, the studio's head of merchandise licensing, who showed a prototype of the Roll-A-Book that included Dumbo. Disney immediately grasped its possibilities and heartwarming story and purchased the rights to it.
Originally intended as a short film, Disney soon realized a decent book adaption needed a feature-length film. At the time, the foreign markets in Europe had been curtailed due to World War II, which caused Pinocchio and Fantasia to fail at the box office. With the film's modest budget, Dumbo was intended to be a low-budget feature designed to bring revenue to the studio. Story artists Dick Huemer and Joe Grant were assigned to develop the plot into a feature-length film. From January 22 to March 21, 1940, they wrote a 102-page script outline in chapters, much like a book, an unusual way of writing a film script. They conceived the stork-delivery and the pink elephants sequences and had Dumbo's mother renamed from "Mother Ella" to "Mrs. Jumbo". They riffed on elephants' fear of mice by replacing a wise robin named "Red" found in the original story with the wisecracking mouse character, Timothy. They also added a "rusty black crow", which was later expanded into five. Regardless of this, very little was changed from the original draft.Archived at Ghostarchive and the Wayback Machine: In March 1940, a story team headed by Otto Englander translated the outline into story sketches.
Animation From Disney's perspective, Dumbo required none of the special effects that had slowed down production and grew the budgets of Pinocchio, Fantasia, and Bambi. When the film went into production in early 1941, supervising director Ben Sharpsteen was given orders to keep the film simple and inexpensive. As a result, the character designs are simpler, background paintings are less detailed, and a number of held cels (or frames) were used in the character animation. Although the film is more "cartoony" than previous Disney films, the animators brought elephants and other animals into the studio to study their movement.
Watercolor paint was used to render the backgrounds. Dumbo is one of the few Disney features to use the technique, which was also used for Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, and regularly employed for the various Disney cartoon shorts. The other Disney features used oil paint and gouache. 2002's Lilo & Stitch, which drew influences from Dumbo, also made use of watercolor backgrounds.
For the part in the "Pink Elephants" sequence where the background is black and the elephants are composed of changing color gradations, it is actually the animation cels that are painted black, while the elephant characters are fully transparent, except for the line drawings. The real backgrounds consist of the various color gradations, which are visible through the transparent elephants.Disney Legend Ken O'Connor
Disney animators' strike
During a story meeting for Bambi on February 27, 1940, Disney observed that Dumbo was "an obvious straight cartoon" and that the animators that were assigned on Bambi were not appropriate for the look of Dumbo. Animators such as Art Babbitt and Ward Kimball were considered for the film. For that reason, less experienced animators were brought on to animate the characters. Kimball recalled that Disney approached him in a parking lot about Dumbo and summarized the entire story in five minutes. "And listening to him tell that story," Kimball noted, "I could tell that the picture was going to work. Because everything sounded right. It had a great plot." In spite of this, Bill Tytla, who was one of the studio's top animators, animated the title character, but admitted that "it was in the nature of the film to go very fast and get it out in a hurry." To speed up production, Disney used photostats of story sketches instead of full layout artwork for the film, and had experienced animators to supervise the younger, less experienced animators assigned on the film.
Production was interrupted on May 29, 1941, when a significant portion of the Disney animation staff initiated a strike; notably, Kimball continued to work on the film despite his sympathy for the strikers' grievances.