D52 Week 6: Saludos Amigos!

It's always kind of a miserable experience to wade through WWII-era entertainment, which is usually maybe not so very good, to say the least. Of course, I realise that there were more pressing issues at the time than the arts, many of those issues involving Fox News alumnus Adolf Hitler (who is so loathed that Firefox's spellchecker refuses to even acknowledge his given name). In Disney's case, this caused a shaky financial situation that lead to them only being able to produce "package films" consisting of several shorts strung together, which - unlike the beautifully crafted shorts comprising the not-at-all cheap Fantasia - were (relatively) simply animated and not terribly distinguishable from Disney's theatrical shorts. Yes, Disney's theatrical shorts weren't bad-looking or anything, but they're a far cry from the visual craftsmanship of Disney's features, and that's especially disappointing coming off the sheer gorgeousness of Bambi. Did I mention that Saludos Amigos is only 42 minutes long? Yeah, everything about this particular "feature" sounds like a very underwhelming experience. But, the original theatrical poster promises that this was Walt Disney's "gayest musical Technicolor feature". So...here's hoping for some hardcore twink action?

Of course, the four shorts are strung together by some travelogue-esque material, in which Walt Disney and a team of artists visit Latin America and seem a little surprised that it's not a total shithole down there. (You know it's a Disney feature produced on the cheap, because just like Dumbo, aerial shots in the animated bits are labelled like a map!) Let's get this out of the way immediately: As a documentary on our neighbours to the south, Saludos Amigos is both incredibly shallow, and certainly outdated. Not only are you probably not gonna learn anything, there's a good chance that you'll actually know more about some of these places than they do! So, if you're looking for a good travelogue, keep looking, because the live action segments are pretty dire. At the very least, though, they gave me my new band name. Syncopated Burros!

The shorts are a bit more interesting, fortunately...

Lake Titicaca: This is probably the most overtly documentary-like of the four shorts, in that the gags seem incidental to what Mr. Announcer Guy is saying, at least until about halfway through; when we reach the precarious rope bridge, there's a definitely upswing in interestingness. It's here that things become amusing and justifiable as a Donald Duck short, so long as you can ignore how weirdly drawn that llama is, with its giant chicken feet and all. Also, as someone who's used to more recent references to Lake Titicaca, let me just say that it's so nice to hear it mentioned without being followed by snickering at its "hilarious" name!
Disney's Message of Goodwill About Lake Titicaca: Visit "the land of the Incas" and a llama will probably murder you on a rickety old rope bridge. Awesome!

Pedro: Is it strange that I regard potential tragedy befalling cartoon airplanes as a far less emotional thing than potential tragedy befalling cartoon elephants or deer? Perhaps. This was definitely a long way to go just to make the point that flying through the Andes is actually not the easiest thing in the world, though. I wonder how many people saw this short, then later in life travelled to Chile, only to be crushingly disappointed to learn that, no, Aconcagua actually doesn't have a giant scary face on it.
Disney's Message of Goodwill About Chile: Chileans are universally such bumbling fools that they are completely inept at being anthropomorphic aeroplanes. (They are much more suited to being bigoted anthropomorphic condors, naturally.)

El Gaucho Goofy: I admit to having a fondness for the Goofy "How To" shorts, so this is probably my favourite of the four segments pretty much by default. (Thankfully, years of Dora the Explorer existing has desensitized me to even the most overzealous use of the "here is a thing and here is the Spanish language name for aforementioned thing" routine.) If you like good old-fashioned cartoon slapstick, you'll probably like this too! The highlight, of both this segment and probably the entire film, is the slow-mo bola bit, which gets even more impressiveness points when you realise just how hard animating slow motion actually is.
Disney's Message of Goodwill About Argentina: The Argentine gauchos enjoy dressing their horses up in pretty dresses, for sex purposes I assume. Nifty!

Aquarela do Brasil: They edited Goofy smoking a cigarette out of "El Gaucho Goofy", but no one has any problem with José Carioca ("The Brazilian Jitterbird", according to the poster) puffing his big fat Brazilian cigar here. Are cigars more socially acceptable than cigarettes or something? Someone get back to me on that. This actually starts off sort of neat, as a fun little music video of sorts that plays like low-budget Fantasia. Yet, whereas Donald Duck's presence pretty much saved the first segment, here we see everything come to a screeching halt as soon as he appears (along with José, who is uninteresting here). The samba sequence is just flat-out boring, even despite my usual love of accordions and green things. If I was to name one bright side, um, I learned how to pronounce "cachaça"?
Disney's Message of Goodwill About Brazil: Despite their dancing skills, Brazilian people (and parrots, etc.) are really just the most boring people you could possibly ever meet. Hells yeah!

In conclusion, though there are a couple segments that are really quite fun (namely, "Lake Titicaca" and "El Gaucho Goofy"), that's only when they're taken outside the context of being part of a film. Maybe you can look them up somewhere else, if you're curious! As a feature, Saludos Amigos is criminally plotless, obviously outdated, and at times outright tedious. (Plus, despite what the original theatrical poster claimed, there was a saddening lack of hardcore bareback action here.) As much as I was hoping I could recommend this, on the grounds that it's so unusual as Disney features go, I just can't. It's just impossible, partly because of the obvious lack of fanaticism about its subject matter. Fantasia was charming despite its faults, because it was an intriguing new idea with a ton of heart and soul poured into it. Meanwhile, despite its cheery demeanor, Saludos Amigos never quite lets you forget that it's Good Neighbor Policy propaganda, hastily thrown together for financial reasons. Here's hoping The Three Caballeros is a slightly more satisfying Disney Latinsploitation film!

OBLIGATORY DIRECT-TO-DVD UNNECESSARY SEQUEL IDEA: In Salu-Tres Amigos, we see what happened to the delightful characters from each delightful segment several years down the road. Donald Duck has somehow been roped into returning to Lake Titicaca to help that llama raise its cute li'l baby chicks! Pedro regrets undergoing Dumboplasty as part of the war effort! Goofy is the best man at the extravagant wedding of that horse and that ostrich! José Carioca has, obviously, been reduced to participating in Dança dos Famosos following some questionable career choices! And Walt Disney is, um....well, maybe they should sidestep that one.