Review of Dumbo (1941) by Kyle G — 22 May 2012

Unnatural, false, and thoughtless all around. From the dumb heaven-sent-stork fantasy, through the incontestably evil delusion of happy and sunshine-y zoos (a cancerous and ridiculous blight on humanity's interaction with the rest of the world), and through to the senseless mouse-as-unlikely-mentor story, Disney has a surprising lack of ideas/questions of any taste or substance at all.

Dumbo the film is much too ugly and depressing to ignore these things, and it doesn't help to add racism and exploitation to its bag of tricks. Dumbo the character, especially when he's a precocious little scamp of a child, is in contrast a fairly interesting and delightful element -- and many of the other characters (with the exception of the stupid, malicious gossipy-older-elephant troupe) are nicely animated -- but most of the movie is just way too useless and icky for him.