SEVENTEEN hundred people recently paid £2/10/- a seat at the Broadway Theatre in New York City to see the opening page of a new chapter in screen history – the premiere of Walt Disney's "Fantasia."
Nobody knew just what to expect. A number of bewildered newspaper editors despatched their art critics, music critics, and straight news reporters along with the regular movie critics to cover the event.
Their precautions were justified, for, to quote the following morning's editorial in the "New York Times," "Mr. Disney has made history."
Actually "Fantasia" is composed of eight pieces of classical music, illustrated on the screen by Disney cartoons.
Roy, Walt Disney's brother, explains it as "an attempt to adapt to pictures some of the world's best music."
Someone else has called it – "Seeing music and hearing pictures."
"Fantasia" runs for two hours and twenty minutes, with a fifteen-minute intermission.
The curtains part, you see the musicians assemble and start to tune up, Deems Taylor, well-known music critic and composer, steps forward with a brief introduction to the picture and announces the first selection. Bach's Toccata and Fugue.
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"Fantasia" may revolutionise the whole of your screen entertainment. For it introduces an entirely new technique in sound.
Sound in this film has the same perspective, as in every day life.
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This new technique is something the movies have long looked for. It is produced by means of a type of recording patented under the name of Fantasound.
While there are certain sections that will be enjoyed by children and adults alike – the "Nutcracker Suite" and "Dance of the Hours," for example – it has not been designed for children. The dramatic force of such items as the "Rite of Spring" and "Night on Bald Mountain" would probably be a good deal too much for most youngsters.
"Fantasia" represents the opening of a new field of entertainment. If the public likes it (and in New York a trebled box-office staff is taking reservations five months in advance). Disney will continue his efforts, perhaps replacing sections of the picture with new selections as time goes on, so the world may continue the experience of "seeing music and hearing pictures."
