Aquarela do Brasil

1942’s Saludos Amigos is a bit of an odd duck in the Disney Animation Studio canon. It’s only 42 minutes long and a good portion of it is live action. I didn’t expect to enjoy it as I don’t have a great memory of the package films of the 40’s, but I thought this was a great little gem of Disney History.

We get to tag along with Walt Disney and a group of hand selected artist on their good will tour through South America. Sure, it reeks of the Good Neighbor Policy but it is so much fun to see parts of the world that were foreign to the eyes of a pre internet world. The Disney animation buff in me is totally delighted in seeing favorite artist like Frank Thomas and Mary Blair do their sketching and doodles in living color.

Playing more like a travelogue than an actual film, the shorts are tied together with the story of the animators getting inspiration from the surrounding lands and cultures. You’ve most likely seen the first 3 stories as standalone shorts and the animation, though consistent in quality, is no more groundbreaking than any other Mickey Mouse/Silly Symphony that was released in the past. We get to see Donald Duck being tourist in Lake Titicaca. We see the first installment of the Planes franchise in Pedro, the little mail plane who bravely flies through a storm over the country of Chile. We visit El Gaucho Goofy as he learns how to turn from an American Cowboy to a genuine Argentine gaucho with hilarious results.

The fourth short, Aquarela do Brasil, is where animation gets to do what animation does best: be wonderfully surrealistic. Translated to “Watercolor of Brazil”, a paint brush is animated painting landscapes of the country with each splattering of paint becoming something alive. A dash of blue paint becomes a flowing river. With a few drops of yellow a palm tree becomes an exotic jungle bird. Magically, a bunch of bananas are transformed to a flock of toucan with a mere splash of black paint. It’s beautiful, fantastic, and awesome. Once the scene is set Jose Carioca, the green parrot most associated with the Three Caballeros, is introduced to samba the night away Donald around the color streets of Brazil.

Not the best feature out there, and I probably wouldn’t recommend it as a must see to the casual fan, but if you have any interest in the Disney Animators of the 40’s, it’s a real treat. Bonus points for any anthropologist out there as all the live action footage has some great stuff from the native cultures of South America and Mid Century era Brazil.

“Recalling thrills of our love, there’s one thing I’m certain of. Return, I will, to old Brazil.”