Saludos Amigos

¡Buenos días, amigos! Let’s join a plane-full of Disney’s finest on an excursion to South America, and have a look at the first fruits of their south-of-the-border fun: 1942’s Saludos Amigos!

 

Brazil - where hearts are entertaining June...

 

The first of Walt Disney Productions’ “package films” (see my review of Make Mine Music, if you dare,) Saludos Amigos was the result of a South American “goodwill tour” sponsored by the U.S. State Department as part of their 1941-enacted Good Neighbor Policy. The United States had not yet entered World War II, but the government was eager to make nice with Brazil, Argentina, Chile and Peru - countries whose governments had ties with Nazi Germany - and the popularity of Walt Disney and his studio’s films made him a perfect ambassador. Saludos Amigos serves as something of a travelogue for those nations, showcasing footage of Walt and his team of artists traveling about and sampling some of the “local color” between short animated sequences. Also included before and after each segment is footage of Norm Ferguson, Frank Thomas, Mary Blair and other #DisneyLegends at work, interpreting the group's travels into works of art. The extent to which these scenes (and Walt’s inscrutable reactions to their efforts) are staged is debatable.

 

Well, it - ah ... it's not your worst work...

 

The first section takes us to Lake Titicaca (teehee!) for an extended look at the local marketplace. Following this is the first animated section, featuring Donald Duck (voiced as always by Clarence Nash) as a “celebrated American tourist.” As Donald familiarizes himself with Peruvian culture (and fights with a stubborn Llama, naturally,) we are also treated to some brilliantly colorful paintings of the region by Mary Blair. Beyond these artistic flourishes, the animated portions of the film feel very much like the typical animated shorts that Disney put out at the time, with a similar look, sound design and use of slapstick comedy. One can easily sense that these “package films” were made on the cheap, and Saludos Amigos especially gives one the impression that the studio planned on splitting the individual segments off into separate shorts later on. This is what they did, in fact, with each of the four animated portions later ending up playing ahead of various movie re-releases or on television.

 

Donald sits on his Titicacas

 

Next we are transported to Chile for the tale of Pedro, a young anthropomorphic airplane who's determined to make a dangerous flight to Mendoza, Argentina and back, in order to get the mail delivered. Though unmemorable, this section is still charming, and is notable as one of the earliest examples of Disney creating a humanized character out of a vehicle (it certainly wouldn’t be the last.) The film’s narrator, Fred Shields, pulls double duty in this section, providing the voices for all the airplane characters as well. Shields, whose voice is familiar as a narrator for several early Disney productions (as well as voicing Bambi’s father!), really gets into the drama in this section; when Pedro spirals off into a cloudbank, Shields screams out “Pedro! PEDROOOO!!! … he’s … gone …”

 

It's not a purse, it's a European Carryall!

 

A side-note here: famed Chilean writer and cartoonist René Ríos Boettiger (known by his nom de plume, Pepo) was reportedly very disappointed with this segment, finding it and the Pedro character poor representations of his home nation. He therefore created his own comic character, the most popular South American comic character and magazine, Condorito. Uh oh…

 

No, no - NO! Back in the damn car, Crawford!

 

Anyway, next up is another extended travelogue sequence, this time showcasing Buenos Aires, the cosmopolitan capital city of Argentina. At the time of release, the sight of a metropolitan city full of skyscrapers and fashionable residents came as something of a culture-shock to North American audiences, who only associated such “big cities” with Europe and the U.S. For the adjoining animated segment, however, Disney’s animators again opted to take us to the rural countryside, for a look at the culture of the Gauchos. Here we have Goofy (voiced by Pinto Colvig) as an American cowboy, transported from Texas to Argentina to have some wacky misadventures learning how to be a Gaucho. There are actually a few very funny moments in this part of the film, such as the Ostrich-like Rhea reacting to the narrator (“Did he say bolas?!? Caramba!!”) and when a lonely Goofy performs some of the native dances after putting his horse in a dress.

 

Magic mirror on the ground - who's the goofiest one around?

 

The film closes with a look at the Carnival in Rio de Janeiro, followed by an energetic animated sequence titled “Watercolor of Brazil,” which curiously gets it’s own separate credits sequence. Set to the familiar songs “Aquarelo do Brasil" and "Tico-Tico no Fubá,” the country’s rainforests and wildlife are “painted” on screen in lush watercolors. Before long, Donald Duck re-appears, and is introduced to cigar-chomping Brazilian parrot (and future fellow Caballero) José Carioca. Energetically voiced by (and based upon) Brazilian musician José Oliveira, the character - whom Donald insists on calling “Joe” - introduces the duck to the samba, and leads him on a quick tour of Rio’s nightlife. Just when the sequence picks up steam (and Donald begins to fall into the rhythm,) the film comes to an abrupt end.

 

Donald's South American wingman

 

Honestly, Saludos Amigos barely qualifies as a feature-length film - it clocks in at a tidy 42 minutes, a whole 20 minutes shorter than Disney’s next-longest feature, Dumbo. It’s hard to say for sure why this is the case, especially considering that there were more characters and sequences being worked on during production (some of which would end up in later “package films” and short-features.) Undoubtedly financial issues contributed; so over-extended were Disney’s finances at the time, the studio had to be given federal loan guarantees before the film's completion. I also don’t doubt that the well-documented 1941 animators strike (which not-so-coincidentally coincided with Walt’s goodwill tour) hurt the production of this film, and made the remaining artists spread their work out over several movies.

 

Paint-by-numbers?

 

While very much a watchable film (and sometimes quite funny,) Saludos Amigos feels insubstantial - low on originality and artistic ambition. A quick watch, one leaves the film feeling like they’ve just sat through a disposable TV special, rather than one of Disney's full animated features. While it’s not one of the more popular animated films these days, it was well-received both critically and financially upon it’s original release, ensuring that the inexpensive-to-produce “package films” would remain the norm for Disney through the rest of the decade. Luckily, it also drove further interest in explorations of Latin American culture amongst its audiences. Disney’s animators were quick to respond with another Latin-flavored “package film” - one that would take their artistic ambitions to wild, unhinged new heights.



Hasta la vista, Disney