The Jungle Book 1967
I was probably a teenager the last time I saw this movie, so it has been a while. I remember noticing that they re-used the animation of the snake Kaa to add another scene essentially identical to the first, which is a sloppy, cheap tactic that characterized Disney during the 1960’s. Still, there are some great songs in this movie and even though some of the voice actors are overused (Sterling Holloway as the Cheshire Cat, Kaa, and Winnie the Pooh!), this is a good collection of characters that moves along pretty well, although the end starts to drag a little. King Louie is just a great character with a timeless, energetic performance on his big song. The elephants are fun too, while the vultures and their pop reference to the Beatles maybe haven’t aged as well.
It may not be fair to compare this 1967 version to the 2016 version, but there was a lot more depth and drama to the 2016 version. This version is more harmless and meant for kids. The animation isn’t groundbreaking, but the quality is still quite good, albeit a little simple at times (plus the recycled stuff with Kaa which is just annoying). One complaint I had heard about the movie beforehand was that it was originally animated in a 4:3 aspect ratio but has been cropped down to 16:9 for the Blu-ray. The argument for 16:9 is that Disney knew most theaters were going to crop it for wide movie screens anyway, so while you are missing decent size strips of the top and bottom of each original frame, by design there was nothing essential there. Even knowing to look out for cropping problems, the movie looks just fine. To show it at 4:3 would mean shrinking everything down and adding black bars along the sides (which was done for Snow White and Pinocchio) and I am not sure it would be worth it, though you do wonder what you are missing.
The extras on the Diamond Edition of the Blu-ray have an alternate ending to the movie, which is interesting. It would have added quite a bit to the length of the movie, but also would have wrapped things up a little better regarding King Louie and Sher Khan. I think because the movie was already dragging a little and may have been overbudget, they decided to leave well enough alone. Still, it is something worth watching as a Disney artist does voiceover of his newly created storyboards, based on an old script.
Written: 30 Apr 2017
Owned on: Blu-ray, DVD, Digital