Disney's Fun and Fancy Free
Disney's Fun and Fancy Free is a collection consisting of four shorts. The first one is a brief opening song featuring Jimminy Cricket and it is entertaining enough. Besides it is good to see the rather lovable insect return but sadly, this time I'm a much less interesting film.
The Bongo short that follows certainly has its charm. It's well-animated and the titular character is rather loveable.
Unfortunately, it's marred by a poorly thought out and harmful message to children as it's revealed that bears show each other love by a slap. This might be harmful to young children to see cute animals sing about showing their love with physical violence
But Pongo despite it's bad moral message to children is not the weakest point in the film as it's partially redeemed by Disney's top notch animation and by it's charm.
The puppet segment is not very entertaining at all. The ventriloquist does not mask his mouth moving when he talks very much and the jokes are mostly unfunny. Besides this, it has the unfortunate habit of constantly interrupting the Mickey and the Beanstalk segment.
Speaking of which, the Mickey and the Beanstalk short is by far the highlight of the film. It's fun and entertaining, featuring Mickey Mpuse, Donald Duck, and Goofy. However, often the action is interrupted by unfunny jokes by the puppets.
As for family-friendliness it's for all ages but families with young children might beware of the questionable morals of the bears and their slapping each other to show love.
Overall, Fun and Fancy Free is a mediocre film and I would give it a 6.5. It would have gotten a much better score if it wasn't for the obnoxiousness of the puppet segment as the Mickey and the Beanstalk is a great cartoon.