Springtime
About Springtime
Trees, flowers, butterflies, and birds dance. Three flowers open the dance, ladybirds come out of one bloom, and a caterpillar breaks into pieces that a top-hatted blackbird eats one by one. His mate hatches four chicks who dance until a storm hits. After the rain, crickets hop into a frog's mouth, the frog plays turtles like instruments, and a spider plucks its web. Frogs swallow one another by size until a heron takes the last one, then falls into a pond.
Cast & crew
More about Springtime
Ub Iwerks directed the third Silly Symphony. Walt Disney produced. Wilfred Jackson and Les Clark animated. Columbia Pictures released it on 24 October 1929, five days before the stock-market crash. It opened a four-film season cycle; Summer, Autumn, and Winter followed in 1930.
Themes
Background
Columbia put it out on 24 October 1929. The market broke five days later.
Making
Iwerks directed under Disney, with Stalling fitting the dances to the track, the method the Silly Symphonies were built on.
Reviews
The Film Daily (3 November 1929) called the drawing about the best yet in animation and read the frogs-eaten-by-a-bird finish as a satire on survival of the fittest. Variety (12 February 1930) praised the timing of the dances and said it was fit for any theatre. Motion Picture News (2 November 1929) headed its notice 'A Panic.'
Music
Carl W. Stalling composed the score. The Film Daily singled out the synchronized music under the frogs' dance.
Preservation
In the U.S. public domain since 1 January 2025. A copy is on Wikimedia Commons.
Notes
- Running time is listed as 6 minutes 14 seconds.
- Carl W. Stalling wrote the music.
- It entered the U.S. public domain on 1 January 2025.
- Disney issued it on 19 December 2006 in the Walt Disney Treasures set More Silly Symphonies, Volume Two.
- Motion Picture News reviewed it on 2 November 1929, The Film Daily on 3 November, and Variety on 12 February 1930.
Scenes
- A blackbird in a top hat eats a caterpillar piece by piece.
- Frogs swallow each other from smallest to largest, and a heron takes the survivor.
Influenced
- Summer (1930)
- Autumn (1930)
- Winter (1930)
Also available
- Wikimedia Commons (Springtime (1929).webm)
- Walt Disney Treasures: More Silly Symphonies, Volume Two (2006)
