SimonJack Less known than the big fantasy films of Walt Disney ("Snow White...," "Bambi," "Cinderella" and the likes ) this 1949 film combined two fables on a single film. Both are based on published stories and later were separated into separate films. But, for this one very early film, the first color renditions of Mr. Toad and Ichabod Crane garnered Disney a Golden Globe for cinematography. The stories appear in the film in the reverse order of the title, "The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad." "Mr. Toad" is based on British author Kenneth Grahame's children's fantasy, "The Wind in the Willows." Basil Rathbone narrates with a fine cast of English actors as the voices of Mr. Toad, Mole, Water Rat, and others. Eric Blore stands out with his excellent rendition of the high-strung, zany and travel-speed obsessed Toad. For a live action portrayal by Blore of his off-the-wall sounds, see his portrayal of Digges, in the hilarious 1937 Warner Brothers comedy, "It's Love I'm After."Bing Crosby narrates "Ichabod" and sings some of his songs. Other voices do the townsfolk. Ichabod is based on American author Washington Irving's short story, "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow." This is an entertaining animated film that holds up well these many decades after Disney released it. The headless horseman in the tale of Ichabod doesn't have near the fright level it did for kids in the mid-20th century. The making and watching of many more scary and horror films over the years make some early fright films seem quite tame or mild by comparison. But this is a film with a couple of children's stories that most should still enjoy well into the future.

Animated Antic In the 1940's, Walt Disney Animation Studios was not doing very well financially. For the past seven years, the company had been most devoted to making films known as "package films" which were generally many shorts films compiled together to make a full length feature. The reason behind this is because their last full length film that wasn't a package film, "Bambi" lost the studio lots of money due to the film not making money in Europe because of the ongoing Second World War. As for their package films, most of them range from being okay to decent. However, "The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad" is an exception. This film cleverly adapts two classic novels and treats them in a very faithful manner. For this review, I am judging both segments as their own separate piece as I think it would be the fair thing to do.The first segment is "The Wind in the Willows" (narrated by Basil Rathbone) which follows on the wealthy and rambunctious J. Thaddeus Toad. He is obsessed with the many fads and his crazy adventures have brought him to the brink of bankruptcy much to the dismay of his friends Moley, Ratty and MacBadger. After Toad's attention is turned to getting the latest invention of a motorcar, he is determined to get the new device only to find himself arrested for car theft. During a trial it is revealed that he had traded the car for his own estate Toad Hall. Not wanting to give more details away, I will now discuss the second segment of the movie which is "The Legend of Sleepy Hallow" (narrated by Bing Crosby). In 1790, a strange but charming man named Ichabod Crane moves to the town of Sleepy Hallow, New York to become the towns new schoolteacher. While he does win the hearts of the women in the town, he also gets the jealousy of the town hero Brom Bones. Ichabod then falls in love with the daughter of the richest man in town named Katrina and vows to try to get her to marry him in order to get her fathers money. What happens next is him and Brom competing for the hand of Katrina and the famous climax involving the Headless Horseman.Out of the many package films that Disney has released, this one was clearly the best. What works about this film where the others failed is the fact that the two stories shown actually work together. The balance of a story with happy and uplifting tone combined with the story featuring the dark sinister tone set the mood up perfectly resulting in a very enjoyable movie. Both stories have funny and memorable moments and are very good adaptations in their own right. The animation is top notch as always for Disney's earlier films. The colors are just right and match the moods of the movies perfectly. As for the characters, I love how memorable and funny they can be. I think more laughs came from me during "The Wind in the Willows" segment mainly because of the character of Cyril. I also love the entire climax from the "Sleepy Hallow" segment which can easily be considered a Halloween classic."The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad" is not one of Disney's best films, but I think it has plenty of memorable moments that I can highly recommend it. The two stories are fantastic, the animation is beautiful and the characters are memorable in the right ways. It's usually rare for two different stories are paired together and work perfectly, but in this case it definitely works.

Michael_Elliott The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad (1949)*** (out of 4)This here is a pretty good Disney film that takes two famous stories and adds that magical touch to them. The first story is based on The Wind and the Willows with the second being based around The Legend of Sleepy Hollow.THE ADVENTURES OF ICHABOD AND MR. TOAD isn't the greatest film to come from Disney but it certainly has enough great animation to make it worth sitting through. It's really strange that the studio would put these two stories together since they're so different and apparently in the years that followed it was the second film that got released on its own. I'd agree that the adaptation of Sleepy Hollow was the better of the two films but at the same time there's some better animation to be found in the first.Again, this is Disney so the animation skills are extremely high and I especially thought that the background work in the first film simply jumped off the screen. This is especially true in the scenes where there's a lot of action moving around in the front. Just take a look at the background and see how much sharp detail is there. The second film also looks beautiful and contains some terrific images and especially the scene where the pumpkin head is thrown towards the camera.Neither short has that much character development and I'd say that the direction of both is rather laid back at times. Still, there's no question that there's some very good vocal work and the animation is top level.

John T. Ryan ONE MAY SEARCH for hours, days or even longer and they will no find such a story anywhere in the annals of the English language. And this would be for good reason; for you see, the title is an invention of convenience and necessity for this Walt Disney Production, NOW, AS WE know, just about all of the great Disney animated features are adaptations from some literary, folk tale or actual historical occurrence. So why this bizarre and otherwise meaningless handle?SIMPLY STATED, THIS title is an incorporation of two names, or at least a portion thereof, of two separate, disparate literary works adapted within the framework of this single "movie". The first segment is of Englishman, Kenneth Grahame's THE WIND IN THE WILLOWS; with the second half's being devoted to Yankee author, Washington Irving's, THE LEGEND OF SLEEPY HOLLOW.THE FIRST SEGMENT gives us a look inside the world of "eccentric/mad" Mr. Toad and his anthropomorphic friends, Mac Badger, Rat and Mole; as they do their best in standing by their obviously slightly insane, upper class friend. Toad's insatiable desire for high times and adventure lead him to carving out a destructive path across the English countryside aided by a cart-pulling horse named Cyril. Eventually Toad is framed for "Grand Theft Auto" and looses the Deed and clear Title to ancestral home, Toad Hall to a gang of (both literally and figuratively) Weasels.THE SECOND HALF of the picture moves to early 19th Century New York State for our encounter with the gangly schoolmaster with the voracious appetite, one Ichabod Crane. The story relates about how this scarecrow-like appearance caused a great disturbance to the locals in the village of Sleepy Hollow. The kindly man of letters eventually finds himself at odds with roughneck leader, the broad-shouldered Brom Bones, over the affections of the lovely Trina van Tassel.OF COURSE, AS we all know, the highlight of the story is Ichabod's encounter with the legendary Headless Horseman, the local ghost of some hapless British soldier killed in the American Revolutionary War. We can personally testify of just how well done and truly frightening is the sequence where the two meet In the woods at night. (It really and truly scary it was to this writer, then about 7 years old in circa 1954,not original release) ALTHOUGH THIS TWO completely different stories in one film may seem like a new way for presenting us with a Disney Animated feature, the company had done some multi-segmented films previously. One only need to look at MELODY TIME, MAKE MINE MUSIC and even the much praised, even cult status "concert feature", FANTASIA, in order to see that the principle had been applied previously.* THE PRODUCTION(S) SPORTED a great cast of actors such as Eric Blore, Claude Allister, J. Par O'Malley and even Pinto Colvig (long time voice of Goofy and Pluto).DOING THE NARRATION for the stories are Basil Rathbone (WIND IN THE WILLOWS) and Bing Crosby, who also sang (for THE LRHEND OF SLEEPY HOLLOW).FUNCTIONING AS SORT of an in betweener bridge and opening to the film is a beautifully done sequence in a library. In this way we are introduced to the stories via copies of the books being conveniently on display on the book shelves.NOTE: * THE STORIES TOLD by being combined in this manner were most likely combined as more of a pragmatic and cost saving measure. Our guess is that the two stories were sort of middle ground films. That is, they were too short to make as a feature, but too long to be produced as short subject cartoons.