Allegro Non Troppo (1976)

Though I loved Walt Disneys Fantasia as a young kid and will credit it with being original, it is Allegro Non Troppo which is the ultimate artful piece when it comes to animation on music. So much more feeling, humor and variation in artwork. The sad parts still nearly get me to tears just when I hear the music (Valse Triste by Jean Sibelius) while some of the funny parts are as hilarious as they are interesting because of the subtle (moral) messages. The art work ranges from simple cartoon-ish to flowing water color paintings. What impressed me most about almost all of the animations was how well they fitted the music. Not just the rhythm, but also the emotion. As a kid I was convinced that the music was created to fit with the animations only later to discover that some of the music was centuries old.

I first saw Allegro non Troppo around 1985 in a VHS copy. I truly loved the film, since it was so different from standard Disney fare. Even the B&W interludes seemed wacky and added to the overall viewing pleasure.Specially great clips were the Sibelius Valse Triste and the Firebird Suite.Well, I recently bought the DVD version from this movie (after joining a list in Amazon, so they would edit a DVD version of the film) and I must say that this version is GREAT. Not only is the original film complete and in an excellent version, but there's also 10 additional Bruno Bozzetto shorts plus a documentary about him and his filmmaking.So I really got a wonderful deal and would truly reccommend this DVD to all animation fans.9/10!

Surely not all of you know the Italian version of Coca Cola... it is called Chinotto, it has better (healthier) ingredients, got more flavour, a bitter-sweet taste, less sparkling effects... in a few words it is pretty good. (Un-)fortunately it cannot challenge the American giant, but for those who know... In a very similar way Allegro Non Troppo stands compared to Fantasia. Fantastic and funny animations, clever and never vulgar, made without a big budget, but with lot of thinking and skills, it creates something quite different from its original model. Obviously the music choice is also very good and both animations and movie (it is not only animation) work fantastically well with the musical selection...You may like it or not, but it surely is a very good and enjoyable effort. Try it once, and you might change your (mass-production) habits...

First of all a warning: my review will be VERY partial... Indeed, I already saw this movie several times, even when it was released (I was a child then). But lately in my favourite movie theatre in the frame of a series about animation I had the occasion to see it again just a couple of weeks after I saw for the first time Fantasia... Well, you already guessed which I preferred. Now actually I could appreciate the Fantasia-spoof part of Bozzetto's operation: when you see Debussy's Prelude a l'Apres-Midi d'un Faune you cannot help thinking for comparison to Beethoven's Sixth in Fantasia, where the Arcadian kitsch of Disney is turned into a funny-melancholic erotic fantasy. And what about my all-time favourite, Ravel's Bolero where a Boschian theory of monsters is generated by the rest of a Coke bottle and migrates toward the ruins of civilisation only to be at the end overwhelmed by man (which turns out to be an ape)? The comparison with the "6 millions years ago's documentary" (Disney's own words) of Stravinsky's Sacre du Printemps is striking. But Allegro Non Troppo is not only a Fantasia's spoof. The Dvorak's and Sibelius' segments are two stand-outs, Vivaldi's is light-hearted and Stravinky's is very funny. And the variety of styles and tones, from the grotesque to the moving, from impressionistic to almost cartoonistic is stunning to everyone who loves animation. And for one who has always loved Bozzetto's work the series of finals reminding him of other shorts like Opera or Ego tears him always to laughters... And let me also say something in favour of the sure weaker live-action's scenes.Sure, they are too forced, Disney's spoof is here too explicit, but at least this atmosphere of "joke among friends" captures also the Bozzetto's fan... And one can see how Nichetti is really building his character, a cartoon-like little man in struggle with the external world, with a mimic reminiscent of Keaton or Tati... Well, I don't know if I transferred my enthusiasm: I would like to say more, but I already used so much space...