Some things I liked some I did not.

Nice effects though.

just watch it!

While it doesn't offer any answers, it both thrills and makes you think.

Mickey and Minnie take a ride on the Reading. Mickey seems to own his own train and takes his main squeeze on a romantic ride. The problem is that the train gets totally out of control and they end up endangering everything around them. It is musically clever and certainly harmless. Like so much of this era, there is little story, just a bunch of excuses for various pratfalls. Mickey is pretty reckless, but he is optimistic and exciting.

This of course has a lot of the good stuff one looks for with these early Iwerks/Disney shorts with Mickey and Minnie: the horsing around, the anthropomorphized train (hey, he/it even gets its teeth washed), and the dancing and lolly-gaggling and so on. It really doesn't pick up with any kind of forward momentum until the last two minutes, when the couple get on the train and it has its ups and downs and, at times, becomes like a roller-coaster ride on a train. These moments certainly make it kind of mind-blowing for the time. But with the exception of that and the first sound of Mickey with his trademark high-pitch voice (I wonder if it was so Disney could sing the song this way, or if he just decided to go for it for the long-haul), it's not all great. It's breezy and fast-paced, though not wholly ambitious. It gets 6 minutes by in a flash.

Mickey's Choo-Choo (1929) *** (out of 4)The railway station is the setting for this Mickey Mouse shorts, which starts off with him singing "I've Been Working on the Railroad" and then we get him and Minnie going on a little adventure that takes a bad turn when their train is unable to get up a mountain. Fans of these early shorts will enjoy this one as it features quite a few funny scenes but there's no question that the highlight was Mickey singing. He had already spoken in the previous shorts but there's no question that the voice left a lot to be desired. While his voice isn't what America came to love, there's still no doubt that there was a very big jump in terms of quality. The finale with the cart going through various tunnels was a nice bit of animation as well.

This is an early Disney cartoon featuring Mickey Mouse. There will be spoilers ahead:Ub Iwerks directed this short and helped animate it as well. Iwerks was an exceptional animator, a sometimes brilliant but sometimes average director and an indifferent "story" person. His shorts are filled with gags and typically have good to excellent animation, but are lacking in plot. This short is a prime example.What lifts this short to above average is the musical direction and choices. Humoresque 7 is used at least twice, which would have been recognizable to the audience and also have contextual meaning because of a series of comical and somewhat off-color verses attached to the tune. "I've Been Working On the Railroad" also features prominently.Mickey is running a train, a somewhat cute little train with an engine which eats coal. Minnie wants a ride and gets one when she says she can play her fiddle. The car she's on separates from the train and Mickey chases after it and her. That's essentially the "plot".For all that, it's still a charming short, available on Mickey Mouse In Black and White, Volume Two, which is well worth tracking down. Recommended.