Don't listen to the negative reviews

Not sure how, but this is easily one of the best movies all summer. Multiple levels of funny, never takes itself seriously, super colorful, and creative.

Blistering performances.

Through painfully honest and emotional moments, the movie becomes irresistibly relatable

Irwin Graham clearly was writing about every pompous know it all it the music business and I have no doubt the wrote from experience. Making sweet Willie a martyred artist has its point to an adult audience existentially. I am amazed at the positive reviews praising the tragic aspect of the beautifully made but but pitifully sad cartoon. Willie in heaven takes about one percent of the edge off and factually there were so many ways to allow a redemptive ending it amazes me no other ending made it to the screen the Ahab and Moby Dick approach was an early lesson in tragic obsession and there is value in teaching such things but Disney had a way of doing the beauty and the humor so well that one is not ready for the sucker punch of Willie not surviving the harpoon. Graham took his revenge of the music world and inspired me to punch him in the nose someday. So I swore at 5 years of age. There are better methods of creation for kids and teaching them about death. Noble idea badly executed Martyr complex One O one

A Walt Disney Cartoon.Endowed with tremendous vocal powers, WILLIE THE OPERATIC WHALE dreams of leaving his ocean home and becoming a success on the stage of the New York Met.This heart touching little film, originally the closing segment of MAKE MINE MUSIC (1946), is buoyed along by the colorful animation and a prodigious vocal performance by Nelson Eddy who enacts all the roles - young & old, male & female, human & animal. The ending couldn't be better.Walt Disney (1901-1966) was always intrigued by pictures & drawings. As a lad in Marceline, Missouri, he sketched farm animals on scraps of paper; later, as an ambulance driver in France during the First World War, he drew comic figures on the sides of his vehicle. Back in Kansas City, along with artist Ub Iwerks, Walt developed a primitive animation studio that provided animated commercials and tiny cartoons for the local movie theaters. Always the innovator, his ALICE IN CARTOONLAND series broke ground in placing a live figure in a cartoon universe. Business reversals sent Disney & Iwerks to Hollywood in 1923, where Walt's older brother Roy became his lifelong business manager & counselor. When a mildly successful series with Oswald The Lucky Rabbit was snatched away by the distributor, the character of Mickey Mouse sprung into Walt's imagination, ensuring Disney's immortality. The happy arrival of sound technology made Mickey's screen debut, STEAMBOAT WILLIE (1928), a tremendous audience success with its use of synchronized music. The SILLY SYMPHONIES soon appeared, and Walt's growing crew of marvelously talented animators were quickly conquering new territory with full color, illusions of depth and radical advancements in personality development, an arena in which Walt's genius was unbeatable. Mickey's feisty, naughty behavior had captured millions of fans, but he was soon to be joined by other animated companions: temperamental Donald Duck, intellectually-challenged Goofy and energetic Pluto. All this was in preparation for Walt's grandest dream - feature length animated films. Against a blizzard of doomsayers, Walt persevered and over the next decades delighted children of all ages with the adventures of Snow White, Pinocchio, Dumbo, Bambi & Peter Pan. Walt never forgot that his fortunes were all started by a mouse, or that childlike simplicity of message and lots of hard work always pay off.

While "chester"'s review was kind-hearted, I felt, as someone who has viewed "Willie the Whale" numerous times, I had to expand on it. While he feels this movie has no other motive than to entertain, I feel it makes the most of the human experience.Nelson Eddy does an inexplicably emotive narrative and also sings ALL of the songs. His inflection on the narration of this story could be the only reason to watch it. But, no, we also have a trained American opera singer (Eddy, again) singing all of the songs, without fault. If you closed your eyes and listened to this video, your emotions would still be evoked to the highest possible level, stimulated by music and narrative.The story is so bittersweet. Although this is an old Disney production, I was not introduced to it until my daughter picked it up at a video store in the 90's. It has, at the core, a burning political statement, all the while, making it simple enough for the smallest children to relate to and to reconcile. All creatures are different; all have their own talents; we don't have precidence over anything we just don't understand; and we all make mistakes.I cannot get through this video without tears at the end. It is simple and complex. Kids could relate it to the playground; we can relate it to world politics.I've said all of this without mentioning a note that Nelson Eddy sings. There are some universal reknowned songs intertwined into this video, and if you know the background of them, "Shortnin' Bread", "Figaro", et. al., then you will get the underlying message. I think Disney and other production companies are very clever at using this type of medium to send a bigger message. If you really listen, you will hear, but if you don't want to, then you will still enjoy this gem of a short. It's a very sweet story.

This movie was interesting. When I first started watching it, i had no idea what was going to happen. Then it started getting good. It was ridiculous but thats half the fun of animation. The ending comes a big shock to all so get the tissues ready. The whale just couldn't fit in with the human world. No matter how wonderful his voice was. I think he would of been happier in the ocean with his seagull friend. Over all a pretty good cartoon.