Not only is Dumbo Disney's best live-action remake to date but it's also the jewel in director Tim Burton's filmographic crown. And Dumbo himself is the greatest animal character to ever grace a movie screen. I shit you not. Not even Babe or Bambi could outcharm the Jumbo family's baby boy. Dumbo's not the type of film that lends itself to follow-ups -- with good reason. But honestly, I really wanna see more of that little guy. Not since WALL-E has a movie character embodied innocence and purity so completely. Not even the Grinch could hate that floppy-eared little pachyderm.
1941's Dumbo was the Disney classic most in need of an update. An enormous hit upon release, the film actually saved the company from financial ruin (Dumbo's immediate predecessors, Pinocchio and Fantasia, were back-to-back flops). But at a mere 64 minutes, this short Disney smash is nevertheless rife with racism (there's actually a crow -- voiced by a white performer using an exaggerated stereotypically African American accent -- named Jim Crow) and better left in the past. But 78 years later, instead of throwing the baby elephant out with the bath water, the entertainment behemoth has wisely allowed Burton to lengthen the truncated story and clean up its egregious moments of bigotry. The new film even (expertly) uses antagonistic character V.A. Vandevere and his Dreamland amusement park to comment on Walt Disney and his empire's ongoing struggles with diversity as well as the founder and his conglomerate's neverending efforts to monopolize show business (the company gobbled up Marvel, Lucasfilm and Twentieth Century Fox in less than a decade, after all).
Burton retained the crux of the original story: a featured circus elephant (Mrs. Jumbo) gives birth to a baby with oversized ears; the calf is ridiculed and nicknamed "Dumbo" because of his unconventional appearance. However, in a spectacular case of making lemonade out of lemons, Dumbo discovers to everyone's surprise, including his own, that his ears grant him the power of flight -- but only when he's in possession of a magic feather. This ability of course catapults Dumbo from bullied reject to star-attraction. And eventually, he learns that the feather was never necessary and that the magic was inside of him all along. But while the original movie featured the "happy" ending of Dumbo and his mom remaining in the circus with slightly improved treatment, the remake allows the duo to be liberated, returning to the wild where they're warmly received by a new herd.
The term "heart-warming" gets thrown around quite a bit but anyone who's ever had a puppy, a kitten or a heart should find his/her chest on fire before Dumbo even reaches the halfway mark. Cinematically speaking, 2018 was certainly the year of the panther. And as far as I'm concerned, this is the year of the elephant.
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