Uncle Walt (lost unauthorized Disney short film; 1964)

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Animator and special effects artist, Robert Swarthe.

Status: Lost


Uncle Walt is a short 1964 cartoon by then-student Robert Swarthe as part of The UCLA Animation Workshop.[1] The only known mass public screening of the short took place in June 1972 at the American Film Institute, as part of a presentation titled "50 Years of American Animation."

The short begins with images of Walt Disney at various ages, followed by a slow pan across a graveyard full of the headstones of Perri the Squirrel and her family (a reference to Disney's 1957 live-action fantasy Perri, a film based on Felix Salten's 1938 novel of the same name). Next comes a very early-style Mickey and Minnie Mouse, followed by racist caricatures and toilet humour. A sequence is then female centaurs from Fantasia are seen working in a red light district with Goofy as their pimp, followed by a scene in which various disturbing scenes from Disney films are shown, with a group of rabbit children looking on in horror (including the scene from Disney's 1937 animated fantasy Snow White in which the Queen transforms into a hag). The final images seen are that of the seven dwarves from Snow White gathering around Mickey Mouse in a "Mouse-ka-mausoleum", worshiping him in a scene reminiscent of one seen in the original 1937 production.[2]

For a time, a rumor circulated that the short was actually produced by Disney employees in 1954, but this was quickly debunked (since the short, as previously mentioned, contains references to the then-non-existent 1957 film Perri). Uncle Walt has not been publicly screened since 1972, and it is unknown if anyone other than Swarthe has a copy of the film.

References