User reviews

This is worth watching - only if you are over 14. I do not recommend this cartoon for anyone under that age. It is slightly disturbing (especially for young people) and I do not think they would find it interesting anyhow.

People over 14, this is a delight to watch. This is basically a very old cartoon where there are trees and plants leaving their roots (literally) and moving around, creating a storyline. You will have to see at least a little snippet of this cartoon to understand what I mean. The animation and music is very beautiful, some of the storyline is very beautiful as well.

Basically the whole cartoon is about two trees falling in love. The girl tree resembles a 1930's posh "lady". There is a horrible, evil gnarled tree who tries to capture her, but the slightly dopey looking tree will not let him have her...

This is one of a great amount of cartoons called "Silly Symphonies". This is, almost beyond doubt, the most beautiful and heartwarming collection of cartoon shorts ever made (they were all made by Disney around the time this was made). I recommend you watch at least one of them, as far as I know they are all worth watching.

I recommend this to people who are interested in historical cartoons and who like something a little different (infact - a LOT different!). Enjoy "Flowers and Trees"! :-)

This is one of many so-called "Silly Symphonies" that Walt Disney Pictures made in the 30s and they were very, very popular. Given how much cartoons have changed, this film wouldn't play nearly as well today as it did then. Cartoons in the 30s tended to be rather schmaltzy and lacked the insane humor and pacing of classic cartoons of the 40s and 50s. Remember that at the time this film was made, Bugs Bunny, Tom & Jerry (the MGM ones--not the earlier series by the same name) and Tex Avery's shenanigans were still in the future. So, while audiences in later years might have been a bit put off by the style of film that FLOWERS AND TREES represent, in its time it was big...real big. Big enough to earn an Oscar as Best Animated Short.

The film consists of classical style music accompanying scenes of anthropomorphic (people-like) trees and flowers dancing, frolicking and eventually being attacked by the dreaded fire. As I said, most of it very sappy but I did like the adorable mushrooms (Disney seemed to have a knack for this--see FANTASIA for more great mushrooms). However, the artwork is tops for the time and it is diverting. It's also the first three-color Technicolor short to win the Oscar--but it's also very old fashioned and will probably bore many viewers.

Indeed a very nice work of art on this one! I enjoyed it immensely. I'm certain you will too. It is definitely worth every bit of the few minutes to watch. More than flowers and trees though, even though that's just the title.

A bunch of sentient trees, who you might sort of recognize from Toontown, and some flowers awaken on a sunny meadow and begin their daily ritual. As with most Silly Symphonies is all set to the timing of the music, but as an animation showcase it is still rather impressive by modern standards. The world the plants inhabit is very pretty and bright, and the characterization is amusing.

I was hoping that the fire effects might lead to something like the Bald Mountain segment of Fantasia but it never really gets that far. Still one of the better Silly Symphonies and notable for a bizarre scene in which two trees get married (they fade out before the tree love-making).

A Walt Disney SILLY SYMPHONY Cartoon Short.

One beautiful Spring morning, the FLOWERS AND TREES awake to rise & shine. Two young trees, swept away by leafy bliss, carry on an arboreal romance which is threatened by the arrival of an evil-hearted old stump...

This cartoon has a cute little story, but its significance lies in the fact that it was the first cartoon produced in Technicolor. Walt had cannily entered into an exclusive contract for the use of the procedure, only the latest of a string of risky innovations he would brave. Technicolor proved to be a sensation, and FLOWERS AND TREES pointed the way to the future. It would be three more years before Mickey Mouse took the Technicolor plunge - his films were so profitable he didn't need to abandon black & white just yet - but eventually virtually all cartoons would appear in one of a handful of competing color processes.

The SILLY SYMPHONIES, which Walt Disney produced for a ten year period beginning in 1929, are among the most fascinating of all animated series. Unlike the Mickey Mouse cartoons in which action was paramount, with the Symphonies the action was made to fit the music. There was little plot in the early Symphonies, which featured lively inanimate objects and anthropomorphic plants & animals, all moving frantically to the soundtrack. Gradually, however, the Symphonies became the school where Walt's animators learned to work with color and began to experiment with plot, characterization & photographic special effects. The pages of Fable & Fairy Tale, Myth & Mother Goose were all mined to provide story lines and even Hollywood's musicals & celebrities were effectively spoofed. It was from this rich soil that Disney's feature-length animation was to spring. In 1939, with SNOW WHITE successfully behind him and PINOCCHIO & FANTASIA on the near horizon, Walt phased out the SILLY SYMPHONIES; they had run their course & served their purpose.

This won the very first Academy Award given for animated short and even after close to 69 years, it is still a marvel to behold. It quite justifiably won its praise at the time and is one of Disney's high points. Everything about this is excellent: story, music, characterization, plot, layout, visuals-everything! Periodically, this is run on the Ink and Paint Club on the Disney Channel and should be out on video. Apparently the powers that make the decisions for The Mouse don't see a point in releasing shorts on home video. Such a shame to have such remarkable material out of circulation. *sigh* The winner, on points. Most highly recommended.

The first Silly Symphony to to be made in Technicolour, Flowers and Trees remains my favourite of the Silly Symphonies. It has a certain charm that is almost irresistible. Flowers and Trees is beautifully animated, with vibrant colours, and considering when it was made, I was most impressed. The characters, although they never speak, are very lovable, especially the Mushrooms. Even the evil tree stump was an engaging character in his own right. The music was wonderfully lyrical, and reminded me of the sort of music you'll find in a ballet. It was so charming and pleasant, it plays a significant role in justifying the undeniable charm of this gem. The story is very simple, and is fairly unrealistic, but everything else that is so good, more than compensate, and it is meant to be silly. The result is a beautiful and imaginative short, with a 10/10. Bethany Cox.

This is a beautifully done award-winning animation short, with cleverly done sequences such as the trees and flowers waking up to the day and the characters sounding off the alarm after an old, grumpy tree stump starts a forest fire in a fit of jealous rage.

Wonderful serene music, including some recognizable tunes, as well.

Grade A

Flowers and Trees is another early 30's Disney short cartoon. The basic setup is the sun rises and trees and flowers awake for a new day of adventures. A young fertile male tree proceeds to court and hopefully mate with a young fertile female tree and then an old dead tree tries to burn down the forest because he's old and dead, or something. He should've just called AARP.

This short does not hold up as well compared to other shorts. It feels like a different studio than Disney created this one. The animations are basic, the backgrounds static and life-less. Almost as if one background plate was used for the whole thing. The characters are depicted as humans in tree form. Something is a miss. The tone is off or the story needs re-worked.

The characters seem too simple for Disney, not going that extra mile. The flowers are flowers, not characters. The trees seem static in expression, even though they move in ways real trees never will be able too. The male tree looks like a different species than the female. They could not possibly mate. They are going to have a really sad wedding night. Somebody should've told them.

The baddie in this feels too on the nose and goofy. I'm searching for some sort of memorable thing about this that will make it enjoyable these days. Its just an old cartoon about trees and flowers.

Best Scene: None

Worst Scene: Wedding Bells

The story ends with the tree getting one one knee (do trees have knees?) and then marrying the female tree. Cue flowers playing bell sounds and you are shocked back into the dreary real-life realization that you will forever be single. Thanks Disney.

Best Actor: None

Worst Actor: Female Tree

She pretty much stands around and shakes her hips (do trees have hips?). She sports a big tree afro for some reason. She does nothing really besides looking pretty waiting for that golden ticket called marriage.

Improvements: This is a wash. Just start over.

Hits

• Interesting premise.
• Music is nice.
• Forrest fire.

Misses

• Boring characters.
• Does not feel Disney.
• Poor quality animation and backgrounds.

Final Grade: D

It can be said simply enough but should bare repeating that without a work like Flowers & Trees, Snow White would have been much harder to make. While that film doesn't take all its cues from this Silly Symphony about the good tree, his lovely lady tree, and the villainous tree coming between them, I think the music cues and how the creatures of the forest all come together is a major part of it. Disney's moves in this classical period - hell, up through the early 40's - had the hallmarks of being musical-filmed pieces, synchronized to sound with the tightest detail. But within these to-the-beat markers, there are the graceful nuances of visual poetry on screen: here are creatures and plant-life coming to life, acting as people do in such ways as to make them universal. You can watch this film anywhere over the world and people get what's going on; same was with Mickey Mouse, though here the aim is more to inspire some kind of awe over laughs.

One can criticize this stuff - it's pretentious, it's full of itself, it thinks its so great. But what if it is just a splendid piece of artistic expression? There's a level of simplicity that I think found its way into a lot of those early Disney features, and the bedrock of that is here: no frills storytelling, clever visual flourishes, and here it borders on gags but one can take it a little more seriously. It's also the forerunner for Fantasia, of course; taking a piece (or in this case pieces) of classical music and finding a way to basically make the earliest films full of life and vitality - in brand-spankingly fresh Technicolor (and good lord does it look full of the synonyms you can think of for gorgeous).

It's not simply one of the superlative shorts of all time but one of the great music 'videos', with a fleshed-out story, conflicts and danger with the fire that spreads (and the teamwork to put it out), and the sentimental side, but wholly and expressed with passionate audacity to go for it. There's not a trace of a modern smirk or wink to the audience, no one is being talked or looked down on, and that's part of the purity: here's the trees, here's the flowers, here's the birds, here are the things that make up this crazy little world that Disney's created. It's what it is: beauty realized in a new way that, for those that can take it in some context, heartfelt.

One of the first color cartoons that has this sophistication. It concerns two trees that fall in love. At first they are firmly entrenched in the turf. However, they and the flowers are able to uproot themselves and move around. So what they are are people who look like trees. If this were not an original piece, it would pretty much go ignored.

The forest awakens and rubs the sleep from it's eyes. The trees, birds, insects and even the bats emerge from the arms of Morpheus in varying humours ready to start their day. One of the trees is enraptured and serenades his intended with some hastily improvised harp music whilst his friend orchestrates a chorus of chirping and the sunflowers present a perfectly choreographed dance. She's gracious enough, but having none of it until pursued by a grisly old stump who has evil designs on her delicate boughs! A duel ensues and with a fire soon ablaze, all must flee for their very lives to find a pond or a stream and hope for some rain. A fine combination of Schubert and Rossini accompanies this enjoyable animation that shows us a bit of the fickleness of affection but also, more seriously, the effects fire can have on nature and of it's recuperative powers afterwards!

Disney's first Silly Symphonies cartoon made with three-strip Technicolor is a trippy bit of business that won the first Oscar for animated short. Basically the plot to the cartoon is that the trees, flowers, mushrooms, and forest creatures are all exercising and dancing and whatever when a fight breaks out between two male trees over a female tree. Yeah I just typed that. From there things get even weirder as we get arson, bird rainmakers, and a character burning to death! It's bizarre but in an awesome way. The animation is excellent for its time. The Technicolor pops as much today as I would imagine it did when it was first released. Disney has really done a marvelous job at maintaining and restoring their old cartoons. The music is upbeat and cheerful. It's a charming old short that's just offbeat enough to appeal even to today's audiences, I think. By the way, early in the short when the mushrooms first pop up through the ground, take notice of what they look like and tell me the animators didn't slide a little dirty joke in there.

After revisiting the iconic short film "Flowers and Trees," once again I felt compelled to share my thoughts. This charming piece holds a special place in many hearts, marking a significant milestone in animation history.

The simplicity of its narrative coupled with expressive animation, music, and dance, creates an enchanting atmosphere. The theme of nature triumphing over adversity through collaboration resonates deeply, delivering a wholesome message that transcends time.

The villain's personality shines through, demonstrating early animation's ability to infuse characters with depth and charm. Despite its age, the film remains remarkably memorable, with characters like the tree coule and the many dancing flowers etched into our collective memory.

"Flowers and Trees" imho serves as a testament to the foundation of modern animation, reminding us of its fairy tale-like quality and musical essence. It earns a solid nine in my book, a tribute to its enduring legacy.

Furthermore, as the film now resides in the public domain, it opens doors for creative reinterpretations and adaptations. Its appearance in scenes of "Who Framed Roger Rabbit" serves as a delightful reminder of its timeless appeal.

In conclusion, "Flowers and Trees" deserves to be remembered and cherished by future generations. It's a classic that paved the way for the animated masterpieces that followed, leaving an indelible mark on cinema history.

An important film for Disney because it's the first animation ever to use full three-bit Tecnicolor. The film started out in black and white - was almost done - when Disney decided to us Tecnicolor so they remade the animation. This costed the studio a lot of money but the decision paid off in the end. An Academy Award went to the film and was the first animation to ever win the award. It also won an Oscar for the best cartoon short.

The animation starts out a lovely day where the birds sing, the flowers and mushrooms dance, the young healthy male tree plays vines like a harp to impress the beautiful lady tree. An old hollow tree wants her and gets jealous - he starts a forest fire in protest of the young tree couple who wants to marry. The animals of the forest put out the fire and run off the old tree. In the end the young tree couple are happy again.

10/10.

After years of experimentation and development to deliver the primary colors of green, red and blue onto one film-strip, the Technicolor company finally arrived at the moment theater-goers were breathlessly anticipating. Walt Disney's 29th installment in his "Silly Symphony" series, July 1932's "Flowers and Trees," became the first film to be shot and projected by Technicolor's new 'three-strip' process to the public, showing cinema's first true realistic colors onto the screen.

Technicolor's camera, introduced in 1931, captured the entire color spectrum, a goal its researchers had been working on since 1924. Labeled 'Process 4' by insiders, three black-and-white film strips wound their way through the camera, using a prism to separate the primary colors, and then were fused in the lab onto one strip for playback on any projector. The technology was a gigantic leap from the company's previous 'two-strip' process of capturing only yellow and green.

Technicolor felt an animated short was the simplest way to present its newly enhanced color process. Disney was in the middle of making the black-and-white "Flowers and Trees" when the two companies connected and agreed the cartoon would be the first to introduce the public to Technicolor's advanced technology. But in its early stages, the process was prohibitively more expensive to produce than black-and-white cartoons. As an incentive, Technicolor gave Disney a three-year exclusivity in the animation field for its vivid, true-color film, expiring on September 1935. It was a gamble on Walt's part since if the cartoon failed to generate a profit because of the high costs, his studio could potentially be bankrupt.

Fortunately for Disney, "Flowers and Tress" became an enormous success. His "Silly Symphony" series, monopolizing the three-strip color process for cartoons for three years, easily made money for Walt and company. The entire film industry was impressed. Producer/director Merian C. Cooper, in production with 1933's "King Kong," said he saw "Flowers and Trees" and claimed he never wanted to make another black-and-white picture again. He was instrumental in getting the first three-strip Technicolor feature film, 1935's "Becky Sharp," produced.

Technicolor slowly rolled out their new cameras and film stock to Hollywood studios for live action. Some studios inserted short Technicolor segments embedded into their black-and-white feature films while others produced full-color two-reeler shorts before the arrival of "Becky Sharp." The years Disney animators worked with color proved to be invaluable when Walt began production of cinema's first color animation feature film, 1937's "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs."