Pippo E L'Aliante

During the 1940s, 50s and 60s, the Disney folks made a ton of "how to" cartoons that starred Goofy. Some of them, such as GOOFY'S GLIDER, were great and some, the preachier ones from the later era, were less than great (I'm trying to be kind here--cut me some slack). Well, the granddaddy of them all also happens to be GOOFY'S GLIDER, as it was the first of this type film.

Like the other "how to" cartoons, this one features a narrator who talks about the best way to do things--at which time Goofy proceeds to do it completely wrong! Again and again, Goofy nearly kills himself by, as usual, not using what little brain he has. Seeing Goofy tumble from the sky and smash into the ground and THEN open his parachute is one of the many ways this indestructible goof entertains in this cute and not at all informative film.

If you see this and don't laugh, check your pulse--you might just be dead! It's funny, well animated and fun.

By the way, although Goofy and most characters have only four fingers (because it's easier to animate), in this one he briefly has five! One scene calls for him to count and he had five, but if you watch before and after in this same film he only has four! I guess he can grow and lose them as needed.

Goofy tries to learn how to fly in his miniature airplane, with hilarious results. Plenty of slapstick hits and misses that will probably send you some chuckles, especially laughs to the little kids.

This short has a background narrator, which is not something I would prefer. For some reason, a narrator for a Disney cartoon makes the story sound a little dreary as it distracts from the action, slapstick fun and character concentration.

Overall, this cartoon is classic Goofy with all the clumsiness, trials and errors and comic relief.

Grade B-

A Walt Disney GOOFY Cartoon.

The most dangerous place in the air may well be GOOFY'S GLIDER.

There are plenty of chuckles in this the first of the Sports Goofy cartoons. Some pertinent information about gliders is actually given in between the Goof's attempts to get airborne. John McLeish narrates in his best documentarian manner.

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 storm of naysayers, 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.

One of the first Goofy cartoons. It has the How to format with the narrator describing Goofy's attempts at flight.

There is no other supporting character, it's just Goofy with his inept attempts to take off and stay up.

The attempts at flight are inventive with Goofy trying various methods to take off, be it catapulting up and he always comes unstuck.

The best vignette is when he does take off he flies upside down so the sky is beneath him and the ground above him.

As it's a cartoon short, it remains inventive without running out of puff, as Goofy lives up to his name.

This is another "how to" cartoon, telling us what we need to know to get a glider airborne. Goofy continues to be diligent and hapless and cause all kinds of problems for himself. That little glider hits walls, falls in the water, flips over, gets blown up, and on and on. And Goofy never wavers, but moves forward. Nothing very new. It slick and colorful and well done.