I received The Three Caballeros two years ago from an old neighbor in NJ as a Christmas present for my children. I had never seen this video before and was quite surprised when I viewed it for the first time.

This is a full-feature Disney movie in Technicolor running for what seemed an eternity of 71 minutes. While it is rated G for general audiences I fail to see what a child would get out of The Three Caballeros.

The one nice feature in their favor is the absence of previews on the video. The star of this feature is Donald Duck. He receives a package with a note written in Spanish, which translates to Happy Birthday from your friends in Latin America.

One box has a projector in it that then has one person talking to Donald while another voice is the Narrator of a story about a penguin. This voice is the same that does Winnie the Pooh (Sterling Holloway) here called Professor Holloway!

Pablo the Penguin wants to live on a tropical island and tries many ways to leave and makes a boat that takes him to his Island.

Then there are short clips on this projector with a bird that carries bagpipes under its beard, scissors birds known as the Columbian cutter. A strange story about a flying donkey bird that acted like he was loco! Off to Fiesta Y Carrera to gamble pesos away with ladies and men dancing in the plaza.

Here the Narrator is actually the small person riding the flying donkey and they enter a race against other donkeys. This strange story than comes to an end with the book closing and another birthday box for Donald to open. Out of the box comes a Jimmy Cricket type bird that shrinks himself and Donald so they can go back into the book via train to visit Brazil.

Here starts the Donald chasing pretty singing ladies all around with the animation being inside other types of scenes. The coloring is not very good for the backgrounds on these scenes and the words to the music are hard to understand. From what I gather it sounded like they were singing, “bash ka kinke la la” over and over again!

Donald and this Jose birdie fly in and out of other movie scenes and the lips of the actors are not in tune with the music making it all out of whack. The best way to describe these people would be to imagine the I Love Lucy episode with Lucy in Italy dancing on the grapes.

Ladies hips are swaying and the men are donning their sombreros dancing all over the streets of these countries. Jose is busy trying to keep Donald out of the way of the activities taking place.

You might be thinking at this point and what is the purpose of this? I could not answer that as this is the theme of the whole movie! If you are one of the few unfortunate ones to actually have this video, it might be best to don a hat and do the cha cha with your kids and hope the music stops soon!

Soon the book closes and Jose and Donald are back to the place they were before, who knows actually but presume it would be Donald’s house. The problem is that they are still small and need to get back to their original sizes. These scenes are silly and point less as the magic shows them in and out of clothing with lots of changes that again make no sense.

Another box is opened for Donald and this brings another bird making them now The Three Caballeros. Panchito gives Donald a pinata for his birthday thus telling the story of Las Posadas, the eight days before Christmas and the feasting celebration.

These birds use the stars to guide them entering the book of Mexico on a carpet that one would buy in Tijuana. Panchito gives a history lesson of the flag of Mexico with the lake now being full of what is known as Mexico City.

The Three Caballeros go to Vera Cruz stopping to watch more dancing pretty ladies thus more antics of Donald trying to see them up closer. Acapulco being the Riviera of Mexico has Donald diving off the carpet in the sky chasing ladies everywhere on the beach.

It is difficult to explain these scenes of women in their bathing suits running after a cartoon figure that seems out of character for a Disney feature film. The movie has many distractions and ends abruptly.

I have no clue why this particular video was chosen for us but it is not worth renting. My oldest son likes to dance to some of this movie but it does not hold his attention for more than ten minutes. I would not recommend this for any family with the theme basically being some birds in the beginning, dancing and singing and Donald Duck chasing all the females.

The color in the live action scenes in the background is of poor quality with the acting fake looking. The Three Caballeros does a poor job in combining Latin America themes with the Disney name. There has never been anything quite like this and Disney must of learned from this mishap.

If you happen to see this at K-Mart, keep moving and opt for another movie. Only the truly bored would want to see these shenanigans.

Recommended:
No

Viewing Format: VHS
Video Occasion: None of the Above
Suitability For Children: Not suitable for Children of any age