Between the release of Bambi in 1942 and Cinderella in 1950, the Walt Disney company was releasing many movies that were simple collections of other shorts. These were known as the package films and included films such as Melody Time from 1948 and The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad the following year. Of these package films, the two that I remember growing up with the most were Melody Time and Fun and Fancy Free.
Fun and Fancy Free was released in 1947 and contained two shorts with bridge segments starring Jimney Cricket. These bridge segments are not very entertaining to watch, and that sadly sets the tone for the movie. The opening segment with Jimney Cricket is only watchable because it features the only decent song in the entire movie. Then it transitions into the first story, before going back to Jimney Cricket going to a party hosted by Edgar Bergen. These segments with Edgar Bergen are the most entertaining part of the movie, as Edgar and his puppets often make humorous quips towards each other and the story they're telling.
The two stories in this movie are "Bongo" and the infamous short "Mickey and the Beanstalk". Neither story is really entertaining. I remember skipping over the Bongo short a lot as a kid, even now I really didn't like it. I did not find Bongo to be engaging a character, the world to be engaging, outside of another horrifying forest scene, and I find the songs to be, like much else in this story, not great. I don't even remember any of the songs, outside of one, and when I say I remember that song, I mean that I remember it existed. It's like that ugly sweater you have in your closet, you remember it exists, but you don't really remember what's on it. You put it on and then you remember why it wasn't worth remembering. Bongo is not a really entertaining short and it kind of makes sense that most VHS covers of this movie leave him off the front cover and focus on Mickey and Jimney.
"Mickey and the Beanstalk" is also not highly entertaining, but it becomes the most entertaining part of the movie because of Edgar Bergen and his puppets. The narration becomes one of the only amusing parts of the movie, but without the narration I can not really see this short staying in anyone's mind for very long. The only scene that I think people remember this short for is when Donald goes crazy and tries to kill a cow with an axe. It is a well done scene, but I personally felt as though the forest at night from the Bongo segment was creepier. Disney has a thing for making their most horrific scenes take place in a forest or woodland. Other than that, the short isn't really memorable outside of Willie the Giant, a character that I don't believe has been used since Mickey's Christmas Carol in 1983.
Fun and Fancy Free is not a terrible movie, it's not ungodly boring like The Black Cauldron was or as bad as any of the direct-to-video sequels. The movie's biggest crime is simply not being very entertaining to watch. While Edgar Bergen brings some entertainment value to this movie, there isn't a whole lot else to enjoy with this movie. The shorts that they put into this movie are not entertaining on their own, and the bridge segments aren't that entertaining either. I would personally skip this movie unless you really want to say that you've seen them all.
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