The Three Caballeros

The Three Caballeros is the second package film to be produced during the Wartime Era of the Walt Disney Studios.  This film features Donald Duck and José Carioca from Saludos Amigos and introduces their new friend Panchito Pistoles. There are a number of different segments that make up The Three Caballeros, but for some of them it is difficult to differentiate between when one segment starts and when one ends. The Story section of this blog post might be a little confusing because of this as the film itself was a little confusing.

Premiered: December 21, 1944 in Mexico City, Mexico

Directed by: Norman Ferguson (supervising); Clyde Geronimi, Jack Kinney, Bill Roberts (sequences)

Produced by: Walt Disney

Sequels: none

Cast:

Sterling Holloway – Narrator
Frank Graham – Narrator
Fred Shields – Narrator
Clarence Nash – Donald Duck
José Oliveira – José Carioca
Joaquin Garay – Panchito Pistoles

Featuring:

Aurora Miranda of Brazil
Carmen Molina of Mexico
Dora Luz of Mexico

Music by:

Edward Plumb
Paul Smith
Charles Wolcott
Ray Gilbert

Songs:

“The Three Caballeros”
“Baía”
“Have You Been to Bahía?”
“Os Quindins de Yayá”
“Mexico”
“You Belong to my Heart”
“La Zandunga”

Academy Awards:

Best Musical Score (nomination)
Best Sound Recording (nomination)

The Story:

The film starts out by introducing Panchito, Joe Carioca, and Donald Duck before the opening credits and then the credits are set to a song of the same title. After the credits, the opening shot shows a large box with a tag that Donald Duck reads out loud. The tag reads “Felicitaciones al Pato Donald en su cumpleaños, viernes 13, de sus amigos en Latinoamérica.” As Donald reads the inscription, the writing changes to English to read “Felicitations to Donald Duck on his birthday, Friday 13, from his friends in Latin America.”

Donald opens up the package to find a large present which contains three smaller presents. The first one he opens is a movie projector. He looks closely at the film strip and sees a little penguin looking back at him through a spyglass. After many unsuccessful attempts, Donald is about to set up the projector and screen and is all set to watch the movie. A narrator reads the words on the screen “Aves Raras” and translates it to “strange birds.” The film shows a map of South America and the narrator introduces Professor Holloway who will tell the rest of the story.

The map zooms down to the South Pole and Professor Holloway says that there are two things that can be found in abundance there: ice and penguins. There are many happy penguins skating, skiing, fishing, and swimming. At the end of Main Street lives Pablo, a little penguin who is never warm. He stays close to his stove, Smokey Joe, at all times while dreaming about spending his life on a tropical beach. He decides to follow his dream and the other penguins give him a huge send off. Pablo walks up a hill but then freezes up and falls right back down. On his second attempt, he straps Smokey Joe to his back but at the top of the hill, the stove proves to be too heavy for Pablo and he falls back down the hill again. For the third attempt, Pablo is covered with hot water bottles but the farewell committee has been reduced to two penguins. Pablo ends up melting the ice and sinking right into the water below.

Finally, Pablo gets the idea to take a boat. He makes an ice raft around his igloo and sets off on his journey with an official launching. He starts to travel north. A blanket of fog literally rolls in and so he knows he must be near Cape Horn. He travels through the Straits of Magellan and a little storm cloud tries to make its first storm over Pablo’s raft to not much success. One day, Pablo sees a water sprout in the distance but it ends up being Robinson Crusoe’s hut. Pablo’s map then shows him heading past the seaside town of Vina del Mar. He sails past Lima while hugging the coastline and sees the mountain top city of Quito right on the equator.

Pablo crosses the equator with the help of King Neptune who lifts up the entire line. Pablo then heads straight to the Galapagos Islands and is very excited about the hot sun. But the sun melts his raft and his igloo. He ends up in his bathtub but the stopper bursts and water is sinking his new lifeboat. Pablo ends up sticking the shower head into the hole and it acts as a motor. He goes zooming towards the island of his dreams. Pablo is then a bird of paradise with his hut and hammock, and his tortoise that brings him drinks. He then looks at his photos of his friends back at the South Pole and is a little bit homesick. The original narrator chimes in that never being satisfied is human nature, even if you are a penguin and Donald agrees.

The shot then pans over the Andes and into the Amazon rainforest where there are many exotic birds. The narrator introduces Donald to the different birds found in South America, including the eccentric Aracuan Bird. The Aracuan Bird jumps out of the screen to shake Donald’s hand and then demonstrates his annoying song.  Another bird that the narrator talks about is the flamingo and Donald copies their every move. The narrator askes Donald if he would like to hear another story about a bird so amazing that he will not believe it. It is an old tale told by a gaucho from Uruguay and a new narrator starts the tale.

Early one morning in springtime, the only bird awake was the Hornero bird that got its name from its nest which looks like a horno (oven). A little boy enters the scene and the narrator says that it is him as a child. He was up early to go hunting all alone. The gauchito puts on the traditional gaucho clothing and sets off into the high mountains to hunt for condo birds. Up high on a rock, he spots a nest of the condo bird and the large wings are stretching up out of the top. The head pops up and it is a donkey! A flying donkey! The donkey was not bashful and kept teasing the little gauchito by stealing his hat and escaping the bolas. The gauchito places his hat on a rock to lure in the flying donkey and then jumps on his back. The pair go on a wild ride through the clouds and the narrator says that he decided to train the donkey for racing. At nighttime, he is sitting by his fire with a string attached to the donkey who is flying above. He calls the donkey Burrito and plans on making thousands of pesos by racing him. They train some more before falling asleep by the camp fire.

The next day was the Fiesta and there was a celebration in the plaza. Gauchito and Burrito only watched the others gamble and dance. When it came time to race, all of the other gauchos and their horses laughed at the funny pair. Gauchito has hidden the donkey’s wings to keep them a surprise. They are slow to take off as they keep facing the wrong way, much to the amusement of the crowd. After some difficulty in untying the blanket that was hiding Burrito’s wings, they pair finally take off. They catch up and pass the other races like they were standing still and win the race! After the race, the crowd finally notice Burrito’s wings and are upset about the cheating. Gauchito and Burrito fly away and the narrator says that neither of them were seen ever again.

Back with Donald, who is all tangled up in the film strips, there is music playing from one of the other birthday presents. This present is also glowing, dancing, and smoking. Donald opens it up and the gift is a pop-up book titled “Brasil.” Inside is a small José Carioca who is dancing and smoking his cigar. He asks Donald if Donald has ever been to Bahía before and Donald says he has not. The Aracuan Bird makes an annoying appearance as he runs through the pop-up book.

The scene pans over an animated city in Bahía, presumably Salvador, and José describes how wonderful this place is and his words turn into the song “Baía.” After the song, José starts to sing “Have You Been to Bahía?” He turns into four Josés and shrinks Donald by hitting him on the head with a mallet. Donald askes José if he has been to Bahía and José admits that he hasn’t. So the two of them run to the pop-up book as it turns the page and jump onto a little train. The Aracuan Bird appears and sets all the train cars off in different directions but the cars all come back together just in time to arrive at Bahía. Donald and José hop off the page of the book in order to flip the page and the new page shows city streets. José is excited at hearing someone close by singing “Os Quindins de Yayá.” The song is being sung by Aurora Miranda who appears with her tray of cookies to sell. Donald instantly falls madly in love with her but José competes with him to get her attention. They are both dismayed when other men arrive to sing with her. Aurora Miranda’s song is briefly interrupted by a man singing “Pregões Cariocas,” but soon she starts singing her song again with Donald trying very hard to dance with her. Donald gives her a bouquet of flowers and she gives him a big kiss. All of the instruments and city structures become anthropomorphic and dance along to the music as the song ends. The pop-up book closes and José and Donald slip out of the pages. Donald is in a romantic daze about Bahía.

José reminds Donald that he has one more present to open. However, since he is still shrunk down, Donald is unable to reach the top of the box. José show Donald a trick to grow by using “black magic.” He just blows on one of his fingers and blows himself up like a balloon. It takes Donald a couple of tries to achieve this trick, but eventually does and heads straight to his present. The last present is labelled “Mexico.” Donald and José open the present up and different musical instruments appear and start playing before Panchito Pistoles bursts out. He welcomes them to Mexico and gives them each a sombrero. The three of them start to sing “The Three Caballeros.”

After the song a piñata appears and Panchito says that it is Donald’s birthday gift from Mexico and a piñata is full of surprises and is the spirit of Christmas. Donald starts to sing “Jingle Bells” but Panchito quickly tells him about the songs that they sing in Mexico. He tells the other two the story of Las Posadas, when the Mexican children re-enact Mary and Joseph’s journey into Bethlehem. The children go door to door looking for shelter but there is none to be found for them. Finally they find someone to let them in and they all celebrate by breaking a piñata. Donald then tries to break his own piñata and when he finally succeeds, many presents float down.  One present is a book about Mexico, which Panchito shows them while talking about Mexico’s history. The song “Mexico” starts to play and artwork of the culture is shown.

Panchito takes them on a tour of Mexico on a flying sarape (flying carpet). There is a mixture of live action and animation. Many traditional dances are shown and Panchito teaches José and Donald the correct steps. Of course Donald falls head over webbed feet for the ladies. They head to a beach where Donald tries to make a good impression with the ladies there but they just tease him and run away. Panchito, José, and Donald visit Mexico City at night. Dora Luz sings “You Belong to My Heart.” Donald imagines rushes of colours and flowers and Panchito and José keep appearing and causing chaos for Donald. The song changes to “La Zandunga” now sung by Carmen Molina.

Panchito then plays matador with Donald inside a toy bull and José sets off some fireworks. The fireworks create a grand finale and spell “Fin”, “Fim”, and “The End” in the sky.

Trivia:

• This is the first Disney animated film to list the cast in the credits.
• The song “You Belong to My Heart” was featured in the 1947 Pluto cartoon Pluto’s Blue Note.
• Many comic books have been written about the different characters found in the film.
• The title translates to The Three Gentlemen.
• Pinto Colvig provided the annoying song for the Aracuan Bird.
• The Three Caballeros was released in the United States on February 3, 1945.
• According to the television show House of Mouse, Panchito’s full name is Panchito Romero Miguel Junipero Francisco Quintero González III.

Representation in the Disney Parks:

In Epcot in the Mexico pavilion is the Gran Fiesta Tour Starring The Three Caballeros. This attraction replaced El Rio del Tiempo in 2007. The characters can sometimes be found there as a meet and greet as well.

The Three Caballeros were part of the former attraction Mickey Mouse Revue at the Magic Kingdom and at Tokyo Disneyland. The characters can be found in the Mexico scene of it’s a small world at Disneyland, Disneyland Paris, and Hong Kong Disneyland.

They are part of  Mickey’s Soundsational Parade at Disneyland and are part of the seasonal ¡Viva Navidad! celebration at Disney California Adventure. At Disney’s Animal Kingdom, José and Panchito have joined the Discovery Island Carnivale dance party.

This film is represented at Disney’s Coronado Springs Resort, particularly at Panchito’s Gifts and Sundries. At Disney’s All-Star Music Resort, the Three Caballeros are part of a fountain at the guitar-shaped Calypso Pool.

Check out the other films of Disney’s Package Era:

Saludos Amigos (1942)
Make Mine Music (1946)
Fun and Fancy Free (1947)
Melody Time (1948)
The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad (1949)