Wait, why does at line 418 the English subs says:

>(The fansubber wants to thank his most amazing wife!)

I think this is probably one of the weaker films of the first batch of "Mountain of Gems" shorts. Even the other film from the same year by the same two directors feels a lot more alive. The art style isn't too appealing, and the script isn't all that interesting overall, despite being fun in spots. Though Tatarskiy is listed as director, it doesn't feel like he was really able to devote a lot of energy to this one.

Also, like Valentin Telegin's other films, this one feels "Eastern" - nothing wrong with that, but it feels wrong in a Belorussian story.

>>1
I think the character design is a dead giveaway. :) Cherkasskiy was the only one who drew characters like that, as far as I know. He seems to have had surprisingly few imitators, given the popularity of his films.

I just noticed this was directed by the same guy behind Treasure Island and Adventures of Captain Wrongel.

Some of the animation occasionally reminds me of earlier Tatarskiy films from the late 1980s and 1990s, especially the elephant (who looks just like his elephant from the Pilot Brothers).

I find it interesting to compare this one to Galina Barinova's 1981 Cat Catafeyevich, the same story but told rather differently (with more pathos and somewhat less slapstick). I think both of them are excellent films, with different strengths.

Although quite a good adaptation in many spots, I think that the parts of the original text that were changed or left out for (I assume) brevity were actually quite important, and the story loses something by not having them in there. In particular, the Emperor's final dialogue with the nightingale and its final words to him, as well as the story of the mechanical bird (which in the story is a lot more impressive and has a much bigger impact than the one in this film).

I think that the creators maybe didn't feel that those things were important, with which I have to disagree.

Quite a pleasant cartoon to view, and a respectable one to end his directing career on for Anatoliy Solin (also one of the final ones released by Ekran studio, right before the government shut it down). Solin's first film in 1973 was the one that started this Munchausen series.

In the original story, though, the wolf actually eats up the horse from the back while it's running and that's how it ends up in the harness, while in this one the horse just runs away. I guess that makes it more "family friendly" but I can't help but prefer the more bizarre original version. The Germans made a cartoon version of that one in 1944 - Die Abenteuer des Freiherrn von Münchhausen (it can be viewed here or here). It's wonderfully demented and I recommend it. :)

The director must have some history living among the peoples of the far north, because a few of his films feature them. I can't help but feel that this one might be inspired by the events of the 1990s, when ordinary people in big cities suddenly found themselves at the mercies of barbaric crime lords and mafias (some of them ethnic), after the government abrogated its responsibilities to keep public order.

Interesting, this one. The director had obviously fought in World War II, and made use of some of his memories here. I'm not sure that anyone could make a film like this today.

In terms of "children being heroic during wartime", this also reminds me a bit of Snezhko-Blotskaya's The Tale of the Boy Nipper-Pipper (1958), though that one was about the Russian Civil War and is much more cartoony.