Dumbo (DVD)

Uniquely for a lead character in a Disney animated feature, Dumbo himself never says a word, relying instead on an extraordinarily expressive face. It's this silence at the film's centre that makes Dumbo's plight so heart-wrenching and allows the story to visit some fairly dark places without it ever feeling forced or manipulative. The reunion between Dumbo and his imprisoned mother is a moment no less stark than the death of Bambi's mother. It's lent extra impact by the way it arises naturally out of the plot, and by the tragic crumpling of Dumbo's face as he's cradled in his mother's trunk.

For the most part the animation is pleasingly simple. Unlike Bambi, here the backgrounds are washes of pale watercolour that allow the characters to take centre stage. Interrupting this, however, is the brain-bendingly inventive Pink Elephants On Parade sequence, a sudden swerve into serious surrealism that wouldn't have looked out of place in some counter-cultural head-trip made 30 years later.

All in all a touching, comic, visually inventive and emotionally convincing, this remains a jewel in the crown of Disney's golden age.