There is really not too much to see here, just a bunch birds and swamp animals moving to music as Spring approaches. There is plenty of clever sound and visual effects and catchy music, just not much in a plot. But, I thought that the excessive scenes of birds gobbling up little animals were a little too much for a children's Disney cartoon.Grade C+

Oh my I am gonna come off as such a crabcake in this review, because I'm afraid that this short really doesn't work for me at all. It's not very fun, it doesn't have any real charm that I could see, and I know it was only the third ever Silly Symphony to be put out and it was all still very much a work in progress as far as the quality and very art of the animation was concerned, but the sound is just awful. As the creatures dance around there is so much tinny klop klop klopping noise that just to me sounded horribly cheap and brutal, like someone is tapping a pan with a teaspoon, it just doesn't sound good at all. I also don't like the more weird unnatural touches like when the caterpillar separates its body segments and the stretchy limbs of the bird, that kinda thing is much more Fleischer than Disney. And I know it was perfectly mild but I really didn't like the animals eating each other, and it wasn't like they all come back alive and well at the end either. I mean I get that in their own way the animators were probably trying to show what really happens in nature from the animals that they doubtlessly observed, but I didn't like that! Thank goodness it didn't become a regular thing! I didn't mean for this to be so negative but I'm only being honest. In fact I've been getting back into these shorts a lot lately, but this is as poor a short as I remembered it, I'd rank it among the series' worst. Most of what is in it was later done again more effectively in later Symphonies like "Flowers and Trees", and even the 1930 "Summer" short. And much like Summer it feels more like a depiction of the animal life of a swamp environment than anything to do with Spring, apart from the opening flowers and hatching chicks at the beginning. It's not even remotely a good tribute to the first season. So to me at least the third time is not always the charm. Oh well, it's still a part of the rich evolving tapestry of a series that had far greater animated wonders yet to come... Not their best!

This is a Silly Symphony from Disney. There will be spoilers ahead:There really isn't much of a plot here, it's simply a series of gags loosely strung together, although a few of them can be grouped together as examples of the food chain in action, as various bugs and amphibians get eaten by some other critter.In addition, there are a few nice bits, like a tree and some other flora reacting to a rainstorm, culminating in lightning striking the tree, with fascinating results.Lots of dancing and moving around to classical music selected by Carl Stalling, the music and animation pair up reasonably well overall.This short is available on the Disney Treasures More Silly Symphonies DVD set, which is well worth getting. Recommended.

A Walt Disney SILLY SYMPHONY Cartoon Short.It is SPRINGTIME at the marsh, and the joy of the season is causing the various birds & bugs to dance about rapturously and eat each other up...This black & white cartoon is basically an exercise in action/reaction animation. The Disney artists seem to have an unending supply of posterior gags, often rather vulgar. The tuneful soundtrack with its familiar themes pushes the action along - most notably Ponchielli's `Dance of the Hours,' which would be showcased to great effect eleven years later in the Studio's FANTASIA.The SILLY SYMPHONIES, which Walt Disney produced for a ten year period beginning in 1929, are among the most interesting of series in the field of animation. Unlike the Mickey Mouse cartoons in which action was paramount, with the Symphonies the action was made to fit the music. There was little plot in the early Symphonies, which featured lively inanimate objects and anthropomorphic plants & animals, all moving frantically to the soundtrack. Gradually, however, the Symphonies became the school where Walt's animators learned to work with color and began to experiment with plot, characterization & photographic special effects. The pages of Fable & Fairy Tale, Myth & Mother Goose were all mined to provide story lines and even Hollywood's musicals & celebrities were effectively spoofed. It was from this rich soil that Disney's feature-length animation was to spring. In 1939, with SNOW WHITE successfully behind him and PINOCCHIO & FANTASIA on the near horizon, Walt phased out the SILLY SYMPHONIES; they had run their course & served their purpose.