Pete's Dragon (1977) Review

Title: Pete's Dragon
Year: 1977
Director: Dan Chaffey
Country: UK
Language: English

Who Framed Roger Rabbit? (1988) is known as the best example of combining live action with hand drawn animation in film, but the practice has been around since at least Anchors Aweigh (1945). In-between those Walt Disney made a creative disco-era children's film called Pete's Dragon. 

In this film, an orphan boy (Sean Marshall) and his magical dragon Elliot come to town with his abusive adoptive parents in pursuit.

Pete's Dragon was a modest commercial success, albeit less commercially and critically successful than Disney's previous live action/animation mashup Bed Knobs and Broomsticks (1971). It underwent a very long development phase, originally conceived as a two part television series in 1957.  Thankfully it was changed to a musical; albeit none of the music is memorable. 

Disney's dragon picture has a lot of charm and whimsy, but it held back by a meandering plot that slows to a crawl whenever Elliot is offscreen. Elliot is quite a technical achievement for 1977; the animation interacts quite fluidly with the live actors onscreen. Elliot is quite an adorable character who functions as the film's heart. I can see why children of the 70's would have loved Pete's Dragon. 

Though it does have a pacing issue & the songs are lackluster, Pete's Dragon is worth an initial viewing because it does a lot with the technical limitations of the day. Watch it in terms of film history and witness the slow progression of "live" animation.