Storm's a comin'.

I didn't have the Disney Channel growing up (or cable, for that matter), so a friend of my mom's would tape movies and cartoons for my brother and me.  I remember watching Donald Duck Presents (which I could probably sing the theme song to if I really had to) and Mousterpiece Theater with George Plimpton, as well as many other movies and shows (that was how I ended up watching Short Circuit, Flight Of The Navigator, a random Raffi concert, and a behind the scenes Return Of The Jedi program that I've never seen anywhere else, over and over and over again).  For all of the tapes that we ended up with, what I remember most, and was happiest of all to find when I was sorting through tapes many years later, was a Silly Symphony called The Old Mill.

I found many reasons to like this short.  The animation was just really beautiful and there was a lot of depth to it.  Also, it was just fun to watch, and it was different from other Silly Symphony cartoons because it wasn't really that silly.  It was almost one of those things that when you watched it as a child and liked it, you could feel grown up and say that you had sophisticated tastes (even if you really didn't and after it was over went back to the pile of LEGOs on the floor).  It also wasn't afraid to be a little scary and I think that was one of the reasons why I liked it so much.  (I mean, sure, the mill made it through this storm, but who knows whether it will make it through the next viewing.)