Ten years before Fantasia and Mickey Mouse would propel the composition into pop culture immortality, Paul Dukas’ “The Sorcerer’s Apprentice” was adapted in a short film directed by William Cameron Menzies.
Menzies had largely worked as a production designer in the 1920s, creating elaborate sets that perfectly suited romantic and adventurous fare such as The Thief of Bagdad, Son of the Sheik, Tempest, Two Arabian Nights, and Bulldog Drummond. He would have a long directorial career too, bringing his aesthetic sensibility to films such as the sci-fi behemoth Things to Come.
This short version of “The Sorcerer’s Apprentice” (or “The Wizard’s Apprentice”) is set in a gothic medieval castle much like the later Disney version. The action largely plays out the same, though the brooms in this version are super creepy. Their movement is mechanical, even uncanny.
