Willy McBean and His Magic Machine

Willy McBean and His Magic Machine
Directed by Arthur Rankin, Jr.
Kizo Nagashima
(associate director)
Produced by Jules Bass
Arthur Rankin, Jr.
Larry Roemer
(associate producer)
Written by Arthur Rankin, Jr.
Anthony Peters
(continuity design)
Starring Larry D. Mann
Billie Mae Richards
Paul Soles
Music by Edward Thomas
Gene Forrell
(songs)
Cinematography Tadahito Mochinaga
Production
company
Distributed by Magna Pictures Distribution Corporation
Release date
  • June 23, 1965 (1965-06-23) (U.S.)
Running time
 94 minutes
Country United States
Canada
Japan
Language English

Willy McBean and His Magic Machine is a 1965 full-length stop-motion puppet animation film produced by Rankin/Bass Productions in the United States and Dentsu Motion Pictures in Japan. It was distributed by Magna Pictures Distribution Corporation, and released in movie theaters on June 23, 1965. Its main theme is time travel.

Plot

Willy McBean is sick of trying to learn history for school. Meanwhile, an evil scientist called Rasputin Von Rotten is building a magical time machine so he can go back in time and be the most famous person in history. A Spanish-English talking monkey named Pablo climbs through Willy's window. He explains that he escaped from Von Rotten and he tells Willy what he is planning to do. Pablo stole the plans to the time machine.

Willy builds his own machine to go back in time to stop Von Rotten. The machine isn't working properly. They end up with General George Armstrong Custer (1839–1876), and escape moments before Custer is killed.

They then arrive in the Wild West, where they meet Buffalo Bill Cody and his Indian pal, Sitting Bull. Von Rotten plans to become the fastest gun in the west. Von Rotten asks Bill for a showdown, but both guns are sabotaged before anyone can be shot.

Von Rotten moves onto his next target, Christopher Columbus. Once there, disguised as a Chinese trader, he convinces Columbus's crew that they should mutiny. Once more McBean and Pablo stop the evil professor by showing the crew that land is not far off.

After that, Von Rotten goes back to England in the days of King Arthur in the kingdom of Camelot, but Pablo and Willy get Arthur to pull Excalibur the magic sword that can talk. A talking green dragon then crashes into Camelot in an effort to eat everyone, but King Arthur and Excalibur are able to drive him away.

Willy and Pablo later go to Ancient Egypt to stop Von Rotten from building the Great Pyramid, but the duo reach Ancient Rome on the way. Then they go back to prehistoric times to encourage cavemen to invent fire and the wheel before Von Rotten.

As they return to the present, Von Rotten shows the students history through his magic machine (in the form of a movie projector) during history class.

Voice cast

Production credits

  • Written, Produced, Directed by Arthur Rankin, Jr.
  • Associate Producers: Jules Bass, Larry Roemer
  • Associate Director: Kizo Nagashima
  • Soundtrack Supervision: Bernard Cowan
  • Music Supervision by Forrell, Thomas and Polack, Associates, Inc.
  • Music by Edward Thomas
  • Songs by Jim Polack, Edward Thomas, Gene Forrell
  • Animation Supervision: Tadahito Mochinaga (credited as Tad Mochinaga)
  • Puppet Makers: Ichiro Komuro, Kyoko Kita, Reiko Yamagata, Sumiko Hosaka (all uncredited)
  • Animation: Tadahito Mochinaga, Hiroshi Tabata, Takeo Nakamura, Fumiko Magari, Tadanari Okamoto, Koichi Oikawa (all uncredited)
  • Choreography: Edward Brinkmann
  • Continuity Design: Anthony Peters (credited as Antony Peters)
  • Additional Dialogue: Len Korobkin
  • a Videocraft/Dentsu picture
  • a Marshall Naify/Magna Pictures Distribution Corporation presentation

© 1965 Videocraft International, Limited and Dentsu Motion Picture Corporation.

Songs

  • "The Magical Magic Machine" (opening) – Chorus
  • "Professor Rasputin Von Rotten" – Professor Rasputin Von Rotten
  • "We Got Showbiz" – Buffalo Bill Cody, Sitting Bull
  • "Gotta Go West to Get East" – Christopher Columbus, Sailors
  • "I Am for Hire" – Professor Rasputin Von Rotten (in his Chinese accent)
  • "We're Knights of the Round Table (Not of the Square)" – Knights, King Arthur, Merlin
  • "I'm the Most Exciting, Horrible Dragon (In All of Camelot)" – The Dragon
  • "Poorest Queen" – Nefertiti, Tut
  • "A Caveman's Lot" – Ned the Caveman, Pablo the Monkey
  • "The Magical Magic Machine" (closing) – Chorus

See also

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