Anastasia is Underrated

I'm gonna say it... Once upon a December is one of my favourite songs I've ever heard, and I'm sick of pretending it's not

"In the dark of the night " had NO RIGHT to be such a banger. I had the soundtrack on cassette for a long time before finally seeing the film.

Considering how you feel about Rasputin in the story, you may enjoy the stage musical of Anastasia. It removes Rasputin and the fantasy elements entirely

While I agree that the story would have worked better without Rasputin, but I'm glad he was included. In The Dark Of The Night is one of the most banging villain songs ever.

Anastasia was and is still my favorite movie growing up. The way the ghost glided off the paintings and glittered like morning frost put me in awe as a little girl, I am still enamored by the colors of the sisters dresses today. Peach, pink, and lilac make yellow or blue a reasonable 4th color in this pattern, but the yellow is so stark and the blue too cold and together they make Anya a sore thumb in her own imagined lost future. All these colors are again repeated in the dream when she was almost tricked into going overboard with more emphasis on the blue that her and her little brother are wearing, but her yellow has faded to a cream nearing stark white. Anya starts the movie in blue with her grandma and as she finds herself as a women, finds her yellow. i don't fully know what i mean by that, but i vibe with it.

I remember the very first time I watched Anastasia as a kid. My naïve little mind had no knowledge of Russian history at the time so I thought the movie was a strange spinoff of Cinderella since one of her stepsisters is named Anastasia😂

I absolutely loved your analysis. Watching Anastasia as an adult, I agree that the fantasy/Rasputin plotline feels disconnected and the story would be just as strong without it. However, as a child, that plotline fascinated me, and I think it's because the fantasy elements communicate the darkness in the story on a visual and psychological level. Those scenes feel more like dreams to me, ones where Anya is working out the violence of her past that's still haunting and terrorizing her - I think the sleepwaking scene on the boat really speaks to this. The demons and ghosts are metaphors for danger and loss, and Rasputin being undead is like the trauma that has ended but is still alive in her psyche. It's fitting that, at the end, she needs to enter her unconscious dreamworld and confront him, taking her power back, before she can move on to the life she chooses for herself. The fact that Dimitri acts as a support for her in several of these scenes adds some depth to their romance, too. If this movie was more for adults, these themes could be handled more subtly, but as it's not, I think the dark fantasy elements (in addition to the songs) add emotional layers. It's like the dark velvet background that sets off all the gold and jewels. Anyway, I love Anastasia! Thank you for the great video that gives it the thoughtful attention it deserves.

About what you're saying at around 24:00 about Rasputin not leaving Limbo... I think the movie makes it pretty obvious that he couldn't leave because he didn't have the green glass thing. That's where his powers come from, and he only got it when he and Bartok reunite. So no, he couldn't have just left Limbo whenever. Also, he lost track of Anastasia just like the rest of the world did. He wasn't all-powerful and didn't know who/where she was until she started to remember herself.

Speaking of Kelsey Grammer's musical chops, what about the song he sings on the boat when Anya and Dimitri are dancing??? It's so sweet, and I love that he realizes what's going on between them before they do!

Anastasia and Mulan are my two most favorite movies ever, they always make me cry. Once I hear the first seconds of Once Upon A December I start crying 😂

PLEASE look into the broadway musical version of anastasia!! it focuses a little more on the actual history, showing more of the romanov family, and it replaces rasputin with a general named gleb. gleb’s dad was involved in the murders of the royal family and he follows anastasia to kill her and finish what his dad started. glebs songs are also impeccable

Now that Disney owns Fox I love telling people that Anastasia is my favorite Disney Princess. The Disney diehards have spent their whole lives correcting people who assume any animated movie is a Disney film, and now they have to justify it is not

as an adopted kid, this movie was always so important to me growing up. It makes me so emotional to this day

Since you mention The Prince of Egypt, I would love for you to talk about it.

I had no idea about Carrie Fischer’s contribution or the accompanying live-action production. Great video, even despite the diss on Rumor in St. Petersburg lol. That song has the power to make me wanna dance like few others do.

Forget the history, how the hell did Anya manage to gather such long thick hair into that tiny bun?

I had a smile on my face this whole video. The memory of seeing this as a kid with my late father in theaters is a treasure of my heart I'll never let go. Remembering seeing those burger king commercials and trailers on foxkids constantly really make it seem like the fantasy helped bring in a bigger box office success.The voice lines of Bartok catching Rasputin's eye "woah that just fell right out there sir." " enough with the glowing and the smoke people" lives comfortably in my mind rent free. Thanks for bringing up Prince of Egypt success and the shout out to the wonderful Cats don't dance and Iron Giant. My heart hasn't given up on this 2d style after a film like Klaus and Nimona.

This film has reappeared frequently throughout my life. This animation style is my favourite and I can never get enough of the songs. The sleepwalking scene on the ship has been an early source of comfort for my near lifelong hallucinations and dissociative episodes so I think that's why it's got such a fond feeling for me. Awesome to know other people love it just as much.

The visuals? Perfect. Character development? Great. Soundtrack? Simply the best

Wow wow, Anastasia was a classic in my household for basically all the reasons you detailed. The characters and cast are charming. The music is amazing (songs and score). The animation and backgrounds are beautiful. I’ve watched this movie many times through childhood to my adulthood, but it wasn’t really until my last rewatch that I noticed how dissonant Rasputin feels to the rest of the story. Doesn’t stop In The Dark Of The Night from being a total banger. In middle school, I even had the title of the song as my password to my school account. My teachers must have thought I was crazy 😂 Side note, you may be interested in looking to the Anastasia stage musical. They completely eradicate Rasputin in favor of a more political style antagonist (who also has some great songs). All the while, they managed to repurpose the melody of In the Dark of the Night for a beautiful cast piece about refugees leaving Russia. I don’t think the musical is AS good as the movie just because I have so much nostalgia tied to it. But it was a lot of fun to see on stage!