A Dream Called Walt Disney World (1981 Video) User Reviews

The Early Days of Disney World

[travisimo · 8/10 · 18 January 2004]

This Disney World video is definitely a product of the time period it was made in. It's got some very peculiar, disco-like music, and some of the visuals look, dare I say, funky!!! This video is also interesting because it highlights Disney World when the Magic Kingdom was the only park there. With so much space, I just find it hard to think of Disney World without Epcot, the Studios, or Animal Kingdom. Yet this video still stands by its story that you can stay there for a week and still not accomplish everything.

Since there's only one park, there is great emphasis on it with more time spent on individual rides. If you look at a current Disney World souvenir video that just couldn't be possible now. There are just too many attractions to highlight in an hour-long video. Other interesting features on the video include a look at their newest water park at the time, River Country (I still don't know what they plan to do with that place) and a nice shot of the Contemporary as the Monorail travels through it. Also, you can see some old footage of Walt Disney opening Disneyland and his brother, Roy, opening Disney World.

Overall, the video is kind of quirky, nothing too special. Many of the attractions illustrated still reside at the Magic Kingdom. Hey, if it ain't broke, don't fix it!!

My IMDb Rating: 8/10

Nice travelogue

[elisereid-29666 · 8/10 · 14 January 2020]

As someone who was a Florida resident for much of her childhood, and who had regular passes to Disney World during that time (1989-95), this film brought back a lot of memories for me. My family spent a lot of time at WDW in that era, but sadly we have relatively little but our memories to show for it (we did not own a functional video camera for much of that time, and still pictures hardly do the place justice). That's why I considered myself fortunate to find this film on the Internet. It shows many of the things I remember most about WDW (though not all-the film pre-dated EPCOT Center, MGM Studios, etc). It shows Space and Thunder Mountains in action (Thunder Mountain was my favorite ride in the whole park-I remember being so bummed out when it was closed for re-painting during one of our trips there in the 90s), the nightly light parade, the various resort hotels, and lots and lots of general footage of the park. (The film was made in 1980 and shows it-all the park guests are very discofied, which, though not true to my own personal memories of the park, is a fun sidenote!). I grew up to be a theme park junkie, and I'm sure Walt Disney World was what got me started.

An incredible "snapshot"

[potsie74 · 8/10 · 14 July 2009]

My parents brought this movie home from our 3rd WDW trip (circa 1983), and I STILL watch it every now and then. It's just amazing to witness what WDW was like in the late seventies/early eighties. This movie really provides a great insight into the scope and focus of the greatest theme park and vacation destination - that was only 10 years old at the time of production.

There are a few things about this movie that are truly amazing. First off, with the exception of the opening and closing montages, practically all of the people in the movie are real guests of WDW. It is neat to see every day visitors enjoying themselves throughout the Magic Kingdom, resorts, etc. It is also neat that many of these people can be seen within the originally-conceived Main Street USA, which - in this film - is grossly different from the way it is now.

The other "gems" within this movie are the revelations of long-gone, discontinued, or otherwise 'vanished' attractions at Disney world. There are too many to list, but newer and younger visitors to WDW will spy such sights as 20'000 Leagues Under the Sea, Discovery Island, WDW Village and ponder; "where the heck is that?!".

Although the narration is somewhat hokey at times, this movie is a great depiction of all that WDW was, and aspired to be in it's early years.