“Once upon a time a story was told about fairies and goblins and witches of old—they haunted the forests and meadows and dells, and this is the legend the storybook tells . . . ”
These are the lyrics in the opening music of the cartoon short Babes in the Woods. In this Silly Symphony, which wandered into theaters on this day in 1932, the “babes” are two children reminiscent of Hansel and Gretel, who, in this retelling of the classic tale, become enchanted with an edible candy house, but soon fall victim to the home’s owner, a wicked witch, who changes the boy into a spider and is about to turn the girl into a rat moments before some of Disney’s earliest dwarfs come to the rescue.
