Best Fantasy Movies of 1933

In Victorian England, a bored young girl dreams that she has entered a fantasy world called Wonderland populated by even more fantastic characters.

This story is based both on a long-standing legend and a play by E. Temple Thurston. Veteran British director Maurice Elvey brought years of experience with theatrical adaptations to the difficult task of filming a movie that spans centuries and strains credulity. Conrad Veidt stars as the Jew who urges Roman authorities to crucify Jesus and release Barabbas. As a punishment, he is condemned by God to wander the Earth for many centuries, enduring innumerable trials and tribulations on several continents.

A fantasy satire on politics in which a little boy dreams that he becomes President of the U.S. and his 'mammy' is Vice President. The film spotlights two now legendary performers much earlier in their careers: Ethel Waters and Sammy Davis Jr. In his first screen appearance, around the age of seven, pint-sized Davis sings, dances and clowns. Nicknamed 'the beanpole' slim and slinky Waters looks far different from the heavier figure she displayed in Pinky (1949) and Member of the Wedding (1953). Statuesque in a long glamorous white gown, she sings her big hit "Am I Blue." Davis, in turn sings "I'll Be Glad When You're Dead You Rascal You." (Separate Cinema)

A storybook opens to depict little Dorothy on the grey Kansas prairies, when suddenly a cyclone comes up, turns her world to color, and she lands on a Scarecrow, who promptly gets up and walks with her. Her dog Toto finds a woodcutter made of tin, so the Scarecrow oils him up and he accompanies them. They watch some animals reproduce before being ushered into the Emerald City by singing suits of armor and a lavish parade of overweight cops before meeting the Wizard, a devious little man who transforms eggs into uncontrollable forms, much to Billina's dismay.

A young American man is transported back to London in the time of the American Revolution and meets his ancestors.

Christmas Eve. A poor orphan boy trudges through the snow, pathetically. He finally arrives at his miserable cabin. While he is crying, Santa arrives and, singing the title song, offers to take the boy to his workshop. They arrive, and the toys go wild (in the full version, they sing the title song, but this has been censored in some versions due to outdated stereotypes). He plays with a few toys. A candle falls off the tree and starts a fire. The toys try in vain to fight the fire; the boy hooks up a hose to a set of bagpipes and takes care of it.

As two feline sweethearts sail along Moonlight Bay, the moon invites them up for a visit. They discover the moon is not made of green cheese, as is rumored, but is actually a land of candy, ice cream and cake.

A 1933 British Production based on the novel by Pierre Louys' "The Adventures of King Pausole", a fantasy based on a theme of King Solomon and his many wives. Good King Pausole (Emil Jannings) selects a wife for every day in the year, but the one played by 'Sidney Fox' protests when he spends her day searching for his favorite daughter who has eloped with a visiting airman stranded in the kingdom. He comes from a modern and different world and this gives Queen for a Day some ideas about how to make her title a lasting one.

A political hack becomes President during the height of the Depression and undergoes a metamorphosis into an incorruptible statesman after a near-fatal accident.