List of The Great Movie Ride Films - The Ride

The Ride

As guests reach the end of the queue, they enter a 1930s-era Hollywood sound stage where they are loaded by cast members into one of two sets of open, theatre-style seating ride vehicles. The vehicles utilize a "traveling theatre"-style ride system similar to the Universe of Energy attraction at Epcot. However, here the ride vehicles are much smaller in size, are grouped together in pairs of two, and feature an open cab in the first row of the front vehicle for a live tour guide to stand, provide narration, and operate the ride vehicle. Both pairs of vehicles are used everyday, but as the day goes on the front vehicles begin to be pulled, leaving only the back vehicles.

The film set within the soundstage features a large neon theatre marquee and a cyclorama of the 1930s-era Hollywood Hills complete with the original Hollywoodland Sign. As the ride begins, "Hooray for Hollywood" plays overhead as the tour guide on the ride vehicle welcomes guests and informs them that they will be taking them through scenes from different classic films throughout history.

The first genre of films introduced are musicals, which begins with a cake of starlets in a scene from Busby Berkeley's Footlight Parade. The next musical scenes include audio-animatronics of Gene Kelly swinging from a lamp post from the film Singin' in the Rain, followed by Julie Andrews and Dick Van Dyke singing on the rooftops of London in Mary Poppins.

The next scene is a tribute to gangster films. The ride vehicle passes through the dark and seedy backstreets of 1930s Chicago and past an audio-animatronic James Cagney as Tom Powers in a scene from The Public Enemy. When both pairs of ride vehicles are in use, the first continues on to the next show scene while the second is stopped by a red light at the entrance to a tunnel. Here, the tour guide stops the ride vehicle and waits for a green light. While stopped, a live gangster named Mugsy (male) or Mugsi (female) and their audio-animatronic companions Squid and Beans show up and get involved in a shoot-out with rival mobsters (Brains, Legs, and Weasel) in a car on the opposite side of the street where the ride vehicle is stopped. During the shoot out, the live gangster then chases away the tour guide and hijacks the ride vehicle. When the gangster notices the red light above the tunnel entrance, they shoot it out and make their getaway aboard the ride vehicle, leaving Squid and Beans behind to "give regards to the warden."

Next is a tribute to the Western film genre. Here, guests encounter audio-animatronics of the Man with No Name (Clint Eastwood) standing outside of a saloon and Ethan Edwards (John Wayne) sitting atop his horse. The second vehicle (which is already being driven by the gangster) continues past a shoot-out between the town sheriff and an audio-animatronic bank robber named Snake. However, the first ride vehicle (which is still being driven by the tour guide) stops in front of the town bank while a robbery is in progress. Suddenly, a live bank robber named Kate Durango (female) or Kid Carson (male) appears from inside the bank. After getting into a shoot-out with the town sheriff and chasing the tour guide into the bank, the bandit blows up the town bank along with the Tour Guide inside it with dynamite and hijacks the ride vehicle. Following this scene, the remainder of the attraction is the same for both ride vehicles.

As the ride vehicle continues into a seemingly abandoned spaceship, a narrator's voice states that this is the Nostromo, the ship from the film Alien. The narrator then tells guests of the alien lurking within the ship waiting to claim its next victim. The tram passes an audio-animatronic Ripley (Sigourney Weaver) holding a flamethrower as she prepares to confront the creature. Guests can also hear the Nostromo's "Mother" computer warning of an imminent ship self-destruction countdown. Hearing this, the hijacker becomes nervous and speeds the ride vehicle through the ship. But not before the Alien appears and attacks the guests, popping out from both the ceiling and the wall.

The ride vehicle next enters a scene set in an ancient Egyptian temple filled with snakes. The narrator informs guests that they are in a scene from Raiders of the Lost Ark as audio-animatronic figures of Indiana Jones (Harrison Ford) and Sallah (John Rhys-Davies) struggle to lift the Ark of the Covenant. A second room within the temple (though not from the film) features a large altar in the form of the ancient Egyptian god Anubis. Near the top of the altar, a large jewel is being watched over by a cloaked temple priest. The hijacker sees the jewel, stops the ride vehicle, and disembarks to retrieve it. Before touching the jewel, the temple guard gives a warning that those who disturb the jewel must pay with their life. Ignoring the warning, the hijacker reaches to grab the jewel. Suddenly, a plume of fiery smoke shoots from the ground. When it disperses, the hijacker is now nothing more than a skeleton (still reaching for the jewel) and the temple priest is revealed to be the original live tour guide, who re-boards the vehicle and continues the ride.

The next film genre introduced is the horror film as the ride vehicle travels through an ancient burial chamber full of mummies, some of which have come to life. The ride vehicle soon leaves the tomb and enters a jungle, which is home to Tarzan the Ape Man. Here, audio-animatronic figures of Tarzan (Johnny Weissmuller) swinging on a vine, Jane (Maureen O'Sullivan) sitting atop Timba the elephant, and Cheeta the chimpanzee can be seen. The ride vehicle then moves past the classic final scene from Casablanca featuring audio-animatronics of Humphrey Bogart and Ingrid Bergman as they stand in front of a waiting airplane - some incorrectly claim that this plane, a Lockheed Model 12 Electra Junior, is the actual plane used during the filming of the film, but no full-size plane was actually used during the filming of Casablanca. The back half of this plane was cut off and can be found resting along the shoreline of the Jungle Cruise attraction at the Magic Kingdom. Next, the ride vehicle passes a film projection of Mickey Mouse in his role as The Sorcerer's Apprentice from the classic Disney animated film Fantasia.

The ride vehicle then enters into the Munchkinland scene from The Wizard of Oz, where Dorothy's house has landed on the Wicked Witch of the East. When both pairs of ride vehicles are in use, they meet up here and come to a stop in the middle of the scene. Audio-Animatronic Munchkins begin to appear from various places and sing as they welcome guests to their home. However, a plume of smoke suddenly rises from the ground as an audio-animatronic Wicked Witch of the West (Margaret Hamilton) appears and asks who is responsible for killing the Wicked Witch of the East. The tour guide aboard the first ride vehicle interacts with her before she disappears in another puff of smoke. The Munchkins reappear from their hiding places and begin to sing again as both ride vehicles follow the Yellow Brick Road out of Munchkinland past audio-animatronic figures of Dorothy (Judy Garland), Scarecrow (Ray Bolger), Tin Man (Jack Haley), Cowardly Lion (Bert Lahr) and Toto standing in front of the Emerald City, and onto the ride's Grand Finale.

For the grand finale, both ride vehicles enter a large, dark theatre where they line up side-by-side and come to a stop in front of a large movie screen. There, a fast-paced three-minute film montage of classic film moments is shown. At the conclusion of the film, both ride vehicles exit the theatre, line up single-file again and return to the 1930s soundstage where the ride concludes and guests disembark the vehicles and exit the attraction.

Unlike many Disney dark rides that feature separate embarkation and debarkation areas, the Great Movie Ride has only a single combined unloading and loading area. The last people to exit the vehicles often pass the next group of guests waiting to board the vehicles. At the time the ride was designed (the mid to late 1980s), it was common throughout the theme park industry to have all major rides exit into a store selling merchandise associated with the attraction. The Great Movie Ride, however, does not exit directly into a store.