Dr. Grob's Animation Review

Betty Boop Bizzy Bee

March 13, 2017 in ★★★½, Betty Boop, Black and White Films, Max Fleischer films | Tags: 1932, belly ache, Betty Boop, Bimbo, canteen, Dave Fleischer, Koko The Clown, wheat cakes | Leave a comment

Director: Dave Fleischer
Release Date: August 19, 1932
Stars: Betty Boop, Bimbo, Koko the Clown
Rating: ★★★½
Review:

In ‘Betty Boop Bizzy Bee’ Betty works in a mobile canteen, where the complete menu consists of wheat cakes.

After some rather trite gags, a song starts with the recurring line ‘pass me the sugar’. When a fat customer appears with an enormous appetite, the cartoon goes haywire. In the end everything has a belly ache, even the stove, the lunch wagon and the moon.

‘Betty Boop Bizzy Bee’ is one of those Fleischer cartoons in which everything is alive. We watch wheat cakes flipping themselves over in a square dance and plates washing and drying themselves. The ‘story’ makes little sense, it’s just a string of gags in a rather stream-of-consciousness-like fashion. ‘Betty Boop Bizzy Bee’ is very similar to Van Beuren’s ‘Pots and Pans‘ from three months earlier, and may have been inspired by it.

Watch ‘Betty Boop Bizzy Bee’ yourself and tell me what you think:

This is Betty Boop cartoon No. 2
To the previous Betty Boop cartoon: Stopping the Show
To the next Betty Boop cartoon: Betty Boop, M.D.

‘Betty Boop Bizzy Bee’ is available on the French DVD Box Set ‘Betty Boop Coffret Collector’

Parade of the Award Nominees

March 10, 2017 in ★★★★, Commercial films, Walt Disney films | Tags: 1932, Academy Awards, Alfred Lunt, cinema, Fredric March, Helen Hayes, Hollywood, Joe Grant, Lynn Fontanne, Marie Dressler, Mickey Mouse, Minnie Mouse, Oscars, Pluto, Wallace Beery | 2 comments

Director: Joe Grant?
Release Date: November 18, 1932
Stars: Mickey Mouse, Minnie Mouse, Pluto, Wallace Beery, Lynn Fontanne, Alfred Lunt, Helen Hayes, Fredric March, Marie Dressler
Rating: ★★★★
Review:

‘Parade of the Award Nominees’ was especially made for the fifth Academy Awards gala night of November 18, 1932 to introduce the nominees for best actors and actresses.

The short is based on the opening parade of ‘Mother Goose Melodies‘ (1931), and reuses quite some animation from the original Silly Symphony, but this time it features Mickey, Minnie and Pluto, all in their color debut, predating their official color debuts in ‘The Band Concert‘, ‘On Ice‘ and ‘Mickey’s Garden‘ respectively by three years. Thus, their color designs are a bit different: Mickey wears green shorts instead of red ones, and Pluto is a sort of grey-ish, instead of orange-brown.

Following Mickey, Minnie and some characters from the original ‘Mother Goose Melodies’ we watch the following Hollywood stars parade: Wallace Beery as ‘The Champ’, Lynn Fontanne and Alfred Lunt (both starring ‘The Guardsman’), Helen Hayes (‘The Sin of Madelon Claudet’), Fredric March (‘Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde’), transforming while walking, and finally Marie Dressler (‘Emma’).

The caricatures were based on designs by Joe Grant, who, at that time, was still working as a newspaper caricutarist. Grant was only hired later, for ‘Mickey’s Gala Premier‘, which premiered eight months later, and which features many more caricatures of Hollywood stars. Incidentally, Fredric March, Wallace Beery and Helen Hayes won the Oscars.

Apart from this film, Disney was very present at this gala night: he was nominated for Best Sound Recording, he won the Oscar for the new category ‘Best Animated Short Film’ with his full-color debut ‘Flowers and Trees‘, and he got an honorary award for the creation of Mickey Mouse, with which Hollywood acknowledged the little mouse’s extraordinary fame. This was Disney’s first triumphant presence at the Academy Awards, but many successes would follow, as Walt Disney would receive no less than 26 Academy Awards during his career…

Watch ‘Parade of the Award Nominees’ yourself and tell me what you think:

‘Parade of the Award Nominees’ is available on the DVD ‘Mickey Mouse in Living Color’

Coo Coo the Magician

March 8, 2017 in ★★★★, Black and White Films, Flip the Frog, Ub Iwerks films | Tags: 1933, Arabia, Flip the Frog, magic carpet, magician | Leave a comment

Director: unknown
Release Date: January 1, 1933
Stars: Flip the Frog
Rating: ★★★★
Review:

While ‘The Goal Rush‘ anticipated Disney’s ‘Touchdown Mickey‘, ‘Coo Coo the Magician’ clearly follows ‘Mickey in Arabia‘ from six months earlier. The setting and the story are too similar to ignore, making ‘Coo Coo the Magician’ quite a rip-off of Mickey’s wonderful cartoon.

Like Mickey, Flip visits some vague Arabian country with his sweetheart. There they meet the magician. When Flip challenges him, the magician makes his sweetheart disappear. While Flip gets lost in an Egyptian tomb, his girl comes in the clutches of a sultan. Flip comes to the rescue, battling several stereotyped black servants, which the cartoon unfortunately also inherited from Mickey’s cartoon. In the end the couple manages to escape on a magic carpet. There’s a short erotic scene of Flip falling into a harem.

Maybe just because it is a copy of ‘Mickey in Arabia’, ‘Coo Coo the Magician’ is an enjoyable cartoon. The exotic setting clearly inspired the makers to make other gags than usual, making this short standing above the average Flip the Frog cartoon.

Watch ‘Coo Coo the Magician’ yourself and tell me what you think:

This is Flip the Frog cartoon No. 32
To the previous Flip the Frog cartoon: Funny Face
To the next Flip the Frog cartoon: Flip’s Lunch Room

‘Coo Coo the Magician’ is available on the DVD ‘Cartoons That Time Forgot – The Ub Iwerks Collection Vol. 2’

Funny Face

March 6, 2017 in ★★★½, Black and White Films, Flip the Frog, Ub Iwerks films | Tags: 1932, date, face, Flip the Frog, girls, masks, plastic surgery | Leave a comment

Director: unknown
Release Date: December 24, 1932
Stars: Flip the Frog
Rating: ★★★½
Review:

By the end of 1932 the Flip the Frog cartoons had turned in genuine gag cartoons, full of action.

‘Funny Face’ starts with a new title card, with an updated Flip the Frog design, showing his more boyish persona he had received the last cartoons, but retaining the bass voice of his earlier incarnation.

In ‘Funny Face’ Flip is typically boyish. He has a date with a girl, but she prefers someone else. So he visits Dr. Skinnum to get a new face. When Flip enters the place, ‘Funny Face’ follows Disney’s ‘King Neptune‘ in the new operetta format, with several masks hanging on a wall singing to him. While Flip gets a new face, his girl is kidnapped by a bully. With his new (human) face, Flip attracts seven girls, who start following him, so he hides in the very house the bully has captured his sweetheart. He rescues her, loses his new face, but gains her love, after all. What becomes of the other seven girls, we’ll never know.

‘Funny Face’ is a strange mix of a gag cartoon and pure melodrama. Its story is erratic, and Flip being a frog among humans becomes more and more problematical, and watching him with a human face is pretty weird to say the least. Notice the strange, rounded backgrounds, however, which are unique to the Iwerks cartoons.

Watch ‘Funny Face’ yourself and tell me what you think:

This is Flip the Frog cartoon No. 31
To the previous Flip the Frog cartoon: Nurse Maid
To the next Flip the Frog cartoon: Coo Coo the Magician

‘Funny Face’ is available on the DVD ‘Cartoons That Time Forgot – The Ub Iwerks Collection Vol. 2’

Nurse Maid

March 3, 2017 in ★★★, Black and White Films, Flip the Frog, Ub Iwerks films | Tags: 1932, baby, Carl Stalling, Flip the Frog, Great Depression | Leave a comment

Director: unknown
Release Date: November 26, 1932
Stars: Flip the Frog
Rating: ★★★
Review:

‘Nurse Maid’ is a typical cartoon from the Great Depression era, depicting small jobs and poverty.

The short starts very well with Flip as a newspaper boy facing a lot of bad luck destroying his trade. Broke, he sits down on the street to worry. Luckily a woman offers him a dollar if he minds her big-nosed baby. The rest of the cartoon is devoted to Flip’s troubles with the baby, which start immediately when the baby swallows the coin. Thus Flip conjures an unhealthy plan to retrieve it from the baby’s mouth with a fishing rod (!). While Flip sets out to get one, the baby swallows a potion which makes the little fellow strong…

Like ‘The Goal Rush‘, ‘Nurse Maid’ is as gag rich as it is unfunny. Luckily, Carl Stalling’s music is very inspired, following the action so closely that most of the tunes are reduced to snippets (for example, when during a chase a Scotchman is encountered, Stalling inserts a few bars of a Scottish tune before resuming the chase music). In fact, the cartoon is recommended for Stalling’s music only, which is a marvel to listen to.

Watch ‘Nurse Maid’ yourself and tell me what you think:

This is Flip the Frog cartoon No. 30
To the previous Flip the Frog cartoon: The Music Lesson
To the next Flip the Frog cartoon: Funny Face

‘Nurse Maid’ is available on the DVD ‘Cartoons That Time Forgot – The Ub Iwerks Collection Vol. 2’

The Goal Rush

March 1, 2017 in ★★★, Black and White Films, Flip the Frog, Ub Iwerks films | Tags: 1932, Flip the Frog, Football, sports | Leave a comment

Director: unknown
Release Date: October 3, 1932
Stars: Flip the Frog
Rating: ★★★
Review:

‘The Goal Rush’ was released only twelve days before the Mickey Mouse cartoon ‘Touchdown Mickey‘ and covers the same ground.

It’s interesting to compare both cartoons, because they’re both lively gag cartoons full of action. Unfortunately, Mickey’s cartoon is better designed, better drawn, better animated, better timed, and better told than Flip’s. So where ‘Touchdown Mickey’ is one of Mickey’s greatest films, and one of the best cartoons of 1932, ‘The Goal Rush’ never really comes off. The gags are often trite, the timing is terribly sloppy and the story meandering.

We watch a football game between Burp University (a bunch of bullies) and Nertz University (Flip and some nerds). Flip’s frog design becomes more and more problematical among the human characters, especially as his love interest is a human girl. The human characters now all have their typical Iwerks designs, except for a very Betty Boop-like farmer girl Flip unveils under a haystack while riding a pig.

There’s a lot going on in this cartoon, but it’s difficult to indicate a good gag. There’s at least a surprising one in which a bandleader shoots a clarinet player who plays off key. The best gag may be the football (pigskin) joining a pig family.

Watch ‘The Goal Rush’ yourself and tell me what you think:

This is Flip the Frog cartoon No. 27
To the previous Flip the Frog cartoon: Circus
To the next Flip the Frog cartoon: Phoney Express

‘The Goal Rush’ is available on the DVD ‘Cartoons That Time Forgot – The Ub Iwerks Collection Vol. 2’

The Music Lesson

February 27, 2017 in ★★, Black and White Films, Flip the Frog, Ub Iwerks films | Tags: 1932, dog, Flip the Frog, music lesson, teacher | Leave a comment

Director: unknown
Release Date: October 29, 1932
Stars: Flip the Frog
Rating: ★★
Review:

In ‘The Music Lesson’ Flip returns to his schoolboy days from ‘School Days‘, and this short also stars the teacher and dog from the earlier cartoon.

‘The Music lesson’ starts with Flip having to stay inside for one hour to practice his piano lessons. But his human friends signal him from the outside to come outside and swim. Flip tries to sneak out three times, and he succeeds the third time, but at the pond he’s caught by both his piano teacher and a gamekeeper, and in the last scene he’s seen practicing his piano in jail, guarded by the two authority figures.

‘The Music Lesson’ is a genuine attempt at a continuity of gags, but the short is severely hampered by erratic animation and sloppy timing. None of the gags really comes off, and the finale is anything but that. It seems that by the end of 1932 Flip’s short-lived heydays were already over.

Watch ‘The Music Lesson’ yourself and tell me what you think:

This is Flip the Frog cartoon No. 29
To the previous Flip the Frog cartoon: Phoney Express
To the next Flip the Frog cartoon: Nurse Maid

‘The Music Lesson’ is available on the DVD ‘Cartoons That Time Forgot – The Ub Iwerks Collection Vol. 1’

Pencil Mania

February 24, 2017 in ★★★★½, Black and White Films, Van Beuren films, Van Beuren's Tom & Jerry | Tags: 1932, 4th wall, George Stallings, John Foster, magic pencil, melodrama, surrealism, Van Beuren's Tom & Jerry | 1 comment

Directors: John Foster & George Stallings
Release Date: December 9, 1932
Stars: Tom and Jerry
Rating: ★★★★½
Review

‘Pencil Mania’ arguably is Tom and Jerry’s most inventive short of all.

In this short Jerry has a magic pencil with which he can draw things in mid-air, which immediately come to life. This leads to some surreal gags with a lot of metamorphosis being involved. It’s for example fascinating to watch a saxophone change into a duck.

Unfortunately, as soon as Jerry has drawn three melodrama figures, the short turns to their antics. Nevertheless, the finale is mesmerizing: a complete train disappears into nothing, and Jerry breaks through the paper to make the heroin return to his pencil before Tom can kiss her. Gags like these, breaking the 4th wall, were extremely rare in 1932, making ‘Pencil Mania’ pretty unique. At any rate it’s very enjoyable to watch, even though the train is the only well-drawn thing in the entire short. One can only guess what more able hands could have made out of a story idea like this.

Eight years later Terrytoons would use the same idea in the Gandy Goose cartoon ‘The Magic Pencil’ (1940). No doubt the Terry animators had seen ‘Pencil Mania’, because not only do the two cartoon share a melodrama sequence, the magic also starts with the same gag: that of the Jerry/Gandy Goose drawing an egg, which falls on Tom’s/Sourpuss’s head. Moreover, both Jerry and Gandy Goose turn a door into a car, and like Jerry, Gandy makes the heroin flow back into his pencil.

‘Pencil Mania’ features three songs: Rudy Wiedoeft’s Saxophobia (1919), the 1923 hit ‘Yes, We Have No Bananas’, and ‘You’ve Got Me in the Palm of Your Hand’.

Watch ‘Pencil Mania’ yourself and tell me what you think:

This is Tom & Jerry cartoon No. 18
To the previous Tom & Jerry cartoon: Piano Tooners
To the next Tom & Jerry cartoon: Tight Rope Tricks

‘Pencil Mania’ is available on the DVD ‘The Complete Animated Adventures of Van Beuren Studio’s Tom and Jerry’

Piano Tooners

February 22, 2017 in ★★★½, Black and White Films, Van Beuren films, Van Beuren's Tom & Jerry | Tags: 1932, concert, concert cartoon, George Rufle, John Foster, piano, piano tuning, Van Beuren's Tom & Jerry | 3 comments

Directors: John Foster & George Rufle
Release Date: November 11, 1932
Stars: Tom and Jerry
Rating: ★★★½
Review

‘Piano Tooners’ opens with Tom and Jerry performing the 1920 hit song ‘Margie’ in their piano shop, which is simply filled with mice. We also watch them tuning pianos, with the best gag being Jerry flushing a bad note through the toilet.

Suddenly we cut to a concert hall, where one Mlle. Pflop will perform. She appears to be a fat woman, and some of the lesser refined humor in this cartoon stems from watching her getting dressed, in rather risque scenes. At the concert Mll. Pflop sings and plays the piano at the same time, until she hits a flat note. Piano tuners Tom and Jerry come to the rescue, pulling the bad key from the piano as if it were a sore tooth. Tom immediately starts playing ‘Doin’ The New Low-Down’, a song Don Redman would turn into a hit (featuring Cab Calloway and the Mills Brothers) more than a month after the release of ‘Piano Tooners’. Also featured is a maid, who is most probably a caricature, but of whom? She joins in, singing along, but it’s Mlle. Pflop who has the last note.

Like the other Tom and Jerry cartoons, ‘Piano Tooners’ is hopelessly primitive, featuring erratic designs and bad animation. However, the piano tuning gags are entertaining, and it’s hard not to enjoy the short’s weird atmosphere.

Watch ‘Piano Tooners’ yourself and tell me what you think:

This is Tom & Jerry cartoon No. 17
To the previous Tom & Jerry cartoon: A Spanish Twist
To the next Tom & Jerry cartoon: Pencil Mania

‘Piano Tooners’ is available on the DVD ‘The Complete Animated Adventures of Van Beuren Studio’s Tom and Jerry’

A Spanish Twist

February 20, 2017 in ★★, Black and White Films, Van Beuren films, Van Beuren's Tom & Jerry | Tags: 18th amendment, 1932, alcohol, bullfight, George Stallings, John Foster, Spain, Van Beuren's Tom & Jerry | 3 comments

Directors: John Foster & George Stallings
Release Date: October 7, 1932
Stars: Tom and Jerry
Rating: ★★
Review

Somehow Tom and Jerry are shipwrecked and plagued by an evil octopus. Lucky for them they’re washed ashore in Spain, where they immediately go to a Spanish cafe.

At the cafe they encounter two female dancers, and an angry guy who orders them to take part in a bullfight. In the arena Tom and Jerry defeat a battalion of bulls with their bare hands. Then a telegraph arrives to tell them the 18th amendment has been lifted, and immediately Tom and Jerry head home again on their raft…

The 18th amendment, abolishing alcohol, was not lifted until December 5, 1933, more than one year after the release of ‘A Spanish Twist’ , making this cartoon strangely prophetic. Unfortunately, it’s hardly enjoyable otherwise. The Spanish dancers are extremely badly drawn, and the bullfight is anything from entertaining. In fact, ‘A Spanish Twist’ is arguably the worst bullfight cartoon before the equally dull Pink Panther cartoon ‘Toro Pink’ (1979).

Watch ‘A Spanish Twist’ yourself and tell me what you think:

This is Tom & Jerry cartoon No. 16
To the previous Tom & Jerry cartoon: Barnyard Bunk
To the next Tom & Jerry cartoon: Piano Tooners

‘A Spanish Twist’ is available on the DVD ‘The Complete Animated Adventures of Van Beuren Studio’s Tom and Jerry’

Barnyard Bunk

February 17, 2017 in ★, Black and White Films, Van Beuren films, Van Beuren's Tom & Jerry | Tags: 1932, barnyard, farm, George Rufle, John Foster, saxophones, Van Beuren's Tom & Jerry | Leave a comment

Directors: John Foster & George Rufle
Release Date: September 16, 1932
Stars: Tom and Jerry
Rating: ★
Review

‘Barnyard Bunk’ opens with a farmer at sleep at a farm, which falls apart. It’s soon clear the farm is destroyed by numerous cheeky mice.

Enter Tom and Jerry playing saxophones. Their music makes a hen laying eggs, a cow producing tons of milk, and two woodpeckers producing a pile of wood. At one point all the lifeless objects of the farm start dancing. In the end the farmer pays the duo for the saxophones, but the moneybag turns out to be filled with mice.

It’s quite shocking to see that in ‘Barnyard Bunk’, a film made well into 1932, still features animation language of the silent era. The short features no dialogue, and the gestures of Tom, Jerry and the farmer are still of the 1920s. The designs of the farmer and the mice do not fare better, and the whole cartoon exudes from archaism. Its only modern feature is the dressed cow, which shows that already by 1932 the Hays code was getting hold of the cartoon industry.

Watch ‘Barnyard Bunk’ yourself and tell me what you think:

This is Tom & Jerry cartoon No. 15
To the previous Tom & Jerry cartoon: Jolly Fish
To the next Tom & Jerry cartoon: A Spanish Twist

‘Barnyard Bunk’ is available on the DVD ‘The Complete Animated Adventures of Van Beuren Studio’s Tom and Jerry’

Betty Boop’s Museum

February 15, 2017 in ★★★½, Betty Boop, Black and White Films, Max Fleischer films | Tags: 1932, Betty Boop, Bimbo, Dave Fleischer, fossil, Koko The Clown, museum, skeletons | Leave a comment

Director: Dave Fleischer
Release Date: December 16, 1932
Stars: Betty Boop, Bimbo, Koko the Clown
Rating: ★★★½
Review:

Koko takes Betty on a sightseeing trip to a museum that displays both art and fossils, and where Bimbo is a guard.

Soon Betty is busy feeding a statue called Hunger, and she’s left behind after closing time. Suddenly the statues and fossils come alive, and a horned fossil demands her to sing for them. Betty Boop starts ‘Was That The Human Thing To Do’, a hit from that year, to which the fossils dance. Then the horned (or rather horny) fossil haunts Betty, until the museum suddenly collapses.

‘Betty Boop’s Museum’ is one of the more bizarre Betty Boop shorts of 1932/1933, even though it’s not as good as ‘Betty Boop’s Bamboo Isle‘ or ‘Snow-White‘. The short starts with a spectacular zoom out from Koko’s mouth. There’s also a very short, but nicely animated scene of Koko’s car on roller skates.

Watch ‘Betty Boop’s Museum’ yourself and tell me what you think:

This is Betty Boop cartoon No. 8
To the previous Betty Boop cartoon: I’ll Be Glad When You’re Dead You Rascal You
To the next Betty Boop cartoon: Betty Boop’s Ker-Choo

Betty Boop’s Museum’ is available on the French DVD Box Set ‘Betty Boop Coffret Collector’

Betty Boop’s Ups and Downs

February 13, 2017 in ★★★½, Betty Boop, Black and White Films, Max Fleischer films | Tags: 1932, auction, Betty Boop, Bimbo, Dave Fleischer, earth, gravity, house, moving, sale, Saturn | Leave a comment

Director: Dave Fleischer
Release Date: October 14, 1932
Stars: Betty Boop, Bimbo
Rating: ★★★½
Review:

‘Betty Boop’s Ups and Downs’ is one of the most stream-of-consciousness-like cartoons the Fleischer Brothers ever made.

The short starts with Betty Boop moving and putting her old house for sale. As soon as she leaves, the house falls apart, which drops the price immediately, even though the chimney desperately tries to keep the building together. This is a rather weird scene itself, but soon we zoom out to reveal the whole area being on sale, the whole of the United States, and even the complete earth. Suddenly we watch the moon auctioning the earth to the neighboring planets. The earth is sold to a Jewish looking Saturn, who draws gravity from the earth. Suddenly everything starts floating upwards. Imagine, this cartoon started with Betty moving to a new home!

Unfortunately, the studio has difficulties inventing good gags about the world without gravity, and the premise never gets proper treatment. For example, their best gag seems to be Betty Boop’s skirt flying upwards, revealing her panties, which is shown twice. It seems as when their imagination could roam completely freely, the studio got stuck, as the same happened in ‘Crazy Town‘ from earlier that year. When the earth pulls its own magnet back into place, everything falls down again to a jazzy score, and it’s Betty who has the last word in a reprise of her opening song.

Even though it’s not really successful, ‘Betty Boop’s Ups and Downs’ is one of the strangest cartoons ever made, and worth while watching.

Watch ‘Betty Boop’s Ups and Downs’ yourself and tell me what you think:

This is Betty Boop cartoon No. 5
To the previous Betty Boop cartoon: Betty Boop’s Bamboo Isle
To the next Betty Boop cartoon: Betty Boop for President

‘Betty Boop’s Ups and Downs’ is available on the French DVD Box Set ‘Betty Boop Coffret Collector’

Just a Gigolo

February 10, 2017 in ★★½, Black and White Films, Max Fleischer films, Screen Songs | Tags: 1932, Betty Boop, Cab Calloway, cabaret, Dave Fleischer, Irène Bordoni | Leave a comment

Director: Dave Fleischer
Release Date: September 9, 1932
Stars: Betty Boop, Irène Bordoni
Rating: ★★½
Review:

In the opening scenes of this Screen Song we watch Betty Boop working at a cabaret nightclub as a tobacco seller.

Betty introduces singer Irène Bordoni who sings the title song, first in French, then in English. At the second chorus the live action audience takes over, and during the third chorus we watch a very short animated sequence about a womanizing cat. The cabaret scene has a jazzy score based on Cab Calloway’s ‘The Scat Song’ from earlier that year, after which Bordoni’s sentimental 1928 song rather pales. Thus, after the opening scenes the cartoon unfortunately plunges into dullness.

Watch ‘Just a Gigolo’ yourself and tell me what you think:

‘Just a Gigolo’ is available on the French DVD Box Set ‘Betty Boop Coffret Collector’

Betty Boop, M.D.

February 8, 2017 in ★★★★, Betty Boop, Black and White Films, Max Fleischer films | Tags: 1932, Betty Boop, Bimbo, Dave Fleischer, jazz, Jippo, Koko The Clown, potion, scatting, surrealism | 4 comments

Director: Dave Fleischer
Release Date: September 2, 1932
Stars: Betty Boop, Bimbo, Koko the Clown
Rating: ★★★★
Review:

‘Betty Boop, M.D.’ opens with Betty driving a tilt car into a town to sell a potion called Jippo, which is advertised as”flattens feet, makes young men old, removes teeth – grows tonsils, and stops breathing”.

Betty gets assistance from Koko and Bimbo to sell the product. First Koko performs some surreal acrobatic stunts, to no avail. Then Betty herself appears to sing a song, and the selling starts. The potion as some wondrous effects on the audience, e.g. a very thin man grows fat in an instant, and an old man turns into a large baby, while a baby turns into a tiny old man.

When Bimbo drinks Jippo himself, he starts the song ‘Nobody’s Sweetheart’, which contains a lot of scatting by members of the audience. To this jazzy sequence the imagery simply explodes with mind-blowing, surreal scenes. This fantastic string of events ends when a baby drinks Jippo, turning into a faithful caricature of Fredric March as Mr. Hyde from the 1931 horror film ‘Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde’.

As is often the case with the Fleischer films from the early 1930s, ‘Betty Boop, M.D.’ has a very weak and rather improvised story line, but this drawback is luckily compensated by original imagery, peppy music, and simply a lot of fun.

Watch ‘Betty Boop, M.D.’ yourself and tell me what you think:

This is Betty Boop cartoon No. 3
To the previous Betty Boop cartoon: Betty Boop Bizzy Bee
To the next Betty Boop cartoon: Betty Boop’s Bamboo Isle

‘Betty Boop, M.D.’ is available on the French DVD Box Set ‘Betty Boop Coffret Collector’

Sleepy Time Down South

February 6, 2017 in ★★★★, Max Fleischer films, Screen Songs | Tags: 1932, cat, Connee Boswell, Dave Fleischer, fire, fire fighters, flames, the Boswell Sisters | Leave a comment

Director: Dave Fleischer
Release Date: November 11, 1932
Stars: The Boswell Sisters
Rating: ★★★★
Review:

‘Sleepy Time Down South’ is a Screen Song featuring the Boswell Sisters, the most famous close harmony trio of its time, but later eclipsed by the similar Andrews Sisters.

The animated part of the short tells about a cat, who’s in the fire brigade, and who with his fellow firemen rushes to a burning house. This part contains nice cartoon versions of the three sisters singing help. When they get rescued they throw down the piano first, which falls apart, but which the three sisters reassemble in an instant. Cut to the live action Boswell Sisters, with lead singer Connee Boswell starting the title song ‘When It’s Sleepy Time Down South’, which had been a hit for Louis Armstrong in 1931. In the end the animation returns, and the three sisters lend their voices to three flames following the cat.

Because of the sisters’ subtle harmonies the song is very hard to sing along, so one wonders whether the cartoon was a success in the theaters. Yet, the combination of the Fleischer’s imaginative images and the Boswell Sisters’ intoxicating performance makes ‘Sleepy Time South’ a joy to watch.

Watch ‘Sleepy Time Down South’ yourself and tell me what you think:

http://www.criticalcommons.org/Members/sammondn/clips/when-its-sleepy-time-down-south-1932

‘Sleepy Time Down South’ is available on the French DVD Box Set ‘Betty Boop Coffret Collector’

Any Rags

February 3, 2017 in ★★★½, Max Fleischer films, Talkartoons | Tags: 1932, Betty Boop, Bimbo, Dave Fleischer, garbage collector, Koko The Clown, Luis Russell | Leave a comment

Director: Dave Fleischer
Release Date: January 2, 1932
Stars: Betty Boop, Bimbo, Koko the Clown
Rating: ★★★½
Review:

‘In ‘Any Rags’ Bimbo is a garbage collector collecting old clothes and things, which he later sells at an improvised auction on the street.

‘Any Rags’ is pretty plotless, but it’s loads of fun to watch. Betty Boop has only a small role, but her sexiness is played out well, when her dress falls off twice, revealing her bra. Koko even has a smaller role in this cartoon as a customer in the crowd around Bimbo’s auction.

The film’s main attraction lies in its jazzy score, which successfully blends the title tune, a hit song from 1903, with Luis Russel’s much more modern ‘The Call of the Freaks’ from 1929. The cartoon suddenly ends when Betty appears from one of Bimbo’s bags and their chart turns over to transform immediately into a house.

Watch ‘Any Rags’ yourself and tell me what you think:

This is Talkartoon No. 30
To the previous Talkartoon: Dizzy Red Riding Hood
To the next Talkartoon: Boop-Oop-a-Doop

‘Any Rags’ is available on the French DVD Box Set ‘Betty Boop Coffret Collector’

The Klondike Kid

February 1, 2017 in ★★★★★ ♕, Black and White Films, Mickey Mouse, Walt Disney films | Tags: 1932, Alaska, Goofy, Klondike, Mickey Mouse, Minnie Mouse, Peg Leg Pete, Pete, Wilfred Jackson | Leave a comment

Director: Wilfred Jackson
Release Date: November 12, 1932
Stars: Mickey Mouse, Minnie Mouse, Pete, Goofy
Rating: ★★★★★ ♕
Review:

Klondike. In a beautiful opening scene we cut to “Klondike Bar’, a rowdy bar, where Mickey is a bar pianist, playing the popular ballad ‘Frankie and Johnny’.

The bar scene is pretty complex, with a lot going on. Goofy is there, too, seemingly just to show he’s a star to stay, for he has no involvement in the plot, at all. Outside, Minnie is freezing, and Mickey takes her inside, but then Pierre (a.k.a. Pete) arrives, peg leg and all. Soon he runs off with Minnie after a short gun fighting scene. Mickey, of course, rushes out to follow him, and jumps on a sled pulled by Pluto. In a remote log cabin, a fight ensues…

In essence ‘The Klondike Kid’ is ‘Gallopin’ Gaucho‘ in Alaska. But what an execution of such an old idea! The gags are plenty and funny and build up to a fast paced finale. This short is unique for its time in its clever integration of story and gags: the gags are not bonuses, but really add to the story. Highlight must be the ridiculous fight between Mickey and Peg Leg Pete hindered by spiral springs. Mickey Mouse arguably reached the apex of his solo career with this cartoon.

Because of the strong similarities in setting and storyline ‘The Klondike Kid’ feels like a direct ancestor to Tex Avery’s two settings of the poem ‘The Shooting of Dan McGrew’: ‘Dangerous Dan McFoo‘ (Warner Bros., 1939) and ‘The Shooting of Dan McGoo‘ (MGM, 1946).

Watch ‘The Klondike Kid’ yourself and tell me what you think:

This is Mickey Mouse cartoon No. 49
To the previous Mickey Mouse cartoon: The Wayward Canary
To the next Mickey Mouse cartoon: Mickey’s Good Deed

‘The Klondike Kid’ is available on the DVD ‘Walt Disney Treasures: Mickey Mouse in black and white’

Touchdown Mickey

January 30, 2017 in ★★★★★ ♕, Black and White Films, Mickey Mouse, Walt Disney films | Tags: 1932, Clarabelle Cow, Football, Goofy, Horace Horsecollar, Mickey Mouse, Minnie Mouse, Pluto, sports, Wilfred Jackson | Leave a comment

Director: Wilfred Jackson
Release Date: October 15, 1932
Stars: Mickey Mouse, Minnie Mouse, Pluto, Horace Horsecollar, Clarabelle Cow, Goofy
Rating: ★★★★★ ♕
Review:

Like the earlier ‘Barnyard Olympics‘, ‘Touchdown Mickey’ is as fast-paced sports cartoon. It plunges right into action, when we watch Mickey getting a touchdown for his team Mickey’s Manglers, in an attempt to defeat their opponents, the Alley Cats. The Alley Cats all look like Pete sans peg leg, and they prove tough opponents to Mickey’s much more diverse team.

The sheer speed with which the countless gags are delivered is astonishing, especially when compared to contemporary cartoons from other studios, or earlier Mickeys. By 1932 the studio made better use of Mickey the little hero than ever before, and ‘Touchdown Mickey’ excellently plays on Mickey as the underdog beating the odds. This means we can immediately sympathize with him and his feeble team, drawing us into the match ourselves – as we really want him to win.

The short marks Goofy’s third screen appearance and already he is a more recognizable and more defined character than Horace Horsecollar and Clarabelle Cow would ever be. In ‘Touchdown Mickey’ he’s a radio reporter, if a rather uninformative one, and in one of the numerous gags he accidentally mistakes the head of a colleague for his microphone. Twelve years later Goofy would be playing football himself, in ‘How to Play Football’ (1944), but by then is character had gone through quite some transformations.

Interestingly, there’s another character with a characteristic laugh in this cartoon, a fat pig in the audience, who wears glasses and holds a cigar. As his design is more complex than that of all other characters, I suspect him to be a caricature, but of whom?

‘Touchdown Mickey’ was released only twelve days after the Flip the Frog cartoon ‘The Goal Rush‘, which covers exactly the same subject to less satisfying results.’Touchdown Mickey’ is great, it’s fun and absolutely among Mickey’s all time best cartoons.

Watch ‘Touchdown Mickey’ yourself and tell me what you think:

This is Mickey Mouse cartoon No. 47
To the previous Mickey Mouse cartoon: The Whoopee Party
To the next Mickey Mouse cartoon: The Wayward Canary

‘Touchdown Mickey’ is available on the DVD ‘Walt Disney Treasures: Mickey Mouse in black and white’

Mickey’s Nightmare

January 27, 2017 in ★★★★★, Black and White Films, Mickey Mouse, Walt Disney films | Tags: 1932, Burt Gillett, children, dream, Floyd Gottfredson, Mickey Mouse, Minnie Mouse, nightmare, orphan mice, Pluto | 2 comments

Director: Burt Gillett
Release Date: August 13, 1932
Stars: Mickey Mouse, Minnie Mouse, Pluto
Rating: ★★★★★
Review:

‘Mickey’s Nightmare’ is not a spooky horror cartoon like ‘The Haunted House‘ or ‘The Gorilla Mystery‘. No, it’s more of a bachelor’s nightmare…

The short’s plot harks back all the way to ‘Poor Papa’ (1928), the pilot film for the Oswald the Lucky Rabbit series, Mickey’s predecessor. In ‘Mickey’s Nightmare’ Mickey dreams he finally marries Minnie, and is soon visited by a stork delivering a baby, and another, and another… Until the storks deliver tons of little kids. When he is awake he’s very happy to be still a bachelor.

‘Mickey’s Nightmare’ introduces the little orphan mice, who would replace the little kittens of ‘Mickey’s Orphans‘ (1931) and ‘Mickey’s Revue’ (1932) as a cause of complete destruction. In Mickey’s dream they ruin the house, especially with paint. In order to show Mickey’s horror scenario, the short uses some excellent and complex use of animation cycles featuring lots and lots of little kids.

It’s interesting that the orphan mice first were introduced as Mickey’s children, and only in dream form. In their next cartoon, ‘Giantland‘ (1933), they suddenly materialized into the real world. The orphan mice would stay around until 1936, starring five more cartoons, before returning one final time in ‘Pluto’s Party‘ from 1952.

The little brats also appeared in the Sunday Pages of Floyd Gottfredson’s Mickey Mouse comic, starting on September 18. In Gottfredson’s comics the mice are reduced to two, but no less disastrous. They are introduced as Mrs. Fieldmouse’s children and are apparently Mickey’s nephews. These two would eventually be christened Morty and Ferdie, and reenter the movie screen once in ‘Mickey’s Steamroller‘ (1934).

‘Mickey’s Nightmare’ spawned at least two similar cartoons: first the Warner Bros. cartoon ‘Porky’s Romance‘ (1937), and second, the Donald Duck short ‘Donald’s Diary‘ from 1954.

Watch ‘Mickey’s Nightmare’ yourself and tell me what you think:

This is Mickey Mouse cartoon No. 44
To the previous Mickey Mouse cartoon: Mickey in Arabia
To the next Mickey Mouse cartoon: Trader Mickey

‘Mickey’s Nightmare’ is available on the DVD ‘Walt Disney Treasures: Mickey Mouse in black and white’

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