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Directors: Joann Sfarr & Antoine Delesvaux
Release date: June 1, 2011
Rating: ★★½
Review:
‘Le chat du Rabbin’ is the film version of the comic strip series of the same name, which comprises eleven volumes thus far. At the time the film was made there were five albums, and the film retells the contents of volume one, two and five very faithfully, with a lot of panels and dialogue being transformed directly from comic strip drawings to film scenes.
Perhaps this is no wonder, as the comic’s author Joann Sfar co-directed the film. He must have had an important vote in the production, because the film flawlessly transcends Sfar’s idiosyncratic drawings to the animated screen
‘Le chat du rabbin’ is set in Algiers, the capital of Algeria, when it was still a French colony. It’s a little hard to date the time setting film, but because carbon dating is mentioned and because of the presence of jazz guitarist Django Reinhardt this limits the time period between 1947 and 1953. In Algiers, the French, Jews, and Muslims all live together harmoniously, and we follow a rabbi of the Sephardic community, and his cat, who turns into a talking creature after swallowing a parrot.
It’s the cat who is the narrator of the film, and we see the events often through his eyes, although, unfortunately, this isn’t maintained consequently. The scenes with the talking cat, mostly recreating the first book, are the film’s best, for the cat turns out to be a skeptic and he asks his master philosophical and theological questions, which are all valid, but drive the poor rabbi mad.
Unfortunately, not only the cat, but the whole movie is rather talkative, and far too dialogue rich, a problem all too common in all French cinema. But this is not the movie’s main problem. No, regrettably, the film also shares the many story problems of the original comic books. Sfar seems to have started his comic book series without a plan, and the volumes are highly different in tone and content. Story ideas are introduced and dropped, and there’s a frustrating lack of focus.
The same accounts for the film. For example, halfway the cat loses his speech again, and with the film immediately loses its main attraction. Even worse, the most interesting character of both the comic books and the film is Zlabya, the rabbi’s daughter, but she lacks a story arc, and is rarely seen, especially during the second half of the film, which focuses on the contents of volume five, in which the attention shifts to a far less interesting character of Russian origin in search of a mythical city of Jews somewhere in Ethiopia. With this part we also leave Algiers and all hope of a consistent story. I actually find the Russian’s quest utterly boring, and I wish the film makers dared to stay in Algiers and tell more about Zlabya. What certainly doesn’t help is an irritating and incomprehensible encounter with famous comic book character Tintin, who turns out to be a complete dork in this film.
The film’s designs are gorgeous, transferring Sfar’s sketchy comic book’s drawings very well, and applying very attractive color schemes, which evoke the subtropical, Mediterranean, and North African settings excellently. Especially the background art is gorgeous. Although heavily hatched, and thus very graphical, the animation reads very well against those background drawings, and it’s nice to see such a consistency of style from animated drawings to background art. There are even some very attractive Van Gogh influences visible in some of the night scenes.Olivier Davaud’s music, too, attributes to the Arabian atmosphere, with its quasi-Arabic style elements.
The animation, on the other hand, is not always that good. For example, when Zlabya plays the piano, the animation and the music aren’t in tune, at all. The animation is at its best when deviating from realism, as in the cat’s dream. In this dream sequence a bolder style is explored, with a lot of metamorphosis, absent from the rest of the film. The finale, too, explores a bolder style, just like the comic book does in these scenes, and I guess with this Sfar tries to tell us by then we’ve abandoned reality and entered the realm of tall tales. These scenes are certainly interesting to look at, but as said before, by then I at least had lost all interest already.
In all, ‘Le chat du Rabbin’ is a visually very attractive film, showing what traditional animation still can do in terms of original styling, but its rambling tale and its lack of focus make the film a frustrating watch. But to be honest, when reading the original comic strips one will experience the same frustration, thus the original source material is to blame. One wishes Sfar was as good a story teller as a visual artist, but let’s face it, he isn’t.
Watch the trailer for ‘Le chat du Rabbin’ yourself and tell me what you think:
‘Le chat du Rabbin’ is available on Blu-Ray and DVD
Airing Date: January 1, 1997
‘Inflata Dee Dee/The Justice Friends: Can’t Nap/Monstory’ was the last episode of the first season Dexter’s Laboratory, and thus, alas, the last of the Dexter’s Laboratory episodes to be released on DVD. Why the other seasons never saw a home media treatment is a mystery to me. It sure is an eternal shame that this great show is not available in its entirety.
Inflata Dee Dee
Director: Genndy Tartakovsky
Stars: Dexter
Rating: ★★★★
Review:
In ‘Inflata Dee Dee’ Dee puts Dexter’s “hydroplasmatic inflation suit” on, making her floating like a bubble in Dexter’s lab, much to the little boy’s annoyance.
What follows is an almost classic chase sequence in which Dexter tries several ways to bring Dee Dee down. One involves a particularly silly suit with springs and a plunger. We also learn that Dee Dee has a watch with indicates when it’s time to play with Dexter. Dexter’s Laboratory rarely was so looney tunes-like.
The Justice Friends: Can’t Nap
Director: Genndy Tartakovsky
Stars: The Justice Friends
Rating: ★
Review:
In another tiresome episode of ‘Justice Friends’ Valhallen takes a justice friend called White Tiger home, which behaves like a cat. Unfortunately, Major Glory is allergic to cats, and with help of Krunk goes at lengths to get rid of the creature.
‘Cat Nap’ is anything but funny, leaving the opening scene, which involves a particularly silly supervillain called Mental Mouse as the most inspired part of the episode. Nevertheless, White Tiger is well-animated, perfectly blending human and cat-like moves.
Monstory
Directors: Rob Renzetti & Genndy Tartakovsky
Stars: Dexter
Rating: ★★★★
Review:
When Dee Dee visits Dexter to tell him a particularly stupid story, Dexter grabs an ampule with a silencer to shut her up. Unfortunately, he grabs the wrong elixir…
‘Monstory’ is great fun and knows some nice references, not only to Godzilla and other monster movies, but also to ‘Horton Hears a Who’ and ‘King-Size Canary’ (1947). The transformation scenes are particularly good, especially the first one involving Dee Dee. Also great is the montage in which a caterpillar-like Dexter lies dormant in a cocoon, with Dee Dee waiting for him to emerge.
‘Inflata Dee Dee/The Justice Friends: Can’t Nap/Monstory’ is available on the DVD ‘Dexter’s Laboratory Season One: All 13 Episodes’
Director: Gisaburō Sugii
Release Date: July 7, 2012
Rating: ★
Review:
‘The Life of Budori Gusuko’ is a film adaption of the novel of the same name by Kenji Miyazawa from 1932. Earlier director Gisaburō Sugii had filmed ‘Night on the Galactic Railroad’ (1985) by the same writer. Strangely, in both films, the characters are inexplicably depicted as cats. The reason of this goes completely beyond me, as Sugii does nothing with the idea of the characters being cats. They’re just humans in a cat shape.
I haven’t seen ‘Night on the Galactic Railroad’, yet, but I understand this film is some kind of classic. I wish I could say the same of ‘The life of Budori Gusuko’, but not so. This film is very disappointing in almost every aspect.
The story tells about Budori Gusuko, a blue cat, and the son of a lumberjack somewhere in the mountains. One year summer never comes, and famine comes to the land. Gusuko’s family disappears, and during the film he keeps on looking for his lost younger sister Neri. Starvation and loss presses Gusuko to leave the mountains…
The story takes place in some parallel world, but Sugii’s world building is annoyingly sloppy. The mountains in which Gusuko grows up are unmistakably European in character, but when Gusuko descends into the valley, we suddenly see very Asian rice paddies. Once we’re in the city, the setting becomes some sort of steampunk, with fantastical flying machines, while Gusuko’s second and third dream take place in some undeniably Japanese fantasy world. The volcano team, too, is typically Japanese.
But worse than that is the story itself. The film is frustratingly episodic, with things just happening on the screen, with little mutual relationship or any detectable story arc. A voice over is used much too much, and there are three very long dream sequences that add very little to the story, and the inclusion of which is more irksome than welcome.
The main problem is that Gusuko’s life story is not particularly interesting. The character himself is frustratingly passive and devoid of character. And worse, after the dire straits in the mountains, he hardly suffers any setbacks. Down in the valley he gets help and work immediately from a friendly but rather reckless farmer called Red Beard. Only when bad harvests hit the valley, too, Gusuko is forced to leave him, too, to descend once more to the city.
Likewise, in the city, Gusuko immediately reaches his goal. There’s some vague climate theme, but Gusuko’s proposed solution is questionable to say the least. Because we learn so little about Gusuko’s motives and inner world (the three dream sequences don’t help a bit) Gusuko’s last act comes out of nowhere. Nor do we care, because Gusuko never gained our sympathy in the first place. The resulting film is appallingly boring.
It must be said that ‘The Life of Budori Gusuko’ can boast some lush and outlandish background art, qualitative if unremarkable animation, adequate effect animation, and a modest dose of apt computer animation when depicting moving doors, lamps, factory parts, flying machines and of Gusuko ascending the stairs. There’s even some puppet animation during the second dream scene. Moreover, the sparse chamber music score is pleasant and effective. Composer Ryōta Komatsu makes clever use of strings, harpsichord, accordion, and percussion. But all these positive aspects cannot rescue a film whose central story is a bad choice to start with.
Surprisingly, this was not the first animated adaptation of the novel. In 1994 the Japanese Animal-ya studio had made another adaptation. It puzzles me what the Japanese see in this terribly boring tale with its questionable message.
Watch the trailer for ‘The Life of Budori Gusuko’ yourself and tell me what you think:
‘The Life of Budori Gusuko’ is available on Blu-Ray and DVD
Directors: Alain Gagnol & Jean-Loup Felicioli
Release Date: December 20, 2015
Rating: ★★★½
Review:
‘Un plan d’enfer’ is a comic short from the makers of ‘Une vie de chat’ (2010) and ‘Phantom Boy’ (2015).
The cartoon is set on a hot night in town. Two burglars plan to steal gold from an old lady. In order to be able to make a lot of noise and keep unheard, they release a multitude of cats on to the streets. These attract numerous dogs (including the vicious mongrel from ‘Phantom Boy‘), creating a lot of noise, indeed. The plan all goes well, until the two spill some katnip on their own car…
‘Un plan d’enfer’ is an unassuming, unpretentious short, told with charming drawings in the great Franco-Belgian comic strip tradition, and with the typical crooked style of Gagnol and Felicioli. There’s nothing mind-blowing or life-changing about this short, but it provides five and half minutes of genuine fun.
Watch the trailer for ‘Un plan d’enfer’ yourself and tell me what you think:
Un plan d’enfer’ is available on the Blu-Ray and DVD of ‘Phantom Boy’
Directors: Cal Howard & Cal Dalton
Release Date: June 11, 1938
Rating: ★★★★
Review:
At Katnip Kollege, all cool hep cats attend the swingology class. They all sure can swing, except bespectacled Johnny, who has no rhythm at all.
Johnny has to stay in the dunce’s corner, and at night he’s still there, while all other cats are having fun outside. But wait! Suddenly the clock gives Johnny the ‘rhythm bug’ and he rushes to the others to sing that swinging is ‘as easy as rollin’ off a log’ to his surprised girlfriend Claudia Kitty Brite. He also breaks into a hot trumpet solo, Roy Eldridge-style, which earns him kisses from his sweetheart.
‘Katnip Kollege’ is the second of only three films directed by the duo consisting of story man Cal Howard and animator Cal Dalton. The two Cals replaced Friz Freleng when he was lured away by MGM. After these three cartoons their unit was merged with that of Ben Hardaway, until Freleng returned from an all too short stint at the competing studio in 1940. In their films Howard, Hardaway and Dalton displayed not too much talent as directors, and although they produced some fun shorts, their cartoons are inferior to contemporary cartoons by Tex Avery, Bob Clampett, and Frank Tashlin.
‘Katnip Kollege’ is a clear example of their unsure style: the cartoon is low on gags, and the animation is erratic, with a lot of superfluous movement. At times it’s unclear whether the characters’ actions are supposed to be funny. Moreover, the school backgrounds feature incongruous over-sized tins, cans and clothes pins, as if the cat characters are supposed to be as tiny as bugs.
On the other hand, the swing music is genuinely intoxicating, the cartoon simply bursts with color, and the atmosphere is one of sheer joy, resulting in a really enjoyable cartoon. The cartoon easily beats ‘The Swing School‘ by the Fleischer studio, which was released only two weeks earlier, but which covers remarkably similar grounds.
Watch ‘Katnip Kollege’ yourself and tell me what you think:
‘Katnip Kollege’ is available on the DVD-set ‘Looney Tunes Golden Collection: Volume 2’
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Director: Dave Fleischer
Release Date: April 29, 1938
Rating: ★★★½
Review:
In ‘Hold It’ a bunch of cats sing a song with many stops in it, a rather lame variation on the 1937 hit song ‘Posin”.
At the stops everybody freezes, including the singing cat himself, who’s able to hang still in mid-air. Later, the cats’ song manages to stop apples from falling and water from flowing.
These rather original and silly gags save the cartoon, which otherwise is anything but interesting, The cats’ song is too trite to become a real classic, and apart from the threat of a dog, nothing really happens in the cartoon. And yet, ‘Hold It’ marks a welcome diversion from the childish morality tales that most Color Classics are. As is often the case with the Color Classics, the opening scene is the most memorable, with its beautiful 3D shots of a village going to sleep. This scene takes a full minute off the cartoon, while the song only enters after the third minute.
Watch ‘Hold It’ yourself and tell me what you think:
‘Hold It’ is available on the DVD-set ‘Somewhere in Dreamland – Max Fleischer’s Color Classics: The Definitive Collection’
Director: Wilfred Jackson
Release Date: May 12, 1932
Stars: Mickey Mouse, Minnie Mouse, Horace Horsecollar, Clarabelle Cow, Pluto, Goofy
Rating: ★★★★
Review:
‘Mickey’s Revue’ is famous for introducing Goofy, whose guffaw we had heard off-stage in the previous Mickey Mouse cartoon, ‘Barnyard Olympics‘.
In this cartoon he’s an elderly person, bearded and wearing glasses. We don’t hear him speak, only his guffaw can be heard, and together with Pluto he forms the running gag of the cartoon. Although Goofy literally has the last laugh, nothing points to the direction of a star career beyond the laugh itself, and indeed, in ‘Trader Mickey‘ his guffaw was used by a cannibal king, indicating it was not an exclusive trait, yet.
Nevertheless, Goofy would return in ‘The Whoopee Party‘, redesigned, christened Dippy Dawg, and here to stay. In fact, Goofy arguably is the first cartoon character, whose voice predates the screen persona, which is completely built around the stupid laugh, and ditto voice.
Apart from Goofy’s debut, there’s enough to enjoy in ‘Mickey’s Revue’, even though it revisits two themes explored earlier in the Mickey Mouse cartoons: that of Mickey and the gang giving a performance and that of animals causing havoc. Here, the source of havoc are the small kittens from ‘The Barnyard Broadcast‘ and ‘Mickey’s Orphans‘ (both 1931). It was their last screen performance, for they would soon be replaced by little mice, first introduced in ‘Mickey’s Nightmare‘ (1932).
‘Mickey’s Revue’ follows the same lines as ‘The Barnyard Broadcast’, but is much better executed, cleverly intertwining the subplots of Goofy’s annoying laugh, Pluto trying to enter the stage, and the kittens interfering with Mickey’s performance. One of the gags involve a kitten caught in the hammers of Minnie’s piano, a gag looking forward to a similar one in the Tom & Jerry cartoon ‘The Cat Concerto‘ (1947). Despite it’s great comedy, ‘Mickey’s Revue’ was the last cartoon exploiting the ruin finale, as used in 1931/1932 cartoons like ‘Mickey Cuts Up‘ and ‘The Grocery Boy‘.
‘Mickey’s Revue’ is a typical ensemble cartoon, also starring Minnie, Horace Horsecollar and no less than three Clarabelle Cows. By now Horace Horsecollar had caught up with his comic personality, and had grown in personality beyond that of a stereotyped horse. Unfortunately, Horace was not developed further on the movie screen – it was left to Floyd Gottfredson to explore Horace’s character further in his comic strip.
Watch ‘Mickey’s Revue’ yourself and tell me what you think:
This is Mickey Mouse cartoon No. 41
To the previous Mickey Mouse cartoon: Barnyard Olympics
To the next Mickey Mouse cartoon: Musical Farmer
‘Mickey’s Revue’ is available on the DVD ‘Walt Disney Treasures: Mickey Mouse in black and white’
Director: Walt Disney
Release Date: July 31, 1929
Stars: Mickey Mouse, Minnie Mouse, Pete
Rating: ★★★★
Review:
‘The Karnival Kid’ forms an important step in the use of sound in an animated cartoon.
We had already watched and heard Minnie singing “lalala” in ‘The Plow Boy’, and in ‘The Barnyard Battle’ a sergeant spoke a few words. But in ‘The Karnival Kid’ there’s suddenly a lot of singing: Pete sings, Mickey sings, and the complete second half of the cartoon is devoted to song.
‘The Karnival Kid’ shows that lip synchronization was far more difficult to master than synchronized sound itself. The animation of the mouth to form syllables was a totally new feat, and initially it was done all too literally. This leads to awkward facial expressions at times, with especially Mickey’s face distorting into a multitude of mouth gestures. This would be even worse in Mickey’s next cartoon, ‘Mickey’s Follies’.
At the same time, a lot of the characters’ action remains typical silent pantomime. For example, when Mickey offers Minnie a hot dog for free, this is acted out in complete silence.
‘The Karnival Kid’ is a wonderfully witty film. Mickey works as a hot dog seller at the fair, where Minnie is a shimmy dancer. The film is split in two parts: in the first Mickey sells living(!) hot dogs and gives one to Minnie. When the unlucky weenie is not very cooperative, Mickey spanks him! These hot dog gags are reused from the Oswald short ‘All Wet‘ (1927), but they still feel fresh, due to the added sound. Now we can hear the hot dogs barking and yelping. And so, after ‘The Karnival Kid’ these hot dog gags were reused a second time by Ub Iwerks in the Flip the Frog cartoon ‘Circus’ (1932).
The second part is introduced by a title card ‘later that night’, which melts before the scene starts. Here Mickey offers Minnie a serenade with the help of two cats who sing ‘Sweet Adeline’. The cartoon ends when Mickey is hit by a bed(!) which Pete has thrown at him.
As you may have noticed, ‘The Karnival Kid’ has very little story. It’s enjoyable because of the carnival atmosphere, the large number of gags, and the intoxicating singing.
Watch ‘The Karnival Kid’ yourself and tell me what you think:
This is Mickey Mouse cartoon No. 9
To the previous Mickey Mouse cartoon: The Barnyard Battle
To the next Mickey Mouse cartoon: Mickey’s Follies
Director: Friz Freleng
Release date: November 26, 1955
Stars: Sylvester, Elmer Fudd, Tweety (cameo)
Rating: ★★★
Review:
‘Heir-Conditioned’ was the second of three propaganda cartoons funded by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation (the other two being ‘By Word of Mouse‘ from the previous year, and ‘Yankee Dood It‘ from the next year).
In this cartoon Sylvester has inherited a fortune, and all the alley cats try to persuade him to spend it. But Elmer, who’s Sylvester’s financial adviser, persuades Sylvester, and all the listening cats, to invest the money, in a lecture celebrating the capitalistic system, now focusing on the importance of investment. Sylvester remains pretty much the straight man in this cartoon, with most of the comic relief coming from the alley cats.
Watch ‘Heir-Conditioned’ yourself and tell me what you think:
Director: David Hand
Release Date: December 19, 1936
Rating: ★★★
Review:
The success of Oscar-winning ‘Three Orphan Kittens‘ (1935) undoubtedly prompted this sequel, which is both less beautiful, less entertaining and less remarkable than the original short.
The film is aptly titled ‘More Kittens’, which shows its crowd-pleasing character. This time the kittens create havoc in the garden, while dealing with a fly, a tortoise and a teasing blue bird.
The cartoon is remarkable for introducing the good-natured St. Bernard Bolivar, who would become Donald Duck’s dog in the comic strip two years later. He’s not named here, but the likeness is so stunning, not only in design but also in character, that there’s no doubt it’s him. True, there was also a St. Bernard in ‘Alpine Climbers’ (1936), but this dog lacks Bolivar’s character, being more of a cliche St. Bernard instead.
Watch ‘More Kittens’ yourself and tell me what you think:
This is Silly Symphony No. 65
To the previous Silly Symphony: Mother Pluto
To the next Silly Symphony: Woodland Café
Director: David Hand
Release Date: October 26, 1935
Rating: ★★★
Review:
On a winter night three kittens are thrown in a sack into a garden.
Luckily they can escape the cold by entering the house, which they explore. This sweet cartoon contains elaborate gags with a.o. pepper, a bottle of milk, and a pianola.
‘Three Orphan Kittens’ was penned by Joe Grant and Bill Cottrell, and benefited from Fred Moore’s appealing animation. Indeed, it won an Academy Award. Its success made it one of those rare Silly Symphonies to evoke a sequel (‘More Kittens‘ from 1936). Moreover, it clearly inspired other animation film makers: the milk bottle gag was more or less copied by Fleischer in ‘We did it‘ (1936) which also stars three kittens. And, some of the pianola gags may have inspired Hanna and Barbera in their ‘The Cat Concerto‘ (1947).
At least Hanna and Barbera copied the black maid (of whom we only see her arms and legs) for their own Mammy Two-Shoes in the Tom & Jerry series. The black maid would also return in a few Disney shorts: ‘More Kittens‘ (1936), ‘The Pantry Pirate‘ (1940, starring Pluto), and ‘Figaro and Cleo‘ (1943).
Watch ‘Three Orphan Kittens’ yourself and tell me what you think:
This is Silly Symphony No. 56
To the previous Silly Symphony: Music Land
To the next Silly Symphony: Cock o’ the Walk
Director: ?
Release Date: 1987
Rating: ★★★★
Review:
‘My Baby Just Cares For Me’ was Aardman Studio’s second video clip, after ‘Sledgehammer’ for Peter Gabriel (1986).
‘My Baby Just Cares For Me’ is not quite as elaborate, however. It’s a sweet little video in mostly black and white. It’s set to Nina Simone’s 1958 recording of the song, which was reissued in 1987 after being used in a successful commercial for Chanel No.5.
The clip features cat characters, including a black female cat singer, and a white cat who’s in love with her. It also features some live action footage showing details of a piano, brushes on a snare drum, and a double bass.
The smoky nightclub atmosphere is captured very well, and the animation, joyful if a little crude, matches the song perfectly. The result is one of the most enjoyable little stop motion films of the 1980s.
Watch ‘My Baby Just Cares For Me’ yourself and tell me what you think:
‘My Baby Just Cares For Me’ is available on the DVD ‘Aardman Classics’
Director: Dave Fleischer
Release Date: October 6, 1933
Stars: Betty Boop
Rating: ★★½
Review:
Rubinoff and his orchestra play the score for this cartoon about a bunch of cats (‘the tom kat social club’) who threaten Betty Boop’s yard full of birds. This orchestra, led by the Russian violinist David Rubinoff, played sweet pseudo-classical music, and this sets the tone for the short.
Based on Franz von Suppé’s overture ‘Ein Morgen, ein Mittag und ein Abend in Wien’ (1844), ‘Morning Noon and Night’ is a very sweet cartoon. It opens with some typical Fleischer gags, like a sun with a hangover, but the overall mood is rather corny and lacking humor. The short is very Silly Symphony-like, and particularly reminiscent of Walt Disney’s ‘Birds in Spring‘ from earlier that year. Both feature a fledgling running away, and encountering a threat.
The cartoon’s finale is a battle scene in which all birds come to the rescue, most notably a boxing rooster. Battle scenes like this could be seen in e.g. the 1932 Silly Symphonies ‘Bugs in Love‘, ‘King Neptune‘, and ‘Babes in the Woods‘. Although ‘Morning, Noon and Night’ doesn’t come near any of these Disney cartoons in quality, it shows that the Disney style was invading the Fleischer studio, and that the brothers were getting more ambitious. This ambition would lead to the launch of the Color Classics in 1934.
Betty is more cute than sexy in this cartoon. The difference in mood between this cartoon and that of ‘I Heard‘ is enormous, although that cartoon was released only one month earlier. The reinforced Hays code would only be installed in the summer of 1934, but ‘Morning, Noon and Night’ shows that already by 1933 its morals had become more and more present in the American film industry’s output.
Watch ‘Morning Noon and Night’ yourself and tell me what you think:
This is Betty Boop cartoon No. 21
To the previous Betty Boop cartoon: I Heard
To the next Betty Boop cartoon: Betty Boop’s Hallowe’en Party
‘Morning Noon and Night’ is available on the French DVD Box Set ‘Betty Boop Coffret Collector’
Director: David Hand
Release Date: August 31, 1935
Stars: Mickey Mouse, Pluto
Rating: ★★★★★
Review:
Although this cartoon is part of the Mickey Mouse series, Pluto is its star.
After he has chased a little kitten, he dreams that his Judgement Day has come and that he’s put on trial by a number of cheating cats.
Like most of Disney’s dream-cartoons this one contains wonderful backgrounds, characters and ideas, thanks to story men Joe Grant and Bill Cottrell. The dream sequence is executed in a Silly Symphony-like fashion with lots of rhyme and song and very beautiful animation. The prosecutor, animated by Bill Roberts, is particularly well done: he’s an impressive figure, whose stature anticipates Stromboli from ‘Pinocchio‘ (1940).
Pluto now is a fully developed character who easily carries the complete cartoon on his own. Mickey’s part, on the other hand, is reduced to that of a cameo, something that would occur more and more in the years to come.
Watch ‘Pluto’s Judgement Day’ yourself and tell me what you think:
This is Mickey Mouse cartoon No. 78
To the previous Mickey Mouse cartoon: Mickey’s Fire Brigade
To the next Mickey Mouse cartoon: On Ice
Dr. Grob's Animation Review 