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Director: Charles Nichols
Release Date: December 12, 1948
Stars: Mickey Mouse, Pluto, the little seal
Rating: ★★★½
Review:
After visiting the seals at the zoo, Mickey accidentally brings a little seal home in his basket.
‘Mickey and the seal’ is the third cartoon to feature the little seal (the other two are ‘Pluto’s Playmate‘ from 1941 and ‘Rescue Dog‘ from 1947). And like the earlier entries featuring this cute animal, ‘Mickey and the Seal’ is charming, but not very funny.
Nevertheless, it contains a lovely scene of Mickey and the seal in bath, which is a prime example of great silent comedy. Its finale, too, arguably is the funniest of all postwar Mickey Mouse cartoons. The bath scene renders a shot of Mickey completely naked (except for his gloves).
Watch ‘Mickey and the Seal’ yourself and tell me what you think:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TS8rW6kCTdc
This is Mickey Mouse cartoon No. 121
To the previous Mickey Mouse cartoon: Mickey Down Under
To the next Mickey Mouse cartoon: R’coon Dawg
Director: Charles Nichols
Release Date: March 19, 1948
Stars: Mickey Mouse, Pluto
Rating: ★
Review:
‘Mickey Down Under’ features Mickey and Pluto in some Australian banana plantation.
Pluto has troubles with a boomerang, while Mickey encounters an ostrich. Even though the animation of Pluto is inspired, ‘Mickey Down Under’ is a boring cartoon, and one of the weakest entries in the Mickey Mouse series. Apart from the boomerang, the setting can hardly be called Australian. On the contrary, the cartoon depicts some flora and fauna not indigenous to Australia: toucans, bananas and ostriches. The title music is that of a Pluto cartoon.
Watch ‘Mickey Down Under’ yourself and tell me what you think:
This is Mickey Mouse cartoon No. 120
To the previous Mickey Mouse cartoon: Mickey’s Delayed Date
To the next Mickey Mouse cartoon: Mickey and the Seal
Director: Charles Nichols
Release Date: October 3, 1947
Stars: Mickey Mouse, Minnie Mouse, Pluto
Rating: ★★★★★
Review:
For the first time in five years (actually, since ‘Symphony Hour’) Mickey receives considerable screen time in his own cartoon, even though he has to share it once again with his dog, Pluto.
In the opening scene ‘Mickey’s Delayed Date’ we watch Mickey snoring at home, when the phone rings. It’s Minnie: she has been waiting an hour for him to come at a date with her for a dance. As soon as she has threatened him on the phone to break up if he doesn’t show up within fifteen minutes, Mickey rushes to the dance hall. Unfortunately he loses the tickets, which are brought by Pluto just in time.
Much screen time of ‘Mickey’s Delayed Date’ is devoted to Pluto in a rather long scene with a humanized tall hat. Nevertheless, it’s nice to watch Mickey in fine comic shape again, although he is less flexible here than in Riley Thomson’s shorts of the early forties. This short contains a shot of an almost naked Mickey (even without gloves).
‘Mickey’s Delayed Date’ was the first Mickey Mouse cartoon directed by Pluto-director Charles Nichols. He would direct five of the eight post-war Mickey Mouse cartoons.
Watch ‘Mickey’s Delayed Date’ yourself and tell me what you think:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IgmLaVPHBG8
This is Mickey Mouse cartoon No. 119
To the previous Mickey Mouse cartoon: Squatter’s Rights
To the next Mickey Mouse cartoon: Mickey Down Under
Director: Charles Nichols
Release Date: April 30, 1948
Stars: Pluto
Rating: ★
Review:
While looking for some bones he has buried, Pluto encounters a gopher who makes him sneeze, using mimosa ,all through this boring picture.
‘Bone Bandit’ is one of Pluto’s most forgettable entries, even though Pluto does not become friends with a little animal for once.
Pluto would encounter another gopher in ‘Pluto and the Gopher‘ (1950), which is only marginally better. Gophers apparently just aren’t funny, a fact also proven by ‘Donald’s Garden‘ (1942) and the Woody Woodpecker cartoon ‘Wicket Wacky‘ (1951).
Watch ‘Bone Bandit’ yourself and tell me what you think:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JPfco0D99ps
This is Pluto cartoon No. 24
To the previous Pluto cartoon: Pluto’s Blue Note
To the next Pluto cartoon: Pluto’s Purchase
Director: Charles Nichols
Release Date: December 26, 1947
Stars: Pluto
Rating: ★★★½
Review:
In ‘Pluto’s Blue Note’ Pluto tries to sing along with some birds, a bee and a grasshopper, but to no avail.
When he discovers that he can use his tail as a needle to play records with, he uses these not only to impress these animals, but also five female dogs, who fall for ‘his’ crooning, Frank Sinatra-like voice. In this short Pluto performs a very silly dance, which is only topped in outrageous animation by his facial expressions while play-backing the crooning voice.
‘Pluto’s Blue Note’ certainly is one of the more inspired Pluto cartoons of the late forties, and its story a welcome deviation from the Pluto-befriends-a-little-animal formula.
Watch ‘Pluto’s Blue Note’ yourself and tell me what you think:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0nlleFrhsgc
This is Pluto cartoon No. 23
To the previous Pluto cartoon: Mail Dog
To the next Pluto cartoon: Bone Bandit
Director: Charles Nichols
Release Date: November 14, 1947
Stars: Pluto
Rating: ★
Review:
‘Mail Dog’ is another arctic short featuring Pluto (see ‘Rescue Dog‘ from eight months earlier).
This time Pluto is a mail dog in Alaska. While delivering the mail he encounters a totem pole and a chilly rabbit. When he chases it, he accidentally delivers the mail in time, too.
This short follows the typical Pluto story, where Pluto befriends a little animal he dislikes at first. Unfortunately, there’s absolutely nothing special about this particular entry, making it one of Pluto’s most forgettable cartoons.
Watch ‘Mail Dog’ yourself and tell me what you think:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oNoIRbWllSo
This is Pluto cartoon No. 22
To the previous Pluto cartoon: Rescue Dog
To the next Pluto cartoon: Pluto’s Blue Note
Director: Charles Nichols
Release Date: March 21, 1947
Stars: Pluto
Rating: ★★
Review:
Pluto somehow is a rescue dog in the arctic, where he encounters the little seal from ‘Pluto’s Playmate‘ (1941).
In a story all too similar to this earlier entry, Pluto tries to get rid of it, but when the seal rescues him from almost drowning, they become friends.
This is one of the more forgettable Pluto shorts in which Pluto befriends a little animal. Its story is told quite slowly. However, it contains some broad and funny animation of Pluto. The seal would return the following year in ‘Mickey and the Seal‘.
Watch ‘Rescue Dog’ yourself and tell me what you think:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NI35uiqws50
This is Pluto cartoon No. 21
To the previous Pluto cartoon: Pluto’s Housewarming
To the next Pluto cartoon: Mail Dog
Director: Charles Nichols
Release Date: August 13, 1948
Stars: Pluto, Figaro
Rating: ★★★★
Review:
In ‘Cat Nap Pluto’ Pluto’s returning home in the morning from a very rough night, but he’s kept out of sleep by a very rise-and-shiny Figaro.
‘Cat Nap Pluto’ is an entertaining short. The funniest gags in this cartoon involve a very, very sleepy miniature Pluto sandman, who puts Pluto to sleep several times. Nevertheless, the cartoon pales when compared to the Tom & Jerry short ‘Sleepy Time Tom‘ (1951), which covers similar grounds.
‘Cat Nap Pluto’ is the second of three cartoons co-starring Pluto and Figaro, the other ones being ‘First Aiders’ from 1944 and ‘Pluto’s Sweater‘ from the next year.
Watch ‘Cat Nap Pluto’ yourself and tell me what you think:
This is Pluto cartoon No. 26
To the previous Pluto cartoon: Pluto’s Purchase
To the next Pluto cartoon: Pluto’s Fledgling
‘Cat Nap Pluto’ is available on the DVD-set ‘The Complete Pluto Volume Two’
Director: Charles Nichols
Release Date: February 2, 1947
Stars: Pluto, Butch, The Little Turtle
Rating: ★★★
Review:
In ‘Pluto’s Housewarming’ Pluto’s got a new and very fancy home at the beach, but even before he moves in, it’s occupied by the little turtle from ‘Canine Patrol‘ (1945).
Pluto manages to dispose of the little fellow, but then bulldog Butch squats his house. Butch chases Pluto away, but he himself is chased away by the little turtle. In return, Pluto allows the little fellow to live in his mansion, too.
‘Pluto’s Housewarming’ is one of those numerous Pluto cartoons from the forties in which Pluto befriends a little animal, which he doesn’t like at first. The addition of Butch, however, brings in a new dimension. Nevertheless, this is cartoon is still rather cute than funny.
The little turtle would reappear in the equally cute and unfunny ‘Pluto’s Surprise Package‘ from 1949.
Watch ‘Pluto’s Housewarming’ yourself and tell me what you think:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lcYhvIfa_VI
This is Pluto cartoon No. 20
To the previous Pluto cartoon: The Purloined Pup
To the next Pluto cartoon: Rescue Dog
Director: Charles Nichols
Release Date: May 10, 1946
Stars: Pluto, Dinah
Rating: ★★★★
Review:
‘In Dutch’ is one of those rare cartoons set in Holland.
In ‘in Dutch’ Pluto is a milk-bringing dog in a very awkward, almost fairy tale-like picture of The Netherlands. He and his love, Dinah the dachshund, accidentally ring the alarm bell in their love play, and they get expelled from the village.
However, our couple saves the day, when Dinah stops a leak in the dyke and Pluto warns the villagers, albeit in an unorthodox way. This story idea is a nice take on the children’s book ‘Hans Brinker, or the Silver Skates’ (1865) by Mary Mapes Dodge. The result is a charming little story in an exotic setting.
Like Mapes Dodge, the animators had probably never visited The Netherlands themselves, for the country is erroneously depicted as surrounded by a huge dyke, behind which the sea is splashing. Further couleur locale is provided by numerous windmills, tulips and wooden shoes. The people in the cartoon speak with a weird accent, which is supposed to sound like Dutch, but which is more reminiscent of German.
Nevertheless, it’s hard to blame the makers for the cliches, for even the George Pal’s cartoon about Holland, ‘Tulips Shall Grow’ (1942), is crowded with windmills, tulips and wooden shoes. And George Pal had lived in The Netherlands for several years…
Watch ‘In Dutch’ yourself and tell me what you think:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kwOSvVWcgk8
This is Pluto cartoon No. 18
To the previous Pluto cartoon: Pluto’s Kid Brother
To the next Pluto cartoon: The Purloined Pup
Director: Charles Nichols
Release Date: April 12, 1946
Stars: Pluto, Butch
Rating: ★★★½
Review:
Pluto’s family life has been treated mysteriously in his films.
Mostly, he is on his own, but in ‘Pluto’s Quin-Puplet’s (1937) he had five children, and in ‘Pluto Junior‘ (1942) only one. In ‘Pluto’s kid Brother’, without any explanation, Pluto suddenly has a smaller brother.
The little brat is full of mischief, causing trouble with a rooster, a mean red cat and even teaming up with Butch the Bulldog to get some sausages from the butcher’s shop. But Butch is not the type to share, and in the end Pluto has to save his brother, while Butch is caught by the dog catcher. However, there’s not too much moral to this story, for Pluto, too, fancies the loot: the sausages his little brother has stolen.
‘Pluto’s Kid Brother’ uses the same story idea as the 1936 Betty Boop cartoon ‘You’re Not Build That Way’ starring Pudgy, but with better results. ‘Pluto’s Kid Brother’ is a great improvement on ‘You’re Not Build That Way’: it’s better animated, less cloying, and more entertaining. The result is a nice cartoon, if by no means among Pluto’s best. It remains unknown whether the makers even knew the Betty Boop cartoon, at all.
The red alley cat would reappear in the Figaro cartoon ‘Bath Day’, six months later. Pluto’s little brother, on the other hand, would disappear again into nothingness, never to return to the screen.
Watch ‘Pluto’s Kid Brother’ yourself and tell me what you think:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wcqK49jB3vM
This is Pluto cartoon No. 17
To the previous Pluto cartoon: Canine Patrol
To the next Pluto cartoon: In Dutch
Director: Charles Nichols
Release Date: June 23, 1944
Stars: Pluto
Rating: ★★★★
Review:
An updated version of Pan from ‘Fantasia’ (1940), now wearing a boiler hat, creates spring.
Pluto enjoys it for a while, e.g. discovering a caterpillar who transforms into a very sexy butterfly. The butterfly is designed as a miniature pin-up girl, who dances to a conga beat. After this encounter, Pluto juggles with a wasps’ nest, angering the wasps who sting him in the form of a Lockheed Lightning and a V2 rocket. These two sequences make ‘Springtime for Pluto’ a typical war era cartoon, even though it’s not about war, at all.
After Pluto gets stung, he’s caught in the rain, and even in a hailstorm. In the end he’s not enjoying spring anymore, and angrily he chases Pan into the distance.
‘Springtime for Pluto’ is the first cartoon directed by Charles Nichols, who would direct all Pluto and Mickey cartoons (save one) from now on until their retirement in 1953. Nichols is famous for his mild-mannered humor, but his debut consists of very enjoyable utter nonsense from the beginning to the end. It’s full of the exuberant spirit of the war time era.
Even the oil backgrounds, painted by Lenard Kester (1917-1997), have more vivid colors than before. These are flatter than in most Disney films, and during the butterfly sequence one can even see the paper texture. They form an early example of a more graphic style of backgrounds within a Disney film, and look forward to the fifties. Perhaps Kester had been inspired by similar experiments by Chuck Jones’ unit at Warner Brothers (e.g. ‘The Dover Boys‘ from 1942). In any case, the result contributes to the surreal atmosphere of the film.
Kester has been credited for backgrounds of only one other Disney cartoon, ‘How To Play Football’ from a few months later. In this short the backgrounds are effective, but unremarkable. Had he been toned down by the studio? Fact is that Kester soon moved on to devote his life to oil painting…
Watch ‘Springtime for Pluto’ yourself and tell me what you think:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R4HSdP8M6vw
This is Pluto cartoon No. 11
To the previous Pluto cartoon: Private Pluto
To the next Pluto cartoon: First Aiders
Director: Clyde Geronimi
Release Date: April 2, 1943
Stars: Pluto, Chip ‘n Dale
Rating: ★★★★
Review:
Pluto has joined the army, and wearing a helmet, he has to protect “the pillbox” (a canon) against saboteurs.
These appear to be two little chipmunks who use the canon to crack acorns. Pluto tries to fight them, but the two critters defeat him in an unexpected ending.
‘Private Pluto’ is the second of two World War II-themed Pluto cartoons (the first being ‘The Army Mascot‘ from 1942). It was also to be the last Pluto cartoon directed by Clyde Geronimi, who promoted to sequence director in Disney’s feature films. Geronimi was succeeded by Charles Nichols, who seemed to be more comfortable with the character and who would direct every Pluto cartoon save one from then on.
‘Private Pluto’ is an important cartoon, because it introduces those famous chipmunks, Chip ‘n Dale. They’re not named yet, nor are they two different characters here, but their mischievous behavior and their hardly comprehensible jabbering are already present, and they’re certainly instantly likeable.
Chip ‘n Dale would eventually become Donald’s adversaries, but Pluto, too, would re-encounter them in three cartoons: ‘Squatters Rights‘ (1946), ‘Food for Feudin’‘ (1950) and ‘Pluto’s Christmas Tree‘ (1952).
‘Private Pluto’ is interesting in its own right, for it shows the line of coastal defense the United States had placed at the Pacific Coast in the years preceding the war. After the attack on Pearl Harbor it had been placed on high alert (thus Pluto’s job), but luckily there was no need ever to use it.
Watch ‘Private Pluto’ yourself and tell me what you think:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yhw8k5Mzoxo
This is Pluto cartoon No. 10
To the previous Pluto cartoon: Pluto at the Zoo
To the next Pluto cartoon: Springtime for Pluto
Director: Charles Nichols
Release Date: March 16, 1961
Rating: ★★★
Review:
‘The Saga of Windwagon Smith’ was Disney’s last tall tale cartoon after entries like ‘Pecos Bill‘ (from ‘Melody Time‘, 1948) and ‘Paul Bunyan‘ (1958).
Unlike the former, which were rooted in American folklore, this story seems to be an original, although it retains a traditional feel. The story, which is narrated in rhyme, and partly sung by Rex Allen and the Sons of the Pioneers, tells about Windwagon Smith, a sailor who arrives at Westport, a small town in Kansas on a wagon with a sail. He convinces the villagers to make even a larger one to sail the prairies to Santa Fe with. But when it’s ready the villagers get scared and abandon the ‘ship’, except for Molly, the mayor’s daughter, who’s in love with Smith. Together they vanish into a storm.
‘The Saga of Windwagon Smith’ was the last cartoon to be directed by Charles Nichols. It’s also the last of only six shorts directed by him not to feature Pluto. It’s moderately stylized except for Molly, who’s conceived and animated in a charmingly stylized way, seeming to float more than to walk. Nichols left Disney in 1962 for Hanna-Barbera, where he worked on countless television series. In the late 1980s he returned to Disney, where he worked onto his death in 1992, 81 years old.
Watch ‘The Saga of Windwagon Smith’ yourself and tell me what you think:
‘The Saga of Windwagon Smith’ is available on the DVD ‘Walt Disney Treasures: Disney Rarities’
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