Some Cartoons for Saturday Morning #285

 Hello my friends and happy Saturday morning. Once again, it is time for some classic cartoons. 

Today's cartoon selection begins with Tree For Two (1952) starring Sylvester the cat. This short film introduced the two dogs, Spike and Chester. They would only appear in two classic theatrical shorts (the other being Dr. Jekyll's Hyde (1954)), but the popularity of these cartoons has made them make cameos in many post-golden age Looney Tunes projects. This short would later be edited into the feature film, Daffy Duck's Movie: Fantastic Island (1983) and be remade as The Dogfather (1974), the first short in The Dogfather series. 

Up next is the Terry Toons cartoon, Hounding the Hares (1948). This short film features our good friend Farmer Al Falfa. 

Now we join Donald Duck in Sky Trooper (1942). Like many cartoon characters, Donald Duck spent much of World War 2 making service comedies that featured him in some branch of the military. Despite the most famous image of Donald being him in his sailor suit, most of these service comedies featured the duck in the army. Many of these cartoons also feature Mickey Mouse's nemesis Pete as Donald's long-suffering sergeant. The highlight of these films is often the interactions between these two characters. Sky Trooper was written by Carl Barks, who is best known for his wonderful comic book stories starring the beloved cartoon duck as well as for the creation of his uncle Scrooge McDuck (for whom Carl also wrote the comic book stories). The cartoon was directed by Jack King, who directed most of the Donald Duck shorts around this time. The film was released to theaters on November 6, 1942. It made its TV debut on an episode of The Mickey Mouse Club that aired on December 10, 1957. The cartoon would also be used in the Walt Disney Presents episode, This is Your Life, Donald Duck (1960). 

Next is the silent Out of the Inkwell film, Hot After It (1926). This film would later be retitled Koko's Treasure Hunt for television and that is the title you see here. 

Now it is time for a commercial break. 

Next comes Bugs Bunny in Bugsy and Mugsy (1957). This film was a semi-remake of the Slyvester cartoon, Stooge for a Mouse (1950). Bugsy and Mugsy would later be remade as the Dogfather cartoon, Heist and Seek (1974).

Now for the Fleischer stone age cartoon, Way Back When a Razzberry was a Fruit (1940). 

Winsor McCay is easily one of the most important, and most talented pioneers of animation. Contrary to some stories you might hear though he is not the first filmmaker to use animation (Emil Cohl, J. Stuart Blackton, Charles-Émile Reynaud, and Segundo de Chomón beat him to it).  However, his importance to the history of animation cannot be underestimated. Winsor McCay had already enjoyed much success before entering the field of animation, as creator and writer of the newspaper comic strips, Little Nemo in Slumberland, and Dreams of a Rarebit Fiend. These comic strips were the highlight of the comics page back then. They transcended what comic strips had been known for through their abundance of imagination, and expert drawing style. It is only natural for a man who created this to be attracted to the art form of animation. His first film was Little Nemo (1911) based off his own comic strip. This film starts out in live action with McCay betting he can make drawings move (although he incorrectly credits himself as the first to do this), and his friends respond with laughter and disbelief. The live action segment of this film is very clever, and humorous. The highlight of the live action portion though is seeing McCay draw his characters before the animation starts. This is when you know you are watching a great talent at work. The animation segment itself is very well done and entertaining, but it is a little dated. It is obvious he had not yet figured out what to do with animation, and that leads to a lack of understanding our characters, and therefore a lack of personal involvement. However this animation is expertly done. It is very appealing and still looks very good by today's standards. This entire segment was hand-drawn by one man, Winsor McCay himself. He drew four-thousand drawings all by himself for this one short segment of the film. The early color was achieved by hand painting the 35mm film itself after it was complete. this was also done only by McCay.

Now let us close with a song. 

Thanks for joining me. Come back next week for more animated treasures. Until then may all your tunes be looney and your melodies merry. 

Resources Used

Of Mice and Magic: A History of American Animated Cartoons by Leonard Maltin

I Tawt I Taw a Puddy Tat: Fifty Years of Sylvester and Tweety by Jerry Beck

Donald Duck: The Ultimate History by J.B. Kaufman and David Gerstein

https://mediahistoryproject.org/

https://disney.fandom.com/wiki/Sky_Trooper

Movie Review: The Death of Robin Hood

 

Michael's Movie Grade: A-

A compelling and thoughtful revisionist take on the tale of Robin Hood. 

Don't go into this movie expecting a typical Robin Hood film. This is not a swashbuckling adventure starring a young dashing Errol Flynn or Douglas Fairbanks. Rather this is often a quiet meditative film that is more interested in delving into the psyche of the main character than providing an action-packed spectacle. Even when we do get action scenes there is very little fun to them. Instead, these scenes are unforgivingly brutal and hard to watch. Still, this is keeping very much with the theme of this movie, rather than being gore for the sake of gore. The brutality serves a purpose here. It is here to rid our minds of any sort of romantism. Instead, we are thrown into a world where violence, even if it is at first well intentioned, deeply changes a person for the worse. We see Robin Hood as an old man (played marvelously by Hugh Jackman), who does not view himself as a hero but instead as a person whose entire legacy was built on nothing but violence and bloodshed. After some early brutal scenes, the rest of the film is very quiet and introspective causing us to go into dark places that we normally wouldn't associate with a Robin Hood story. While this film will definitely divide movie fans and critics for years to come, it leaves a devastating emotional impact and lots of food for thought. 

Director/writer Michael Sarnoski (Pig (2021), A Quiet Place: Day One (2024)) not only dismantles and deconstructs the tale of Robin Hood but also creates a powerful cautionary tale about violence and when fiction and romanticism override the brutal truth. 

I am not saying this movie is for everyone. It can be unrelenting in its unpleasantness, and the pacing will probably be too slow for those used to big blockbusters. Others will simply have a hard time accepting such a dark take on such a beloved figure. Yet if you are willing to give yourself over to such a challenging movie that asks a lot of its audience, it is an extremely rewarding experience.   

Joan Crawford On Radio

What if Joan Crawford had her own weekly radio show? Joan Crawford herself answers this question in the 1936 article from Radio Stars magazine. If you have trouble reading the article, click on the pages and use your touch screen to zoom in. If you don't have a touch screen, click here.

For an example of Joan on radio enjoy this following episode of Suspense. 

Pinocchio: The Making of The Disney Epic (2015)

 

Pinocchio (1940) is one of the Disney studio's greatest animated movies. Even with the many animated Disney films that have followed there is still something about Pinocchio that makes it stand out as something truly special. When you read film historian J.B. Kaufman's essential book about the making of Pinocchio you will understand why it is so special. Kaufman's research is exhaustive and there is no detail about the production that is too small for this book. This lets us see how the filmmakers spent a great amount of time and effort on the smallest details in this film. There is not a single second that was not the result of much time and effort on the part of the filmmakers. It is a result of how these filmmakers never settled for anything less than perfection that makes this such an incredible movie. 

Kaufman's book is so informative that even the most dedicated Disney buffs will learn a great deal. You may think you know your Disney history before reading this book but there is so much here, you have never even heard about before. This film spends a great deal of time discussing story ideas that were discarded around the time. The story may seem effortless when you watch the movie, but they were anything but. It is fascinating to read about all the different directions this movie could have gone (if you have read Collidi's original story, you can easily note how hard of a story this would be to adapt to a movie). When you read about the various directions this film could have gone in, it is great fun to picture the various completely different movies we could have gotten instead.   

As well as the bulk of the book telling the story of production, this book has various appendixes. One lists who animated what from start to finish of the film. Another goes over the uses of Figaro the cat and his career as a star of the Disney studio's short cartoons. Another goes over Jiminy Cricket and his life outside of this movie. Each of these appendixes are just as fascinating as the main body of the book.

This book also features an extra chapter by film historian Russell Merrit (whom Kaufman had co-written a couple of Disney books with). Merrit gives a deep critical dive into the themes of this film. Some of his discussion involves deep analysis that goes into symbolism that I doubt was on the mind of most anyone working on this film. However, a film is always open to interpretation on the part of the viewer, and his analysis is very well written and intelligent.    

This is a must own for any Disney fan. 

 

Movie Review: Obsession

 

Michael's Movie Grade: C+

A well-made but incredibly predictable horror movie. 

In this film, a young man has a massive crush on a close female friend but is too scared to tell her. One day he comes across an object called a One Wish Williow, which is said to grant one specific wish. Not believing that this will work he uses one and wishes that his friend loved him more than anyone else in the whole world. The wish comes true and at first seems like a dream come true, but her obsession with him gets darker and more twisted. 

The basic storyline is a great twist on the classic monkey paw storyline. It is instantly relatable as many of us might have wished for the same thing he did, only to regret making the wish shortly after. And if we ended up in the same situation he is in, we too would try to shift the blame from ourselves and try to live out our fantasy regardless of how creepy things become. That is the truly disturbing thing about this film. We see darker parts of ourselves that we often try to deny or suppress brought to the surface. This movie also delivers some great scares. The jump scares here are incredibly effective, and the first one definitely made me jump out of my seat. Many scenes revolving around the friend turned girlfriend, Nikki, are legitimately disturbing in the best way possible (though the scenes revolving around the cat were unnecessary). 

However, there are many things that keep this from being the great movie it should have been. The main fault is its predictability. You figure out how this film is going to end well before it happens. The last act can start to make an audience member grow impatient as it takes its time to get to this very predictable ending. Some other scenes that are supposed to be shocking are also incredibly predictable. The movie also tries to inject a lot of dark humor into its storyline, but this humor is very rarely funny. I also felt the whole movie could have been stronger if we knew more about who the main female character was before the wish was made. This could have given the movie a much stronger emotional connection. 

I enjoyed this movie, but I still don't think it fully lived up to the hype around it. 

    

Cowboy Church #271

 Hello my friends and welcome back for another service of Cowboy Church.

Today's musical selection begins with Roy Rogers and Dale Evans with The Bible Tells Me So. Roy and Dale were strong Christians in their later years and their entertainment careers became simultaneous with their faith as they took every chance they could to spread the word of God. They also greatly supported others who shared the faith. One of those they supported was the Reverend Billy Graham and when the King of the Cowboys and the Queen of the West toured Great Britian they would tell their audiences to see Billy in London. They were warned not to try that when they went to Dublin, but Dale responded that Billy was the reason they came across the seas in the first place. Dale also let any naysayers know that when they had performed How Great Thou Art in Ireland, they got a standing ovation. This lead them to meeting the chaplain for the Abbey Players, a troupe of actors in Ireland. He asked them what kind of man Billy was and Dale responded, "he is the most utterly dedicated, committed Christian I have ever met in my life." The chaplain responded, "You tell Mr. Graham that I said God bless him." Dale would later write, "I will never forget the sincerity in that man's voice when he said those words." 

This is followed by Jim and Jessie with That Number That No Man Can Number. 

Afterwards is Ricky Skaggs with Seven Hillsides. This comes from his 1999 gospel album, Solider of the Cross.

This is followed by Johnny Cash singing No Earthly Good. In the notes for the Unearthed box set, John wrote, "That's a song I wrote for phony pious Christians 'You're so heavenly minded you're no earthly good.' People who are always talking about Heaven and how close we are to being there give Christianity a bad name. And it should have a good name because it's a wonderful thing. Wonderful and I don't like it, it makes me very angry, when charlatans abuse and misuse the Gospel of Jesus Christ, It's outrageous and totally uncalled for." 

Then comes Blind Willie Johnson with his 1927 recording of I Know His Blood Can Make Me Whole.

Next is Charlie Rich with Amazing Grace. This hymn was written by John Newton in 1772. It is no coincidence that John Newton wrote this hymn, as he was someone who badly needed God's grace. Looking at his life before he gave it to God, there is not much to find that is admirable and in fact some of what we see is downright horrific. He played a part in one of the darkest (if not the darkest) parts of American history. He was a slave trader. To say that slavery in the United States (and in any country at any time) was a tragedy and a horrible part of our history is an incredible understatement, and this man was a part of that horrific system. Later he even admitted that he treated the human beings that he was bringing over harshly. If there is anyone, we in our humanness would think is beyond God to reach it would be this guy. Yet God did reach him and being God completely changed him. He not only abandoned his job, but he gave his life to God's ministry and helped fight slavery every step of the way. If God could do this with him who is to say that any of us or anyone we know could possibly be out of God's power to reach. This recording comes from Charlie's 1976 gospel album, Silver Linings. 

Afterwards is Gene Autry with The Bible on the Table and the Flag Upon the Wall. This version of the song comes from an episode of Gene Autry's Melody Ranch radio show that aired March 5, 1949. After Walter Winchell showed his support for Gene's radio show, Gene wrote a note of thanks to Winchell. "I want you to know I appreciate everything you give me. Of course, the radio show, I'm doing is not a sophisticated program and probably a lot of the kids in the city won't enjoy it, but the thing I am trying to do more than anything else is to keep the program down to earth, and especially so the kids will like it. I want to concentrate on trying to point out the value of Americanism and what America should mean to everyone these days when there is so much communism and other isms going so strong in this country. I feel we cannot go to strong on preaching this to the people and I think the best way to do this is playing particularly to the kids and teaching them Americanism while they are young."

Today's musical selection ends with the Sons of the Pioneers with their 1948 recording of Lead Me Gently Home Father. 

Now for the 15th episode of The Lone Ranger TV show. 

Now for a message from the Reverand Billy Graham. 

Psalm 78

A maskil of Asaph.

1 My people, hear my teaching;

    listen to the words of my mouth.

2 I will open my mouth with a parable;

    I will utter hidden things, things from of old—

3 things we have heard and known,

    things our ancestors have told us.

4 We will not hide them from their descendants;

    we will tell the next generation

the praiseworthy deeds of the Lord,

    his power, and the wonders he has done.

5 He decreed statutes for Jacob

    and established the law in Israel,

which he commanded our ancestors

    to teach their children,

6 so the next generation would know them,

    even the children yet to be born,

    and they in turn would tell their children.

7 Then they would put their trust in God

    and would not forget his deeds

    but would keep his commands.

8 They would not be like their ancestors—

    a stubborn and rebellious generation,

whose hearts were not loyal to God,

    whose spirits were not faithful to him.

9 The men of Ephraim, though armed with bows,

    turned back on the day of battle;

10 they did not keep God’s covenant

    and refused to live by his law.

11 They forgot what he had done,

    the wonders he had shown them.

12 He did miracles in the sight of their ancestors

    in the land of Egypt, in the region of Zoan.

13 He divided the sea and led them through;

    he made the water stand up like a wall.

14 He guided them with the cloud by day

    and with light from the fire all night.

15 He split the rocks in the wilderness

    and gave them water as abundant as the seas;

16 he brought streams out of a rocky crag

    and made water flow down like rivers.

17 But they continued to sin against him,

    rebelling in the wilderness against the Most High.

18 They willfully put God to the test

    by demanding the food they craved.

19 They spoke against God;

    they said, “Can God really

    spread a table in the wilderness?

20 True, he struck the rock,

    and water gushed out,

    streams flowed abundantly,

but can he also give us bread?

    Can he supply meat for his people?”

21 When the Lord heard them, he was furious;

    his fire broke out against Jacob,

    and his wrath rose against Israel,

22 for they did not believe in God

    or trust in his deliverance.

23 Yet he gave a command to the skies above

    and opened the doors of the heavens;

24 he rained down manna for the people to eat,

    he gave them the grain of heaven.

25 Human beings ate the bread of angels;

    he sent them all the food they could eat.

26 He let loose the east wind from the heavens

    and by his power made the south wind blow.

27 He rained meat down on them like dust,

    birds like sand on the seashore.

28 He made them come down inside their camp,

    all around their tents.

29 They ate till they were gorged—

    he had given them what they craved.

30 But before they turned from what they craved,

    even while the food was still in their mouths,

31 God’s anger rose against them;

    he put to death the sturdiest among them,

    cutting down the young men of Israel.

32 In spite of all this, they kept on sinning;

    in spite of his wonders, they did not believe.

33 So he ended their days in futility

    and their years in terror.

34 Whenever God slew them, they would seek him;

    they eagerly turned to him again.

35 They remembered that God was their Rock,

    that God Most High was their Redeemer.

36 But then they would flatter him with their mouths,

    lying to him with their tongues;

37 their hearts were not loyal to him,

    they were not faithful to his covenant.

38 Yet he was merciful;

    he forgave their iniquities

    and did not destroy them.

Time after time he restrained his anger

    and did not stir up his full wrath.

39 He remembered that they were but flesh,

    a passing breeze that does not return.

40 How often they rebelled against him in the wilderness

    and grieved him in the wasteland!

41 Again and again they put God to the test;

    they vexed the Holy One of Israel.

42 They did not remember his power—

    the day he redeemed them from the oppressor,

43 the day he displayed his signs in Egypt,

    his wonders in the region of Zoan.

44 He turned their river into blood;

    they could not drink from their streams.

45 He sent swarms of flies that devoured them,

    and frogs that devastated them.

46 He gave their crops to the grasshopper,

    their produce to the locust.

47 He destroyed their vines with hail

    and their sycamore-figs with sleet.

48 He gave over their cattle to the hail,

    their livestock to bolts of lightning.

49 He unleashed against them his hot anger,

    his wrath, indignation and hostility—

    a band of destroying angels.

50 He prepared a path for his anger;

    he did not spare them from death

    but gave them over to the plague.

51 He struck down all the firstborn of Egypt,

    the firstfruits of manhood in the tents of Ham.

52 But he brought his people out like a flock;

    he led them like sheep through the wilderness.

53 He guided them safely, so they were unafraid;

    but the sea engulfed their enemies.

54 And so he brought them to the border of his holy land,

    to the hill country his right hand had taken.

55 He drove out nations before them

    and allotted their lands to them as an inheritance;

    he settled the tribes of Israel in their homes.

56 But they put God to the test

    and rebelled against the Most High;

    they did not keep his statutes.

57 Like their ancestors they were disloyal and faithless,

    as unreliable as a faulty bow.

58 They angered him with their high places;

    they aroused his jealousy with their idols.

59 When God heard them, he was furious;

    he rejected Israel completely.

60 He abandoned the tabernacle of Shiloh,

    the tent he had set up among humans.

61 He sent the ark of his might into captivity,

    his splendor into the hands of the enemy.

62 He gave his people over to the sword;

    he was furious with his inheritance.

63 Fire consumed their young men,

    and their young women had no wedding songs;

64 their priests were put to the sword,

    and their widows could not weep.

65 Then the Lord awoke as from sleep,

    as a warrior wakes from the stupor of wine.

66 He beat back his enemies;

    he put them to everlasting shame.

67 Then he rejected the tents of Joseph,

    he did not choose the tribe of Ephraim;

68 but he chose the tribe of Judah,

    Mount Zion, which he loved.

69 He built his sanctuary like the heights,

    like the earth that he established forever.

70 He chose David his servant

    and took him from the sheep pens;

71 from tending the sheep he brought him

    to be the shepherd of his people Jacob,

    of Israel his inheritance.

72 And David shepherded them with integrity of heart;

    with skillful hands he led them.

Thanks for joining me come back next week for another service of Cowboy Church. Happy trails to you. 

Resources Used

Public Cowboy no. 1: The Life and Times of Gene Autry by Holly George-Warren

Happy Trails: Our Life Story by Roy Rogers and Dale Evans

Johnny Cash: Unearthed box set liner notes. 

Video Link: The Big Store - Piano Scene - The Marx Brothers