Silent Film of the Month: Felix Saves the Day (1922)

 

Run Time: 7 minutes. Studio: Pat Sullivan Cartoons. Director: Otto Messmer. Producer: Pat Sullivan. Animator: Otto Messmer

During much of the 1920's Felix the cat was the world's biggest cartoon star. Those who only know the cat for his sound work might be a bit surprised at this, but during the silent era he appeared in some of the cleverest and most inventive cartoons. Beyond this Felix showed a great strive towards personality animation. This is when the animation not only shows the character doing something, but thinking as well. Though this had been done by Winsor McCay in the fantastic Gertie The Dinosaur, before Felix it had not been done with a regularly occurring character.

Though the Felix cartoons were only credited to Pat Sullivian. However Otto Messmer was extremely important to these. films. Otto Messmer didn't really get much attention for his contributions until much later thanks to such historians as Leonard Maltin and John Canemaker. There has been some argument to just how much Messmer contributed to these cartoons. Some say he did almost everything for these films, but others say while he was important to the cartoons Pat Sullivan was a much bigger contributor. Before Felix, Messmer and Sullivan did a short series of cartoons with Charlie Chaplin's Little Tramp character. Otto Mesmer as the main animator on these cartoons studied Charlie Chaplin closely to get his mannerisms down. Messmer would later claim this as his main inspiration for his animation for Felix. Indeed this was picked up by many film critics, who often favorably compared Felix and Chaplin. Felix made his debut in a 1919 cartoon called Feline Follies. In that film Felix was called Master Tom. In the cat's second cartoon Musical Mews, he received the name Felix. These cartoons were so successful, that Pat Sullivan decided to make a series out of the cat, where shorts would be released on a monthly schedule. Felix Saves the Day was the first cartoon made for this new schedule. Messmer considered this film to be his favorite Felix cartoon. Film Historian Leonard Maltin believes this is because he made this film virtually by himself.

In this film Felix is a huge fan of the Tar-Heels baseball team. Felix practing with the team accidentilly hits a ball that knocks off a policeman's hat. Willie Brown, the star of the team is blamed for it and winds up in prison. Felix tries to get Willie out but his efforts don't work. Felix muxt then take the place for Willie in the game.

This cartoon is very entertaining. It has some good humor (a joke about a Fly Cop is esspicially funny), the film looks great and most importantly Felix is very likable. This film features some blending of animation and live action. This is expertly done. It not only looks very cool, but the prencese of both animation and live action somehow adds to the reality of the character of Felix. Most of all though this film is very creative. Things like Felix climbing question marks that appear above his head, and him getting into a live action taxi, are just so imaginative that they are a joy to watch.

-Michael J. Ruhland

Resourses Used
Of Mice and Magic: The History of the American Animated Cartoon by Leonard Maltin
Felix: The Twisted Tale of the World's Most Famous Cat by John Canemaker