Movies With Michael : Some Cartoons for Saturday Morning #177

Saturday, May 28, 2022

Some Cartoons for Saturday Morning #177

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

Today’s cartoon selection starts off with Three For Breakfast (1948). This movie is one of director Jack Hannah’s cartoons where he puts Donald Duck against Chip and Dale. Hannah had a gift for comedic timing and many of the Disney films that he directed were excellent slapstick outings. This film is a clear example of that and is simply a really funny cartoon. This film would make its TV debut on an episode of the Disneyland TV show entitled The Donald Duck Story (1954).

Up next is Tweety's first appearance in a cartoon, A Tale of Two Kitties (1942). Sharp eyed viewers may notice that Tweety is not yellow in this film, but pink. Since he was a newborn baby bird, it made sense for him not to have feathers. According to director Bob Clampett, he based the character off of a nude baby photo of himself. Tweety already has his famous line, "I Tawt I Taw a Puddy Tat." According to animation historian Jerry Beck's book, I Tawt I Taw a Puddy Tat: Fifty Years of Sylvester and Tweety, This line also originated with Bob Clampett when in the mid-1930's he wrote a letter to a friend on MGM stationary. Next to Leo the MGM lion, Clampett drew a small bird with a word balloon with "I think I taw a titty-tat." Instead of Sylvester Tweety is here pitted against two cats named Babbit and Catstello. As should be obvious by the names, these cats were a take off on the infamous comedy team Abbott and Costello, who had just made their movie debut just a couple years earlier in One Night in the Tropics (1940). The voice of Catstello was provided by the man of a thousand voices, Mel Blanc (who also voiced Tweety) and Babbitt was voiced by writer Tedd Pierce. A reviewer in Showman's Trade Review was very impressed with these voices stating, "Either the famous comedy pair furnished the accompanying dialogue themselves or the impersonators are the last word in perfection." Though they would not catch on the way Tweety did, these characters would reappear in other cartoons. Some of these cartoons would even feature the duo as mice instead of cats. They would appear with Tweety much later in a 1998 episode of the TV show, Sylvester and Tweety Mysteries. This cartoon was reissued to theaters in 1948, the year Abbott and Costello released their most popular movie, Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein (1948).

Up next is Willie Whopper in Play Ball (1933). The basic storyline for this movie is quite similar to the later Looney Tunes cartoon, Baseball Bugs (1946). Here Willie is watching a baseball game and brags that he could beat the home team easy, and with this he finds himself dragged into the game. Both cartoons also have a gag involving the Statue of Liberty. Willie Whopper was the second starring character to come out of Ub Iwerks' own cartoon studio. The first character is Flip the Frog, who did not prove to be that popular and had to be replaced. Unfortunately, Willie did not catch on with audiences either and his movie career only lasted 13 short films. Before leaving to make cartoons for his own studio, Ub had worked at Disney playing an incredibly important role in the Disney shorts of the 1920's and early 30's. He even played a large role in the creation of Mickey Mouse. After his own studio work did not pan out, he returned to Disney where he would do special effects work on many of the Disney's best feature films.

Next we join Dudley Do Right in Faithful Dog.

Now it is time for a commercial break.

Next up is Popeye in Assault and Flattery (1956). This movie is a cheater and reuses clips from the previous Popeye cartoons, A Balmy Swami (1949), How Green Is My Spinach (1950) and The Farmer and the Belle (1950). Though this is a cheater the new footage is actually pretty good and actually outshines much of the reused footage, some of which is not from Popeye's best cartoons.

Next comes a delightful silent short, The Original Movie (1922). This movie was directed by Tony Sarg, who also co-wrote and co-animated the film with Herbert M. Dawley. This short was part of a series of films entitled Tony Sarg's Almanac, which ran in movie theaters from 1921to 1923. These films comedically and satirically traced the origins of many parts of modern life back to the Stone Age, predating The Flintstones by decades. Tony Sarg's most popular creation was outside of the realm of cinema. He had long been interested in puppets and put on elaborate and beloved puppet shows of the era. This would lead him to creating the balloons for the 1928 Macy's Thanksgiving Parade. He thought of these balloons as upside down marionettes. These types of balloons have become one of the most beloved parts of the parade and still play a major role today.

There were many themes that were repeated through the run of the Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies cartoons (probably the most famous being one character chasing another). One of these themes that was used quite a bit in the 1930's and 40's was the idea of books coming to life. A top notch example of this theme is in the Frank Tashlin directed short, Have You Got Any Castles? (1938). This film featured one book related pun after another, creating the sense of pure energy that was so prevalent in all the best Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies. This short features quite a few delights for movie fans as most of these books had been turned into films by this time and so the literary characters are often caricatures of the stars in those movie versions. The title song in this cartoon was a hit just a year earlier when performed by Tom Dorsey. The song was written by Johnny Mercer and Richard Whiting (the team that wrote Too Marvelous For Words). The following is an exhibitors review from The Motion Picture Herald, " HAVE YOU GOT ANY CASTLES: Merrie Melodies —A swell little cartoon in color. Another smash hit, very clever and it impressed me as it did the older people. Kiddish enough for the kiddies. Yet to under- stand it. it would get a real laugh from the older folks. Running time, seven minutes.—Pearce Park- hurst, State Theatre, Torrington, Conn. General patronage." The following is another, "HAVE YOU GOT ANY CASTLES: Merrie Melodies - To sit down and watch these cartoons is like watching something in line of a miracle. You can't beat them. This is a knockout. Running Time: eight minutes. - George Khattar, Casino Theatre, Whitney Pier, Sydney, Nova Scottia, Canada, General Patronage." This cartoon was reissued to theatres in 1947.