Animated Cartoons in the Golden Era

[vitanola]

Anybody remember the old bouncing ball cartoons made by Paramounts Famous Studios, the same studio that made Popeye and Little Lulu cartoons?

Of course Paramount's Famous Studios was the former Fleisher Studios, inventors of the "Bouncing Ball" sing-along back in the 'Twenties.

Here is an early "Ko-Ko Song Car-Tune" from 1924:
[video=youtube_share;06DSmvgoyqE]http://youtu.be/06DSmvgoyqE[/video]
Of course the picture is silent, and the necessary musical accompaniment would have been provided (more or less satisfactorily) by the house musicians.

Interestingly enough, this series of 39 titles made between 1924 and 1927 included 19 talking pictures with fully synchronized music, dialogue and effects, filmed using the DeForest Phonofilm process. I cannot find any files of these to link here.

 

[vitanola]

Here is a favorite early "Screen Song", released by Paramount, with RCA Photophone process sound, "Mariutch" a popular dialect song of 1908 vintage.

[video=youtube;tQ_kXsjAkYU]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tQ_kXsjAkYU&feature=share[/video]

 

[GoldenEraFan]

Yes! It is not well known, but the Fleischers were making synchronized sound cartoons years before Disney made Steamboat Willie.

 

[Red Diabla]

I'm first and foremost a Warner Bros. fan, hands down. I can appreciate other studios, but nothing compares to Golden Era Warners for cartoons. The sensibility, the economical use of drawings, the humor...just so good! I can't stand to watch most modern animation, but will still laugh like a child when a good WB cartoon is on. Why Warners won't show the classic cartoons on tv like they used to is beyond me, and frankly it's almost criminal.

RD

 

[dh66]

Guess my favorite

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[GoldenEraFan]

You can thank Tex Avery for making the Warner Brothers cartoons so funny, but I think his MGM work is the pinnacle of Golden Era animation right next to Disney.

 

[dh66]

I totally agree, Golden Era Fan.

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[Doctor Strange]

Not to take anything away from Tex Avery, who DID first come up with the unique comedy approach of the Warner Bros. cartoons... but Bob Clampett, Friz Freleng, Chuck Jones, Frank Tashlin, Bob McKimson, etc., had a little something to do with making them more brilliant for twenty years after Avery defected to M-G-M.

And while Avery's M-G-M films are undeniably brilliant - particularly the one-shots like Who Killed Who?, King Size Canary, Little 'Tinker (all of which I've had on 16mm since the seventies) - he never again really managed to create the kind of characters that audiences could really identify with. Droopy Dog, George and Lenny, Wolf and Red, Screwball Squirrel, and the others: they're all too bizarre for folks to love a la Bugs, Porky, Daffy, etc.

Me, I love nearly ALL the cartoons of the thirties and forties - besides Warners and M-G-M: Disney, Fleischer, Van Beuren, Lantz, etc. - and think they represent an amazing burst of creativity (and often surprisingly personal filmmaking) right smack in the middle of the studio factory era. I would never argue that Avery isn't one of the primordial geniuses of American short cartoons (and he's very well represented in my collection), but I also never make best-of lists. There were just too many other geniuses in classic animation!

 

[dh66]

In all fairness.... I have never been much of a fan of Droopy Dog (and that's stating my view as politely as I can).

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[scottyrocks]

The 1940s Warner Brothers cartoon shorts are far and away my favorites, in every aspect.

 

[dh66]

As much as I dig Tex's wolf cartoons (which is a LOT), WB's "Three Little Bops" fom 1957 is my all time favorite. That was Friz Freling if I'm remembering right.

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[vitanola]

It is probably apparent that I prefer the "rubber hose" era animaiton.

to wit:[video=youtube_share;TkQ6X7g25H0]http://youtu.be/TkQ6X7g25H0[/video]

 

[Nobert]

A side note, but one of my favorite moments from the Fleischer Superman occurs when Lois Lane is snooping on a new military plane, which gets abducted by Japanese agents, with Lois on board. Witnessing this, Clark Kent turns away and says, "This looks like a job for Superman." But it's delivered in such a perfunctory, listless tone of voice, it sounds as though he's saying, "This looks like a job for Supermann...*Sigh.* Again. Can't that dame stay out of trouble for one lousy week?"

 

[LizzieMaine]

Frank Tashlin's Porky Pig shorts of 1936-37 are works of underrated genius, treating the title character as kind of a ridiculous porcine version of Harold Lloyd. "Today you are a ham!"

 

[Sloan1874]

[video=youtube;bkjsN-J27aU]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bkjsN-J27aU[/video]

 

[Nobert]

I think One Froggy Evening belongs in the canon of great American short stories, alongside Poe, Bierce, O. Henry and some of Rod Serling's Twighlight Zone episodes.

 

[Doctor Strange]

Interesting site about the SONGS in One Froggy Evening:

http://froggyeve.tripod.com/intro.html

And agreed that it's one of Jones' masterworks, a great depiction of the cyclical dilemma, and a true American classic! (I've had a 16mm print for ages.)

 

[Doctor Strange]

I revived this thread just to mention that I recently treated myself to all three Popeye DVD box sets. These comprise ALL the black & white Popeye cartoons (including some early 40s ones from the "Famous Studios" period after Paramount took over the Fleischer brothers' studio), plus the three color two-reel "Popeye Specials" by the Fleischers. I paid under $50 for all three boxes at Amazon. I often used to pay $30 or $40 APIECE for my film prints 30 years ago, so I couldn't resist any longer.

It goes without saying that the early Popeye cartoons are unique, hilarious, and brilliant. (And the especially outstanding ones, e.g., "A Dream Walking", are simply jaw-dropping!) The image and sound quality on these restored cartoons is spectacular - way better than any film prints I've ever seen - and the discs are loaded with commentaries and documentaries by a wide range of well-chosen experts. This is exactly the treatment that the great Fleischer Popeye shorts deserve. Highly recommended to cartoon buffs!

 

[LizzieMaine]

I love those sets. I showed "A Dream Walking" to a group of fourth graders who came for a theatre tour, none of whom had ever seen or heard of Popeye in any format, and they absolutely fell in love with it. I ended up having to show them everything else on that particular disc before they'd leave.

Never believe anyone who tells you kids won't sit still for old or black-and-white. If it's timelessly good, it doesn't matter how old or black-and-white it is.

 

[dh66]

My kids are big enough Popeye fans that they begged for a can of spinach when they saw one with his picture on it at the grocery store.......and even ate most of it.