Friday, September 30, 2011

097 Room and Bored



Title: Room and Bored
Studio: Columbia
Date: 09/30/43
Credits: -
Series: Fox and Crow
Running time (of viewed version): 7:08
Commercial DVD Availability: -

Synopsis: Fox looks for roommate. Crow is as good a roommate as Michael Keaton in Pacific Heights.





















Comments: Fez and fiddle. They fake you out by putting the text after some animation. Still they rely on opening, more or less, text. Sneering bust. Lots of pinups and other decorations. Interesting "Came the Dawn" bit, with its Mad magazine human face; Somewhere in Egypt was similar re: the sphinx. Odd confluence. Shooting a toy Japanese boat with a pistol. It keeps seeming like it's about to end, but it doesn't. Except at the actual end of this cartoon as viewed, where it abruptly ends in the midst of a joke about coffee where it doesn't seem like it's about to end. Lots of odd high angles. THe last shot of pouring coffee through his own head kinda looks like a suicide.

75% of the way done. Entry written on May 30, 2011. I blogged all of September '43's cartoons today.

Tuesday, September 27, 2011

096 Boogie Woogie Man



Title: Boogie Woogie Man (Will Get You If You DOn't Watch Out)
Studio: Lantz
Date: 09/27/43
Credits:
Music and Lyrics
Alberta Nichols & Mann Holiner
Vocals
Lew Mel Morgan Trio
Direction
James Culhane
Story
Ben Hardaway - Milt Schaffer
Music
Darrell Calker
Animation
Verne Harding - - Les Kline
Series: Swing Symphony
Running time (of viewed version): 6:59
Commercial DVD Availability: WWv2d2

Synopsis: Bloodless musical number for ghosts in a ghost town.



















Comments: Open on a sign. Mics with "Boo" and "Yahh" next to each other. Was Booyah a saying then? I'm not sure if the dark ghosts are meant to be black or just shadowed (as opposed to the brown ghosts). Goosepimpled wooden leg is guh. THe spoken/rapped dialogue is all a bad fit. Did they recycle the jitterbug stock footage again?. Spook Jones parody of Spike Jones. This doesn't have very much energy. The party just kinda breaks up and the thing is over.

Sunday, September 25, 2011

BoxOffice September 25, 1943


BoxOffice September 25, 1943

p25 "Weshner. who has completed his assignment as publicity and exploitation consultant for Disney Productions on "Victoi-y Through Air Power," will announce his new connection on return from a short vacation. Weshner's contract originally called for 20 weeks of his exclusive services, but it was subsequently increased by ten weeks at Disney's request. He formerly was diE."


p78
"Tlie committee obtained from Hollywood an autographed blouse worn by Miss Durbin in the picture and put it up for auction along with a less glamorous but milkable goat. Various writers and cartoonists contributed manuscripts and original cartoons to be auctioned in the sale as well. The 712-seat house was jammed to the rafters."

pshowmandizer

go with what people already know:
"In another ad he identified "Seein' Red, White and Blue" as a Pop Eye Cartoon. One ad reads "Also the Truck That Flew" which does not mean anytliing, whereas Ed Rowley jr., in his ad said,

"A Color

Fantasy;

The

Truck

That

Flew."

Pet»

car-"
"Bugs Bunny, name bands and Disney mean something to the public. Let's"


p
Polio kept attendance down:
"Cartoon

Show Brings

Kids Back In Droves

—Neighborhoods
had lost considerable kid patronage during midsummer as a result of an upturn in infantile paralysis here. With school opening at hand and the disease scare over, Joe Jackson of the neighborhood Varsity and Knox, Interstate houses, decided to do something about it, and arranged simultaneous car-"
"Our aim in having the big cartoon show was to try and get some of the kids back into the theatre. We felt that the best way would be through a giant cartoon show. Our exploitation was simple, but well mapped out. We went to work with but one aim that aim was to let
every kid know about the show. I do beUeve that we informed them all. The advertising consisted of trailer on the screen,

HEY! KIDS!

ATTEXDING THE PERFORM

Ol'RlNr.

THE ENGAGE^

Here are the ads run on the cartoon shows staged by Interstate houses in Dallas to get the kids back in the shows following the close of a disease scare that extended through midsum-

mer

there.

house-to-house distribution or heralds, lobby set pieces, billing on the marquees, special banners, newspaper ads and stories." As a result of Jackson's success, Interstate staged a giant Bugs Bunny Jamboree at six other neighborhood houses with equal success. The jamboree was made up of three cartoons and an extra feature.


Saturday, September 24, 2011

The Phantom Chapter 4

http://www.archive.org/details/ThePhantom1943Serial-15Chapters

Go to chapter 4. The Seat of Judgement.

Let us all stand very stiffly! And then let us box stiffly!
Wouldn't the quiet way of getting rid of him involve slitting his throat? This is the jungle, not a vet's office. The Adam West Batman is a very direct descendent of this. Not really news to anyone, but the whole gas chamber bit really drives it home, more than "hey look, there's a lion!" or "oh no, a grenade landed on me!" did.

Friday, September 23, 2011

095 A Corny Concerto



Title: A Corny Concerto
Studio: Warner Bros.
Date: 09/25/43
Credits:
Supervision
Robert Clampett
Animation
Robert McKimson
Story
Frank Tashlin
Musical Direction
Carl W. Stalling
Series: Merrie Melodies
Running time (of viewed version): 7:57
Commercial DVD Availability: LTGCv2d4

Synopsis: Clampett desperately tries to get some yucks out of Fantasia.























Comments: Title is, if not exactly animated, isn't static title cards. I've always disliked this cartoon. Silhouette. Fantasia parody. There seem to be interlacing issues on this (there is or was a replacement program for this; PITA). Doughy stomach on Elmer. Porky dressed as Elmer. Dog nose odd. Maybe it's the dramatics that I don't like, maybe it's the dancing, maybe it's the paucity of dialogue. Maybe it's that they seemed to show it all the damn time in the syndicated package. Exposed bra joke. Reverse ugly duckling. Big Clampetty heads on the swanlettes. Having two stories feels wrong; perhaps this is also subject to the comedy rule of threes; the bumpers do not count. Also, there should be a bumper at the end. I think somone likes to rip off Elmer's ill-fitting gloves. The Tales From the Vienna Woods title card is static. The Blue Danube title is static, bit with an effect over it, then it switches to animated cels.