Cartoons Or Mental Floss, Make Mine Mint!
Posted: Friday, August 26, 2011
by Octavia Hansen
Octavia Hansen
I watch cartoons. Yes, at my age and at a time when world news is changing hourly, I like to watch cartoons. I'm still informed, but once-a-day apocalyptic-depressing declining-state-of-the-world news is enough for me, probably for anyone, mostly for me.
Cartoons are visual dessert. They used to separate a double feature, sometimes on television they were inserted when a movie wasn't quite filling the time allotted. I don't go for just any cartoons. Animation is just the popcorn, cold drink and hot dog singing their way to a lobby full of snacks. I mean real cartoons. Scooby Doo and South Park never did it for me and the Cartoon Channel is at an all time low, everything explodes or throws up. No thanks. My grand passion is for old cartoons, when cels were hand-drawn and painted, not always the best registration but there's a human feel to the unreal.
Another known trivia fact to show I have a lot of time on my hands, in the full-length live/animated movie of Who Framed Roger Rabbit, Betty Boop's voice was one of the originals who made her come alive, Mae Questel, and Roger was brought to life by Charles Fleischer, no relation to Max and Dave but a strange coincidence. The Roger Rabbit film brought together characters previously never seen together, most outstanding being Mickey Mouse and Bugs Bunny in the same scene. If you haven't caught this film -- shame on you! All star cast, brilliant writing and live action/animation blend developed for this movie. Yes, there are early examples but usually shorts, not full length. Do your psyche a favor and laugh along with Roger.
The earliest Popeye cartoons open aboard ship with cabin doors opening and closing to show credits, it saved a lot of time by simply writing on the chalkboard and filming this way. The dialogue, almost inaudible, is witty and I'll never know where some of those word come from (edumacation?), obviously not just for kids.
Tom and Jerry are remarkable for William Hanna and Joseph Barbera caricatures of facial features and over-the-top violence. This visual stamp was used by Jim Carrey in The Mask (1994) movie, but still not one of my favs. His nervous style of comedy is too much for me, I'm jumpy on my own. Ultra-violence, if you can get past it, gives way to remarkable art. Some story lines were subtle and disturbing; Tom (cat) goes to Heaven and while waiting at the pearly gates, a wet bag opens to release wet kittens is a sad statement about unwanted animals. It's haunting still, almost fifty years later.
Tex Avery was over the top for contrasting characters (Droopy VS Wolf) and especially for women -- Swing Shift Cinderella and Red Riding Hood. Love the music, love the babes, can't get enough of the animation. I never found a credit for the women singing. Shame, it was a time in Hollywood where only the star got the billing, on cartoons, even less credit was given to the staff. Again, there are some violent parts most disturbing. Perhaps children don't connect it with real life; as an adult, even though I grew up with this pounding into my brain on Saturday mornings, I'm a peaceful person.
Walter Lantz, of Woody Woodpecker fame, lays out a beautiful story board but again, the over-the-top violence is really scary. Woody turns psycho for retribution on what was an accident or a slight that should have been excused any other time. Pick and choose your battles -- even when he wins, what did he win? Watch at your own risk. The perspective is incredibly different from when I was a proverbial kneehigh.
Television brought down the style of animation but not the wit. Jay Ward and Bill Scott produced Rocky and Bull Winkle. What they did not have in spectacular backgrounds or photographic technique was made up in sharp, fast dialogue and clever story lines. Only the older crowd will get the jokes -- sorry, kids. They also later produced George of the Jungle, Tom Slick and Super Chicken, and sugar breakfast huckster Captain Crunch. They knew kids did not have much say when it came to television viewing, if they could also interest parents, everyone could watch. Even now the satire is silly yet still poignant.
Warner Brothers had a lot of competition in Walt Disney Studios, but rather than knock heads, they went a different direction. Disney aimed at kids and family entertainment, though some of their stories are horrific for young minds -- loss of parents, abandonment, abuse, terrifying adventures inside a whale, and step-mothers have never recovered from their evil image. Warner went with intellectual and sometimes over the top patriotic themes. There is a series of cartoons where Bug Bunny fights Japanese in the Pacific and Germans in the Black Forest. If you can find it, catch Bugs flying a bomber while verbally jousting with the Gremlins from the Kremlin. Oh, boy! Daffy Duck also does his part for the war effort, flying high and selling bonds. Warner somehow managed to lure Salvador Dali to work on a cartoon. He only did one, he said it was all he could take of the studio grind, but it's incredible. Porky Pig and the last Dodo -- Dali style stamped all over it. You have to see this two or three times to catch everything in the background, and you'll love every surrealistic minute.
Epic hand-drawn animation was costly but beautiful; even today Fantasia (1940) is a feast for the eyes and mind. Though how they got away with the march of life/evolution sequence in a militant religious society who had been known to chase ideas up a tree and set fire to it, I'm amazed to this day it was included. The breakneck speed artists had to produce cut into creativity, it really took it's toll in the 1950's. When television and electronic/computer animation took over, stories, characters and art became flat. Relegated to children, it also lost wit.
Japanese Anime became an art form. Early experimental animation, around 1917, was successful enough to continue producing but the style we see today developed after 1960. And it wasn't all for children. Story lines come from thousands of years of fables, history and recently science fiction. Most tales stress honor and justice, explosions and violence sometimes get in the way but it's all eye candy. Does everything have to end in smoke and fire, or is it just that they are so good at animating smoke and fire? I still don't understand why so many characters are round-eyed Westerner types, but it's really funny when the mad scientists are usually Americans, or at least English speaking.
Is there a message in cartoons? Well, technically, there is something to be learned from everything we see and do. Perhaps the message is that we take ourselves too seriously, that we should all laugh more, love more and think more and you don't have to leave your couch to have an out-of-this-world adventure. It would be wonderful to have more color in the world and we can relax knowing cool isn't all it's cracked up to be. We can all have more fun being bumbly and lovable, or just watching it.
"Hey, Rocky, watch me pull a rabbit out of my hat!"
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Top-level comments on this article: (1 total)Man! This is jammed. History upon history and then cultural comment too. You are a thinker, including all of the obvious smarts you have. Here's to Octavia.
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