THE CARTOON CRYPT: The Old Mill Pond (1937)

THE CARTOON CRYPT

Here’s a great, silly, musical Harman-Ising MGM cartoon featuring frog caricatures of Cab Calloway, Fats Waller, The Mills Brothers and Louis Armstrong (and others that I can’t identify… if you know, please let me know in the comments).

Warning: This cartoon contains offensive racial caricatures… if this sort of thing offends you, you may not want to watch it.

Read more about this cartoon on The Big Cartoon Database here.

THE CARTOON CRYPT: A Car-Tune Portrait (1937)

THE CARTOON CRYPT

When I first saw this I thought it was a Fleischer satire of Disney’s Fantasia, but it actually came out three years before Fantasia (1940). I imagine Fantasia was already in some sort of production at that point, so it doesn’t seem unlikely it may have been a satire of the seemingly pretentious and grandiose idea of it at the time, I suppose. This came out before Snow White (1938), Pinocchio (1940), or any of the Disney Features, so the idea of a feature length cartoon probably seemed ridiculous to a lot of people at the time, let alone one that featured animation and classical music.

Read more about this cartoon at The Big Cartoon Database.

THE CARTOON CRYPT: Foxy and Roxy in Smile Darn Ya Smile (1931)

THE CARTOON CRYPT

The Big Cartoon Database claims that besides Foxy and Roxy looking a whole lot like Mickey and Minnie, a lot of the gags in this cartoon were plagiarized. It sure is fun, regardless. The hobos are just great.

Read more about this cartoon at the Big Cartoon Database.

It appears that this cartoon is available with a bunch of other miscellaneous cartoons from the 30’s on the DVD Return of the 30’s Characters.

THE CARTOON CRYPT: Little Nemo (1911)

THE CARTOON CRYPT

Winsor McCay was a pioneer in both comic strips and animated films, and he did both disciplines more skillfully than anyone else attempting them at the time. This lovely cartoon was hand animated on rice paper and color tinted by hand on the film by Winsor McCay in 1911, if you can believe that. 1911!

Please be advised that like much of the popular culture of the era, it contains offensive racial depictions. If this sort of thing offends you, you may not want to view it.

Read more about this cartoon on the Big Cartoon Database here.

Read more about Winsor McCay at Lambiek.net.

Read more about Winsor McCay on Wikipedia.

There is a DVD that collects Winsor McCay’s cartoons that can be purchased here.

I think all his cartoons are available on the internet as well.

THE CARTOON CRYPT: Count Screwloose – Jitterbug Follies (1939)

THE CARTOON CRYPT

Here’s one of the two cartoon adaptations of Milt Gross’ Count Screwloose. It isn’t a very good translation of the feel and charm of the comic strip, but it is fun and very well animated. The loony bin is nowhere to be seen. Why they decided to change Iggy’s name to J.R. the Wonder Dog I have no idea… and they stole his funny hat! You can see the other Count Screwloose cartoon, Wanted: No Master (also from 1939), here.


Note that this cartoon contains offensive racial depictions, and if this sort of thing offends you deeply you may not want to watch it.

Read more about this cartoon on the Big Cartoon Database.

Read more about Milt Gross on Wikipedia.

Read about Count Screwloose on Don Markstein’s Toonopedia.