A blog reviewing all the available American animated cartoons of 1939, in approximately release order (or reverse order from the perspective of someone reading the blog after it is done).
Wednesday, December 15, 2010
153 The Film Fan
Title: The Film Fan
Studio: Warner Bros.
Date: 12/16/39
Credits:
Supervision
Robert Clampett
Animation
Norman McCabe & Vive Risto
Musical Direction
Carl W. Stalling
Series: Looney Tunes
Running time (of viewed version): 6:51
Synopsis: Porky goes to the free movies instead of coming right home from the store. Gosh, what a bad kid.
Comments: Establishing building, followed by text gag. All with a crappy little ditty under it. About the movies, making it self referential. Many posters advertising Looney Tunes. "Ahs of a Wizard" is a title; obvious Wizard of Oz reference (as opposed to the even ore explicit Gone with the Breeze). Lots of text jokes. A better name would have been "Text Joke Fan". So many stills and text based shots. Lone Stranger cheater footage (here, the Masked Marvel). They're all such film fans they went for free. There aren't any actual films; just newsreels/non fiction shorts and a couple of trailers. I feel cheated by this cheater. Sardine dog men. Nice shiny floor. I assume Cold Promise is a specific reference but I don't know to what. It's like a bad collection of spot gags; they needed an excuse for them, and then totally blew the potential of the premise.
"Cold Promise" is a really awful pun on Lowell Thomas, Fox Movietone News commentator, who also worked as a newsman for CBS, NBC and chronicled Lawrence of Arabia back during World War I.
ReplyDeleteSince this cartoon was basically some leftover gags and re-used animation from "She Was An Acrobat's Daughter" (with a little bit of "The Lone Stanger and Porky thrown in), I suppose they needed an awful pun to replace the "Who Dehr" (Lew Lehr) characture from the first cartoon.