068 Nick's Coffee Pot

1939 Number: 068
Title: Nick's Coffee Pot
Studio: Terry
Date: 5/19/39
Credits: -
Series: -
Running time (of viewed version): 5:44

Synopsis: A new diner opens, a spider is rejected from it, so he absconds with a fly, until his boat is sunk and he drowns.




















Comments: Second cartoon in a row where the female is taken away by a big hairy male. Yet another jitterbug cartoon (based on lyrics and bugs; no one actually jitterbugs). This opening title is from Barker Bill's Cartoon Show, which ran on CBS from 1953 to 1956 twice a week for 15 minutes each; this led to CBS buying Terrytoons. There's a nice NYWF sign, replacing the trylon and perispehere with asparagus and meatball. Something about this overall cartoon feels earlier than '39. Now we'd expect this to be about a coffee shop, but it's more like a diner... I'm not sure if the general intention was to comment on restaurants that looked like things or not. The spider goes down with the ship with Al Jolson's "mammy". The spider is yet another instance of Jimmy Durante-ism. I assume the "No Spiders Allowed" followed the general form of race based exclusion signs.

067 Wotta Nitemare

Title: Wotta Nitemare
Studio: Fleischer
Date: 5/19/39
Credits:
Directed by
Dave Fleischer
Animated by
Aillard Bowsky
George Germanetti
Series: Popeye
Running time (of viewed version): 7:21

Synopsis: Popeye dreams Olive prefers Bluto, and then unreasonably beats up Bluto in the real world.























Comments: Sleeping Popeye looks like a skin demon, but it's because it turns out it's his feet. This Popeye looks redder than usual in the first sequence (he's still black and white, but I get the impression he's red. Lucky Pierre Bluto is the great god Pan (I'd say the Krampus except he doesn't have a switch or a sack), fooling around with winged Victory Olive. OK, maybe I'm overthinking it, but isn't that what people do to dreams? The cartoon is cheapened by spending more than bookend times in the real (to Popeye) world instead of the interesting dream land (even if it is reminiscent of the sixth season of Lost). Air heads are cool. For some reason, Wimpy eats a big bowl of slop instead of the big plate of hamburgers. There are a couple of shots of Bluto with his eyes wide open, which explains why characters in the cartoon don't tend to show much of the whites of their eyes. Popeye's tongue is out while being strangled as if he were in one of the Lantz Mello Dramas (or a Thai closet). Popeye is pulling some sort of short, curly, black hair from his mattress and is eating it like spinach in his sleep. When eating handfuls of pubic hair, Popeye does not need spinach, he just needs to suckerpunch Bluto when he is caught unaware.
(Jerry Beck's commentary mentions this is the first Popeye cartoon without a Seegar credit, and that it's one of four 1939 Popeyes with non ship titles.)

Addition: Wotta Nitemare poster:

066 Donald's Cousin Gus

Title: Donald's Cousin Gus
Studio: Disney
Date: 5/19/39
Credits: None listed on print
Series: Donald Duck
Running time (of viewed version): 7:32

Synopsis: Donald's cousin Gus comes by and eats and eats and eats and cannot be gotten rid of.















Comments: A big fat idiot cartoon. Big fat idiot cartoons generally suck, and this is no exception. Gus is incapable of speech. One would normally expect him, in the context of speaking-Donald, to be on the menu, or at best a companion animal like Pluto. However, he is a tool user, so apparently that's the test for sentience (or perhaps citizenship) in the Disney universe, not speech. The pea sucking scene is good. Donald keeps joke hot dogs to get rid of guests, but he seems to simply discover them (and reads the tag aloud like a '60s Lantz cartoon) instead of knowing they were there. There's a bit when Gus is eating a spaghetti sock that sounds like Donald is saying "Clever, these Chinese". The captions claim it's "Clever, this child is". However, a Google search for "clever, these chinese" comes up with almost 30,000 hits (earliest on the first page was the title of a story in 1925), as opposed to the clean Yoda version, which only came up with 3 hits, none stand-alone. And there was a 1939 Hoagy Carmichael/Johnny Mercer song called "Darn Clever These Chinese" (tho it wasn't copyrighted until December, so they probably just share a common source in the preexisting saying). The fictional subtitles probably helped to allow the cartoon to pass without too much interference. If taken literally of course, it means either Donald or part of his family is Chinese... The incessant goopy music is irritating in many of the Disney films of the time, including this one.