You Can't Go Home Again

Børge Ring called the above to my attention. It's a 2005 Tom and Jerry, co-directed by Joe Barbera. In some ways, it does a remarkably good job of duplicating the look and feel of the Hanna-Barbera Tom and Jerry cartoons of the 1940s and '50s. However, in other ways, it doesn't, and surrounded by those things that work, the lapses stand out even more.

Børge pointed out that Bill Hanna's timing just isn't there and that this cartoon inadvertently shows the importance of Hanna's contribution. He's right. For instance, the gag at 3:05 where Tom hurtles into the garbage truck is timed too slowly. Hanna never would have had the extended pause between Tom landing and the jaws closing. Furthermore, the jaws would have closed faster. That wouldn't have been true to life, but it would have been funnier.

Like the opening titles, a collision of Warner Bros. and MGM fonts, some of the character poses look to be from Warner Bros. rather than MGM. Jerry's look to the audience at 2:36 smacks of Chuck Jones. Jerry's pose at 1:36 has the look of a Robert McKimson cartoon. Tom's look to the camera at 3:26, with his eyes merging, is also more reminiscent of Warners.

The music can't compare to the exuberance of Scott Bradley's scores.

There are good things here. The characters stay on model. The animators have captured the way Tom scrambles off screen, including the subtle stretch in his mid-section, and have also captured the way Hanna and Barbera had characters shooting and rebounding into holds. As I said above, because so much of this is right, what's wrong stand out and that is why you can't go home again.

Revivals work in the theatre because the originals only exist in memory. There is no expectation that a revival will duplicate the look and feel of the original because the original is not there for comparison. In film and TV, though, the originals are not only there, they are often front and center, showing right next to attempts at a revival. The comparisons are inescapable.

Creative works are not only the product of people, they're also the products of a time and place. As the world keeps changing, it is impossible to recreate something from the past. While artists often wish to duplicate what they love, they can only approximate it. Paradoxically, the closer they get to it, the more they've succeeded in doing nothing more than an good imitation. And since the originals are everywhere to begin with, is an imitation necessary?

From a corporate standpoint, it's another cartoon to add to the library. From an artistic standpoint, it's a dead end. What could this budget and these creators, including 94 year old Joe Barbera, have come up with if they tried something new?

The Night Before Christmas

As there are only 359 days until Christmas, this seems like the appropriate time for this mosaic. The information on the animator draft, courtesy of Mark Kausler, can be found here and here. Click any of the images below to enlarge.

A Guilty Pleasure

A guilty pleasure is something that's not good (or good for you) but that you like anyway. I have to admit that early Van Beuren sound cartoons are a guilty pleasure of mine. No one would compare them to the animation produced by the best of American studios, but they are the definition of the word "quirky." While occasionally, there are well drawn or animated scenes, the majority of them are clumsy, but they are clumsy in a way that provokes amazement, disbelief and most of all, laughter.

Steve Stanchfield's Thunderbean Animation has now collected the complete Van Beuren Tom and Jerry. These are not the cat and mouse cartoons that most associate with the character names, they are a human, Mutt and Jeff-like pair who starred in cartoons from 1931 to 1933. Because of the name confusion, when the cartoons were released to the home movie market, they were renamed Dick and Larry. The Van Beuren studio went out of business in 1936, so the cartoons became orphans and slipped into the public domain. They have suffered from endless duping, editing and retitling until Stanchfield began restoring them.

What makes these crude cartoons entertaining is their randomness. There is little logic in the cartoons from 1931 and '32 especially. Characters do things without reason, so you never know what's going to happen next. Tom and Jerry are barely developed. They seem to have different voices in every cartoon and their personalities and relationships are perfunctory at best. Often, they seem to be bystanders in their own cartoons, watching other characters carry the story and action.

However, the cartoons are driven by Gene Rodemich's jazz soundtracks and the animation, though weightless, is funny. These characters and cartoons are not believable in any sense of the word, but they amuse me. Animation is one of the least spontaneous art forms, requiring enormous planning. These cartoons come closer to being spontaneous than any others I can think of; many appear to be made up drawing by drawing, with no thought to what comes next.

Why, in Barnyard Bunk (embedded below) is there a skeleton in the outhouse? Why do ducks hatch from chicken eggs? What strange compulsion drives the mouse with the "Danger" sign? Does it matter? The walk cycles and dancing in this cartoon are ludicrous, but they make me laugh. These days, animation is either overly refined (see just about any recent feature) or barely expressive (see any recent TV animation). Funny movement seems to be a forgotten art. (Wait a minute. I'm sounding like John K. here...) When Grim Natwick said that many a cartoon was saved by a funny walk, he could have been talking about these.

And these cartoons may have been more influential than they are credited for. The cartoon Rabid Hunters looks like a warm-up for Porky's Hare Hunt, the first proto-Bugs Bunny cartoon. The Haunted Ship (one of four Waffles and Don cartoons on the set as a bonus) contains a quartet of drunk turtles singing "Sweet Adeline," and I have to wonder if that influenced Tex Avery's drunken fish singing "Moonlight Bay" in Porky's Duck Hunt.

Steve Stanchfield has searched for years to find the best prints of these cartoons, going to great lengths to restore original titles and missing footage. The gem on this set is a beautiful copy of A Swiss Trick, transferred from a 35mm original. This two disk collection contains every Tom and Jerry cartoon, liner notes and rare publicity artwork. No one but Stanchfield would have gone to the lengths he has to show off these cartoons.

This is not the first time he's laboured to revive the Van Beuren cartoons. He's also compiled the complete Cubby Bear, the complete Little King and a set of Toddle Tales and Rainbow Parade cartoons from that studio. Stanchfield has also put together sets of TV commercials, World War II propaganda films and various other collections. You can order Thunderbean collections here. I recommend them all.

If you're not familiar with Tom and Jerry, enjoy Barnyard Bunk below. The copy on the DVD set is better than this version I took from YouTube.

Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Mouse Part 1

Watch Dr. Jekyll And Mr. Mouse - Tom and Jerry in Animation  |  View More Free Videos Online at Veoh.com






This cartoon is available on the DVD Tom and Jerry Spotlight Collection Volume 2. Mark Kausler's animator identifications come from his blog.