The Chris Moeller Archives

Looniest Tunes

The Warner Brothers Merrie Melodies are still the best cartoons of all-time. These are my five favorites-- all seven-minute masterpieces. The second and fourth are in the National Film Registry. Enjoy! There are links!


For Scent-imental Reasons, 1949-- Shower habits are said to be more lax in France, but I don’t think that was the source of inspiration for Pepe Le Pew, that suave skunk of Paris instantly infatuated with the le purr of a lovely female cat accursed by a strip of fresh paint. Le Pew’s introductory episode in theaters in ’49 won its animators an Oscar, and the star won legions of admirers. The funniest moment of the short has recently been restored for most television airings in the U.S. after years of censorship. (When will broadcasters realize that these cartoons are meant for adults?) Driven to the brink of suicide over his unrequited love, Pepe points a pistol to his temple, and then the gun fires, off camera. Pepe’s panicked paramour relents at this extreme gesture and runs to his side. “I missed,” he confesses to her, “fortunately for you.”

One Froggy Evening, 1955-- This one and only short featuring Michigan J. Frog plays out like an episode of the Twilight Zone. During one of those urban renewal demolitions so au courant in the mid-‘50s, a construction worker discovers a living frog inside a time capsule that’s been dislocated from a building cornerstone. Documents in the box are dated 1892, and the ageless frog that emerges from it turns out to have multiple, and seemingly-marketable, theatrical skills-- singing, dancing, tightrope walking-- and even comes with little required overhead as he already has his own top hat and cane. Though the frog’s repertoire is a bit musty, even by mid-century standards, his talent is undeniable. The one inescapable problem is that the little green monster will only perform for the solitary audience of his new owner. This short has no spoken dialogue, the only verbalizing coming via the ragtime and Tin Pan Alley tunes croaked out by the Jolson-esque amphibian. Based on a true story.

Little Boy Boo, 1954-- My favorite Looney Tunes character, by a country mile, is Foghorn Leghorn. The most famous chicken on the Warner Brothers lot is a good ole’ country boy who dispenses down-home wisdom and simply will not stop talking. He wears boxers under his feathers and knows only some of the words to "Camptown Races." In Little Boy Boo, Foghorn is charged with making a man of the widow hen's bookish son, and the boy, I say boy, turns out to be the perfect comedy foil for the imperious, oversized rooster who prides himself on his innate intelligence, but who ruffles the feathers of almost everyone he meets.

Duck Amuck, 1953-- Do animators harbor secret resentment towards their more famous subjects? In Duck Amuck, the resentment is not very secret. In an early frame, Daffy Duck (in period costume as a musketeer that suggests he’s trying to broaden his dramatic range) literally runs out of background. In front of a white screen for the next six minutes, his unseen illustrator beyond the fourth wall puts him through torture, starting off with just embarrassing costume changes, but moving on to a plane crash, an ocean drop, and full amputation. Do you get the feeling that animator Chuck Jones had been called a “slop artist” one too many times during his life?

Woolen Under Where, 1963-- The decade-long battle between Ralph Wolf and Sam Sheepdog is remembered today mostly for its allegory. Through seven different shorts and 11 years, they danced the dance that wolves and sheepdogs must dance. Wolves have a biological imperative to try and steal any and all livestock they can carry off the farm, and sheepdogs are trained to protect sheep. But those two unfortunate—and unrelated—facts don’t mean that the two canines can’t still be friends after the work day has ended. Woolen Under Where is the last of the Ralph and Sam shorts, and by this episode, they have become roommates. They go to work together. They even help each other punch the clock. In the episode’s final Act, Ralph has aimed five cannons at Sam, along with a pair of rockets or short-range missiles, a loaded crossbow, a sword, and a sledgehammer. A guillotine waits to drop above Sam’s head, and the edge of the observation cliff has also been rigged to collapse beneath him. Below the ledge, a pool of alligators snaps hungrily in anticipation of the falling corpse. But once more, Ralph fails to get the master switch pulled in time. Perhaps tomorrow.

That's all folks.

posted by CM @ 9:22 PM