Friday 31 May 2013

277. Busy Bakers (1940)

Warner cartoon no. 276.
Release date: February 10, 1940.
Series: Merrie Melodies.
Supervision: Ben Hardaway and Cal Dalton.
Producer: Leon Schlesinger.
Starring: Mel Blanc (Eldery Elf/Cross-Eyed Elf).
Story: Jack Miller.
Animation: Richard Bickenbach.
Musical Direction: Carl W. Stalling.
Sound: Treg Brown (uncredited).
Synopsis: A baker is already near bankrupt and is facing closure, although with the help of elves, the bakery is back to business.


Last cartoon which was directed by Ben Hardaway and Cal Dalton, prior Freleng's return in April 1939, who took over their unit, and the pair given demotions: Cal Dalton returning to animation, and Ben Hardaway given the Head of Story Department position, although didn't hold that position for very long.

Cartoon begins with a local village set at night. Ironically, not one light seems to be off in every window that shows the village from the Art Loomer backgrounds. The shot features some brief sign gags contributed from Ben Hardaway, which appears to be a trait of his--with one sign that shows the bakery is facing closure: 'We Can't Complain About Business--There Ain't None!!'.


Meanwhile inside the bakery; the main baker: The baker, Swenson is pacing around the shop. He appears to take out a measurement for the barrels, where the camera trucks in to already indicate to the audience, through communication it's empty.

He walks over towards the cashier to check for any profits the bakery has made. To make it appear gag-wise; a tin of canned tomatoes indicate his 'profits' aren't shown as real money (i.e. bottle cap, button, etc), which is a dark for a gag, since Melancholy Mood is  the music cue. Meanwhile; a elderly blind man walks into a store, where the baker believes he has a customer. He asks for any dimes to spare; although the baker could only offer him a doughnut. After almost a whole minute of just drama with no gags, we get a rather odd blessing from the blind man, as he leaves.

Meanwhile, the supposed elderly blind man then leaves the store, as he rushes back towards his headquarters. He dashes all the way towards a windmill, where he changes out of his disguise, and warns the other elves, sleeping in bed--one of the elves is a Henry Binder caricature. He starts off with the basic warning, that is store is facing closure.

Jack Miller, probably directed from Hardaway/Dalton is engaged with some rhyming couplets, that feel Disney-ish. An example is shown where the main elf warns: 'The store is empty, he hasn't a crust / we must work fast, or he'll go bust!'.

All the other elves then scamper out of their beds to get changes as they are to head over towards Swenson's Bakery. One of the elderly elves then looks over towards a sleepy Swenson where he is lying on his desk, which means the coast is clear.

As Swenson is asleep and they enter inside the bakery shop; the elderly elf reminds the others: 'Must work fast before he wakes / and fill his store with pies and cakes!'. The elves then begin with the bakery, and as if the cartoon could get any worse--the elves start to sing the song The Happy, Slappy Little Baker Man. The chorus singers are terribly irritating to listen to, its insufferable, and painfully unentertaining.

During the song sequence; the voices from the elves singing (as well as making the recipes) really do not entertain the sequences, and the baking gags are certainly not funny. The cross-eyed baker where he has his head by a frying pan is only just obnoxious, though I believe that's Blanc's voice really sped up there, and the comic timing is very sloppy in these Hardaway-Dalton cartoons.


Not too sure who is providing much of the voices of the other elves, although it sounds like much of them were sped up, especially the Colonna elf; whose voice impersonation just sounds off-key. The elderly elf is also seen a shot where he puts all the ingredients together to help bake the recipe.

After the sequence, it's all just gag-after-gag; where you will find virtually no surprises coming up whatsoever, and it all just runs down together. A Harpo Marx-type elf runs into the scene, dropping the cake; and flips the other side. To add to a really corny gag, he pins a sign on top reading 'Upside down cake'. The gag itself has no charm, and just unfocused.

Meanwhile, there is a elf baker who pulls out a can which contains the pumpkin. Whilst the gag is similar to that of Avery's Cinderella Meets Fella where the Fairy Godmother pulls out a pumpkin from a can, you still just got to admire the sound effects by Treg Brown, who just knew how to add weight to a physical gag, even if it was very gag.

Obvious to the fact he has pulled out an enormous, rounded pumpkin; it takes him a while to know the pumpkin isn't flat or squished to be prepared for a pumpkin pie. To solve the problem, he grabs a mallet where the pumpkin splats and also splatters on his clothes and face.

Whilst it could work as a gag, the comic timing for that part is just flat. More baking scenes appear where there is a baker making some doughnuts and uses a pumper to pump up the flattened doughnuts, and another elf just sprays chocolate icing over the doughnuts. Seriously, these gag sequences are just extremely weak. In fact, even 8 years olds have a better understanding on how a good gag work, and would even criticise such poor pacing in this cartoon.

The next sequence does so happens to be one of those slow-paced pointless gags where a character comes in a sticky situation, and attempt to figure out how to solve the problem, but still come to failure. This results where a cross-eyed baker is rolling the dough with his rolling pin..the rolling pin ends up stuck on the dough.

The rolling pin is very sticky, and he attempts to pull it out physically, although the weight is trapped inside the dough that it is too strong to pull off. However, this does work except he falls off the table with the rolling pin clashing on top of his head.

It gets extremely even more pointless where the baker just attempts to whack the dole; and yet the dough retaliates. For such a crappy cartoon, this sort of exaggeration just doesn't work in that environment. The dough then forms into a hand and prods the baker in the eye, and then they battle one another on top of the table. Virtually humourless, and also known as padding in that cartoon.

With Little Dutch Plate played in the background; the baker then folds the piece of dough as he has already swept it with jelly. He then folds it up like folding a piece of carpet. However, the carpet then unrolls itself, once he has reached the top and then ends up being flattened from the jam roll. Just by watching that scene, these are gags that Disney would even laugh at.

After just an entire string of gags, that I couldn't take any longer, Swenson finally wakes up from the rumpus, thank God, as he walks over to investigate the activity occurring in his kitchen. The elves discover he has approached the kitchen and then rush out of the scene.

Swenson is completely baffled from all the activity occurring his kitchen, but moments later, a doorbell rings where the entire village see all different kinds of bakery in display which persuades to purchase the food.

In a conversative looking crowd shot, the whole crowd are waving their money in the shop, desperate to purchase some of the bakes. Hardaway and Dalton, whose never been very daring in their film techniques, use the following shots as a montage success for Swenson; which is relevant at best for the sequence, despite the atrocity the directors have already given us.

After a series of montage from the success of Swenson on that night, he finds the amount of cash that have poured on his desk and he piles up the money with glee. Meanwhile the same elderly blind man (disguised as the elderly elf) walks into the bakery store, and asks: 'Could you spare a poor, hungry man a few crumbs of bread?'. He hands over the pie towards the elderly man where he thanks him.


Just as the elderly man walks out of the bakery store, closes the door and then walks away. Swenson then steps out of his own store, where he shouts out towards the elderly man: "Hey, mister! I forgot to tell you there's a five-cent deposit on the pie tin!".

Love the fact that he is trying to use his hand for the 'five-cents' gesture, when in the cartoon world: he only has four fingers. Doesn't see work out too well when it comes to personality animation. The pie is then tossed straight towards his face, where he finishes with the closing line "That's gratitude for ya!", as the cartoon ends.

Overall comments: Which much of my comments mentioned throughout the review, this is a particular cartoon from the era prior Friz Freleng's return to the studio that I love to hate. The gags are just extremely flat, and the bakery sequences extremely run together badly. This short is a great example for poor structure as well as pacing. It has a terrible build up, where we find in the opening--the baker is bankrupt, and then the elves make a attempt to save the store: which follows by a lame sequence of baking the food; then success for the baker: and concludes with that ridiculous one-liner gag at the end. Shows how the cartoon, itself, wasn't worth it. Being the final Hardaway/Dalton cartoon, I suppose that the two directors weren't expecting it to be their by the time Friz Freleng returned to the Studio in April 1939.

As already mentioned, Dalton was still working in the same unit, but as a animator; and according to the 'Exposure Sheet' issue 5--it was a position he already loved...whilst Ben Hardaway took the demotion pretty hardly, at least according to Martha Sigall. He was, however, given the position as Head of the Story department, where he would work on a few shorts, before his departure in January 1940 for Lantz. Nevertheless, it was evidently all for the greater good. With Freleng's return to the Studio, the cartoons released from the previous year finally pick up the pace again, and the Studio desperately needed Friz Freleng back to help reform the WB cartoons, in terms of comic timing, as well as humour...which Freleng does.

Wednesday 29 May 2013

276. Ali-Baba Bound (1940)

starring PORKY
Warner cartoon no. 275.
Release date: February 10, 1940.
Series: Looney Tunes.
Producer: Leon Schlesinger.
Starring: Mel Blanc (Porky Pig/Baby Dumpling/Suicide Squad/Man at Gas Station/Bomber)
Story: Melvin Millar.
Animation: Vive Risto.
Musical Direction: Carl W. Stalling.
Sound: Treg Brown (uncredited).
Synopsis: Porky is sent on a mission to stop the attacks of Ali Baba and his troops from attacking a fortress.

A preface card of the cartoon's location takes place in the Sahara Desert; where Tubby Millar notes in a ridiculously corny and bad one-liner: 'Where it is so hot the fan dancers use electric fans'. Meanwhile out in the Sahara desert, it starts off as how it would usually look: dry, sandy and empty.

Then the camera quickly pans to a gas station, with neon-lights reading 'The Oasis', where Clampett and his crew are satirising names of clubs as well as linking the word to a isolated area in a desert.

Meanwhile over at the Brown Turban nightclub (a pretty obvious spoof of the Brown Derby, don't you think?)..Porky walks out of the club singing The Girlfriend of a Whirling Dervish--and for some reason, Blanc's voice isn't sped up for those scenes, which does sound rather odd for a viewer listening. In a quick pan to the left, we find a particular spy loitering by a palm tree in secrecy. The spy is shown as a caricature of George Raft, and there's a little gag Clampett hyperbolises where he is flipping a coin with his feet, which is a direct reference to one of Raft's most famous films: Scarface.

Whilst Porky walks past the George Raft spy; the spy then whispers a 'psst' for Porky's attention. Porky, makes a take from the whisper and walks backwards to discover. The spy, then signals him to be quiet, and reveals from his cloak a secret message ballot..I guess the ballot idea was supposed to be a gag.

Porky reads the letter and discovers a message from the spy, notice the film reference to the 1939 motion picture: Confessions of a Nazi Spy written as Confessions of a Nasty Spy.

Prior America entering World War II, altering the title to 'nasty' would of course, be relevant for that matter, even though they both have a negative connotation, of course. Porky reads the message and discovers the legionnaire criminal: Ali-Baba and his Dirty-Sleeves (referencing the famous Arabian legend: Ali Baba) are planning to attack the Desert Fortress. The letter turns out to be signed by the 'Tattle Tale' Guy. Porky gets a reaction from the letter, and rushes off to save the day, before rushing back to the spy to thank him, and quotes Joe Penner, 'Ya nahaaaaasty spy!', were Penner's original quote was 'Ya naaaaaasty man!'.

Porky then rushes off an a attempt to save the day and stop the attacking from occurring. 'And I thought Ali Baba and his Dirty Sleeves were washed up!' stutters Porky. Meanwhile, Porky stops and finds a 'U-Drive' store where you can hire camels. Porky walks in to hire a camel.


He reads the sign of a small camel who is labelled as Kiddy Kar. He picks the baby camel as a choice to stop the attack on the foreign fortresses. Without paying the price yet, he already decides to start off riding the camel as he climbs on top, although slides off the humps, and back on the camel's back again.

Particularly very cutesy gags for Porky, although Treg Brown's sound effects at least make an attempt and help make it a little funnier, even if weak. The next scene shows some neat timing by Clampett which syncs in wonderfully to the notorious song The Streets of Cairo to the camel walking out of the rental store.

Meanwhile out at the legion's headquarters, Porky arrives at the spot, although notices a note on the door. The note is written by a 'General De Livery' who wrote a note to any messenger that he has gone to a legion convention all the way in Boston.

No gag written on the letter, except for a rather weird and silly regard at the end reading 'Loves and kisses' which is amusing as it just looks unprofessional and camp. After reading the note, Porky is relieved: 'And I was worried about those days'.

Pan to the left, we find the real Ali-Baba spying on Porky by using beer bottles as binoculars. To avoid any tension and fearfulness of the character: Blanc just delivers a dog voice which Clampett asked for, to add weight to the caption under Ali Baba's name in the screen: The Mad Dog of the Desert. Clampett comes up with a unique visual gag, which is cleverly animated, of Ali Baba whistling with his fingers which briefly turn into a whistle.

Meanwhile as Porky and the camel walk away from the fortress, which is not in use, charging straight towards them are Ali Baba's tribe charging straight towards them...if you think the African cannibals from Buddy of the Apes has been overused, well, this has been taken from the morgue and one of the animators in Clampett's unit reanimates it.

Porky then makes a turn to escape from the thieves as they dash out of the scene. Porky and the camel already encounter a dash of mud; Clampett interrupts the pacing of the action and music for tiptoeing through the mud, and then back to action.

The sort of action Clampett and the other WB directors loved, to test the audience's attention span. Porky and the camel quickly rush back inside the fortress where the thieves have the complete fortress surrounded. Porky closes the door and locks it tightly. However, the thieves are already attempting to break into the door with one particular thief using headache pills to help break the door open. Ouch.

A lot of the attacking sequence all relies on gag dumping, where its all a string of gags, with absolutely no character personality flowing through the cartoon, and it results in short attention spans. Porky grabs out a shotgun and aims towards at one of the thiefs, although every time he fires, the gun turns floppy.

Each gag is unfunny and slow, and this is a good example to show that Clampett isn't showing any reform in his own cartoons. More gags included show the thieves aiming inside the fortress like a strength tester.

Meanwhile, outside where the attacking is occurring: a thief with a bomber strapped on top of his head is cheerleading on the fighting that's going on, and is seated as a substitute. Blanc's delivery is rather amusing, as it usually is, although the gag itself is a little overused in some of the earlier 1930s cartoons.

Meanwhile there is another thief who then attempts to climb up a fortress, by climbing and jumping up like a cat would. Whilst at the top of the fortress, Porky just knocks the thief down with a mallet. Instead of a fighting back with violence, the thief just turns into a attitude of a depressed labour worker holding out a sign reading: 'This fort UNFAIR to Arabs!'..which is mildly amusing, where he just tames immediately from the point of anger.

In the next sequence; the cornered Baby Dumpling who is standing rather meekly by the war: to create tension; a shadow of a thief with a dagger is pointing towards Baby Dumpling, and also kills him within an inch of his life. The baby camel then grabs out a horn which shouts out 'Help!' with the way Mel Blanc would usually deliver it.

Meanwhile over at the camel rental place; the words 'HELP' occur to her mind; until the words pop out of the scene. She realises that Baby Dumplings is in trouble and leaves her spot and rushes on her way towards the fortress to save her baby camel.

She also hops along the way which makes the characteristic hop very funny. During her journey towards the fortress; the mother camel pauses; and then hops back over to a local gas station in the desert.

The cartoon continues to get bonkers where a guy is filling the camel with gas, inside the camel's hump. An awful lot of the writing of the cartoon just runs together, especially the 'gas' sequence which just shows an awful lot of padding. The inside of the camel's humps appear, as the engine inside is functioning, and the camel can resume the rescue, although travel at such speed. As he breaks inside the fortress, Ali Baba has Porky and Baby Dumpling cornered. The camel then charges straight across his rear end where he falls out the scene. Clampett is obviously not very ambitious with any wackiness in any of those scenes, and the timing of being booted is rather conservative and disappointing.

After Ali-Baba and all of his troops have been booted out of the fortress, all controlled by the mother camel, and Porky--the substitute troop is the last one in line to attack the fortress.

In his goofy mode, with the bullet strapped towards his head, he then makes way to charge straight towards the fortress with a powerful bullet on his head to blow up the fortress.

Whilst he is charging straight towards the fortress, Porky opens the door, and discovers that he is in danger from the bullet, and quickly opens the door as a result. The substitute thief charges at the bullet shouting out 'Beep, beep' continuously. As he continues to charge, the other camels open the door to make way for the bullet to attack Ali Baba and his followers by accident. The final gag ends with the bullet striking the organisation, where they turn into tents, and the sign turning into: Ali Baba's Auto Camp.

Overall comments: Compared to Clampett's last effort in Africa Squeaks, in this cartoon, he is more or less back to square one again. This time Melvin Millar is writing the story for this cartoon, and
his output is about as weak as Clampett's other Porky cartoons are in that period. Explaining the weakness of the cartoon is almost as similar to repeating myself about his previous efforts, but I'll go through it again. Much of Clampett's gags in the attack are just too unoriginal and flat. Clampett doesn't encounter anything daring to do in production, and throws throws in a lot of mild gags that it all runs down together as a cartoon. Much of the gags are just padded like the gas station sequence, which just doesn't juice into the cartoon very well. Watching Clampett's own comic timing (and gags)--you just know that despite his frustrations with the pig, his attitude just got lazy, and he isn't even trying to come out with something outrageous gagwise.

He also had used battle sequences before in earlier cartoons like What Price, Porky which did have funny gags as well as great timing, whilst here it is lacking the spirit.The gag with the substitute bomber was probably the only amusing part of the cartoon as a mode, and to resemble Clampett's own charm. However, I did particularly like the sequence prior to the attacks with the George Raft spy; which showed some media appeal in that particular sequence. It's also the 2nd Porky cartoon where he is seen defending a foreign fortress; although the previous cartoon Little Beau Porky, has him working in a fortress, whereas Porky is just a mere messenger in the cartoon, and ends up victimised into this. Clampett couldn't have much better accomplishments to do with Porky, and either uses him in less screen time of the cartoon, or just victimise Porky in battles, due to his frustrations.

Tuesday 28 May 2013

275. Mighty Hunters (1940)


Jimmy Swinnerton's 
CANYON KIDDIES.
'through courtesy of the'
GOOD HOUSEKEEPING MAGAZINE.

Warner cartoon no. 274.
Release date: January 27, 1940.
Series: Merrie Melodies.
Supervision: Chuck Jones.
Producer: Leon Schlesinger (uncredited).
Starring: Shepperd Strudwick (Narrator).
Story: Dave Monahan.
Animation: Ken Harris.
Backgrounds: Jimmy Swinnerton (uncredited).
Musical Direction: Carl W. Stalling.
Sound: Treg Brown (uncredited).
Synopsis: Based on the Canyon Kiddies, a group of children living under the Grand Canyon explore and play around the Canyon.

A animated short where Chuck Jones intended to go ambitious in terms of its artistic style, whereas the comic timing, as well as the story, misadventures, etc. are all the same in terms of Chuck's earlier efforts, although here he is adapting a well-known comic-strip by James Swinnerton. Here, Chuck Jones and Leon Schlesinger travelled to Arizona in early 1939, where Chuck and his unit were on a trip to visit the Canyon in search and to feel inspired for the locations for the cartoon, as indicated on a Exposure Sheet magazine, much thanks to the courtesy of Jerry Beck. Chuck and his unit were also reported to have visited some old Indians who lived in the Canyon areas.

For a cartoon that proved to be ambitious for Warner Bros. artistically, Schlesinger hired Jimmy Swinnerton to help contribute and paint backgrounds for Chuck Jones' cartoon, which Jimmy agreed to do. As reported before, more than 50 backgrounds in this cartoon were painted by Swinnerton. As indicated from the Schlesinger 1939 gag reel, there were also several Indians who were hired to play the canyon drums which were conducted by Carl Stalling himself. Also, this is the only pre-1956 cartoon to be Blue Ribboned with its original titles.

The camera fades in to a beautiful background scenario of the Grand Canyon; I believe this was most likely painted by Jimmy Swinnerton. The narrator then begins his introduction towards the audience, with some minor exposition of the canyon kids, who lived in the caved canyons of Arizona for millions of years.

With that mentioned, this also comes directly from Chuck's Arizona trip experience with old Indian residents of the canyons. The narrator continues onwards, where the Indians were descripted as wild:

'A fierce tribe of wild Indians. So savage were these ferocious warriors. That the very birds and animals of the forest, fled in terror when the deep, throbbing sound of their war drums filled the air'. Just as Carl Stalling's beautiful music score plays in the background, the narrator breaks the forth wall, and directs the audience. '

'I think I can hear the sounds of their drums now. Listen!'. The sounds of the drums playing start off quietly before they are heard much more loudly. Deep down the canyon; some light can be viewed below the distance.

Some great Swinnerton backgrounds, and Chuck uses a beautifully elongated silhouettes which create a illusion in perception of the size; a beautiful technique that Chuck rarely used; even though it greats such suspense, and we are already introduced to the canon kids. The shadows of the canyon kids continue their dance, with the shadows that add suspense--the real canyon kids are a lot smaller in comparison as they dance around the fire.

In the next range of shots; Chuck focuses on each shot, the activities of the canyons, such as the canyon girls tapping on their tom-toms. Chuck's character designs of the canyon girls, appear to stand out like Chinese dolls, judging their facial looks.

Cute, charming gags are in order; particularly with dogs, who also reside at the canyon, with a puppy wagging his tail, which hits each tom-tom to create rhythm--as well as a canyon kid whacking a sleeping dog's belly with a percussion mallet.

A Indian Boy uses a club to whack firmly at a tom-tom; attempting to create rhythm. Chuck's timing in those original scenes are slow, but also syrupy fun, and is paced leisurely. After the individual scenes, Chuck builds up the pace slightly faster by speeding up the original animated shots (minus the puppy scene); and it all finishes when the little Indian boy whacks at the tom-tom; although ends up breaking the top part, and is caught inside the tom-tom.

The kids rush outside for some adventure exploring; as the sun has already risen. As the kids all rush through the homes; an unseen mother raises her hand out of the door to grab the Indian boy, whose given the job to look after his younger brother in a papoose. All of the kids continue to rush deep down the Grand Canyon, including the boy with the papoose, and the kid, still stuck inside the tom-tom.

The canyon boy stuck in the tom-tom, trips and rolls down the path of the canyon. The drum continues to roll, until the tom-tom hits a rock, and brakes.

The boy steps out of the broken tom-tom, and steps out of the tom-tom, although tipping it over. Although this is Chuck going at his syrupy pace, he takes what he can with the sequence, where he uses some personality animation of the boy tipping the tom-tom over, and tripping. Then the Indian boy rushes over in a attempt to catch up with the other canyon kids, who are rushing down with excitement. He makes a complete top, at a edge of the canyon, knowing he could fall to his death. Watching the kids run deeper down the canyon, the boy looks around; and with glee: he finds a donkey chewing on some cactus. Before any fandom readers raise any eyebrows, do donkeys eat cactus? Yes, wild donkeys in the desert do.

The boy rushes over towards the donkey eating cactus, and makes an attempt to ride the donkey, by using cowboy manoeuvres, which creates some charming, personality animation. The boy makes an attempt to push the donkey's behind to make the mule move, as Chuck and Monahan underplays the whole 'stubborn as a mule' simile.

After a big step back, the boy's attempt to push the donkey fails, and finds himself being sat on by the mule, and the mule's tail wriggles around the boy's face. Considering how the character designs are delicately drawn, Chuck appears to have a hard time with the expressions on the boy's face, as they're drawn rather conservatively.

Slow-paced sequence? Sure. Chuck already shows an attempt to charm the audience with a Disney-esque sequence as, of course, they were a hit from audiences watching Disney shorts, but Chuck just hasn't learned the ropes of comic timing yet, as 1940 was too early a year for when fast-action came to be.

Carl Stalling's music for the sequence stands out far better than Chuck's timing, as well as the gag development of the scene. Whenever, a sequence such as this being tepid, Stalling still manages to bring charm in the music, by developing that music cue which is underscored throughout the donkey sequences in the cartoon. Familiar amongst fans? Of-course; being Stalling's own music cue: he used it several more times in cartoons like Calling Dr. Porky, Kiss Me Cat and Cheese Chasers.

The next sequence, two other canyon kids climb on top of a cliff located elsewhere in the canyon; as they climb up in search for hunting for animals. Jimmy Swinnerton paints a beautiful pictorial shot of the canyon kids on top of the edge, where the backgrounds of  the Grand Canyon (as well as the horizon) show a beautiful effect on it.

Chuck also uses some unique staging to spice up the sequence, and save it from boring an audience with its pacing. One kid spots a squirrel up in a tree, and makes an attempt to shoot towards it with a bow & arrow. The squirrel notices he is being spotted, and gulps with fright.

The facial expression on the squirrel's face is pure Chuck, and juices it in animation wonderfully. The squirrel runs towards the other side from the hole of the tree trunk, and ends up cornered from the other Indian boy.

The squirrel pulls out another priceless expression on his face, where it registers nerves, and it looks completely human in a cartoony way. The squirrel dashes inside the hole, and the Indian boy places his bow & arrow closer inside the tree; however the squirrel finds himself standing on top of the arrow. The Indian boy lets go of the arrow with a surprise, and the arrow shoots towards a branch, vibrating. The squirrel looks at the boys, and scampers off. Chuck shows a good sense of emotions in the sequences, particularly the facial expressions, which still charm the viewer from watching the padding.

Back to the sequence with the donkey and the boy, the donkey is still seated on top of the boy, although the donkey stands back up and continues to eat the cactus. The Indian boy, then walks over in front, attempting to think of an idea of how to move the donkey. Continuing to waste his time, other than continue climbing down the canyon; he think of an idea.

He continues with his attempts and thinking thoroughly, just like what Pluto or an early Goofy would do. He pretty much uses the same plan which he used the first time, by jumping on top of the donkey's back again, except he slides off.

The attempt happens again, where the boy jumps back onto the donkey's back, although ends up clinging onto the donkey's neck. The result ends up with the donkey happily licking the boy's face.

Meanwhile, climbing up the paths of the canyon: an Indian boy carrying his brother in a papoose is walking upwards for some adventures. Again, Chuck also focuses on some much more unique staging in terms of layout; as well as animation-wise. As the bear sniffs out for a intruder, Chuck goes ahead with a point of view shot, animated in perspective, and its rather effective, where the baby is carrying a candy stick. The bear looks at the candy with delight.

Already back to the donkey and boy sequence, it has already reached its position where it gets too repetitive, although this sequence is showing an attempt in causing the donkey to move.

Just like the Mynah bird, Chuck uses the donkey in that sequence where he is supernatural, and its promising for Chuck in that period, as he would go on to create Road Runner, who is his most famous supernatural creation.

Chuck also uses the Indian boy, in comparison towards other assiduous, though unsuccessful characters such as the Coyote and Inki. Back to the boy with the papoose; the bear follows their track as the bear is mostly eager in licking the candy stick from the baby. The baby whacks the bear in the nose with the candy stick as a result. The Indian boy tells the baby to hush whilst on a hunting adventure.

Already from the start of the introduction of the bear sequence; Chuck shows some arrangements of all the characters, but paced quickly before reaching the pinnacle of its climax in the story. The climax already arrives, when the two Indian hunters scurry behind a rock; as a bear is following the Indian boy with the papoose.

Through a series of close-up shots; the two Indian boys, and the other indian boy communicate towards each other..all without dialogue. Chuck knew exactly what he was doing, whereas hand gestures are absolutely key in the character animation of the Indian kids.

 The two Indian boys point towards the Indian boy of a bear behind him. The boy turns and notices the bear behind him. In a long-shot; Chuck displays tenseness where they slowly walk backwards from the approaching bear.

Up to the point where they reach the end of the cliff: the climax is already at its peak; as the two indian boys hang on to each other as well as the edge of the cliff.

The point of view shot of the Grand Canyon at the bottom; presents a good case in how the kids are at peril with the bear, and the likeliness of falling. With the Indian boy with the papoose in trouble, the bear makes an attempt to grab the candy stick; that Chuck displays in a point of view, the struggles of reaching the candy. In what is supposed to temporarily shock the audience, the bear falls off the edge of the cliff; believing he has fallen to his death. However, it turns out the bear has landed safely on a tree branch licking the candy stick from the baby, and enjoying the taste of it.

The canyon kids climbs back on top of the edge of the cliff, where they flee back from underneath, and back to their homes. In the concluding shots, the backgrounds, most likely painted by Swinnerton, display a beautiful atmosphere of the kids running away, and the backgrounds also give a sense of beauty of the canyon; as to what it looks like in real life.

As the evening dusk gets pinker, the narrator arrives back in to conclude the cartoon. The sky is then saturated and adjusted to pink clouds, and then to darkness.

The narrator narrates the conclusion of the day, whereas we view a shot of the canyon kids asleep in their homes, and the animals are safe for the night, and the canyon at peace. In the final shot, we see the last throwback of the donkey gag, where it shows the kid is still bothered and tugs the donkey, and still fails.

Overall comments: For a typical Warner Bros. fan, this may not occur to you as a cartoon with many merits, or just the same pattern as many of Jones' early cartoons. In terms of the plotless cartoon, which focus on the Canyon kids out on their adventures, and leading themselves into danger--this is no breakthrough for Jones, when it comes to story, and will agree it is just as similar to his other earlier efforts. Artistically, this is a new level for Jones. To begin with, Chuck Jones shies away from his typical drawing style which is extremely noticeable in his cartoons from 1939; that looked rather similar to the character layouts he drew for Clampett. Chuck goes for a different approach, similar to what he used for Old Glory--although his character designs, that are strongly influenced by Swinnerston's Canyon Kiddies comic strips are extremely relevant for this cartoon. Swinnerton's own contributions towards the cartoon are also vital for the cartoon's rustic output; where he paints a sense of absolute beauty of the Canyon, that it stands out a lot more than the sequences of the film, and is able to paint a background of the canyon, almost as beautifully as though it was a photograph.

As for how the cartoon flows through, the cartoon pacing of the cartoon may be rather spotty in some parts, particularly the donkey scenes, although being clocked in at 8 and a half minutes: much of what was featured had to be included: (i.e.) the narrator's preface; as well as the introduction towards the canyon kids, and the epilogue scenes. The donkey and the boy sequences really do slow down the picture, and is featured a lot more throughout the other sequences, that the hunting characters aren't as important or displayed as often. However, Stalling uses the music cue as a remedy to help bring charm towards the sequence, as well as personality into the music. Nevertheless, Stalling's musical direction throughout the cartoon really add weight to the cartoon. Overall, this cartoon deserves a pass in my book. Other opinions of the cartoon may differ from my point of view, but this to me, shows a rare example of how delightful the Warner Bros. cartoons were wonderfully artistic in their early days; and how Chuck Jones already showed a lot of promise of being a sensational director. The artistic side of the cartoon also brings a nostalgic feel of the Golden-Age animation, and what isn't with us any longer.