Wednesday 16 December 2015

Santa's Workshop, 1932

Walt Disney switched from Christmas comic violence in 1931 (Mickey’s Orphans) to Christmas charming musicality the following year. The biggest gag in Santa’s Workshop was a doll being scared by a spider so her messy hair will stand on end to be put through a permanent wave machine. He’s not being shot in the butt by cats smaller than a mouse like in the Mickey cartoon the year before. But there’s lots of colour to dazzle people’s minds away from the lack of a story, some nice early ‘30s settings and plenty of characters marching (or doing other stuff) to fill the screen.



Compare the two shots below. One is from Santa’s Workshop and the other is from The Night Before Christmas, released in December 1933.



Read more about the cartoon and see it at Devon Baxter’s post on Cartoon Research.

2 comments:

  1. "Santa's Workshop" seams to have a better detailed moon (the backdrop invokes a more majestic feel), but the reindeer are recycled.

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    1. Is is actually not a moon, but a ''midnight sun''. But is looks more majestic in the first picture indeed!

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