Tuesday 13 February 2018

Phone-y Disguise

Ten-Pin Terrors (1953) features some good animation (the bulldog bowling at the start, Jeckle tapping his fingers against the bathtub at the end), nice backgrounds and a solid story.

One gag I particularly like is when the magpies disguise themselves as candlestick phones in a phone booth to get away from the angry dog. Here are some frames as the dog answers each phone (the third one is a real one; the operator tells him his two minutes are up).



Incidentally, an in-house paper called 20th Century Dynamo of April 18, 1953 not only announced Ten-Pin Terrors and other coming releases but also talked about bonuses given to branches in Canada and the U.S. that booked Terrytoons. The article is a wonderful piece of spin, saying how revenue for Terrytoons in the first quarter was below that of the previous quarter (and 1.6% from the previous year) and only 11 of 38 booking departments qualified for bonuses but things were looking up! Canadians evidently loved Terrytoons, as Vancouver, St. John, New Brunswick and Calgary all finished in the top ten.

5 comments:

  1. Are we to assume that there is a definitive answer to as to who was Heckle and who was Jeckle?

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    Replies
    1. Yes, they were identified in at least one cartoon.

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  2. Heckle is the one who was circumcised.

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  3. Heckle has the Brooklyn accent, Jeckle has the falsetto voice.

    The print of "Ten Pin Terrors" currently in circulation is missing a scene: After the bulldog breaks the chocolate syrup bottles on the bar with the billiard balls, H & J use the syrup along with whipped cream to disguise themselves as shuffling Uncle Toms to get away.

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  4. The phone booth scene was animated by Jim Tyer. I always remember that Jeckle has an English accent by remembering Dr. Jekyll from the novel:Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. Dr. Jekyll was an English doctor.

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