Spinning Wolf

Some intelligent animation fan once postulated that MGM’s Tex Avery wasn’t really making fun of Walt Disney with his Disney-esque cartoon openings (such as in Red Hot Riding Hood), he was making fun of MGM’s Hugh Harman and Rudy Ising.

That may be right.

Mind you, Hugh and Rudy had one goal—to make Disney-type cartoons. Lots of cute animals, scenes full of them, with one hopelessly helpless child or child-like character that gets rescued dramatically. Lots of animation on ones; let those lesser studios animate on twos (the same drawing is photographed for two frames of film). Lots of titles with “little” in them—Two Little Pups, The Little Mole, The Little Bantamweight, and Little Gravel Voice.

You or I could write the plot for Little Gravel Voice (released in 1942). A little donkey is rejected by all the other animals in the forest because of his noisy braying. Boo hoo hoo, he cries. But then a hungry wolf shows up. In Disneyland Harman-Ising-Land, wolves eat donkeys. This one can’t because he can’t handle the sound of the donkey.

Ah, what about all the other animals in the forest? I don’t need to tell you. You already know. No spoiler alerts are necessary here. The wolf goes for a little chipmunk cowering in a hole. But the altruistic donkey rushes to the rescue. Just as the wolf is about to grab the little creature, he senses the donkey, who now realises his gravelly braying will stop and completely unhinge the wolf.

Here are some of the drawings of the wolf, spinning, flipping and twirling because of the hee-hawing. The animation is top notch.



The wolf bashes his head against a rock. That makes him insane, so insane he jumps off a cliff to his death.



The animals the donkey has saved reject him—but only temporarily. They all feel sorry for the blubbering donkey, and surround him. He looks astonished. Then delighted. He brays. Now the comedy. The animals tie his ears into his mouth so he can’t make any noise. The little chipmunk kisses his nose and rests peacefully on his head as the iris closes. Aww.



Oh, yes, a war is on, so Buy Bonds!

By this time, even sleepy Fred Quimby figured that cutsy-wootsy was out, and harder humour was in. Rudy Ising turned away from kiddie creatures of the woodlands and created Barney Bear. But MGM’s stars were now a cat and mouse. Even Walt Disney had trouble toppling them for an Oscar for a while.