The Starring Lamp

The cartoon’s called Aladdin’s Lamp, but the lamp really doesn’t have much to do with John Foster’s plot. It’s like the Terrytoons studio had to put another Mighty Mouse cartoon on the schedule and everyone went through it half-heartedly. There isn’t even a TerrySplash™ in this one. A tall female mouse gets kidnapped by a cat, is rescued by M.M. and, well, that’s it.

The cartoon takes about a minute to get into the plot. Aladdin has a daughter who cries like a baby and wants Mighty Mouse (as displayed in a huge picture in Aladdin’s palace). Foster doesn’t even bother having the cat in some kind of Mighty Mouse disguise. The cat (designed like Sour Puss with a huge red nose) simply shows up and grabs the girl about half-way through the cartoon.

The lamp? Oh, he grabs that, too. No struggle or anything.

Finally, our hero arrives, unnecessarily riding a magic carpet as he can fly on his own (I guess riding a carpet is what one is expected to do in Aladdin Land). Now, the evil cat summons the power of the lamp. Oh, no! It’s a flying black boar!!



Mighty Mouse punches it. And the gag is? Does it turn into a stack of pork chops with a “kosher” sign? Nah. (The Fleischers would do it). It looks like Foster and the rest of the crew couldn’t come up with anything amusing so the pig flies out of the scene and the cartoon for good. I do like effects in the frame below.



Next, the cat summons a vicious flying tiger–with a large moustache. Perhaps the story department was passing around some cheap hootch when they thought that up.



“Shhay, howbout he grabsh him by the tail?” “Yeah, a tiger by the tail! That’sh funny.” So that’s what Mighty Mouse does. Foster and his guys thought of a gag this time, borrowed from an old Popeye cartoon, I think. When the tiger crash-lands, his stripes come off him. The tiger sees the stripes and runs into the distance, like in a 1920s silent Fables cartoon, the stripes following.



Now the mouse is met with a fire breathing dragon from the lamp. As Phil Scheib fills the background with dramatic music, Mighty Mouse turns the fire back on the dragon, which falls into the ground. No Popeye punch-line here. That’s it.



Finally, bad guy cat gives up on the lamp. In the cartoon’s climax, the cat tries slicing Mighty Mouse with a scimitar. Failing, he is punched out of the scene and...



Well, Foster has no gag here, so that’s it. A punch. That’s all they came up with.

Cut to the daughter (and lamp) being reunited with her father in song as she kisses her hero. The lamp gets into the last word, growing a face and editoralising about the situation with a wolf whistle.



At least we’re spared hordes of cheering mice at the end like in so many other Mighty Mouse epics.

Fortunately, there’s no “bible” or “canon” or “alternate Mighty Mouse universe” or some other such nonsense. Otherwise, Mr. Mouse would be stuck with this obsessive pantalooned girl in future cartoons.

This is a 1947 release with Eddie Donnelly directing. The default identification is Carlo Vinci animating the dancing mouse girl in his usual fine fashion.