Pink Elephants Not On Parade

There’s a great sequence in Walter Lantz’s The Bandmaster (1947) where a drunk on a circus high-wire sees pink elephants. There’s a cut to a scene where they are ballet dancing to the Overture to Zampa.

There’s a cut back to the drunk and the elephants, which dive into his bottle of hootch. Each of the three elephants go into the bottle in a different way. The drunk’s reactions are animated as well.



How did the drunk get up there? Beats me. Maybe that scene got cut.

Bugs Hardaway and Webb Smith came up with the gags. La Verne Harding and Les Kline received the animation credits but the star animator in this one is the great Pat Matthews, who gives us some lovely perspective animation of the staggering drunk. He is my favourite of the 1940s Lantz artists.

Darrell Calker does a fine job for the score.

Tom and Jerry Home Video News

Delightful news has come out from the Warner Archive Collection twice this year.

First, the company was able to release all four seasons of The Huckleberry Hound Show. Now comes word that the complete Hanna-Barbera theatrical run of Tom and Jerry will be on Blu-Ray AND DVD. Release date is December 2nd.

Let’s get right to the point. Anyone reading this likely knows a release of Tom and Jerry cartoons was stopped several years ago because of concerns about blackface gags. Here’s what Warners says:

The complete collection of Hanna Barbera’s Tom and Jerry Oscar® winning masterpieces, available at last! Including three shorts, Casanova Cat, Mouse Cleaning   and His Mouse Friday   which are now completely remastered and uncut for the very first time.

Six discs. 20 audio commentaries. From what I can tell, correct aspect ratios for cartoons released in Cinemascope. A 28-page booklet. Bonus features. They’re going all out on this.

I’ve mentioned over the years I’m not a huge Tom and Jerry fan, though I can name a number of cartoons I really like (none of which include an annoying duck). But this release sounds great.

You can read more at this site.

A minor announcement from yours truly: I’ve finished some partial posts and Tralfaz will be active again for a full week, starting Monday.