It took Felix the Cat 72 years to star in his only feature film. His creator (and, at times, sole animator), Otto Mesmer, did not live to see this event, nor did anyone else who brought various incarnations of Felix to animated life over the decades. However, the last person to usher Felix to reasonable success in 1958, Joe Oriolo, passed the reins on to his son Don, who paid tribute to Dad with Felix the Cat: The Movie.
If there was ever a labor of love, this 1989 animated film is it. Don Oriolo wrote the script, did some voice work, served as one of the producers, and, if the end credits are correct, even performed some of the music. Wow. The direction was by Tibor Hernadi (“Animation director” on The Time Masters). No less than six nations (primarily Hungary) contributed to the production.
Yet, the film had but one US theatrical showing (as the opening selection of the third Los Angeles Animation Celebration), and plans for a wider release ended when the movie’s distributor, New World Pictures, went belly-up. The picture went unseen until it appeared on DVD on August 29, 2002.
Felix is, alas, not a very good film, and most critics have been considerably harsher than that. The story, involving Felix’s adventures in an alternate dimension where he battles on the side of a beautiful princess against her evil uncle, the Duke of Zill, is disjointed and plagued by unnecessary scenes that push the plot aside. In one of them, we watch foxes (who get their own song!) prepare to urinate on Felix’s bag. They disappear after that. An interlude with tap-dancing mice goes on far too long. And how about the one-time appearance of a dragon that silently impersonates (I think) Marlon Brando?
The animation reflects the $9M budget and is almost universally floppy and choppy: mouth movements rarely match the dialogue, and facial expressions often do not correspond to what the characters are experiencing. The editing is atrocious. There are some very primitive CGI sequences of Felix’s head bookending the film. Most of Felix’s lines are like “Dad jokes” that would embarrass Dad. Some of the characters (particularly Madame Pearl and Pim) look like they came from different films.
The picture strongly reminded me of the 1986 film Cat City (another very bad Hungarian film) in its flawed design and execution, and I would not be surprised if Felix employed many of the same animators. However, Felix is the better film, and this leads us to why this movie is merely a semi-total disaster. Some redemptive comments are due here:
To begin with, the film harkens back to the 1958 TV version of the fabulous feline, and this is rather welcome. Felix has a magical bag of tricks that comes in quite handy. Series stalwarts The Professor and his brilliant nephew Poindexter are along for the ride (Rock Bottom must still be serving time). The Master Cylinder gets a cameo (on paper). The picture even ends with Felix signing off with “Right-e-o!” The closing theme (by Winston Sharples) is the same one featuring Ann Bennett’s singing. David Kolin, replacing the immortal Jack Mercer, does a credible job voicing Felix.
The main villain, the Duke of Zill, is perhaps the best-designed character the crew came up with, and he gets a fitting backstory. The Duke resembles a tricked-up version of Spider-Man villain Mysterio, and Peter Newman lends the bad guy a great voice.
But what are the real reasons to buy/rent/stream this Felix movie besides Boomer nostalgia? One, it’s a surreal, loopy ride featuring acid-trip design, hallucinatory color, and bonkers secondary character designs (especially in the land of Zill) that must have existed in the animators’ nightmares. This messed-up menagerie is even weirder than the nutty backgrounds and layouts in this picture.
Secondly, if seeing this movie piques anyone’s curiosity about Felix the Cat, it is worth sitting through. Whether they explore the 1958 series, the three 1936 shorts from Van Bueren Studios, or take a deep dive into the iconic black-and-white Felix cartoons from his heyday during the 1920s, rediscovering this animated idol is a worthy cause. Felix the Cat: The Movie may not have been the cat’s crowning glory, but at least it kept a legend alive.
Martin Goodman is a veteran writer specializing in stories about animation. He has written for AWN and Animation Scoop – and lives in Anderson, Indiana.
“The picture went unseen until it appeared on DVD on August 29, 2002.”
This isn’t true – it received a VHS release in 1991 in North America and the United Kingdom, with the former release being handled by Buena Vista Home Video. In the US, it was also broadcast on the Disney Channel for several years starting on April 11, 1991: https://dcba.fandom.com/wiki/Felix_the_Cat:_The_Movie
“it was also broadcast on the Disney Channel for several years starting on April 11, 1991”
Learning that makes me suspect that my one attempt at watching this movie was during a free preview weekend of the Disney Channel. If I couldn’t finish it despite not knowing when my next chance would be, it must’ve really rubbed me the wrong way.
I can confirm that it aired on The Disney Channel a lot as a child. I also recall seeing copies of the VHS at the now closed Phar-Mor.
Yes I remember watching it on the Disney channel multiple times as a child in the early 90’s.
I do remember seeing it on TV too. Nit sure if it was Disney, but it wouldn’t surprise me.
I wonder who owns it now? Would be perfect for Severin’s Kids line.
I believe the sentence was referring to the US exclusively, but it played in UK Cinemas too, and in several other European countries. In Germany there was a tie in comic adaptation.
I distinctly remember trying to watch this movie on some basic cable channel in the ’90s, but as much as I love animation and wanted to know more about Felix (at that time, not having seen any of his other incarnations), I gave up on it after less than a half hour. I have little doubt that if I did watch the full feature, I would agree about the land of Zill and its eponymous villain being highlights, but on the whole I’m sure I’d rather spend my limited spare time on the old, silent Felix cartoons.
I haven’t seen this movie since I rented it from Blockbuster Video over thirty years ago. Certainly it was a far cry from what I, having spent much of my early childhood watching the Trans-Lux series, had expected. Strange to say, what it reminded me of more than anything else was, of all things, “Inspector Gadget”. The Duke of Zill, with his cape, unseen face, deep voice and constantly gesticulating fist, had much in common with Gadget’s nemesis Dr. Claw; and other elements, such as some of the character designs (especially the Professor) and much of the musical score, recalled the DiC series of the ’80s. I enjoyed the movie a lot, and when it was over I rewound it and immediately watched it again. I didn’t worry too much about following the story, such as it was. I just sat back, lit my pipe, and went along for the ride.
I’m afraid you may get some pushback from truculent Australians by referring to Otto Messmer as the “creator” of Felix the Cat. In the past decade or so there has been a movement in this country to reclaim Sydney-born Pat Sullivan as Felix’s sole and rightful creator. The argument rests upon a comparison of the lettering and line work in “Feline Follies” with that of Sullivan’s earlier print cartoons, and also with the presence of the word “Mum” (for “mother”) in the aforementioned film short. It seems rather tenuous to me (while few Americans address their mothers as “Mum” today, it was not an uncommon endearment in the past), but people can get very passionate when a matter of national pride is at stake.
Felix the Cat deserves better. I tried to sit through this one when it aired on the Disney Channel. There are few animated movies that I have been unable to watch from beginning to end, but this one lost me by about twenty minutes in. There are some good ideas but much of the film drags or is unfathomably surreal in ways that don’t seem to be part of a master concept or overarching theme. What audience were they trying to reach? I really tried to like this one, because Felix has always been a favorite of mine. Looking through my collection of Felix videos, I observe that I didn’t keep a copy of this movie.
There was a Saturday morning TV series titled “The Twisted Tales of Felix the Cat” which succeeded a bit better than this film at presenting a surreal and wildly animated version of Felix adventures. There was also a Christmas special “Felix the Cat Saves Christmas.” Overall, though, my preference is for the late 50’s television cartoons, or the early black and white cartoons, or the Van Beuren color shorts. If there is a “real” Felix, those earlier cartoons are more representative.
I have to admit you’ve peaked my interest here. The only Felix that I’m familiar with of course is the Trans-Lux “Felix, the cat“ cartoons, and the three Van Buren versions of Felix, who I think is voiced by Walter Tetley, but I could be wrong about that. I would just like to see how those stand up to this feature, but since it was last seen through Buena Vista home video, I’m sure it is somewhere within those vaults and will never see the light of day on physical media ever again and according to the bad reviews here, I guess it will never be seen anywhere again. Too bad, because I would’ve liked to have made up my own mind.
I worked at deGraf/Wahrman on the CG part of this film. The plot made no sense, so we created a disembodied CG head to try to explain it. Yeah, it was as bad as it sounds.
Ah yes, I remember being part of the staff of the W.A.C. when this screened. This was on the grounds of the Santa Monica VA hospital, and one of the sponsors was Stolichnaya vodka, a rather big blind spot in the ol’ planning department. It was a tough choice which was the worse decision: Having vodka on the grounds of a VA hospital, or giving people a reason to use it by showing them this flick.
Also stumbled over this on cable; disappointed to find only token references to the 50s version I remembered as a kid and nothing of the silent original encountered much later. Was always intrigued that Felix’s bag of tricks had a fixed flat pattern no matter the angle or perspective. Here it’s just some little animated “X”es.
Note the slight echo effect on the talking CGI head. That might have played impressively on a big screen kiddie matinee, despite the lame speech.
There was a short-lived comic strip teaming Felix with Betty Boop, another iconic character who endured some misfired revivals. Once saw an episode of “Felix the Cat Live”, a weak educational show with Felix as a costumed character. Thought it was a failed pilot; a quick search reveals it was an actual series in the late 70s. Looks syndication-cheap, but supposedly ran on CBS.
I like the Trans-lux Felix There’s a charm in their simplicity (the stories are in a classic vein). From what I’ve seen of the Twisted Tales of Felix, I’ll pass! Jack Mercer provided his voice in the original Tv series.
I remember an official Felix YouTube channel ran by Universal uploaded this in full HD restored quality at one point. It seems to have vanished, though.
Fortunately, it’s available for free viewing on archive.org. There was also a photo comic version produced in Germany, which can be found floating around the Internet.