{"id":66054,"date":"2021-07-07T00:01:01","date_gmt":"2021-07-07T07:01:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cartoonresearch.com\/?p=66054"},"modified":"2021-07-07T07:16:09","modified_gmt":"2021-07-07T14:16:09","slug":"hit-the-beach-part-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cartoonresearch.com\/index.php\/hit-the-beach-part-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Hit the Beach (Part 2)"},"content":{"rendered":"\"\"\n

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One of literature\u2019s most famous beach dwellers was Daniel Defoe\u2019s \u201cRobinson Crusoe\u201d. Now often treated as politically incorrect, the work was nevertheless a literary staple for over 200 years, and an easy target for animators, who, especially in the 30’s, seemed to have an absolute passion for anything dealing with cannibals, and usually played up this angle of the story. In fact, it seems that animation\u2019s cannibal tribes were almost evenly split between those hailing from darkest Adrica, and those inhabiting tropical islands. We will thus encounter several highspots of the latter variety in today\u2019s article, with continuing recurrences of such theme in weeks to come. We\u2019ll also visit some more placid tropical settings of white sandy shores, and a few visits to the hustle and bustle of the average urban beachfront where civilized mankind flocks to beat the heat. <\/p>\n\"\"\n

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\tSometimes I take a few artistic liberties with these columns. Thus, for stylistic sake, we begin this week\u2019s survey with a film slightly out of chronological sequence – Bosko Shipwrecked!<\/strong> (Warner\/Harman-Ising, Looney Tunes<\/em> (Bosko) – 9\/19\/31 – Rollin Hamiltom\/Larry Martin, anim.). Doing things this way allowed me to keep the Disney product and the Harman-Ising product together in groups instead of scattered, amd allowed the first installment of this trail to end on a creative high note, instead of with a film that has a feeling of being derivative. Released a mere six moths after the release of Mickey Mouse\u2019s The Castaway<\/em> (discussed last week), this film has the earmarks of being an \u201canswer\u201d to the Mickey adventure, and gives us another insight into the storyboard-to-film gestation time for an early sudio. <\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>The film\u2019s actual highpoints occur before Bosko ever reaches the beach, in the form of a powerful and well-animated storm at sea, abounding in effects animation for waves, thunder and lightning. As storms may provide fodder for another trail to be potentially delved into in subsequent articles, I will for the time being let this film\u2019s visuals speak for themselves as to the opening sequence, and jump to where Bosko washes up on what Bugs Bunny would later refer to in \u201cBugs Bunny Nips the Nips\u201d as \u201cthe inevitable island\u201d. Bosko, much like the literary Gulliver, lies exhausted on the shoreline, sound asleep. Two monkeys descend from a tree, cautiously creeping up on the sleeping figure, and abscond with Bosko\u2019s derby. (Amazing in that, without a chin strap, this chapeau somehow manages to stay on Bosko\u2019s head throughout the storm instead of being swept away by the waves or winds – but then, would we have wanted to endure a whole cartoon with a bald-headed Bosko?) As the two monkeys fight over the prize (one of them giving the other a pre-code raspberry), there seems to be a continuity break, suddenly finding both monkeys up a tree and shaking a branch containing a bird\u2019s nest. (Any guesses if a scene was censored by the Guild Films distributors?) An egg falls out of the nest, waking Bosko with an egg shampoo. \u201cWhere am I?\u201d. asks Bosko. A parrot breaks up with laughter, calling out to Bosko, \u201cThe yolk\u2019s on you!\u201d. Okay, maybe the line gets a chuckle the first time – but is there any justification for having the bird repeat this punchline three times? Mercifully, the bird falls, popping into the small end of a hollow wooden branch fallen from the tree, and coming out the large end completely shaved of feathers. <\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>At this point, the derivative nature of this project begins to clearly show – as Bosko encounters a lion from nowhere, just as did Mickey Mouse, and a chase begins. To its credit, the sequence includes a very dimensional tracking shot, with the camera only a pace ahead of Bosko, while the lion approaches so closely that his paws protrude into the plane of the camera on either side of the screen – then reverses the angle for a tail-away track of the lion as the chase diverts in the other direction. (This is the kind of point-of-view tracking shot that New York\u2019s Van Buren studio so often tried for in early Aesop\u2019s Fables – but simply didn\u2019t have the draftsmanship skills to truly pull off.) Then, talk about a rip-off. We get the identical setup from the Mickey Mouse cartoon, with Bosko standing on a rock in the river, between the lion and an alligator\u2019s open jaws, and the same gag of the lion leaping over Bosko\u2019s head and into the alligator\u2019s mouth! The only difference is that, instead of tying the lion\u2019s tail around the alligator\u2019s mouth, Bosko ties the tail to a branch overhanging the river, suspending the gator out of water. (Not as effective a solution, as the gator could easily free himself by simply opening his mouth wider and letting the lion go – if he ever stops being hungry enough to allow him to think it through.) Civilization of some sort has apparently touched this island, as Bosko finds a rowboat (not marked as from his ship) in the river, and rows downstream. He finds inside a large, fully nautically-advanced ship\u2019s anchor, and casts it over the side onto what appears to be a sand bar. With a loud \u201cYEOW\u201d, we and he discover the \u201cbar\u201d is actually a hippo, with the anchor point very painfully lodged into the skin of his backside. The hippo tows Bosko ashore, then disappears down a convenient hole, along with the rowboat, casting Bosko into the side of a boiling pot in a cannibal village. A savage appears, and pounds on his own stomach like a native drum, arousing the whole tribe of warriors. In one of the best gags of the short (though poorly synchronized), a skeleton rises from the boiling pot in Fleischeresque fashion, shakes Bosko\u2019s hand, and says, \u201cCome on in. The water\u2019s fine.\u201d Bosko attempts to delay the chief\u2019s command of \u201cBoil him\u201d by pulling out a pistol and firing at point-blank range – inly to find he is carrying a pop-gun. Bosko runs for the shore, where he sees what appears to be an inflated rubber raft, and leaps in. The \u201craft\u201d suddenly folds in half, revealing itself to have been the open jaws of a submerged rhino, which surfaces and swims away, while the luckless natives are left hungry on the shore. Out of the rhino\u2019s heavy \u201carmor plate\u201d hide, Bosko reappears, merely pushing aside one of the plates to provide an escape hatch. He lifts from the rhino\u2019s snout his horn as if completely unattached to the animal, and blows through it the old musical sting, \u201cYou\u2019re a horse\u2019s a\u2013\u201c at the natives left behind, for the iris out. <\/p>\n