The Rare and Unknown : " A Mad House "
In the early Thirties the Horror genre was very popular in Hollywood , thanks to brilliant directors like Tod Browning ( " Freaks " ; " Dracula " ) or James Whale ( the director of the great " Frankestein " and the marvellous " The Bride of Frankestein " ) and studios like Universal ( " Dracula " ; " The Mummy "... ) .
The medium of animation could not resist this trend . Ub Iwers directed and animated a considerable number of cartoons starring an unlimited number of skeletons , from the first Silly Symphony " the Skeleton Dance ( 1929 ) to " Skeleton Frolics " ( 1937 ) . Also , Tashlin directed a magnificent horror spoof starring our favorite ham actor , " The Case of the Stuttering Pig " that is undoubtely a masterpiece .
Mickey Mouse , in these same year , found a lot of skeletons on his way in such cartoons like " The Haunted House " ( again , an Iwerks at work ! ) and " The Mad Doctor " .
Even Terrytoons spoofed the now more than popular genre , with this unknown short .
" A Mad House " ( 1934 ) starts in an old dark house where several skeletons are having fun , dancing and singing ( of course , the influence from both " The Skeleton Dance " and " the Haunted House " is great ) . then , a villanious mad scientist enters ! He created a formula that can make a guy invisible ! He first tries it on a skeleton cat ( ! ) which first returns a normal cat ( !! ) and then becomes invisible ( !!! ) .
The wacky scientist kidnaps the hero's leading lady ( a female dog . Terry in this period did a lot of cartoons with these two dogs as protagonists ) , but the damsel is easily saved for an happy ending .
The supposed protagonists appeared only near the end of the pictures . The real highlights of the show are the skeletons ' gags ! Enjoy !
Yours Truly ,
Duck Dodgers
Blog Founder and Administrator
2 Comments:
I don't care what theater goers said about the Terrytoons during the 1930s. The images you just post shows some gags (with the exception of the Fleishers)that even Disney couldn't pull.
8:22 pm
Yep 1 Terrytoons were not that bad after all... the fact is that they are the most underrated cartoon in history . Rarely seen and for this unappreciated by the majority of people .
8:36 pm
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