Max Fleischer

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Max Fleischers Color Classics

• An Introduction by
• Wendy Huot
• LIBR 500
• wendy.huot_at_gmail.com

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Color Classics Screen Shots
Bunny Mooning (1937), Small Fry (1939)
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What are Color Classics?

• A series of 36 short cartoons created by
  Fleischer studios
• Produced by Paramount
• Made between 1934-1940
• Cartoons center around catchy songs and simple
  (or non-existent) stories
• Public domain!

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Color Classics Themes

• Bizarre yet charming animation
• Dark and cheeky humor
• Optimistic many tales of redemption
• Experimental animation techniques

Song of the Birds (1935), Small Fry (1939)
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Sample Clip

• Educated Fish (1937)

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Cartoons in the 1930s

• A short cartoon (7-8 minutes long) would play
  before every movie
• Cartoons aimed mainly at adults, though popular
  with kids
• First feature length cartoons
• Snow White (Disney, 1937)
• Gullivers Travels (Fleischer, 1938)

Poor Cinderella (1934)
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Fleischer Studios

• New York based animation company
• Operated from 1921-1942
• Famous creations
• Betty Boop
• Koko the Clown
• Popeye and Superman cartoons

Poor Cinderella (1934)
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The Fleischer Brothers

• Max Fleischer
• Ran the studio, produced the cartoons
• Inventor, animation pioneer
• Invented rotoscoping (technique of animating over
  live-action footage)
• Used sound in cartoons before The Jazz Singer
  (1927) or Steamboat Willie (1928)
• Dave Fleischer
• Directed and animated the cartoons

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Animation Technology

• Color Classics were very early color cartoons
• The first few only used 2 colors
• Many cartoons use Max Fleischers patented
  stereo optical process
• Photograph animation cells in front of 3D model
  background
• Creates a stunning 3D effect!

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Video of Stereo Optical Process

• Hold It! (1938)

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Somewhere in Dreamland (1936)

• Two poor children scrounge for kindling, go to
  bed hungry
• Children dream of a candy-filled fantasy
  dreamland
• Wake up and discover that the townsfolk have made
  them a wonderful feast!

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Christmas Comes But Once a Year (1936)

• Features Grampy from the Betty Boop cartoons!
• Orphans receive defective presents for Christmas,
  cry
• Grampy uses household objects to make new toys
• Christmas is saved!

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Christmas Comes But Once a Year Stills
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Fresh Vegetable Mystery (1939)

• Baby carrots go missing
• Irish Potato police officers interrogate suspects
• An egg says
• The jokes on you guys Im hard boiled!

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Cartoon Purgatory

• Fleischer cartoons not as popular as Disney or
  Looney Tunes
• Color classics overshadowed by Betty Boop
• Master reels gathering dust in Republic
  Entertainments vaults
• Color classics used to fill space on cheap kids
  cartoon compilations
• Those 30 minute VHS tapes you see at thrift
  stores Kiddie Cartoon Klassics Featuring
  Porky Pig!

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New Life on DVD

• Animation Historian Jerry Beck assembled and
  restored Color Classics on DVD
• DVD titled Somewhere In Dreamland
• Available for just over 20
• Jerry Beck runs a wonderful website on animation

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Thank You!

• I hope you enjoyed learning about this wonderful
  cartoon series
• Check out some Color Classic cartoons online!
• Visit Wendy's Page

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Sources Referenced

• Wikipedia the Free Encyclopedia.
  ltwww.wikipedia.orggt (last accessed 26 September
  2004).
• Somewhere in Dreamland. Produced by Jerry Beck
  Michael Geisler. VCI Entertainment, 2002. (DVD)