Antique Antics (1933)
Article 5723 by Dave Sindelar
Date: 3-18-2020
Directed by Manny Gould and Ben Harrison
Voice cast unknown
Country: USA
What it is: Spooky early 30s animation

When proprietor Krazy Kat goes to bed, the antiques in his shop come to life and have a party.

I don’t think I’ve covered much of Columbia’s cartoon output up to this point, but then, much of their work has been forgotten. However, this one is pretty good, and it plays up the spookiness of the situation, especially during the first half of this cartoon. We have singing and dancing inanimate objects, skeletons, cigar store Indians, pianos, grandfather clocks, etc. It’s creative and even a little offbeat. There’s no real plot; what happens is mostly there to flesh out the music and dancing. Still, this one is worth hunting up and being given a look.

Alien Species (1996)
Article 5722 by Dave Sindelar
Date: 3-8-2020
Directed by Peter Maris
Featuring Charles Napier, Hoke Howell, David Homb
Country: USA
What it is: Low budget aliens invade

Aliens invade Earth, but most of the action takes place in a small town.

By this time, even a small-budget independent movie such as this one could manage to work up the wherewithal to have a few CGI effects; however, there’s still no guarantee that the script will be any good, and this tired compendium of cliches bears this out. It also doesn’t help that most of the middle of this movie takes place in a poorly-lit cave; nothing can sap the pleasure out of a movie as quickly as having to squint and concentrate just to see what’s going on. The acting is merely passable, but that’s okay; with the script the way it is, it doesn’t really give much opportunity for great acting. It also promises a sequel that never saw the light of day, but I won’t complain about that. Ninety minutes of time have been killed.

Alice of Wonderland in Paris (1966)
Article 5721 by Dave Sindelar
Date: 3-7-2020
Directed by Gene Deitch
Featuring the voices of Luce Ennis, Norma MacMillan, Howard Morris
Country: USA
What it is: Odd little animated anthology

Alice of the Wonderland stories wishes to go to a real Wonderland – Paris! She does so with the help of a mouse doing a cheese survey. In the process, several stories are told.

This animated movie has a fairly dismal rating on IMDB, and I can see why; those expecting a variation on the Lewis Carroll stories will find very little of it here (though two stories are told featuring fellow fictional character Madeline), and the animation is on the threadbare side (Gene Deitch mostly worked with Terrytoons). I myself wasn’t sure what to expect, but an animated anthology was certainly a surprise. Yet, for all of the weaknesses of this one, I eventually found it to be rather charming. I think what did it for me was the denouement of the story about the princess who wanted the moon; the princess’s explanation about how the moon can be up in the sky as well as hanging about her neck has just the right touch of magical wonder to warm my heart. The other stories are merely okay, and the framing story with Alice and the talking mouse is mostly forgettable, though even that has a charming moment when Alice first meets Madeline. I wouldn’t exactly call the movie a success, but it has its points of interest.

Affairs of Cappy Ricks (1937)
Article 5720 by Dave Sindelar
Date: 3-1-2020
Directed by Ralph Staub
Featuring Walter Brennan, Mary Brian, Lyle Talbot
Country: USA
What it is: Comedy

A sea captain returns home to find his family has been seduced by easy living and that he is on the verge of losing a controlling interest in his company. He concocts a scheme to teach his family the value of hard work as well as protecting his control of the company.

There are early hints in this movie that there may be a bit of science fiction content to the proceedings when the main character discovers that one of the doors in his house is self-opening, and there’s some talk of a boat that is so highly automated it only needs a crew of three. If that’s all that had happened in the movie, I would have consigned it to the realms of marginalia, but the discussed boat does make an appearance in the final reel and plays a significant role in the plot, so it qualifies. On its own terms, it’s a mildly amusing comedy, which mostly relies on a series of “the worm turns” type of situations. It’s fun to see Brennan and Talbot, but the whole cast fares well, even if the story is only so-so.

The Adventures of Sam Space (1955)
Article 5719 by Dave Sindelar
Date: 2-29-2020
Directed by Paul Sprunck
Featuring the voice of Paul Frees
Country: USA
What it is: 3-D Space Opera with puppets

A scientist take two children on a space voyage to battle an evil space island.

I hoped it looked good in 3-D; as far as the story goes, it’s pretty lame, and is largely played for laughs. It’s done in puppet animation, and at least one character bears a certain resemblance to the child in DAVEY AND GOLIATH (a Sunday morning Christian TV show I’m certain many of you remember). It all takes place in that futuristic year 2001, and there are spaceships and flying saucers and robots. It’s mildly entertaining hokum, but not very good and not very memorable.

The Adventures of Hal 5 (1958)
Article 5718 by Dave Sindelar
Date: 2-29-2020
Directed by Don Sharp
Featuring John Glyn-Jones, John Charlesworth, David Morrell
Country: UK
What it is: Children’s adventure

A car finds itself in the hands of an unscrupulous auto dealer after his owner is forced to sell him.

This is another production of the Children’s Film Foundation; I’ve reviewed several of these over the years. Though it wasn’t listed in any of my guides, the title made me suspect it might have some fantastic content; Hal 5 sounded like it might be the name of a robot. Upon inspection, it turned out to be the name of a car, and once I saw the animated face appear in the car’s grill, I began to suspect it might be genre after all. The question would be whether the car would only persist as a passive character to the action, or if it would have an active will in the proceedings. Once I noticed the car trying to swerve into the driveway of its former owner of its own volition, I decided it did qualify.

As for the story itself, it’s passable. It’s one of those that seems rather contrived, as it’s one of those stories which largely relies for its plot twists on the fact that most of the characters know each other, but often don’t know that the other characters also know each other, and you know the conflicts will be resolved by the right people running into each other at the right times. Nevertheless, it’s a charming little piece, and rather fun.

Adventures in Music: Melody (1953)
aka Melody
Article 5717 by Dave Sindelar
Date: 2-29-2020
Directed by Ward Kimball and Charles A. Nichols
Featuring the voices of Loulie Jean Norman, Harry Stanton and Bill Thompson
Country: USA
What it is: Meditation on Music

An owl holds a class on the subject of Melody.

I’m making something of a judgment call on this Disney animated short in terms of including it on the strength of its fantastic content; though there isn’t a particular element that I can point to, the cartoon as a whole has a level of abstraction and unreality that makes it qualify. It has definite Disney touches, but it’s also full of stylistic moments that recall the work of UPA at the time, as well as that of the various abstract animation works I’ve viewed over the years. It really doesn’t have a plot to speak of; it’s mostly an exploration of how music pervades our life, and in its own way, it’s as loosely focused as was the short in my previous review, ACTION ANTICS, albeit the owl-teaching-class setup gives it a center that one didn’t have. It’s interesting, but I’m not really sure it’s effective; I’m not sure how I’m supposed to feel about it all when it’s finally over. It is, however, an interesting experiment.

Action Antics (1926)
Article 5716 by Dave Sindelar
Date: 2-28-2020
Director unknown
Cast unknown
Country: USA
What it is: You tell me

Scenes with action are shown.

It’s hard to know what to make of this part live-action, part-animated silent short. It seems to be a collection of unrelated footage thrown into a Cuisinart and edited together. There’s scenes of a waterfall, a segment involving a TNT being used to build a bungalow on Mars (hence its inclusion here), footage of football players in regular- and slow-motion, animated Charleston dancing, etc. It seems to think that it’s tied together by the theme of “action”, but that’s a very loose concept, and the end result is a headscratcher. It’s just another little oddity off to the sides of my personal collection.