A MOONLIGHT SERENADE, OR A MISER PUNISHED (1904)
aka Au clair de la lune ou Pierror malheureux
Article 4216 by Dave Sindelar
Date: 4-30-2013
Directed by Georges Melies
Featuring Georges Melies
Country: France
What it is: Strange drama

A starving clown is not allowed to sing for his supper by a stingy miser, but fortunately the moon comes to his rescue.

The comeuppance of a villain (in this case, the miser) is a fairly common theme, but this one is pretty bizarre variation on the subject. This is no doubt due to Melies’s affection for strange visual effects, and the strangest one here (in which the moon turns into a closeup of an eyeball) is pretty jarring. It’s probably not surprising that the plot is a little obscure at times, but the short’s biggest problem is its rather slow beginning; for a while it looks like there will be no special effects at all. This is one of Melies’s oddest works.

MOLLY MOO-COW AND RIP VAN WINKLE (1935)
aka Molly Moo-Cow and Rip Van Wrinkle
Article 4215 by Dave Sindelar
Date: 4-28-2013
Directed by Burt Gillett and Tom Palmer
Voice cast unknown
Country: USA
What it is: Cartoon

Molly Moo-Cow encounters a group of dwarfs playing tenpins while she is grazing, and she sees the sleeping Rip Van Winkle. She then decides to try out the dwarf’s ale…

This is the best cartoon about a drunk cow bowling that I’ve ever seen, but that’s admittedly a very small universe, and when you get down to it, this cartoon is pretty lame. Molly Moo-Cow appears to have been a very minor repeating character for Van Beuren studios during the thirties; I saw the name listed in only four cartoons during a two-year period. From what I can see here, I suspect the character had some gender issues; the name certainly implies a female, but she is udderless and talks with a decidedly masculine voice. The gags mostly consist of Molly fighting with her guardian angel (who doesn’t want her to touch the ale) and bowling while drunk. This one is not a high point in the history of animation.

MR. HURRY-UP OF NEW YORK (1907)
Article 4214 by Dave Sindelar
Date: 4-27-2013
Director unknown
Cast unknown
Country: USA
What it is: Trick short

Mr. Hurry-up is in a rush to get dressed and eat breakfast so he can get to work and then go to the dentist. Then he goes to a bar and has a little too much to drink…

The title made me expect we were going to have an experiment with early fast-motion photography; I had visions of the title character moving through the world with super-human speed to get everything done, and I still think the opening scenes would have been a lot more amusing had they done that. What I got was a character who, though he is moving as quick as humanly possible, is still moving at speeds that are humanly possible, which was somewhat disappointing. Still, the movie does have fantastic content in the second half, in which the title character gets drunk and undergoes a variation of THE DREAM OF A RAREBIT FIEND; in his inebriated state, keyholes shift around the door, a circular staircase rotates as he tries to climb it, and when he tries to sleep, his bed hops all around the room. The best scene is with the staircase, largely because it’s the most striking visual moment in the short. Nevertheless, I find this one somewhat disappointing, largely because of the missed opportunities.

THE MILLER’S DAUGHTER (1934)
Article 4213 by Dave Sindelar
Date: 4-26-2013
Directed by Friz Freleng
Voice cast unknown
Country: USA
What it is: Whimsical animation

When a porcelain statue of a miller’s daughter is broken by a cat, the owner disposes of its remains in an attic. Its companion statue, a boy shepherd, comes to life and seeks out the daughter in order to repair her.

As far as the fantastic content goes, we get inanimate objects coming to life as well as a few dancing skeletons. Those who like caricatures will find that the Three Stooges appear as the “see no evil” monkeys and sing the title song. It’s a pretty typical cartoon of the period; it has only the thinnest whisper of a plot, it seems to mostly exist for the singing and dancing, and it has a villain show up in the second half (in this case, a statue of a lion comes to life and begins chasing the shepherd’s lamb) for a bit of action. This one is pretty ordinary on all counts.

THE MARCH OF THE MACHINES (1927)
aka La marche des machines
Article 4212 by Dave Sindelar
Date: 4-25-2013
Directed by Eugene Deslaw
No cast
Country: France
What it is: Abstract machinery montage

Imagery of machinery in motion is shown.

It’s a shame that the copy I found of this short on YouTube didn’t have a musical soundtrack; its images of machines in motion should inspire a creative one. It might even help me like this short more than I do. That’s not to say that it’s bad, but I do think that an abstract short like this will only really work if it taps into a certain type of visual magic that transcends the mere editing together of images that makes the whole somehow greater than the sum of its parts. Though the editor does have a decent feel for which images to match up, the only time it really transcends itself is in a shot of a pair of machine arms that end up looking like clutching human hands, easily the most striking moment in the short. The rest of it feels merely cute. I’m also not quite sure if I can call this short genre or not. The emphasis on machinery and technology gives it a science fictional air, but that’s undercut by the fact that all of the machinery existed at the time of its making. And it doesn’t quite reach the level of abstraction to make it a fantasy by default. So let’s classify it as a marginal curiosity.

MILK AND MONEY (1936)
Article 4206 by Dave Sindelar
Date: 4-18-2013
Directed by Tex Avery
Featuring the voices of Billy Bletcher and Joe Dougherty
Country: USA
What it is: Cartoon

In order to save the family farm from foreclosure, Porky Pig takes his horse to the city in order to find a job. He gets a job as a milkman, but will lose his job if he breaks a bottle. And then a hungry horsefly shows up….

The fantastic content here is standard cartoon fare; we have anthropomorphic animals (Porky and his father) and that general sense of animated cartoon surrealism. I do think it’s interesting to balance out the anthropomorphic animals with a human character who occasionally acts like a snake (the aptly named villainous landlord Mr. Viper). Both the Warner Brothers cartoon department and Tex Avery would go on to better things, but if you compare it to their other work at the time, this was a pretty strong showing; you can even see some of the boundary-stretching touches that would become Tex Avery trademarks. My favorite joke is a subtle one; try to figure out why the horsefly attacks Mr. Viper in the final moments. (Hint – What does the horsefly usually attack?)

THE MELOMANIAC (1903)
aka Le melomane
Article 4203 by Dave Sindelar
Date: 4-14-2013
Directed by Georges Melies
Featuring Georges Melies
Country: France
What it is: Musical trick short

A bandleader uses his head in creating music for his band to play.

This is one of the easier Melies shorts to find, as well as being one of his better and more creative ones. In it, Melies (initially disguised as a clown bandleader, but he ditches the disguise to reveal himself) writes the melody of “God Save the Queen” on a musical staff over his head; he throws a musical instrument up there to create a treble clef, tosses batons up to separate the measures, and then uses his own head (which he pulls off several times and pops into the staff) to create the notes. It’s quite fun, especially if the accompanying music chooses to follow the lead and play the appropriate melody. I do notice the French must have some different notes in their “do-re-mi” scale than we do; the musicians display the notes in cards, and one is called “ut”.

LA MAISON ENSORCELEE (1908)
Article 4200 by Dave Sindelar
Date: 4-9-2013
Directed by Segundo de Chomon
Cast unknown
Country: France / Spain
What it is: Haunted house trick film

Three travelers duck into a deserted house on a rainy night, only to have their night interrupted by weird goings-on.

This title has actually been on my hunt list for quite some time, so I was delighted to stumble across a copy of it on YouTube. Yet, I find that there’s something very familiar about this one; in particular, there’s a moment where the exterior of the house turns into a giant face that I definitely recall having seen before. At any rate, this is the sort of thing I’d expect from Chomon; half of it is very Melies-inspired, while other moments seem original with him. There’s a scene where the items on a dinner table prepare themselves that is pretty fun; a knife cuts up sausage and bread on its own, coffee pours itself, etc. There’s a demon-like figure that shows up in a painting and then manifests itself as a giant in the final scene. It’s actually a little bit on the scary side, despite the fact that the three travelers appear to be clowns… or, maybe it’s because they are clowns that it’s so scary. Yes, I can’t resist another scary clown joke.

**NOTE** At the time this was written, I thought I was watching THE HAUNTED HOUSE (1906) aka LA MAISON HANTEE, It is now apparent that I was watching a copy of LA MAISON ENSORCELEE that was mistitled, which explains why I found it very familiar; I already had a copy of that one. Thanks to doctor kiss for setting me on the right track.

MALICE IN SLUMBERLAND (1942)
Article 4198 by Dave Sindelar
Date: 4-7-2013
Directed by Dave Fleischer or Alec Geiss
No voice credits
Country: USA
What it is: Cartoon

An anthropomorphic dog is kept from sleeping by a drippy faucet.

I’ve not been very impressed by the Columbia animated shorts I’ve seen to date; this is probably the best that I’ve seen. This may have to do with the presence of Dave Fleischer in the credits, but IMDB credits Alec Geiss as the director and doesn’t list any extra credits, so I don’t know if the entry is in error or if Fleischer worked in some other capacity on the short. It’s a pretty basic cartoon concept; the dog tries everything he can to try and drown out the noise, and when nothing works, he takes increasingly drastic measures to stop the leak. On top of the anthropomorphic dog (I’m not saying talking dog, because other than a shriek at one point, he keeps silent), we have a sentient drip of water and a general air of slapstick outrageousness for the fantastic content. It’s not great, but it’s fairly entertaining.

THE MAGICIAN’S CAVERN (1901)
aka L’antre des esprits
Article 4197 by Dave Sindelar
Date: 4-6-2013
Directed by Georges Melies
Cast unknown
Country: France
What it is: Magic trick

A magician does tricks with skeletons, dancing ladies and furniture.

I found yesterday’s trip into the world of Melies’s magic films to have points of interest that made it more interesting than usual; today’s is, I’m afraid, a much more ordinary example of that type of film. A magician appears, makes skeletons dance and turn into women, makes chairs frolic, etc. It’s cute enough, but if you’ve seen a lot of these, it’s nothing really special.