Week #4 -Animation

Fleischer Studio


     From several Fleischer Studio’s cartoons I watched, Minnie the Moocher was one of the most memorable cartoons for me. I was interested in its bizarre style, rhythm, and combination with jazz music. Also, the fact that Minnie the Moocher does not have a continuous storyline reminds me of the comic strips from this time period.
     Minnie the Moocher, which takes its name from Cab Calloway’s song, is a combination of animation and music. Although there is a plot—Betty Boop runs away from her house with Bimbo and meets the ghosts singing Minnie the Moocher—, the storyline is not solid. Instead, this cartoon shows Fleischer Studio’s technique and new invention: rotoscoping. In order to animate Calloway’s dance, the dance is filmed and projected onto the back of a glass easel so that the motion can be traced on the paper. The interesting point is that it can be seen that only Calloway (the ghost dancing like Calloway) is rotoscoped and other ghosts are animated in the traditional style. I feel that it is one of the reasons making this cartoon bizarre; at the same time, this imbalance creates the charm. Minnie the Moocher is surrealistic such as the part when Betty’s father turns into a phonograph, the kittens suck the life out of their mother, Betty’s lipstick stain starts talking, and so on. This surreal style reminds me of the surreal comics such as Little Nemo, although the drawing style is totally different. 

     Nowadays, people value the storylines of animation/comics way more than the time of Fleischer Studio, Winsor McCay, and so on. As discussed in the last class, the entertainment in that time period was much limited; thus, people enjoyed the comic strips on Sunday, the short cartoons, etc. It is interesting to know the entertainment of different time periods and people’s preference.

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