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The golden age of American animation was a period in the history of U.S. animation that began with the popularization of sound synchronized cartoons in 1928 and gradually ended in the 1960s when theatrical animated shorts started to lose popularity to the newer medium of television. Animated media from after the golden age, especially on television, were produced on cheaper budgets and with more limited techniques between the late 1950s and 1980s.
Fleischer Studios was an American animation studio founded in 1929 by brothers Max and Dave Fleischer, who ran the pioneering company from its inception until its acquisition by Paramount Pictures, the parent company and the distributor of its films. In its prime, Fleischer Studios was a premier producer of animated cartoons for theaters, with Walt Disney Productions being its chief competitor in the 1930s.
Max Fleischer was a Polish-American animator and studio owner. Born in Kraków, Poland, Fleischer immigrated to the United States where he became a pioneer in the development of the animated cartoon and served as the head of Fleischer Studios, which he co-founded with his younger brother Dave. He brought such comic characters as Koko the Clown, Betty Boop, Popeye, and Superman to the movie screen, and was responsible for several technological innovations, including the rotoscope, the "follow the bouncing ball" technique pioneered in the Ko-Ko Song Car-Tunes films, and the "stereoptical process". Film director Richard Fleischer was his son.
Betty Boop is an animated cartoon character designed by Grim Natwick at the request of Dave Fleischer. She originally appeared in the Talkartoon and Betty Boop film series, which were produced by Fleischer Studios and released by Paramount Pictures. She was featured in 90 theatrical cartoons between 1930 and 1939. She has also been featured in comic strips and mass merchandising.
Flowers and Trees is a Silly Symphonies cartoon produced by Walt Disney, directed by Burt Gillett, and released to theatres by United Artists on July 30, 1932. It was the first commercially released film to be produced in the full-color three-strip Technicolor process after several years of two-color Technicolor films. The film was a commercial and critical success, winning the first Academy Award for Best Cartoon Short Subject.
Flip the Frog is an animated cartoon character created by American animator Ub Iwerks. He starred in a series of cartoons produced by Celebrity Pictures and distributed by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer from 1930 to 1933. The series had many recurring characters, including Flip's dog, the mule Orace, and a dizzy neighborhood spinster.
Famous Studios was the first animation division of the film studio Paramount Pictures from 1942 to 1967. Famous was established as a successor company to Fleischer Studios, after Paramount seized control of the aforementioned studio amid the departure of its founders, Max and Dave Fleischer, in 1942. The studio's productions included three series started by the Fleischers—Popeye the Sailor, Superman, and Screen Songs—as well as Little Audrey, Little Lulu, Casper the Friendly Ghost, Honey Halfwitch, Herman and Katnip, Baby Huey, and the Noveltoons and Modern Madcaps series.
Noveltoons is a series of cartoons produced by Paramount Pictures' Famous Studios from 1943 to the end of the studio during 1967. The series was known for bringing the characters from Harvey Comics to life, such as Casper the Friendly Ghost, Wendy the Good Little Witch, Herman and Katnip, Little Audrey, and Baby Huey. All shorts from Baby Huey and Little Audrey are included. It was the successor to the series Color Classics produced by Fleischer Studios. Several Noveltoons feature characters which originated in Color Classics. This series was also similar to the two series from Warner Bros., Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies, in that it features several recurring characters with one general title.
ComiColor Cartoons is a series of twenty-five animated short subjects produced by Ub Iwerks from 1933 to 1936. The series was the last produced by Iwerks Studio; after losing distributor Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer in 1934, the Iwerks studio's senior company Celebrity Pictures had to distribute the films itself. The series was shot exclusively in Cinecolor.
U.M. & M. TV Corporation was an American media company best known as the original purchaser of the pre-October 1950 short films and cartoons produced by Paramount Pictures, excluding Popeye and Superman. The initials stand for United Film Service, MPA TV of New Orleans, and Minot T.V.
Screen Songs are a series of animated cartoons produced at the Fleischer Studios and distributed by Paramount Pictures between 1929 and 1938. Paramount brought back the sing-along cartoons in 1945, now in color, and released them regularly through 1951. Two of Paramount's one-shot cartoons quietly revived the format later: Candy Cabaret (1954) and Hobo's Holiday (1963).
National Telefilm Associates (NTA) was a distribution company primarily concerned with the syndication of American film libraries to television, including the Republic Pictures film library. It was successful enough on cable television between 1983 and 1985 that it renamed itself Republic Pictures and undertook film production and home video sales as well.
Gulliver's Travels is a 1939 American animated musical fantasy film produced by Max Fleischer and directed by Dave Fleischer for Fleischer Studios. Released to cinemas in the United States on December 22, 1939, by Paramount Pictures, the story is a very loose adaptation of Jonathan Swift's 1726 novel of the same name, specifically only the first part of four, which tells the story of Lilliput and Blefuscu, and centers around an explorer who helps a small kingdom who declared war after an argument over a wedding song. The film was Fleischer Studios' first feature-length animated film, as well as the second animated feature film produced by an American studio after Walt Disney Productions' Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, as Paramount had commissioned the feature in response to the success of that film. The sequences for the film were directed by Seymour Kneitel, Willard Bowsky, Tom Palmer, Grim Natwick, William Henning, Roland Crandall, Thomas Johnson, Robert Leffingwell, Frank Kelling, Winfield Hoskins, and Orestes Calpini.
Seymour Kneitel was an American animator, best known for his work with Fleischer Studios and its successor, Famous Studios.
Poor Cinderella is a 1934 Fleischer Studios-animated short film featuring Betty Boop. Poor Cinderella was Fleischer Studios' first color film, and the only appearance of Betty Boop in color during the Fleischer era. It was the first Paramount Pictures animated short in color.
Hunky and Spunky are fictional characters appearing in the series of animated short subjects produced by Fleischer Studios for Paramount Pictures from 1938 to 1941. Filmed in Technicolor (three-strip), the series revolves around a mother burro and her son.
Rainbow Parade is a series of 26 animated shorts produced by Van Beuren Studios and distributed to theaters by RKO between 1934 and 1936. This was the only color cartoon series produced by Van Beuren, and the final series of the studio.
Popeye the Sailor is an American animated series of short films based on the Popeye comic strip character created by E. C. Segar. In 1933, Max and Dave Fleischer's Fleischer Studios, based in New York City, adapted Segar's characters into a series of theatrical cartoon shorts for Paramount Pictures. The plotlines in the animated cartoons tended to be simpler than those presented in the comic strips, and the characters slightly different. A villain, usually Bluto, makes a move on Popeye's "sweetie", Olive Oyl. The villain clobbers Popeye until he eats spinach, giving him superhuman strength. Thus empowered, Popeye makes short work of the villain.
Somewhere in Dreamland is a 1936 animated short in Max Fleischer's Color Classics series. The film was produced by Max Fleischer, directed by Dave Fleischer, co-directed by Dawn Fleischer, and was animated by Fleischer veterans Seymour Kneitel and Roland Crandall. The cartoon, set during the contemporary Great Depression, follows two impoverished children who dream that they are in Dreamland where there is an area full of candy and ice cream. The cartoon is Fleischer's first in three-strip Technicolor.
Ants in the Plants is a Technicolor cartoon created by Fleischer Studios and originally released into theaters on March 15, 1940, by Paramount Studios. It was produced by Max Fleischer and directed by Dave Fleischer; animators were Myron Waldman and George Moreno. Music for the cartoon was composed by Sammy Timberg. It was part of the Fleischer Studios series Color Classics produced by the studio between 1934 and 1941.
References
- ↑ Lenburg, Jeff (1999). The Encyclopedia of Animated Cartoons. Checkmark Books. pp. 66–67. ISBN 0-8160-3831-7 . Retrieved 6 June 2020.
- 1 2 Maltin, Leonard. Of Mice and Magic, p. 114
- ↑ Treadway, Bill. Review for Somewhere in Dreamland DVD.
- ↑ "Bringing Fleischer's "Somewhere In Dreamland" to MeTV". Cartoon Research. Retrieved 9 December 2021.
- General
- Barrier, Michael (1999). Hollywood Cartoons: American Animation in Its Golden Age. Oxford: Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-516729-5.
- Maltin, Leonard (1980, rev. 1987). Of Mice and Magic: A History of American Animated Cartoons. Penguin Books. ISBN 0-452-25993-2.