Is My Palm Read

Last updated

Is My Palm Read
Directed by Dave Fleischer
Produced by Max Fleischer
Chase Gassert
Dave Copeland
Starring Mae Questel
Billy Murray
Animation by David Tendlar
William Henning
Color process Black-and-white
Production
company
Distributed by Paramount Publix Corporation
Release date
  • February 17, 1933 (1933-02-17)
Running time
7 minutes
CountryUnited States
LanguageEnglish

Is My Palm Read is a 1933 Pre-Code Fleischer Studios animated short film starring Betty Boop, and featuring Koko the Clown and Bimbo. [1]

Contents

Plot

Act One. A modestly dressed Betty visits the shop of an elderly, swami-like fortune teller named Professor Bimbo for some advice, but Bimbo is only interested in making time with Betty. Koko the Clown is the swami's assistant.

Act Two. Bimbo shows Betty images of herself in a crystal ball. After reliving her infancy, this vision of Betty is shipwrecked on a jungle island, where she loses her clothing and fashions a scanty "hula girl" bikini to cover herself. She sings the first few lines of the Irving Berlin song "All by Myself", before being abducted by evil ghosts (perhaps Poltergeists) who imprison her in a jungle cabin. Fortunately, she is rescued by a young, strong sailor, who just happened to be exploring the island on horseback.

Act Three. Back in the fortune teller's shop, Betty is horrified by the vision, but the "elderly" swami removes his fake beard and reveals himself to be the heroic sailor. A happy Betty embraces him lovingly, but their reunion is disrupted by the ghosts from the vision, who burst out of the crystal ball and chase the two through a time portal, back to the desert isle. The head ghost rips off Betty's dress to reveal the hula bikini. Betty and Bimbo escape from the ghosts by tricking them into running off a cliff into the sea. The short ends on an unresolved, but optimistic, cliffhanger.

Alternate versions

This short was hand-colorized for a 1972 re-release. Colorized prints (mainly television prints) by Fred Ladd's Color Systems are missing several scenes, including three risqué "pre-Code" clips.

In the 1980s and 1990s, VHS editions usually restored the short to its original black and white appearance, but retained most or all of the above cuts.

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References

  1. Lenburg, Jeff (1999). The Encyclopedia of Animated Cartoons. Checkmark Books. pp. 54–56. ISBN   0-8160-3831-7 . Retrieved June 6, 2020.