The House of Tomorrow (1949 film)

The House of Tomorrow
Directed by	Tex Avery
Story by	Jack Cosgriff Rich Hogan
Produced by	Fred Quimby
Starring	Frank Graham Tex Avery Joi Lansing [1]
Narrated by	Frank Graham Don Messick
Music by	Scott Bradley
Animation by	Walter Clinton Michael Lah Grant Simmons
Color process	Technicolor
Production company	MGM cartoon studio
Distributed by	Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer
Release date	June 11, 1949 (1949-06-11)
Running time	7:00
Language	English

The House of Tomorrow is a 1949 animated theatrical short directed by Tex Avery. ^[2] It was part of a series of cartoons Avery did satirizing technology of the future which included: The Car of Tomorrow, The T.V. of Tomorrow , and The Farm of Tomorrow . These were spoofs of live-action promotional films that were commonly shown in theaters at the time.

The film is a straightforward narrated showcase of appliances said to be found in a typical house in the year 2050, roughly a hundred years after the cartoon was made, each one actually an outlandish joke. Most of the time, the inventions follow a similar pattern of being made for each member of the family, but ending with a fatal version for the "mother-in-law".

Plot

An off-screen narrator introduces The House of Tomorrow, a pre-fabricated luxury residence that unfolds from a tiny gift box. The house has separate entrances for each member of the family: for Fido, a tiny door surrounded by bones; for Junior, a door covered in muddy handprints; for the mother, a wide and curvy door to accommodate her large form from eating sweets; for the father, a saloon door; and, for the mother-in-law, a heavily barricaded door with a welcome mat that reads "SCRAM!"

Once inside, the narrator offers a tour of the house's modern conveniences, presented as a series of brief vignettes consisting of sight gags. The house contains all of the following:

• Carpeting so lush and deep that a passing butler sinks into it up to his neck.
• A climate control system that, with the push of a button, sends a raining thundercloud across the room
• A trophy room where animal heads share space with a liquor bottle that was "killed" one New Year's Eve.
• A button to fool tax assessors by transforming the home's appearance and its inhabitants into that of a dilapidated hovel resided in by poor people.
• A machine to handle Junior's nonstop questions by yelling "Ahh, shaddap!" and plugging his mouth with a toilet plunger.
• An automatic sandwich maker that shuffles slices of bread and cold cuts like playing cards before "dealing" the sandwiches to diners.
• A tanning machine that flips the user with a giant spatula.
• A guest chair that can adjust its shape for any visitor, whether tall, short, or the mother-in law (for her, it transforms into an electric chair).
• A three-screen television set the whole family can watch at once: a cooking show for the mother, a western for Junior, and, for the "tired businessman," a film of a beautiful woman (Joi Lansing) in a bathing suit.
• Individual medicine cabinets for each member of the family; the father's and mother's are filled with various hygiene implements, Junior's contains a single large bottle of castor oil with a spoon, and the mother-in-law's is filled with vials of poison.
• An electric shaver that can remove not only stubble, but also almost all of a man's facial features.
• A toaster that pops its users up in the air instead of the toast.
• A juicer that removes the seeds from oranges by noisily spitting them into a spittoon.
• A frying pan that prevents bacon from curling by hitting it with a tiny mallet.
• An oven with a window to let one see everything inside (a roasting chicken screams for its modesty and pulls down a blind).
• A device to remove the burps from radishes by pressing each one as it passes through, forcing out a literal burping sound.
• A pressure cooker that can cook an entire meal at once; it's shown that it does so via the heat from a catastrophic explosion which sends all the food airborne, along with the stunned housewife herself.
• A refrigerator with a built-in window for those curious about whether the light turns off when the door is closed. It reveals a little gnome-like creature pushing an "off" button each time.

As the narrator signs off, a typewritten letter suddenly appears on the screen:

PATRONS ATTENTION!!

Due to numerous requests of the tired business-men in the audience, we are going to show you the girl again.

The Management

The short then ends with a repeat of the film of Joi Lansing in her swimsuit.

See also

• What's Buzzin' Buzzard - A previous cartoon that also had a "Patrons Attention" at the end of it.

References

1. "AVERY…. Vol. 2??? WELL, IMAGINE THAT! -". cartoonresearch.com. 7 December 2020. Retrieved 15 December 2020.
2. Lenburg, Jeff (1999). The Encyclopedia of Animated Cartoons. Checkmark Books. pp. 146–147. ISBN   0-8160-3831-7.

External links

• The House of Tomorrow at IMDb