"MASS MOUSE MEETING" (Screen Gems/Columbia-1943)

"Mass Mouse Meeting" (1943), one of the most notorious of Columbia's Screen Gems cartoons, is this retelling of the old story of a mouse placing a bell around the neck of a cat so that he and his fellow mice can know when the feline is coming. In this one, the rodent chosen for this chore spends roughly three and-a-half minutes talking to the curious cat about his new collar. This black-and-white "Phantasy" cartoon, with story by Dun Roman, animation by Chic Otterstrom, and music by Paul Worth, was produced by Dave Fleischer and directed by Alec Geiss.

Category:

Film & Animation

Tags:

• Columbia Pictures
• Cartoon

[Dachshund]

This is the kind of cartoon that Leonard Maltin wrote about. Misguided story direction, indeed!

[superleviathan]

This really makes you appreciate the kind of gold Clampett, Jones and Freleng at Warners and Avery and Hanna-Barbera at MGM were able to strike.

[Ryoku75]

@RayPointer Great analyzation of this one.

[RayPointer]

The story spends a lot of time in the meeting before getting to the main part. The "victim" mouse is not really established as being "drunk," if he is supposed to be. Then he is suddenly sober in the rest of the cartoon. A lot of time in used up with presenting the cat with the collar. Finally the payoff with the cat placing Jingle Bells on the tails of the mice starts to build to a climax that does not happen. The cartoon just ends there as if they ran out of time. Great anmation wasted.

[deadlyshoesalesman]

I've been wanting to see this one ever since I read Leonard Maltin's write-up on it in "Of Mice and Magic." It's just as weak as he describes it. I'm giving thumbs up to your video, of course, but I won't be so kind when I rate this cartoon over at IMDb.

[vmpickle123]

A cat who tricks the mice by tying their tail to a bell so as to make them believe he chases them, whose trick backfires on him? This hardly makes sense at all.