So after last night's discussion of pitch-black horror, I thought I'd lighten the mood a bit for Night Twelve of the Countdown to Halloween by posting up my two all-time favorite Disney cartoons.
Now, don't think I'm going completely soft on you here. These cartoons were made when Unca Walt was still alive, so they've got a little bite to 'em. I mean, Mickey's got a shotgun in one of 'em, and Donald's just being a complete bastard in the other. And they are, naturally, Halloweenie cartoons to boot, which automatically made 'em my favorites as a wee lad. This was back before there was a Dork Forty to plow, understand, when my nerd farm didn't really extend very far past the boundaries of my bedroom, and the most sincere punkin patch I'd ever seen was the one Linus laid in with his best gal Sally Brown. Good times. Innocent times. Times that were ripe for my young brain to be warped (in the best way possible, of course) by the Halloweenie magic of the Walt Disney Company...
Cartoon goodness awaits... after the jump!
The first cartoon I wanna show you tonight is called "Trick or Treat." I had a "radio play" version of this on a big ol' hunk of long-playing vinyl when I was wee, and I listened the grooves off it. I think a lot of that had to do with the bitchin' theme song, mind you, and I never saw the cartoon itself til I was a big hairy grown-up. But it's still a fun Halloween treat...
Heh. Whoo! I'll be the first to admit that my admiration of that one is tinged by at least a little bit of nostalgia; it's not top-notch Disney animation, even for one of the shorts, and the story's a bit weak. But, man. I had a complicated relationship with the Donald Duck character for a long time because of this cartoon. He's just such an asshole in it that I couldn't figure out if he was a good guy or a bad guy. And that's something I never quite got over. I mean, whenever there's a murder to solve in Disneyland, he's still my first suspect...
This next cartoon, though, is a bona-fide classic: "The Lonesome Ghosts." This is the one where Mickey, Donald, and Goofy are ghost-breakers! Which is the most awesome idea ever when you're five. I had this one on the old Fisher Price movie viewer, which was kind of like a View-Master, except with moving pictures. You put in a cassette and cranked a handle on the side to watch the movie. There was no sound, but you controlled the speed of the film, you could roll it forwards and backwards... It was a pretty great toy for a pre-schooler. And this was by far my favorite movie for it. I literally watched this thing til I broke it, and then begged my folks to get me another one. They never did, and, like "Trick or Treat," I never saw the actual cartoon til I grew up. This one holds up a little bit better, though, I think...
One note there: this is apparently a later Disney edit of the cartoon, in which they cut out the scene where they actually use that shotgun. The shotgun version is, obviously, better, and I'm sorry I couldn't find you the glorious unexpurgated version tonight. [HOMER] Lousy people who don't wanna let kids see dangerously repeatable acts of violence... [/HOMER]
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