Gerald McBoing-Boing (1950)

How sad is this?

Admirable film.

One of the most extraordinary films you will see this year. Take that as you want.

The movie turns out to be a little better than the average. Starting from a romantic formula often seen in the cinema, it ends in the most predictable (and somewhat bland) way.

Gerald McBoing-Boing (1951) *** (out of 4) Oscar-winning, animated short has a story by Dr. Seuss so you know it's going to be something special. The film tells the story of Bobby McBoing who never learns to speak and instead just makes various noises including "boing" over and over. His parents slowly begin to get upset because he can't speak normal words and after a while it's hard for them to know what to do when nothing but sounds come out of his mouth. This is a pretty interesting little short as it's clear they didn't spend too much money on the thing but at the same time there's a strong touch of imagination that makes it worth watching. The animation style is I guess what you'd call "simple" as there aren't any grand backgrounds, beautiful images or rich colors. Instead the drawings are pretty simple and not particularly ground breaking but they are unique in their own way. I think the real key to this thing are the sound effects and how they use them to tell the story. The constant "boing" is charming in its own way but what's really funny are the train noises and various other ones that scare Gerald's father when he's shaving.

This is a film that really makes me cringe. In 1951, MGM and Looney Toons were making some of their very best cartoons--with amazing animation, exceptional backgrounds and great stories. Then, in the late 40s, a new style of animation began to appear (such as the "Crusader Rabbit" series on TV)--animation with extremely simplistic artwork in order to save money. Unfortunately, Columbia Picture's cynical ploy worked!! Instead of the public hating the toons (as they should have), many accepted them and the Oscar people (AMPAS) actually gave this film the award for Best Animated Short--giving legitimacy for an inferior product. Unfortunately, in the dollars and sense world of Hollywood, this soon began to creep into the products of legitimate studios--resulting in rather crappy cartoons. Later, it got even worse as in addition to lousy animation and backgrounds, the stories themselves became almost unbearable for adults to watch. The cleverness and style of the classic cartoons were gone. And for this tragedy, I blame, in part, GERALD MCBOING-BOING--one of the granddaddies of cheap cartoons. The story isn't that bad but the animation is a horror and listening to the kid saying "boing-boing" incessantly is a pain.

This is a witty and delightful adaptation of the Dr Seuss book, brilliantly animated by UPA's finest and thoroughly deserving of its Academy Award. Special mention should be made of the superb music score and sound effects, which are an integral element in helping to make this such a memorable and enjoyable cartoon. Later episodes in the series (of which there were four in total) were not actually based on original Dr Seuss material, although all but the last continued to use his familiar rhyming style. The three sequels were: Gerald McBoing Boing's Symphony (1953); How Now Boing Boing (1954); Gerald McBoing Boing On Planet Moo (1956) - although he also appeared in a later episode of Mr Magoo.

This short, which won an Oscar, spawned two sequels and a TV cartoon show, has minimal animation but adelightful script (by Theodore Geisel aka Dr. Seuss) and aneven more memorable and enchanting main character. UPA pioneered a style of animation that even influenced Disney during the mid-1950s and produced some of the best animated shorts done in the late 1940s and the 1950s. This is on of their finest. God to have it in print. Highly recommended.