quote:"Tragedy is when I prick my finger. Comedy is when I fall into an open manhole and die." - Mel Brooks
Recently a CGI Tom and Jerry film was announced. It didn't surprise me. Ever since The Chipmunks became a big hit on a shoestring budget, it was only a matter of time before other old characters got snatched up for makeovers.
The problem is, despite the seeming simplicity of the concept, no one can seem to capture Tom and Jerry.
Part of it is that people the caliber Will Hanna and Joe Barbera, Tex Avery, and Chuck Jones are not the sort of people put in charge of the revivals. Instead we get someone who's never done animation or even done comedy before. Because "how hard can it be? It's a cat chasing a mouse!"
Yes. Yes it is. But it has to be funny. Even a bit edgy. There's a reason why the Simpsons Itchy and Scratchy parody shorts got such a response. If one watches the original Tom & Jerry shorts, you realize the animators are well aware of the fact that they're asking the audience to laugh at pain and violence. At cruelty. So they cross the line twice by making it so over the top that the audience laughs and plays along.
The various briefly-lived el-cheap-o TV series of the 70s, 80s, and 90s never dared to go that far. The various modern parodies go in the opposite direction, focusing mostly on gory sight gags and self awareness than actual physical humor.
(We shall not speak of the 1992 movie, where Tom and Jerry reveal that not only could they talk all along, but they're best friends now and never want to fight again! They want to sing and dance and help waifish girls!)
My predictions for the CGI Tom & Jerry film:
The CGI will be bargain basement. Oh, they'll make a fuss about counting the number of whiskers on Tom, the tufts in Jerry's ears...but it'll still end up looking like a slightly animate set of wax figures.
There will be a couple of human characters with names that reference the classic creators of Tom and Jerry. This will be in place of having an actual tribute during the credits or something.
There will be one, and one sequence only of Tom chasing Jerry through a house. Much will be made of some snazzy new 3-D animation motion deal invented for this sequence. This sequence will also have the most unimaginative, bland gags in the entire movie.
There will be token shout-outs to the truly imaginative, funny gags of the old cartoons. Jerry flooding the kitchen then making it freeze into an ice skating rink? They'll reference it. They won't do it, but they'll reference it.
Hmmm. Now I'm feeling slightly miffed. Oh well, at least it's not over anything important.
quote:Originally posted by Shmuel: Close. Double-check those pronouns...
I'm giving the quote as it's printed in my copy of Tex Avery: King of Cartoons by Joe Adamson. I'll try and go back to the early 80s and tell him he got it wrong, but I'm not sure how successful I'll be. Posts: 6689 | Registered: Jan 2005
| IP: Logged |
quote:Originally posted by Nighthawk: Well, it depends actually... Can I get a Tom and Jerry written and directed by David Lynch?
That's the ticket, right there.
I mean, looking back at those tom and jerry cartoons, they were absurdly violent. cruel, coercive, full of morbid connotations. A symbolic portrait of inhumanity between sapients, coarse physical drives, and how to make extreme pain and distress funny. For children.
Now that we're all adults and we grew up watching that crap, the Lynch treatment will be just what is needed to foment all that into a collective snapping of our psyches, like a dry and brittle twig.
Posts: 15421 | Registered: Aug 2005
| IP: Logged |
quote:Originally posted by Nighthawk: I want to see Tom just eat the damn mouse, but I don't think I'm gonna get my wish.
Well, some of the really old shorts -did- end with Tom (seemingly) triumphant! It was a different era.
Posts: 6689 | Registered: Jan 2005
| IP: Logged |
quote:Originally posted by Samprimary: That's the ticket, right there.
I mean, looking back at those tom and jerry cartoons, they were absurdly violent. cruel, coercive, full of morbid connotations. A symbolic portrait of inhumanity between sapients, coarse physical drives, and how to make extreme pain and distress funny. For children.
The original theatrical shorts were aimed more at adults. It was in later years that they became almost exclusively aimed at the kiddies, which lead to a lot of censorship of the older shorts.
(Not just the violence...also a lot of ethnic stereotypes and even the occasional racy gag got deleted.)
Posts: 6689 | Registered: Jan 2005
| IP: Logged |
posted
What I wonder is if they will have a full set studio orchestra frantically hammering out the action and subtly building up the suspense.
Posts: 14316 | Registered: Jul 2005
| IP: Logged |
quote:Originally posted by Nighthawk: I want to see Tom just eat the damn mouse, but I don't think I'm gonna get my wish.
Well, some of the really old shorts -did- end with Tom (seemingly) triumphant! It was a different era.
True story, there is definitely one episode where Tom traps Jerry in a block of cheese, and throws him outside into a blizzard where Jerry freezes to death. Tom after some time feels remorse and goes to fetch Jerry only to find his dead body. He takes him inside and cries with regret.
I remember being so dumb struck that I was certain I misremembered it when I got older, but no I saw the episode again and it definitely happened.
Posts: 14316 | Registered: Jul 2005
| IP: Logged |
posted
I remember there was another cartoon where Jerry and Nibbles (the annoying little grey mouse) were certain they had escaped Tom once and for all, and let their guard down. Nearby, Tom pops up, laughs evilly, begins sealing off any escape routes. Iris out. End of cartoon. Posts: 6689 | Registered: Jan 2005
| IP: Logged |
quote:Originally posted by Shmuel: Close. Double-check those pronouns...
I'm giving the quote as it's printed in my copy of Tex Avery: King of Cartoons by Joe Adamson. I'll try and go back to the early 80s and tell him he got it wrong, but I'm not sure how successful I'll be.
Okay, in that case it's not your fault, but that book's editor's. I've seen versions of this in several places, including a 1975 New York Times article, and every other one has some form of "Tragedy is when I cut my finger. Comedy is when you fall into an open sewer and die." (Brooks used this joke on more than one occasion, so the exact wording does change, but the pronoun switch is essential to his point: it's funny when it happens to other people.)
Posts: 884 | Registered: Mar 2005
| IP: Logged |
posted
According to Chuck Jones, Wile E. has even forgotten his purpose for chasing the Road Runner. If he did capture the bird, he'd no longer know what to do with it.
Posts: 6689 | Registered: Jan 2005
| IP: Logged |
posted
Wow, Sean! I forgot all about that! I didn't understand the significance of him "finally catching the road runner" when I saw that episode.
Posts: 6367 | Registered: Aug 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
A big problem with making a full-length Tom and Jerry feature is that they'll have to try to write a story that can be sustained for 1.5 hours or so. And those shorts were... well... short for a reason. They are not really about story. They are slapstick. They are Vaudeville. They are snacks, not meals.
Posts: 1080 | Registered: Apr 2006
| IP: Logged |
quote:Originally posted by Juxtapose: Eh. I don't think I've ever actually found a Hanna-Barbera cartoon funny.
Not even the Tom and Jerry cartoons from the Golden Age of theatrical shorts?
(If you're referring to their later work in TV animation, then I'll agree.)
Well, definitely not the crap that seems to ALWAYS be on Cartoon Network. But honestly, I don't remember any of the older stuff really tickling me either. Know of a place I can refresh my memory?
Posts: 2907 | Registered: Nov 2005
| IP: Logged |
posted
Well, you can rent or NetFlix the Tom & Jerry Spotlight collection...that has a lot of the earliest cartoons.
Posts: 6689 | Registered: Jan 2005
| IP: Logged |
quote:Originally posted by Juxtapose: Gotcha, maybe I just never saw the good ones.
I never thought they were funny, either. Maybe you did see the good ones? I've seen plenty and always thought there was something wrong with me.
Posts: 368 | Registered: Aug 2007
| IP: Logged |
posted
They just never really surprised me, you know? I find that's pretty important to my sense of humor.
Posts: 2907 | Registered: Nov 2005
| IP: Logged |
posted
You might try Yankee Doodle Mouse and The Cat Concerto. They won the Oscar for best animated short in 1943 and 1946, respectively. (That said, it's entirely possible that you just don't like 'em. Nothing wrong with that...)
Posts: 884 | Registered: Mar 2005
| IP: Logged |
Printer-friendly view of this topic
![[Big Grin]](biggrin.gif)
![[Cry]](graemlins/cry.gif)
![[Angst]](graemlins/angst.gif)
![[Smile]](smile.gif)
I've seen versions of this in several places, including a 1975 New York Times article, and every other one has some form of "Tragedy is when I cut my finger. Comedy is when you fall into an open sewer and die." (Brooks used this joke on more than one occasion, so the exact wording does change, but the pronoun switch is essential to his point: it's funny when it happens to other people.)
