Friday 21 October 2016

Film: 'Superman' - The Fleischer Cartoons (1941-1943)

The seventeen 'Superman' cartoons made by Fleischer (and Famous) Studios are a marvel to behold. In this era of limited animation, those fully animated mini-masterpieces are spectacular. It's a little sad that the new management that oversaw the last eight packed those examples full of war propaganda and some awful stereotypes, but the quality of the workmanship is unparallelled. All the previous expertise developed from the Popeye and Betty Boop cartoons is concentrated and condensed until the whole screen is filled with technicolour exploits.

The Superman in the Fleischer cartoons is radically different to what you might expect if you have experienced only the modern DC screen universe. The cartoons are filled with rescues of every variety, and some of the best screen action you could ever imagine in a modern television show. It's fantastic. My favourite example so far is the train rescue in 'Billion Dollar Limited', which captures so much of what was wonderful about Superman as to render practically every other version redundant. You may think this is hyperbole, but the Fleischer cartoons really are that good. They're magical. In 'Billion Dollar Brain', Superman ends up pulling the train himself, after the locomotive goes off a precipice, in a spectacularly rhythmic fashion, while pulling off a dozen other feats.

Superman in the Fleischer cartoons is a rescue machine. His main interaction with the villain is at the end, after defeating the scheme, when he picks up the fiend and drops him off with the police. Clark Kent is just a bit player, working at the Daily Planet as it's one of the rare places where he can get up to the date news. He also turns up at the end to do the George Reeves wink to camera that apparently didn't start with George Reeves! Yes, the wink originated here, or in the comic strip. It's hard to say without more research. The end wink might have originated in principle in the radio serial, as did the voice actors used, the legendary Bud Collyer and Joan Alexander.

The Superman phenomenon can be pretty hard to understand now, so long past the relevant time frame. Superman began in Action Comics in 1938, leaped into the radio sphere in 1940, then theatrical cartoons in 1941 and movie serials in 1948 and 1950, before George Reeves took over for television in the 1950s. Superman was massive, a wonderful burst of positivity in a depressed world, exploding out of the chaos of the 1930s. He was the first popular superhero.

These Fleischer cartoons are also utterly gorgeous, with the best technicolour and a truly drop dead gorgeous pinup version of Lois Lane. Lois here is a gutsy newshound, always following stories in the most dogged fashion, and getting into a dust up whenever possible! Yes, she may end up in distress, but not without giving a good account of herself. Oh, Lois, you have either the most wonderful or terrible luck... She also gets to kiss the man himself, which would be frowned upon in many a following year. The artwork is amazing in these cartoons, and puts a lot of modern animation in a box of shame from which it would never recover. Colour, full animation, music, sight gags, and some of the most fluid visuals you can find now, and which you wouldn't even have imagined at the time; all combine to make something special.

Oh, and if you're not sold: These cartoons are in the public domain and available at the Internet Archive. Try 'Billion Dollar Limited'. Go on.

O.

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