Popeye The Sailor: 1938-1940
DVD Review by Kevin Martinez
DVD Review by Kevin Martinez
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Popeye.com classiccartoonsdvd.com |
Of course, that was before now, when you can buy almost all of the black-and-white Popeye's, in the original non-retraced forms, on two splendid DVD sets. It's taken quite a while for me to absorb all of the goodness of this newest one, but I have to say it's been worthwhile.
Popeye Volume 2 picks up where the last sets leaves off, with the Fleischer studio still hitting it's stride on a regular basis. The Fleischer Studio move from New York to Miami, Mae Questel's reluctance to move to Miami, Gus Wickie's Death (and the imperfect successors to Bluto's voice), and the bleaching of the gritter elements the cartoons on the first set pioneered are all pretty well documented, but despite the relative turmoil of this particular Popeye period, the cartoons themselves still hold up and mostly steer clear of any bleakness.
Cartoons like "I Yam Love Sick" and "Goonland" need no introduction, but one of my favorites of this period is "Plumbing is a Pipe". It has a simple premise; Olive Oyl enlists the help of Popeye to repair her plumbing and makes a total botch of it, but the delivery of each gag hits strong even before the obligatory can of spinach, particularly the running gag of Wimpy (the real plumber) stalling work with a lunch break and forgetting various necessary items. The ending is a curveball in and of itself. Another hit is "Mutiny Ain't Nice" which showcases the novel concept of Popeye being both a sailor with a boat. Olive stowaways in spite of a sailor superstition about women on a ship and chaos ensues, culminating in a mutiny attempt by Popeye's crew. Popeye's spinach round in this one is perhaps one of his finest.
"Wotta Nightmare" with it surreal imagery feels like a throwback to the earliest post-silent days of the Fleischer studio and I like it better now than when it was shown on the aforementioned Boomerang marathon. I actually hated "It's the Natural Thing to Do" when I first saw it, but it grew on me what I saw it again. It has an inspired premise; Popeye, Olive and Bluto giving up the series formula in order for a more refined, or "ruff-fined" cartoon. Doesn't last, but it is fun to see them try, and the title song is catchy.
The centerpiece of this disc and indeed this set is Aladdin and his Wonderful Lamp, which has been fabulously restored. I like this short in spite of its relatively low reputation as the weakest of the three Popeye two-reelers. It's basically the story you're familiar with, Aladdin squares off against an villain for the lamp and the hand of a princess, and the Genie, of course, scenes every scene he's in. But the main attraction here is Popeye's funniest mumble ever, "I've never made love in Technicolor before."
Disc 2 is where we see the cartoons at a more uneven ratio between great and forgettable. For example, "Popeye Meets William Tell" teams our Sailor Man up with perhaps the most annoying Fleischer character this side of Gabby and as a whole comes off as shrill and unpleasant. "Popeye Presents Eugene the Jeep" also is based on a simple concept, Popeye having to put the Jeep out for the night, but since he's the fall guy in this short, it's less satisfying than "Plumbing is a ÔPipe'" was. And as the controversy that has surrounded this short as of late suggests, "My Pop, My Pop" is not one of the stronger Popeye entries.
That's not to say every short on this disc is a dud. "Fighting Pals"' twist on the Popeye formula might be up there with "It's the Natural Thing to Do", since it actually has Popeye tearing through a jungle in SEARCH of Bluto, so they can fight again. "Stealin' Ain't Honest" , as has been described in detail, feels quite a bit like a Warner cartoon, and has a lot of little touches that you'd might expect from a Looney Tune. And Shakespearean Spinach has Popeye and Olive performing Romeo and Juliet, with Bluto intervening for the role of Romeo. However, the short would've been even better had it been made a few year later. Colvig's Bluto is really that distracting.
This being a 2-disc set, there are fewer bonus features than Disc 1, but the ones that are here are very substantial. The inclusion of the Superman "The Mechanical Monsters" is a welcome addition for anyone who didn't buy the Superman movies on DVD, and I hope Warner will eventually trickle down the rest in future sets. Out of the Inkwell, the new documentary on the Fleischers, does a decent but not spectacular job of covering the basics on the studios and it's story. There are still many commentaries, with commentators ranging from Jerry Beck, to animators, to newcomer Bob Jacques. One thing's for certain, if you had misgivings over the commentaries on the previous set, you'll be glad to hear there's no giggling on any of these tracks.
The only real problem is with the restoration with some of the cartoons, and it's a significant one. The cartoons themselves look and sound as good as any film from that vintage can be made to look, and the restoration of the opening and closing titles for the shorts on Disc 2 is pretty close to perfect , but Disc 1 has quite a few hiccups. On some of the cartoons, parts of the opening Popeye music are cut, on others the Paramount logos are sloppily attached and jumpcut jarringly to the Popeye card, and on "Customers Wanted" and "Hello, How Am I?" vestiges of the altered-for-TV a.a.p. titles remain. These problems don't actually affect the cartoons themselves, but are nonetheless disappointing, and it's fortunate that Warner has begun a Disc replacement program for Disc 1. Hopefully the disc will clear those errors right up.
Ultimately, I recommend "Popeye Volume 2" to any cartoon fan. The cartoons are mostly great, and the positives of the set far outweigh the negatives. Oh, and prepare to laugh your head off when you see the Wizard of Oz anti-piracy spot that plays before Disc 1.
