Thursday, November 03, 2005
Filmography: Swing, You Sinners
This post is just the tip of the iceberg... see reason number 7 on our The Top Ten Reasons To Support The A-HAA for links to more great cartoons to study.
Today, I would like to direct your attention to the organization that is responsible for presenting this website and the Animation Archive... The International Animated Film Society: ASIFA-Hollywood. ASIFA is such a strange name, few people know what it is. But if you love animation, you should be an ASIFA member yourself. To find out who we are and what we do, please see... ASIFA-Hollywood Membership Page. I'm sure you will want to become a member too.In addition to the Animation Archive, ASIFA-Hollywood sponsors the Animation Preservation Program. When you buy a DVD, and it says "restored" on the cover, it really isn't restored. Video companies create a video master, which they color correct and clean up, but they don't always strike safety copies of the original film elements. Even fewer still create projectable prints so the films can be seen on the big screen the way they were originally intended to be seen.
ASIFA-Hollywood, in association with the UCLA Film & Television Archives, sponsors the "Adopt-A-Cartoon" program to fully restore cartoons in danger of being lost forever to film deterioration. Under the supervision of Jere Guldin, the Director of the ASIFA-Hollywood Film Preservation Program, we have rescued dozens of important films, including significant titles by Walter Lantz, George Pal and the Fleischer Brothers.One of the films preserved with the assistance of ASIFA-Hollywood was the classic Fleischer Talkartoon, Swing, You Sinners. Animated by Ted Sears and Willard Bowsky, with an eye-popping surreal ending by Grim Natwick and Bowsky, this film was the first of many Fleischer cartoons that mixed surrealism, cartoony ghosts & goblins, and hot jazz. While other studios built their cartoons around fairy tale stories or topical gags, the Fleischers constructed cartoons in the same way jazz music was constructed... statement of the theme, a series of variations and a big finish.
Today, this important film was inducted into our digital collection.
Swing, You Sinners
(Quicktime 7 / 17 mb)
If you have a blog or website, please link to us so more people can find out about the ASIFA-Hollywood Animation Archive.
PLEASE NOTE The text and media files on the ASIFA-Hollywood Animation Archive Blog are not to be duplicated, redistributed or hosted on other websites without the prior written permission of the Board of Directors of ASIFA-Hollywood.
Thanks
Stephen Worth
Director
ASIFA-Hollywood
Animation Archive
Stumble It!
posted by Stephen Worth @ 2:52 PM
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13 Comments:
This is so great!! I love this cartoon and have had such a hard of time finding it anywhere. Thank you!
This is great that they are asking the public's help to restore these films. I find it odd that the "Restored" SWING YOU SINNERS doesn't have it's original opening frame.... the one pictured is from a 1950's TV print from UM&M. The original would have a credit to Paramount or the Publix Corporation, which is what Paramount operated as when it was restructuring.
-Nick Langdon, Sacramento
nlangdon@decofilms.com
FWIW, the tune that starts at about 1:35 in the cartoon is identified as "Down South" on a CD I have called "Mechanical Memories," where it is played (memorably!) on an Imhof & Mukle Orchestrion.
The cartoon is much enjoyed, and I eagerly await what you'll put up next. It's like a nice drink of water in the desert.
Hi there..
Have posted the links here
http://watchinmewatchinu.blogspot.com/2005/11/category-animations-fexlix-no-not-that.html
..but are seeking the author of a certain felix catalogue
I'm afraid there's no way that we can put the whole collection, or even parts of it online at this point. The bandwidth costs would be prohibitive. However, every cartoon in our collection is available for viewing by the public during office hours at the Archive office in Burbank.
This website is intended to let the supporters of the Archive project know how we're progressing on building out the archive in Burbank. The website isn't intended to be the archive itself. Once the Archive is fully built out, we'll try to get funding to bring portions of it online for members of ASIFA-Hollywood behind a password gate, but that's a year or two off at this point.
Right now, the funding for the archive is running very low. We'll continue to build out and provide updates until it runs out. If you want to see more, the best thing you can do is join ASIFA-HOLLYWOOD, volunteer to help out at the archive, AND contribute material or donate to the Animation Archive Project. The amount we are able to do is dependent on the support we receive.
Thanks
Stephen Worth
Director
AS)FA-Hollywood Animation Archive
Wow! This is quite exceptional. Thanks for sharing it with us!
One question : can you tell us who performed the music in this film?
-GB
A mastewrpiece ! The most strange and surreal cartoon i've ever seen ! You can post about it in my blog if you want !
One of the main vocalists in the soundtrack to "Swing You Sinners" sounds like Ward Pinkett. He was a trumpet player who recorded with Chick Webb, Bingie Madison, and King Oliver. If you go to http://www.redhotjazz.com/oorchestra.html (King Oliver's Orchestra), listen to the scat vocal on "Stop Crying" and you'll see what I mean. He also takes a vocal on "One More Time," and "Papa Dee Da Dah". Pinkett died at about 1936 from health complications related to alcoholism.
Excellent job on restoring this cartoon! The vocalist in "Swing, You Sinners" sounds a lot like Ward Pinkett. Pinkett, an enormous talent whose life was cut short by alcoholism in 1936, played trumpet and sang with several New York City bands in the 1920s and 1930s. Some of these bands included Chick Webb, Bingie Madison, and King Oliver. Go to http://www.redhotjazz.com/oorchestra.html and listen to "Stop Crying" which has a Pinkett vocal, and you'll see what I mean. Pinkett would have been in New York City at the time this cartoon was created, and it doesn't stretch the imagination too much that he might have made a little extra money doing studio work like this, especially considering how the Fleischers used African-American talents in the soundtracks of their earlier cartoons. Perhaps some of the trumpet work is by Pinkett as well. The title song of the cartoon is actually, "Sing, You Sinners" and the studio band is following a 1929 Frank Skinner orchestration that was available through Paramount's music publishing wing. I have that orchestration, and in spots, it is identical to parts of the soundtrack.
thanks for posting this! I've been wanting to see this cartoon for years. I just linked to your site too, so thanks!
THIS cartoon is unbelievable. Is this for real or a gag? The cartoon looks like it was made recently, it's so fresh and wild and hallucinogenic. It looks like this is the cartoon that changed Bob Clampett's life. This so much better than ANY cartoon that happened in 1930. The only contemporary cartoon I can think that stands up to that is [b]I Miss You[/b] music video by John K and Steven Worth. So much vibrant life and energy!
Oh, my. I always wanted to see those old old cartoons and this was really amusing. I totally loved it!
One Hour with you - Betty Boop cartoon. A man in a painters smock is singing the song, "One hour with you", as he paints a picture on an easel while a white ball bounces on top each word on the screen.
Who is the man singing the song and where can I download the cartoon?
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