Grin and Bear It

A Walt Disney DONALD DUCK Cartoon.

Ursine Humphrey refuses to GRIN AND BEAR IT when Brownstone tourist Donald refuses to share his basket of tasty comestibles.

This is an unremarkable little film, enjoyable but significant only as the debut of fussbudget Ranger J. Audubon Woodlore - voiced by Bill Thompson, he would appear in 5 cartoons. Donald is voiced by Clarence "Ducky" Nash; Jim MacDonald does the honors for Humphrey.

Walt Disney (1901-1966) was always intrigued by drawings. As a lad in Marceline, Missouri, he sketched farm animals on scraps of paper; later, as an ambulance driver in France during the First World War, he drew figures on the sides of his vehicle. Back in Kansas City, along with artist Ub Iwerks, Walt developed a primitive animation studio that provided animated commercials and tiny cartoons for the local movie theaters. Always the innovator, his ALICE IN CARTOONLAND series broke ground in placing a live figure in a cartoon universe. Business reversals sent Disney & Iwerks to Hollywood in 1923, where Walt's older brother Roy became his lifelong business manager & counselor. When a mildly successful series with Oswald The Lucky Rabbit was snatched away by the distributor, the character of Mickey Mouse sprung into Walt's imagination, ensuring Disney's immortality. The happy arrival of sound technology made Mickey's screen debut, STEAMBOAT WILLIE (1928), a tremendous audience success with its use of synchronized music. The SILLY SYMPHONIES soon appeared, and Walt's growing crew of marvelously talented animators were quickly conquering new territory with full color, illusions of depth and radical advancements in personality development, an arena in which Walt's genius was unbeatable. Mickey's feisty, naughty behavior had captured millions of fans, but he was soon to be joined by other animated companions: temperamental Donald Duck, intellectually-challenged Goofy and energetic Pluto. All this was in preparation for Walt's grandest dream - feature length animated films. Against a blizzard of doomsayers, Walt persevered and over the next decades delighted children of all ages with the adventures of Snow White, Pinocchio, Dumbo, Bambi & Peter Pan. Walt never forgot that his fortunes were all started by a mouse, or that simplicity of message and lots of hard work always pay off.

It's picnic season at the national park and the bears are warned to be on best behaviour in front of the visitors – most importantly there must be no theft of picnic baskets. When the park opens all the bears get themselves a party and begin to perform, however one bear is lumbered with begging for food from Donald Duck. When Donald is unwilling to share his food the bear goes to extreme lengths to get it!

Disney is not my favourite stable for cartoons of this period in time and Donald Duck is certainly not my favourite character of the time either. That this short is carried by him is a problem for me, but the fact that he almost plays second fiddle to an over animated bear is a bigger one. The bear isn't that funny save for a few moments, but the film relies on him rather than Donald for most of the time – Donald just does his `grumpy in a flap' act as usual.

Some of the jokes are funny and some of them have nice little bits of build-up to them but most are only so-so. I must admit that I'm not a fan of the character and thus was a little shut off to it from the start, so perhaps it is funnier than I'm giving credit to it for. However for me it was pretty ho-hum apart from some funny bits.

Even if the story is rather routine, I quite liked Grin and Bear It. The animation has a lot of beautiful colours to it with well drawn characters(Donald especially) and fluid backgrounds, and the music is very energetic. Like a lot of the Disney cartoons, the humour is sight-gag-driven and a lot of it is amusing if nothing new strictly speaking, particularly the ending and Donald's reaction to the "Don't molest(not what you think it means) the bears" sign. Grin and Bear It is notable for the debut of the Ranger, voiced with exuberance by Bill Thompson, but it is Donald and Humphrey the bear that are the main focus and both are great fun, with their contrasting personalities shining. Overall, unexceptional but still quite amusing. 8/10 Bethany Cox

Donald Duck visits Brownstone National Park, with a bunch of other guests, and the park's ranger, J. Audubon Woodlore, asks the bears to mingle with the tourists. Humphrey decides to mingle with Donald but only because of the food he has and wants to have. When Donald doesn't give the bear any of his share of the food, the frantic-acting Humphrey goes through all sorts of schemes to try to get some.

It's a beautifully animated cartoon - not much laughs in this one, though, but it is nice to see Donald not getting the brunt of all the bad luck and jokes, which is a rare feat.

Grade B-