Little Cheeser

A little mouse is incited by the little red devil inside him to defy his mother's instructions to go to bed. Instead he sneaks up to the kitchen to steal some cheese. The little white angel inside him urges him to go home to bed.

It's another of the goo-plotted cartoons that Harman & Ising -- and other cartoon makers of this period -- were fond of making: instructions to be a good little man and do what mama tells you. I've seen far too many of them to be impressed any more (although the images and Technicolor background work is, as always, striking), and I'm excessively tired of Bernice Hansen's cutesy-woodsy, mousie-wousie voice. Although she did many voices in her career, he specialized in doing kiddie voices, and these have annoyed me for more than sixty years, since I first noticed that all the baby mice in Looney Tunes sounded the same, and all were annoying.

Voicework was always a side job for her. She worked mostly as a seamstress. Her career as a voice actor in cartoons began with voicing Oswald the Lucky Rabbit for Lantz in 1932; she would continue doing so through 1938. The next year she added Leon Schlesinger to her roster of employers, voicing Cookie, the girlfriend in the 'Buddy' cartoons. By the time her movie career ended in 1941, she had done voices in more than a hundred cartoons. Whenever someone wanted a voice that sounded like a brain-damaged toddler, they called in Miss Hansen.

Not that it was her responsibility. Those were the roles she was offered, and I imagine the money was good. She died in 1981, 83 years of age.

Love animation, it was a big part of my life as a child, particularly Disney, Looney Tunes, Hanna Barbera, Studio Ghibli and Tom and Jerry, and still love it whether it's film, television or cartoons. With significantly broader knowledge of different directors, animation styles and studios, actually appreciate and love it even more now. Rudolf Ising was very hit and miss, some of his cartoons were very charming and engaging, others despite great animation and music were bland.

1936's 'Little Cheeser' is fairly typical of Ising and a good deal of the Happy Harmonies cartoons, leaning towards the cute kind of cartoon with a lot of sentiment in alternative to the laugh a minute and hilarious kind, the latter being the one that a lot seem to prefer (understandably, though am hardly biased against the former). This approach has varied with Ising. In some instances it has been very sweet and charming, in others it can be cloying and too cutesy. Some fit in the former category, others in the latter category. 'Little Cheeser' is one of too many Happy Harmonies cartoons (a very uneven series of cartoons) to be in the latter and not do it.

It is not all bad by all means. Its best asset is the animation, it's vibrantly and atmospherically coloured and shaded, beautifully drawn and rich in meticulous background detail. The music is another big plus, it's lushly orchestrated, full of charm and character and fits with the visuals beautifully.

Despite being too far and between, there are moments of endearing charm. Loved the character of the devil, the most and only interesting character in the cartoon.

However, 'Little Cheeser' has a lot working against it. It is significantly undone by Little Cheeser, don't be fooled by the cute exterior because he is anything but in personality. Instead he is very bland, too cloying and later on also too much of an annoying brat. Have nothing against Bernice Hanson, but she voices him with too much of a shrill voice and it is not pleasant on the eardrums. The story is barely existent and there are times when it drags hard.

Too much of the cartoon is too saccharine and cloying and there are very few laughs. What there is is not funny and isn't really amusing either. There are attempts at racy content, including smoking, alcohol and ahead of the time magazines, but there isn't really any real edge to it and some of it felt bizarre and out of place. It made the cartoon feel tonally muddled at times, where figuring out what it was trying to be was not always easy. Any moralising has the subtlety of a sledgehammer.

Overall, very mediocre. 4/10.

It's a Happy Harmonies cartoon from MGM. Restless young mice Little Cheeser is sent to bed by his doting mother. He is desperate to be a tough guy. The devil in him pushes him to steal cheese but the angel in him tries to stop him. Soon, the cat is after him and all hell breaks loose. I want the bratty Little Cheeser to get eaten. That might be too dark. So the mother should be the one who comes to the rescue. This is fine as a lesson to obey one's parent.