Neptune Nonsense

I am a fan of the early Felix the Cat cartoons. I am talking about the silent ones they made from 1919 to about 1929. The films were, more than anything else, fun--with a strange surrealistic style about them. Felix was a joker--and occasionally a bit of a jerk--and I liked it that way. Well, the series petered out in the talking picture era--mostly because the cartoons lost their zip. The surrealism was gone and the cartoons became dull. A few years after their initial demise, Van Beuren Studios attempted to revive the series. Now considering that they only made three Felix cartoons, you can pretty much guess what the public thought. As far as I am concerned, the public got it right. Although the Van Beuren cartoons looked a lot better (with color and really nice animation), they changed Felix--making him a nice-guy. The public didn't want a nice-guy--they wanted FELIX!

As I watched "Neptune Nonsense" I was struck by how bad this film turned out to be. I'd already seen another one of the Felix films from the studio, the disappointing "Bold King Cole". Little did I realize that "Neptune Nonsense" would be a lot worse! Felix is just too nice, too sweet and too dull here.

The plot, if you even care, involves Felix going fishing in the ocean for a goldfish so that his other goldfish could have a friend (yes, I am a fisherman and I know goldfish are freshwater creatures). Felix is pulled into the water and spends the rest of the cartoon underwater (how he breathed, I have no idea). The fish catch him trying to catch a goldfish and they take him prisoner. But, when King Neptune learns why he did this, he gives him the fish and sends him home...how sweet! And, how boring!! Despite nice animation, this cartoon has nothing else going for it and is Felix in name only.