Lumber Jerks

The Goofy Gophers are one of the lesser known creations from Termite Terrace. Their schtick, involving excessive politeness and a need to make an articulate comment on virtually every little detail, emphasises the verbal as opposed to the physical and their constant yammering back and forth is a truly love-it-or-hate-it experience. Fortunately, I fall firmly into the former category. I've always found the Goofy Gophers absolutely hilarious and while they may have been too much of an acquired taste for stardom, their excessively talky comedy makes a refreshing alternative to the anvil and dynamite slapstick favoured in many of Friz Freleng's other cartoons. The Gophers were created by Bob Clampett although he left Warner Bros. before he got a chance to direct them. Their cartoons were subsequently divided up between Art Davis, Robert McKimson and Friz. Freleng has done a beautiful job with 'Lumber Jerks', ensuring the laughs barely stop throughout this remarkably slow moving cartoon. There's even a hint of an environmental message as the Gophers lose their home to logging and proceed to trace the progress of their tree as it is sawn up and made into furniture. For those who cannot abide the Goofy Gophers middle class politeness, 'Lumber Jerks' will be a painful experience but fans like me will find it delightful. Warren Foster's wonderfully restrained script wisely makes the Gophers the whole show with barely another character showing up throughout. Most of my favourite Freleng cartoons are wildly energetic pieces such as 'Canned Feud' or 'Yankee Doodle Daffy' but 'Lumber Jerks' takes a different approach and comes up with a different kind of classic and a fascinating showcase for two of the oddest characters in the Warner Bros. repertoire.

I notice by all the comments I've seen that most people are under the impression that "The Goofy Gophers" first and possibly only appearance was in "Lumber Jerks". Actually by my count, they appeared in a total of 9 cartoons (7 Looney Toons and 2 Merrie Melodies). There may possibly be more I don't know about. "Lumber Jerks" was actually their 7th cartoon. They appeared in:

1. The Goofy Gophers (1947)

2. Two Gophers from Texas (1948)

3. A Ham in a Role (1949)

4. A Bone for a Bone (1951)

5. I Gopher You (1954)

6. Pests for Guests (1955)

7. Lumber Jerks (1955)

8. Gopher Broke (1958)

9. Tease for Two (1965)

They seem to be more popular than most people think (although still no comparison to BUGS!)

I wouldn't compare this cartoon to Chip and Dale, those gophers are funny being themselves. Their flavor is certainly, English accent and behavior of gentlemen, that was funny as hell. It would be interesting to know what exactly means this world play "Lumber Jerks", 'cause I've came up with two variants. As usually this cartoon was simply killed in translation to Russian language, besides, somehow gophers turned out to be boy and girl :) I wish there was more of these characters to see, and I second that one of the drivers was Bugs Bunny, that was a nice touch. As for DVD release it is very worth buying the video quality is very good, that is remastered very good, vivid colors and stuff like that, audio quality is good as well considering that it is from year 1955, you know.

Mac and Tosh? The Goofy Gophers? Never heard of them. And I bet Walt Disney cried plagiarism the day this came out. And I don't blame him if he did as they are a total rip-off of Chip and Dale. They are kinda funny funny though.

Mac and Tosh both have English accents and are very well spoken. When lumberjacks show up in their forest and cut their home down they go off to the lumber mill to get it back. Only it's made into furniture (you can't help but notice the tiniest environmental subtext here) and they plan to steal it back, nonetheless, from the delivery drivers (one of whom sounds EXACTLY like Bugs).

They are cute but not strong enough to really last as long as the better known Looney Tunes. And perhaps Disney put an injunction on Warner preventing such blatant plagiarism. Is this why we never saw Mac and Tosh again?

cute cartoon very reminiscent of chip n dale but with english accents.

two chipmunks find their tree home has been demolished and follow it along the river and to the sawmill.

Clever and inventive cartoon but I still prefer chip n dale