Gold Diggers of '49

"Gold DIggers of '49"* is a first...as well as a second. First, it is the first cartoon directed by Fred 'Tex' Avery. While it lacks the wonderful weirdness of his later MGM films, it is significantly better than the Harmon-Ising singing cartoons Looney Tunes was known for at the time. Second, it's Porky Pig's second film. And, unlike the first ("I Haven't Got a Hat"), Porky is older and fatter.

The cartoon is one starring a character long forgotten...mostly because he just wasn't that interesting. 'Beans' (I think he's supposed to be a cat) is the hero here and he and Porky and many others are all out looking for gold in 19th century California. There are a few nice laughs here and there...as well as a few nasty 1930s racial stereotypes which were not that unusual for the time.



*Nearly all of the cartoons by Looney Tunes and most other studios (aside from Disney) made black & white cartoons in 1935. This is because Disney bought exclusive cartoon rights to Three-Color Technicolor--the first true color film stock widely used by filmmakers. As a result, other studios either needed to use black & white or a two-color process, such as those made by Technicolor and Cinecolor....and the colors tended to be more orangy-green than color.

Porky Pig's second appearance (and Tex Avery's directorial debut) does feature a few racial stereotypes, but overall, "Gold Diggers of '49" made me laugh. Set at the time of the 1849 California gold rush, Porky and Beans are prospectors, and Beans wants to marry Porky's daughter Kitty (the three characters got introduced in "I Haven't Got a Hat" earlier in 1935, and Porky looks as if he needs triple bypass surgery). Part of this involves Beans guarding a little something of Porky's.

If you've seen any of Tex Avery's cartoons, then you should know what sorts of things to expect here. The gags aren't quite as zany as I might have hoped for, but I try to imagine how hilarious they must have looked the first time that moviegoers ever saw them. If absolutely nothing else, this should be of interest to cartoon fans as a look into the Termite Terrace crowd's early days. Worth seeing.

As for the question of how a pig fathered a cat...well, in cartoons things don't have to make sense.

This is a Warner Brothers cartoon, made with Porky Pig, less than a year old.

In this cartoon, in the 1800's, a cat called Beans has found gold. After kissing his love (the cat who is Porky's "daughter") goodbye, he head off and with Porky and townfolk, he mines for gold. He seems to be doing very well. Then, along comes a robber, who has his eye on one bag of gold - but he did not count on Beans coming along...

This is a very interesting cartoon in a historical and plot-wise point of view. It is historical because of the way it is made, which is old and the humour, which is old. The plot is interesting, partly because it was unlike the plots of many of the Warner Brothers cartoons in the future. I like the cartoon because of this and I also like it because of Beans the cat (who for some reason reminds me of Mickey mouse), Porky (who looks a lot different) and Beans' sweetheart. Some parts of the cartoon are very cute.

Well worth a watch - especially for people who like historical cartoons and exciting old cartoons! Enjoy "Gold Diggers of '49". :-)

Tex Avery has gone on to far better cartoons since, but 'Gold Diggers of 49' is not a bad first cartoon at all, while not great it's decent.

Wasn't crazy about Porky here, really like him as a character but his taller and slobbery look is nowhere near as appealing as the design that we're more familiar with, pretty crude from personal opinion actually. Nor with Joe Dougherty's voice work, Mel Blanc's Porky stutter is much more natural while Dougherty's sounds annoying and overdone. One gag misfires too, and that's the racially stereotypical gag with the Chinese dogs.

However, while Avery's animation style became more refined later on there are some really imaginative and beautiful visuals here, especially in the chase sequence with lots of fluidity, crispness and meticulous detail. The music is no Carl Stalling, but it's lively, charmingly orchestrated, rousing and dynamic enough. There are some good gags, though Avery's succeeding cartoons were more consistent in humour and were sharper and wittier, especially the barber shop gag and the chase sequence, the latter being the highlight of the cartoon. There are some cute moments too, and the whole stuff with the gold makes for good fun.

Beans is not one of the funniest ever characters and there are more interesting ones too, but he is compelling and amusing enough and he's likable. Kitty is adorable, and the villain is suitably dastardly. The chemistry between the characters is also enjoyable, and apart from Dougherty the voice acting from Bernice Hansen and Billy Bletcher is very good but the lack of Mel Blanc is much lamented.

All in all, a decent first cartoon for Avery but he went on to do better. 7/10 Bethany Cox

It's 1849 and prospectors are searching for gold in Red Gulch. Our hero Beans finds it by way of a slot machine and inspires a small town to join the gold rush. There are lots of captions to move the story along, although they never explain what kind of animal Beans is. I suppose he look a bit like Felix the cat, but then most of the characters in the thirties did. Still the Warner brothers must have had high hopes for Beans, as he gets the honour of saying "That's all folks" at the end. Lots of silly animals appear, including an unnecessary barbershop quartet and a big fat pig who seems to be in charge of things. Could this slob really be Porky? He has the stutter, but that is the only recognizable feature.

Enter the villain employing an impressive lasso gun to steal Porky's most prized possession. If beans gets it back Porky tells him he can literally have his daughter. Luckily for Beans the girl does not look like her father but seems to be of the same unidentified black and white species as our hero. The chase scene features some early examples of the kind of lunacy that would make Supervisor Fred (Tex) Avery famous in later years, but the pace is much slower. The art of animation was so new at this time, that just seeing funny animals riding mules and horses, driving cars and playing racial stereotypes was good enough for a laugh.

4 out of 10