The Cat Came Back

"The Cat Came Back" is an unusual cartoon for Looney Tunes because it's made with two-color film stock...and inferior sort of color process which produced a very limited range of colors. However, with the copy I saw on HBO Max, clearly someone must have altered the cartoon, as some colors which you never see in two-color film ARE present here...such as bright yellows, true blue (often with two-color, blues look blue-green) and chartreuse. The other possibility is that IMDB is wrong and this film WAS actually made with three-color Technicolor. Regardless, it looks really nice.

In this short, a small cat (perhaps it was Beans...a hero the studio tried, in vain, to promote in this era) getting slapped around by mother mouse. However, when he complains to his mother, she approaches the mother mouse...and she beats up this cat as well. This is a bit of a problem as both mothers have offspring who like each other and want to be friends. When the kitten is washed away into the sewer, his mouse friend follows....so what's next?

The animation and color are great. The story isn't bad since it's not overly cute nor filled with singing (a problem with Looney Tunes shorts of this era), but it's also not particularly funny either. Of course, I'd rather have not particularly funny than super-cute characters singing mindlessly! Overall, I give it a 6...which is relative to other cartoons of 1936 and does NOT mean the short is comparable to the great shorts the studio made in the 1940s and 50s.

While "The Cat Came Back" may just look like a cartoon at face value, I see a connection to a historical event: the 1914 Christmas Truce. Several soldiers fighting in WWI were charging at each other, when they suddenly stopped; they began to see each other not as enemies, but as fellow human beings.

Of course, I'm probably reading way too far into the cartoon. I'm sure that it was intended as silly entertainment to precede a feature film. As this was during the early days of Warner Bros. animation, we shouldn't expect any of the totally wacky things that would characterize their work within the next few years. Worth seeing, if only once.

Love animation, it was a big part of my life as a child, particularly Disney, Looney Tunes and Tom and Jerry, and still love it whether it's film, television or cartoons. Actually appreciate it even more through young adults eyes, due to having more knowledge of it, various animation styles, studios, directors and how it all works.

Granted, 'The Cat Came Back' is not one of Friz Freleng's, a director who did many great cartoons and a director held in high admiration by me, best, not being one of his funniest, wittiest or freshest. For relatively early Freleng, 'The Cat Came Back' is worth watching though he would do much better later. It is never what one would call properly hilarious (but is never unfunny), Freleng's later efforts show more evenness and confidence in directing and the story.

It is quite thin in terms of story, with nothing new done, and the structure is basically an excuse to string the events along. It is not terribly imaginative and occasionally momentum is not always there. A few of the characters are bland with not an awful lot to do.

However, enough of the characters and their chemistry carry 'The Cat Came Back' very well. The most interesting character being the cat.

'The Cat Came Back' has enough very amusing moments (like some suitably wild action), some variety and there is a good deal of liveliness in the second half. The conflict is nicely done and there is a good deal of cuteness and charm. The sentimentality is kept at bay thankfully.

Animation is very good, it's fluid in movement, crisp in shading, vibrant and very meticulous in detail. The music is outstanding, it is lovely on the ears, lushly orchestrated, full of lively energy and characterful in rhythm, not only adding to the action but also enhancing it.

Overall, well done but Freleng did much better later. 7/10 Bethany Cox