Mickey's Polo Team

It's a polo match that pits Movie Stars vs Mickey Mousers. Stan Laurel, Oliver Hardy, Harpo Marx, and Charlie Chaplin are the movie stars. Mickey leads The Goof, Big Bad Wolf, and Donald Duck. There are a myriad of movie and cartoon characters in the stands.

This is an animated colored short. Its greatest value is that it's like a time capsule of the Golden Age of Hollywood. It has many of the classic Disney characters and the old Hollywood stars of that era. It's also a load of fun.

I've never seen humans drawn so ugly. Not so much the Polo players like Laurel and Hardy (I always like them) but more the spectators in the audience. I don't know who that huge-headed, bulbous-eyed guy was supposed to be but he freaked me out.

Anyways, it's Disney stars vs Real Actors in this Polo match (A rather odd choice of sport. Was it popular in the '30s?) and nothing really funny happens. Sure there are a couple of clever moments but, like far too many Disney toons, it's all a set-up for everything to come crashing down.

Vividly animated as it may be, it's still a bit too boring and doesn't hold up against Looney Tunes when it comes to hijinks.

This is possibly the second-most caricature laden short (after Mother Goose Goes Hollywood) that Disney ever did and they aren't just playing polo, either. Half the fun is spotting familiar faces (cartoon characters and caricatures of celebrities), while the other half is watching the strangest polo match ever put on celluloid! Every time I've seen this one, I wonder what various celebrities thought of this one, if they saw it at all, particularly what Clark Gable may have thought! Very visual, with the gags principally being sight gags and the Disney principals taking a back seat to the caricatures. Well worth watching. Most recommended.

This is a crazy cartoon featuring Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck and his friends who face off against a team of celebrities in a polo match. It's nice seeing the celebrities represented in this cartoon - Laurel and Hardy, Harpo Marx and Charlie Chaplin. There are even familiar-looking faces in the audience stands as well including Shirley Temple, Clark Gable, the Three Little Pigs and the Hare from Tortoise and the Hare.

Plenty of slapstick stuff, but the appearance of the many characters seem to be the only fun thing about this cartoon short. Other than that, the story just consists of lots of running and around and chaotic game-play. Not much entertainment here.

Grade D+

one of the better 1936 mickeys. mm hardly appears in it though, the main player is donald duck as he battles it out with harpo marx, and he swallows the ball and becomes a target for the rest of the players. The laurel and hardy characters are spot on and overall the animation is a treat. Available on dvd now along with all the mm 1935-1938 shorts.