More Kittens

A Walt Disney SILLY SYMPHONY Cartoon Short.

Mammy Twoshoes has MORE KITTENS underfoot than she can tolerate. She drives the three diminutive felines out into the yard where many adventures finally reveal an unlikely protector...

A sequel to 1935's Oscar winning THREE ORPHAN KITTENS, this is a cute, enjoyable film but breaks no new ground technically. The perception of dimensional depth, so apparent in some of the previous film's backgrounds, are noticeably lacking here.

The SILLY SYMPHONIES, which Walt Disney produced for a ten year period beginning in 1929, are among the most interesting of series in the field of animation. Unlike the Mickey Mouse cartoons in which action was paramount, with the Symphonies the action was made to fit the music. There was little plot in the early Symphonies, which featured lively inanimate objects and anthropomorphic plants & animals, all moving frantically to the soundtrack. Gradually, however, the Symphonies became the school where Walt's animators learned to work with color and began to experiment with plot, characterization & photographic special effects. The pages of Fable & Fairy Tale, Myth & Mother Goose were all mined to provide story lines and even Hollywood's musicals & celebrities were effectively spoofed. It was from this rich soil that Disney's feature-length animation was to spring. In 1939, with SNOW WHITE successfully behind him and PINOCCHIO & FANTASIA on the near horizon, Walt phased out the SILLY SYMPHONIES; they had run their course & served their purpose.

I happen to love Three Orphan Kittens, it was cute, quite touching and fun. I find More Kittens not as good, with the story rather routine and lacking force, the Mammy character is rather stereotypical and could be seen as offensive to some people and the dog doesn't have much to do that is interesting, most of the time he is just there and the kittens and whatever lands in the folds of the dog's mouth do the work. However, while not the most technically accomplished or sophisticated, the animation is very pretty with the characters beautifully drawn, the colours lush and the backgrounds suitably colourful. The music also has a energetic and pastoral feel to it. The kittens are very sweet characters and it is easy to relate to them, even if there are more interesting characters in the Silly Symphonies series. I also loved the gag with the bird whistling Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf, keeping being pushed out by the dog's tongue in cuckoo-clock style. All in all, cute and well animated but inferior sequel. 7/10 Bethany Cox