I'm Afraid to Go Home in the Dark

This one has a spook motif. A dog in a bowler hat leaves a house and needs to get home. But there are fearful things out there, including a couple of predatory owls who watch him. The cleverest thing of all is a battle with his shadow. The song is again one of those sing alongs. Still the two or three minutes at the beginning has some sophistication to it. I've had a chance to watch quite a few of these things now. They are all about the same.

Just watched this early Max Fleischer Screen Song talkie cartoon on YouTube. This one has a humanized dog coming from a bar and fighting with his shadow in the dark just before that famous bouncing ball comes on and has the singer warbling the title song. Lots of highly amusing scare gags that seemed par for the course of these Dave Fleischer-"directed" cartoons. I put the "D"-word in quotes since Dave was the only credited person of such position on every cartoon his brother Max was associated with until their split in the early '40s. Still, the gag structure seemed to be mainly the influence of Dave's love of whatever sight jokes he could think of whether they really fit in or not. So on that note, I'm Afraid to Come Home in the Dark is well worth seeing for anyone curious about these early Fleischer sound cartoons.

I'm Afraid to Go Home in the Dark (1930)

** 1/2 (out of 4)

The Fleischer Studio produced a number of these animated short films where the "bouncing ball" would have audience members singing together. If you're familiar with this "bouncing ball" series then you already know there's really not too much plot to any of them. You're given a little animation piece leading up to the bouncing ball where the crowd would obviously sing along. There's nothing ground-breaking here but I must say that I enjoyed the song for what it was and the animation was good as well. If you're a fan of these types of films then you'll enjoy this one.