Put on Your Old Gray Bonnet

Put on Your Old Gray Bonnet (1929)

** 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. The story here is pretty simple as a group of animals are warming up with their instruments before going into the title song. If you're familiar with these shorts then you know the plots really aren't anything special. With that said, these were meant to be fun for a crowd of people and to get them to sing together. On that level this here was mildly entertaining and there's no question that the animation itself was good. This won't have much appeal today but it's worth watching for film buffs.

I'm sure some wonder why I'm reviewing these things. My interest in early cinema takes me all over the place. This uses a staple of early animation: an animal orchestra, led by a lion (he has the crazy hair) and a group of characters with some bizarre instruments that won't cooperate. Some nice little bits occur and we conclude with a bouncing ball sing-along. The Fleischers seemed to go a step further with the initial characters becoming part of the song-leading. Nothing is particularly interesting about this one.

A band of cartoon animal musicians-- including their long-haired lion conductor -- warm up before going into the title song.

Although Walt Disney claimed to have produced the first sound cartoon with STEAMBOAT WILLIE in 1928, the Fleischers had begun their regular series of Screen Songs in 1925, a continuation of the live sing-alongs from early days of vaudeville and purpose-built movie theaters -- sing the song and then buy the sheet music. This sort of short subject would continue through the end of regular short subject production in the 1950s.

In the meantime, this is a fairly simple version of the elaborate Screen song that the form would evolve into. After the warm-up, the song is sung through once, straight, then there is a little more by-play. A decent if not remarkable example of the series.