The Novelty Shop

An elderly owner of a novelty shop leaves for the night. The place is filled with every manner of junk, from piggy banks to cactuses. A little pipe cleaner figure blows a trumpet and the whole place comes to life with all the figures going bonkers. It is pretty clever for the most part, but there is little plot. The animation is fine. Once again we get to see some of the movie stars of the time figuring in this film.

Finally! Been waiting for a cartoon like this since the last time I watch a similar-themed one. Where are these cartoons? They are the very best. One character used once, in a cartoon never to return, sadly. These are the best. There is so much to see in every cell that it needs multiple re-watches.

For those who aren't familiar with the era, you'll notice 3 Kewpie dolls, at the end returning to their cards, in a play on (silent) words, posing as Cupids. Very charming, extremely well done. I'm sadly removing 1 star for those creepy dolls with the black hair and black eyes and screechy singing. UGH! Had no place here.

As for Martin Hafer, I think your wife does LSD when you're not around the house, wink! And as for the other that said "lacked in laughs"... who watches cartoons to laugh?! Do you laugh at the recurring stupidity of Jerry hitting Tom repeatedly? Does seeing the same idiotic Beep-Beep bird hurting coyote leave you in stitches?? Cos it sure doesn't me! Perhaps you think Bugs is hilarious, huh? Well, I don't. Those are lame cartoons.

This one goes on my to-buy-DVD list. Coulda been a 10/10 but a 9/10 is much closer to what it deserves, what those clueless dummies can't appreciate and they need to stay away from classy cartoons and watch their moronic aforementioned cookie-cutter cartoon crap instead!

In my sizeable (thus far) collection of 16mm films I found this short cartoon from 1936 entitled "Novelty Shop", running about six minutes with the print being black and white (I am aware other viewers have seen the official color version as well). This film had been unknowingly given to me in a lot of around forty films of various types for a Christmas present, and despite having been labeled as consisting of mostly educational films, the lot had just about everything in it - from random peoples' home movie footage to Castle and Official Film releases. I was pleasantly surprised with the discovery of this one, as it is not every day I get one of these added to my collection.

"The Novelty Shop" is an entertaining and humorous old cartoon, despite the fact it lacks any real originality. The premise is one that had plenty of variations done on it, a story in which the owner of a toy shop leaves for the night and the toys inside come to life and start dancing, singing and playing until the owner returns. That's about all the plot to this one, although there is certainly enough humor and creativity (not to mention skill) in the animation to make it enjoyable. The most notable thing would be its cartoon portrayal of popular comedy acts such as the Three Stooges; others noted the Marx Brothers and Laurel & Hardy were included, although I am not familiar with these. Overall, a fun watch which I am glad to own a print of, if clearly just another run-of-the-mill use of the 'living toys' concept.

An obscure mid 1930's technicolor cartoon that is loaded with classic comedians. The Marx Brothers, Laurel & Hardy The Three Stooges and Eddie Cantor can be seen as cartoon characters. The story is about an old toymaker who closes shop for the night. As he departs the Toy Store his inventory all come to life. Laurel and Hardy have several scenes. There are three necklaces that turn into The Three Stooges. Later there are three buxom ladies dancing only to turn around and reveal The Marx Brothers. When the toy maker returns to work all of the toys scramble to be back in place just as he left them. There were several cartoons that had a similar theme such as The Brave Tin Soldier, Mother Goose Goes Hollywood and The Soda Squirt.

"The Novelty Shop" is a cartoon from Columbia Pictures and it reminds me of many other cartoons by studios like Disney and Warner Brothers. In all of them, once the humans have left, the characters in a shop all come to life and dance about until the shop owner returns. The only major differences were that there was (thank goodness) no singing and the characters included the likes of The Three Stooges, The Marx Brothers, and Laurel & Hardy.

Overall, there isn't a lot of story in this one. My wife thought it was all pretty weird and thought the animators were 'on LSD'! I thought it was a bit sappy and lacked laughs...but the animation quality was decent.