Sure, we now know that reams of MGM cartoons have unique title art lost to the ages… but did you know Disney did too?
Example: here are some low quality screen shots taken from an original IB blue track print of Jack Kinney’s uproariously funny How to Play Football… We start on Walt Disney’s name spelled out by the spectators, over the same background we’re used to seeing in the reissue.
We then jump cut to the crowd spelling out (through cross dissolves) the hero of the picture. The illustration of Goofy here is funky (oddly 80’s video game-ish), but I still love it.
… dissolve to the film’s title …
… and one more dissolve to the copyrights.
Neat huh? Unfortunately, this print’s end title was clipped off, so alas, I don’t know if there was a special stadium title. (And for the curious, no, no “4-F” jokes, or any other WW2 references, were in the original version.) Gawrsh!
(Aside rant: I think it it says a lot about Disney’s conceit with him not crediting his artists on the shorts until literally the 1945 season, a practice none of the other studios had for so long. Sure, they were occasionally credited in trade ads and whatnot, but the actual film is what people are going to look at. Walt wanted to give the general public the idea he did all of the work himself on wonderful cartoons like this, and they sure bought it.)
An impressive discovery, Thad! Apart from TRICK OR TREAT, I wasn’t aware of unique title designs on many later Disney shorts—but they obviously had them. Every day, modern knowledge of animation intricacy grows… nomn, ghotta keep at it!
Stupendous find. The goofy head really does look like it belongs in an 80’s computer game.
Rugged Bear also has a unique opening title. An original print was used for an early 80’s VHS release (which I have).
I love that. I wish that they could have kept some of these original title sequences on the DVDs, but you can’t have everything you want in life, now can you?
Walt did the same thing with his comics as well as his films. I think people today think that Walt made all of those films by himself.
I think also, Walt didn’t like crediting animators or actors or whoever, because it was the same as acknowledging that the cartoons aren’t real. That people CREATED them.
You know, the first thing I thought (after “OK, I guess this *isn’t* some sort of photoshop joke”) was “Hey, I wonder if there were any credits in these original titles!” Unfortunately not though.
Huh, so these early ’40s film really didn’t have anybody credited. I always thought that the names were just removed for reissue. I was wrong, apparently.
Practically ahead of its time.
Another one that supposedly had a special title sequence was Symphony Hour. The one we see today was made for its 1953 re-release commemorating Mickey’s 25th birthday.
Symphony Hour is on this VHS tape with the original RKO titles. The only special thing is that cartoon’s title card consists of a silhouette of Mickey conducting.
It’s beside the point, but—wow, I remember when that VHS tape first came out. It was the first attempt at a Mickey collectors’ volume ever, and four of its eight cartoons gave Mickey less than half of the screen time. Walt Disney Home Video could barely have done a better job of sidelining their hero.
Oh yeah, I remember noticing on Hans’ draft that it originally had a different title card.
Does it have special opening music, or just the standard 1940’s Goofy theme?
It’s the same special opening music that’s heard over the reissue titles.