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Today, we digitized a batch of Terrytoons. Among them was a real gem… Catnip Capers (1940).

This cartoon is among the best cartoons TerryToons ever produced. It starts out like a typical Terry cat and mouse cartoon, but before long, it’s gone off on a wild tangent into feline surrealism and exotica.

The backgrounds in this cartoons are spectacular. If anyone out there knows who laid out or painted these, please post to the comments below. There are times where backgrounds and layout are equal in importance to the animation of the characters… a couple of good examples would be the end of Tex Avery’s "King Size Canary" and the St. James Infirmary Blues sequence of "Betty Boop in Snow White". This cartoon certainly fits in that category as well.

Terrytoons have been ufairly criticized as being "monotonous", "predictable" and "boring" in just about every animation history book that references them. Animation Resources has made it a goal to collect and make available as much of the output of the studio as possible to put the lie to those mischaracterizations.

Catnip Capers (Terry/1940)
(Quicktime 7 / 13.5 megs)

Stephen Worth
Director
Animation Resources

This posting is part of the online Encyclopedia of Cartooning under the subject heading, Animation.

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