Merbabies (1938)

It may have a whole lot of babies in it..sort of, but this isn't a short cartoon that I'd label as babyish, it's very sweet and fun and it's finely animated. I enjoy this a bit more than the Silly Symphony "Water Babies" of a few years earlier, it feels like a case of less being a little more to me and it just seems to be a little more relaxed about its tone. There's no real story, the focus is only on the beautiful fantasy of cherubic little angels under the sea who make their own underwater circus. And that was something really clever and interesting about this short, I love how inventive they were at making the sea creatures clearly represent various classic circus animals. I love how there's always little precursors to the feature length movies to spot in the Symphonies, like that whale is definitely a pre-Monstro right down to the sneeze, and that adorable baby octopus-elephant is so Dumbo! As is a lot of that parade of 'animals' come to think about it.. The lush artwork that's put into the coral backgrounds is amazing, it's just like a real painting you'd hang on your wall. I always generally notice the little details over the bigger stuff, like I enjoy the texture of the water as it swirls and bubbles as the Merbabies swim through it. And I love the magnificent richness of the closing sunset over the water. It looks so fantastic that to look at it I find it hard to tell whether it's real or not. It really is one of the most astonishingly beautiful scenes I've ever seen in animated shorts like this. Animating surface water movements must have been one of the hardest things to do and make look fluid and realistic by hand. I love how they appear out of bubbles and disappear the same way at the end as they break the surface of the ocean, no more than mere sea foam or so it would seem... As in Anderson's fairytale. I don't find it sad how it ends, it feels poetic and fitting to me. It's like they were a little touch of unseen magic beneath the waves. They can't die if they're not real, more like fleeting joyful dreams of the eternal crashing sea... I like it a lot, but I don't love it like I do some of the other Symphonies. Nothing spectacular about it I'd say, but it's simply precious nonetheless. One of many short animated works of, at their most basic level, pure joy put out by the vintage Disney studio of a very long time ago indeed for a world that needs it. If Warner Bros was good at making us laugh then Disney excelled at making us feel warm inside. Swim on forever Merbabies!

Merbabies (1938) *** (out of 4) This animated short was actually released by Disney but it was produced by Hugh Harmon and Rudolf Ising. Both men had previously worked at Disney but when Walt needed help finishing SNOW WHITE AND THE SEVEN DWARFS this film was bought from them and released. The plot, well, there really isn't much plot but it deals with the title characters, baby mermaids, and their underwater adventures. The "adventures" aren't much either but what makes this film work isn't the plot but instead it's the wonderful and very well-detailed animation. There are some terrific footage underwater and I must admit that the look at the merbabies were rather cute and adorable.

My main interest in watching this Walt Disney Silly Symphony was in my knowledge that Hugh Harmon and Rudolf Ising-former Disney animators-were the actual producers of this cartoon but went to their former employer because their M-G-M contract had recently run out. Disney himself was looking for some extra facilities for his Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (which was released about a year before this short) so Harmon-Ising lent them some of theirs. The result was another of H-I's cutesy endeavors without much of a plot and little actual humor but as always beautiful animation. Besides the title characters, there's a circus-parade of various sea creatures performing with the whale providing the climax. Like I said, not very funny but if you love seeing good animation, Merbabies is worth a look.

A Walt Disney SILLY SYMPHONY Cartoon Short.The MERBABIES are frolicking beneath the salt waves - swimming & playing with various sea creatures. An elaborate underwater circus parade & performances fill much of their day, culminating in a rise to the surface in the expelled breath of a whale at sunset.While the plot is virtually invisible in this little film, there's much to fill the eye as the colorful images cavort about the screen. The real significance of this cartoon is that it gave the folks in Disney Animation some excellent experience in working with the particular aspects of underwater scenes (bubble movement, light & shadow) which would be so important in the under seas sequence in PINOCCHIO.The SILLY SYMPHONIES, which Walt Disney produced for a ten year period beginning in 1929, are among the most interesting of series in the field of animation. Unlike the Mickey Mouse cartoons in which action was paramount, with the Symphonies the action was made to fit the music. There was little plot in the early Symphonies, which featured lively inanimate objects and anthropomorphic plants & animals, all moving frantically to the soundtrack. Gradually, however, the Symphonies became the school where Walt's animators learned to work with color and began to experiment with plot, characterization & photographic special effects. The pages of Fable & Fairy Tale, Myth & Mother Goose were all mined to provide story lines and even Hollywood's musicals & celebrities were effectively spoofed. It was from this rich soil that Disney's feature-length animation was to spring. In 1939, with SNOW WHITE successfully behind him and PINOCCHIO & FANTASIA on the near horizon, Walt phased out the SILLY SYMPHONIES; they had run their course & served their purpose.