{"id":540,"date":"2008-09-13T10:18:36","date_gmt":"2008-09-13T17:18:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.bspcn.com\/2008\/09\/13\/10-cartoon-classics-to-share-with-your-kids\/"},"modified":"2010-05-02T07:33:03","modified_gmt":"2010-05-02T14:33:03","slug":"10-cartoon-classics-to-share-with-your-kids","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/localhost\/wordpress\/2008\/09\/13\/10-cartoon-classics-to-share-with-your-kids\/","title":{"rendered":"10 Cartoon Classics to Share with your Kids"},"content":{"rendered":"

Written by Kathy Ceceri<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

Want to elevate your kids to a whole new level of
\nGeekdom? Turn them into animation historians!<\/p>\n

By its very nature, animation has always lent itself to science fiction, fantasy, horror and outrageous satire, because \u2013 unlike live action film \u2013 every animated image is created by the hand of an artist. OK, maybe not as literally as when Winsor McCay was drawing every individual frame of Gertie the Dinosaur<\/a> on reams of paper with pen and ink. But still more so than live action photography (at least before the advent of CGI).<\/p>\n

\"Gertie_with_cartoon_mccay\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Anyway, I\u2019d like to present my personal list of landmarks of animation no Geekchild should grow up without. The choices are based on insight gained working with Academy Award-winner John Canemaker<\/a>, a comprehensive History of Animation<\/a> class description I found while researching this article, and years of my young life spent sitting in front of my family\u2019s old black and white boob tube.<\/p>\n

So here, in chronological order, 10 Cartoon Classics to Share with your GeekKids:<\/p>\n

\"Gulliver_\"<\/a><\/p>\n

1. Gulliver\u2019s Travels<\/em> (1939)<\/p>\n

Jack Mercer, the voice of<\/p>\n

Fleischer Studio\u2019s Popeye, was just one of the talents in this feature length, kid-friendly retelling of Jonathan Swift\u2019s satiric masterwork. I saw this many times on TV as a kid, and always loved its Oscar-nominated songs and score and its great comic characters. And I was fascinated by the expressive drawing style of Fleischer\u2019s use of Rotoscoping, a more subtle counterpart to today\u2019s motion capture.\u00a0 (Although several public domain versions exist, Amazon customer reviews recommend this remastered edition<\/a>.)<\/p>\n

2. Pinocchio<\/a> (1940)\"Pinocchio4\"<\/a><\/p>\n

As John Canemaker will tell you,<\/p>\n

Pinocchio was one of Walt Disney\u2019s first big-budget extravaganzas. The use of a multi-plane camera gave the oil painted glass panes over a watercolor background more depth and vitality than the standard celluloid (\u201ccel\u201d)<\/p>\n

technique. Of course, it didn\u2019t hurt that the little wooden hero plunges viewers from one fast-paced adventure to another. As a kid (I first saw this around age 5 at the Lafayette<\/a>),<\/p>\n

I remember being relieved when Pinocchio and friends landed in the belly of the whale after his harrowing escape from Pleasure Island \u2014 an early taste of dramatic catharsis.<\/p>\n

\"Bugs_bunny_2\"<\/a><\/p>\n

3. Bugs Bunny<\/a><\/p>\n

Disney is about artistry and wonderment; Warner Brothers cartoons are about attitude. And what an attitude Bugs had! Fittingly, my favorite Bugs Bunny cartoons starred Marvin the Martian<\/a>, in his push-broom<\/p>\n

Roman Legion helmet, and the giant hirsute monster from Hair Raising Hare<\/em><\/a> (1946).<\/p>\n

See the rest in the Extended Post.<\/p>\n

4. Gumby (1954)\"Gumby_\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Stop-motion animation has been used to make models move in everything from King Kong<\/em> to The Nightmare before Christmas<\/em>. And the original Gumby TV series used clay animation to good effect. You can find the old episodes on TV<\/p>\n

and DVD, and they\u2019re fine. But for a real mind-blowing experience, sit down with your kid and watch Gumby The Movie<\/em>.<\/p>\n

The 1995 feature includes characters added in the 1980s revival of the show, and it is surreal. Somehow I don\u2019t remember TV Gumby being such a freeform\u00a0 experience, morphing into endless shapes and even splitting apart. The freedom which animator Art Clokey brought to stop-motion animation may have been equaled only by Otto Messmer\u2019s original silent Felix the Cat<\/a>. Get the VHS<\/a>, not the DVD, which according to Amazon reviews has had scenes deleted.<\/p>\n

\"Rocky_and_bullwinkle\"<\/a><\/p>\n

5. The Rocky and Bullwinkle Show<\/a> (1959)<\/p>\n

Rocky is a flying squirrel, and Bullwinkle makes bad puns about the Rubyait of Omar Kayam. What more could a geek want? How about Mr.<\/p>\n

Peabody, the doggy inventor, his boy Sherman and their Wayback Machine? In the 1950\u2019s and \u201960s limited animation TV series like The Flintstones<\/em> and Mr. Magoo<\/em><\/p>\n

\u2013 where only a body part or two would move in any given scene were the norm. But Jay Ward\u2019s comedic sensibility made limited animation unforgettable.<\/p>\n

\"Yellow_submarine\"<\/a><\/p>\n

6. Yellow Submarine<\/em><\/a> (1968)<\/p>\n

Seeing The Beatles\u2019 animated feature in the theater with my parents was cool because it was as much a grown-up film as a kid film. Plus, with its Peter Max poster vibe, it tied in with the Pop Art sensibility that was starting to permeate the country. I bought the video of this movie as soon as it came out to put away and save for my kids, but it didn\u2019t impress on the first showing. Having been saturated in<\/p>\n

Beatlemania by Julie Taymor\u2019s recent Across the Universe<\/em><\/a>, however, I think they\u2019re probably ready for another try.<\/p>\n

\"Rogerrabbit\"<\/a><\/p>\n

7. Who Framed Roger Rabbit?<\/em><\/a> (1988)<\/p>\n

Arguably the most convincing combination of live action and animation. And still more attractive (and clever) than such recent 3D<\/p>\n

offerings as Scooby Doo (or, heaven forbid, the Rocky and Bullwinkle remake). A combination of film noir<\/em> design, comic book evil and Warner Brother\u2019s-style zaniness.<\/p>\n

\"Toystory\"<\/a>8. Toy Story<\/em><\/a> (1995)<\/p>\n

With this film Pixar transformed computer animation from a novelty to an art form, ushering in a whole new Golden Age of feature cartoons that continues to this day with great films like this summer\u2019s Wall-E<\/a>. Kids love it, even without the nostalgic frisson of all those Baby<\/p>\n

Boomer playthings.<\/p>\n

\"Kiki\"<\/a>9. Kiki\u2019s Delivery Service<\/em><\/a> (1998)<\/p>\n

I was never particularly excited by Japanese animation, but this film made me a diehard Miyazaki fan. I disagree with Ken\u2019s advice<\/a> to start with My Neighbor Totoro; set in a European city and employing symbolism which American kids can understand (black cats rather than<\/p>\n

Shinto river gods) Kiki<\/em> is much more accessible \u2014 and like all Miyazak films, a nice counterbalance to boycentric Pixar.<\/p>\n

10. Flushed Away<\/a> \"Flushedaway2\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Computer animation meets clay animation, and does it fantastically. Aardman Studios was behind Nick Park\u2019s original Wallace and<\/p>\n

Gromit<\/a> adventure, A Grand Day Out<\/em><\/a>, which harked back to M\u00e9li\u00e8s\u2019 early cinematic moon voyage and took the art form to new heights through its meticulously detailed props and deadpan humor. But with Flushed Away,<\/em> in collaboration with Dreamworks (creator of Shrek<\/a>, about which more in a future post), Aardman took the Parks look and made something completely unique. Moms will love Hugh Jackman as a hapless James Bond-like mouse. Kids will love the singing slugs. And<\/p>\n

GeekDads can enjoy the obsessiveness that put computerized fingerprints on the virtual clay. Something for everyone!<\/p>\n

Kathy Ceceri\u2019s book Around the World Crafts: Great Activities for Kids who Like History, Math, Art, Science and More!<\/a> <\/em>has a chapter on animated flipbooks.<\/p>\n

<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Written by Kathy Ceceri Want to elevate your kids to a whole new level of Geekdom? Turn them into animation historians! By its very nature, animation has always lent itself to science fiction, fantasy, horror and outrageous satire, because \u2013 unlike live action film \u2013 every animated image is created by the hand of an […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/localhost\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/540"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/localhost\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/localhost\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/localhost\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/localhost\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=540"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/localhost\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/540\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1733,"href":"http:\/\/localhost\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/540\/revisions\/1733"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/localhost\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=540"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/localhost\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=540"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/localhost\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=540"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}