Puss n' Booty (1943) User Reviews

Hitchcock Presents: Proto-Tweety & Sylvester

[Vimacone · 8/10 · 9 May 2018]

In 1942, the Schlesinger studio started producing the Looney Tunes series in color. That same year, Frank Tashlin returned after a four year long absence. Since he had the least seniority of the four directors, he directed the last few black and white cartoons at the studio. One may see that a unworthy distinction, but no other director at the studio handled black and white like Tashlin did.

The last released b/w LT features a cat/bird scenario that would serve as a forerunner to what the Tweety and Sylvester cartoons would be just a few years later. Tashlins use of camera movements and dramatic camera angles give an almost suspenseful buildup in every gag. It's almost as if Tashlin collaborated with Alfred Hitchcock. The nighttime scenes could only have been executed effectively in black and white and would not have had the same dramatic effect had it been produced in Technicolor.

The Tweety and Sylvester setup is probably not a coincidence. Freleng did a semi-remake of this short in 1947 titled I TAW A PUTTY TAT. While it was one of their better shorts, it pales in comparison to the classy, cinematic original.

that's all, folks (for B&W Warner Bros. cartoons, that is)

[lee_eisenberg · 7/10 · 18 September 2007]

The final black and white cartoon from Warner Bros. features a plot line that we've seen many times: cat tries to eat bird, bird turns out to be nasty little dude. Believe it or not, "Puss n' Booty" came before the Sylvester-Tweety pairings (Sylvester hadn't even yet debuted when this one came out), so if anything, those copied this one; in fact, they remade it as "I Taw a Putty Tat" and cast Sylvester and Tweety.

Some of the shots - such as looking down from inside the birdcage - reminded me a little bit of POV shots from movies like "Rear Window", but maybe that's just me. While I do prefer the Sylvester-Tweety pairings for cat-canary rivalries, I do have to give this one credit for starting the genre, and for giving Bea Benaderet her debut. Worth seeing.

Puss n' Booty

[CinemaSerf · 7/10 · 18 March 2024]

Yikes! Where has "Dickie" gone? He's not in his cage and the cat ("Rudolph") has a very smug look on his face. He knows he's for it if she finds out so he needs to convince her that this fifth canary of the month has also flown the coup? Luckily, 1605 Maple Drive has an account with the pet shop so another lunch is soon on it's way! This time, though, the cage is relocated somewhere less accessible and the canary - well he's a little more clued up than any of his predecessors and so a battle royal ensues - and we just know who the winner is going to be. The humour here has more of the slapstick "Tom and Jerry" style to it - it's quite enjoyably action-packed and finishes with quite a fun twist!

Would a canary of any other color . . .

[oscaralbert · 7/10 · 30 October 2016]

. . . sound less tweet? Warner Bros. tries to answer that conundrum with the questionably-titled animated short PUSS N' BOOTY. (My classmate asserted to our instructor that this constituted two-thirds of Around-the-World, but he got exiled to the Abnormal Psychology Course.) N' is Warner's final black & white cartoon, and it's not hard to see why it is responsible for killing off a once-golden goose of cost-cutting for the Old Gray Lady of Poverty Row, as Warner was known in the 1900s (and probably will be called again, if the AT&T mercenary coup is approved by President Trump). The Looney Tuners involved with N' apparently never consulted an Audubon book (or even a cheap Peterson Field Guide) when they tried to draw birds. This would explain why a homeowner ordering the latest in a string of a half dozen canaries winds up with a feathered pet which appears to be a common sparrow. Consider this: Even if you're NOT good a drawing circles, all you need to scrawl is a lop-sided oval with an orange crayon to imply a citrus fruit of that color. The same goes for canaries, only more so. No one would be tempted to have a YELLOW canary burp up a cat, but with a gray "canary" apparently all things seemed possible to Warner's Looney scribblers.

One of the most perfect cartoons ever made.

[phantom_tollbooth · 10/10 · 9 January 2009]

Frank Tashlin's 'Puss 'n' Booty' is perhaps the great underrated director's most perfect cartoon. The last black and white Looney Tune, 'Puss 'n' Booty' opens with a fairly standard setup that you might expect to see in a Tweety and Sylvester cartoon. What separates it from that repetitive series is this cartoon's refusal to just cut straight to the easy gags. Instead, 'Puss 'n' Booty' is very much a character piece and dedicates a good portion of its running time to sequences which would have been summarised in a couple of shots in a Tweety and Sylvester cartoon. After Rudolf the cat has hiccupped feathers, thereby letting the audience know what has happened, Tashlin refuses to leave it at that and cut to the main story, instead initiating a tremendous bit of character comedy as Rudolf pretends to be devastated and searches everywhere for his missing "friend". The following sequence is even more masterful as Rudolf anxiously awaits the delivery of a new canary, pacing backwards and forwards on the garden wall and frantically waving down every passing vehicle.

This long build up to the arrival of the cartoon's second main character would have been reason enough to hail 'Puss 'n' Booty' as a masterpiece but Tashlin sustains the brilliance. Instead of resorting to a series of spot gags as Rudolf tries to eat the canary, Tashlin keeps the emphasis on character and the jokes themselves are conspicuously kept low-key so that we can continue to focus on the character's priceless reactions. There's an air of real threat that is absent in the Tweety and Sylvester cartoons, as the canary battles for his life. These scenes are also spectacular, particularly the beautifully directed night-time shots. It all culminates in one of the best and strangest final gags in cartoon history. Despite initially appearing to be just another cat and bird cartoon, 'Puss 'n' Booty' quickly establishes itself as something very different. It's a genuine triumph, an unsung classic that I still consider one of the most perfect films of animation's golden age.

Just Desserts

[Hitchcoc · 9/10 · 29 March 2019]

A woman orders her sixth canary from the pet shop. She is clueless when it comes to her little darling kitty, who is a master of duplicity and bird hungry. This ultimately leads to a confrontation between bird number six and the Sylvester prototype. There are some great scenes as the cat schemes to get the bird, but like our friend Tweety, the bird is his worst nightmare.

A definite contender for Tashlin's best

[TheLittleSongbird · 10/10 · 24 September 2013]

Frank Tashlin generally is an underrated director, not every single one of his cartoons are great but they are when they are at their best. Puss n' Booty is another cartoon of his that reinforces that he deserves more recognition. The animation is fluid and detailed, even better are the expertly camera angles that show directorial mastery. The music is lush and characterful, synchronising with the humour beautifully. The writing maintains the freshness, charm and wit we expect from a WB/Looney Tunes cartoon, and while standard the story wins one over because of its endless fun and charm and how it characterises the characters and their relationships. In the more antagonistic parts there is a genuine sense of threat. The characters engage and carry Puss n' Booty very well and the voices of Mel Blanc and Bea Beanderet are spot on. All in all, wonderful cartoon and a contender for the best that Tashlin made. 10/10 Bethany Cox

A Cat Who Finally Loses In The End This Time.

[Dawalk-1 · 10/10 · 8 November 2017]

As the final black and white Looney Tunes short, the gray scale run of the series went out strongly. This is an atypical and unordinary predator versus prey cartoon. Unlike other pairings such as Sylvester and Tweety, Tom and Jerry, Herman and Catnip, etc., this one is quite unique. After a cat named Rudolph made meals out of his owner's previous pet birds, the owner phones the pet store to have a new bird delivered, once again, as a replacement. As always, after fake-mourning the losses, Rudolph gets excited or overjoyed, as he can't wait to devour his next victim. There seems to be a history of this, which is a big problem for the owner, much to her dismay.

Later, when the big day arrives, Rudolph eagerly anticipates for the latest bird, named Petey, to be sent to the home. But little does the feline know, he's about to expect the unexpected and underestimate him. Petey manages to outsmart Rudolph at every turn and Rudolph makes every failed attempt to catch him. What makes this stand out from the like-minded characters' series I mentioned is the ending. Ultimately, Rudolph is unsuccessful in feasting on Petey, his nine lives run out, and it turns out that he somehow is the one who gets feasted on instead by Petey. What separates this from the others is a cat is the one who gets victimized and seals his fate.

This is a very dark comedy cartoon in the truest sense and I think that's exactly what many would love about it. If one could just imagine how freaky the moment Petey consumes Rudolph would be, coming on top. I don't think I remember seeing this one in my childhood. But I'm more likely to remember seeing I Taw A Puddy Tat, a Sylvester and Tweety short, which I didn't know is a remake of this. There are similarities between the two, but at the same time, there are a few differences as well. But out of the two, I think I like this one more. Anyway, it's one of the most well-done and funniest LT shorts from the Golden Era. The technical aspects of this were already commented on by another or others here and I think they did better at explaining them than I could. I found out in one of the other reviews on this that Rudolph's owner was Bea Benaderet's first voice role, intriguingly enough. A reviewer also claimed that she sounded annoying in that role, but I didn't find that to be the same when I watched it. In conclusion, this one is another winner. I can't find anything to complain about it. Recommended.

Don't mess with Petey!

[slymusic · 29 August 2009]

I've seen better Warner Bros. cartoons, but "Puss n' Booty" is adequate. It's yet another one of those struggles between cat and bird. Petey looks innocent and sweet enough as a canary, so Rudolf figures he's got another snack coming. Wrong!

There are a couple of scenes from "Puss n' Booty" that are pretty good. Feigning sorrow over the loss of Dicky bird, Rudolf looks out the window and weeps to the accompaniment of a Hawaiian slide guitar, then he weeps in his pillow to the accompaniment of "I'll Pray for You", which suddenly becomes upbeat & swinging when the lady of the house telephones the pet shop asking for another bird. I also love how Petey suddenly smacks Rudolf's paw with a mallet.

Probably the best thing about "Puss n' Booty" is the series of Hitchcock-type camera angles, courtesy of director Frank Tashlin. Bea Benaderet provides the voice of the lady of the house, and I usually like her vocal characterizations in other cartoons, but in this film her voice is annoying.